It’s time to kick off my four-part MMA year in review series on Josh Nason’s Punch-Out: a tradition dating back to 2015.
Eight years later, a lot remains the same including that the UFC is still the dominant leader in MMA and even more so than ever before.
Joining me once again is my trusty co-pilot Paul Fontaine of F4W Online and co-host of both the In The Clinch podcast and The Dynamite Show.
To kick things off, we tackle the first three months of the year (January, February & March if you’re keeping track) which saw a changing of the guard at heavyweight in the UFC.
After the UFC and heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou came to an impasse on a new contract, Dana White & Co. simply changed course and decided to move on, vacating the title and putting together Jon Jones vs. Cyril Gane instead…but not without some shade thrown Ngannou’s way first.
We talk about March’s UFC 285 where Jones quickly won the title, preceded by a massive upset that saw Alexa Grasso win the women’s flyweight title.
We saw several other new champions made including Jamahal Hill, Brandon Moreno and Yair Rodriguez and a notable retirement in Benson Henderson.
Hear about all the big fights that happened, the new ones that got made, and all of the other news from the first three months of the year.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:09:36 — 48.3MB)