The light heavyweight division is going through a massive and unexpected shakeup, as champ Jiří Procházka has shockingly vacated his title.
It is hard to be a fight fan and not enjoy the eccentric style of Procházka, who steamrolled his way to a UFC title after just two fights, winning the belt in a war with Glover Teixeira. The two of them were slated for a rematch to headline the last pay-per-view event of the year, UFC 282, on December 10th.
Now, it seems that the plans for the UFC 282 main event, as well as the light heavyweight division, are fluctuating in a big way.
Jiří Procházka Injured, Vacates Title
According to a report from Yahoo! Sports, Jiří Procházka has suffered a severe injury to his shoulder, which will require surgery and has been forced out of the bout with Glover Teixeira.
However, this is not the only major piece of breaking news to come from this announcement, as it was revealed that because of this injury, Procházka has decided to vacate the light heavyweight title due to not wanting to hold up the division for what is expected to be a year-long recovery process.
Glover Teixeira turned down a replacement fight, leading to co-main event between former champ Jan Blachowicz and Magomed Ankalaevto be bumped to the headlining act for UFC 282, with the vacant strap on the line.
MMA Twitter Reacts To Shakeup
This was obviously a shocking turn of events, as nobody would have expected to hear that Jiří Procházka was not only injured but suddenly vacated the belt. As expected, this led to quite the buzz on social media, with stunned and shocked reactions from the MMA Twitter community.
“Jiri Prochazka is out of UFC 282 due to a severe orthopedic injury. Timeframe for recovery is upwards of a year. According to UFC and Jiri’s representatives, it was his decision to vacate the belt out of respect for other contenders,” writes Brett Okamoto of ESPN.
“Shoutout to Jiri Prochazka. Got injured and didn’t want to hold the division up. Vacated the title immediately. That is very rare. We could’ve easily been in a situation where an interim title was created. Wishing him a speedy recovery 🙏” tweeted Chamatkar Sandhu.
“Huh. That’s wild,” reacted Luke Thomas, simply.
“Wondering why Jiří vacated the belt here and why Glover turned down the title fight,” ponder Adam Martin, with the latter question still remaining unanswered currently.
“In the world of buying twitter verification I genuinely thought this was a blag account.OMG WWHHHAAAATTT??!!!! 🤯” wrote Adam Catterall.
What is your reaction to these shocking developments concerning UFC 282?
