by After 15 years as a pro, Chris Weidman had a new experience during UFC 309 fight day in New York.
Heading to the shuttle for his ride to the arena and a showdown with Eryk Anders, the former UFC middleweight champion received a call from UFC CBO Hunter Campbell informing him that his opponent was out of action due to food poisoning. Weidman, 40, was booked at 5:30 p.m. local time, catching him as close as possible to entering the Octagon without actually doing so.
As difficult as some of his losses were during his 23-fight career, this experience was a new pain.
“Completely devastated,” Weidman said on Uncrowned’s “The Ariel Helwani Show.” “I felt good during that training camp, a 12-week camp, and the weight cut was definitely a tough weight cut. You got through that part and you wait all day, anticipating the fight and the pressure of that then all of a sudden you get that phone call before your walk and you’re ready to rip that bandage off and walk up to the Octagon and put on a show, and it’s just taken away from you.
“Part of me was like, ‘Is this a joke?’ This has never happened to me before, so this is new after all these years.
“I was super excited to fight in New York in front of all these people,” he continued. “I had two fights at Madison Square Garden and we know how bad those [losses] I’ve been there, so it was kind of like third time’s the charm. I was ready for punishment and redemption. That was taken away from me.”
New York and Weidman don’t get along as he’s 1-3 in state with the three losses coming by increasingly devastating knockouts. Madison Square Garden, in particular, handed Weidman brutal losses to Yoel Romero and Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza shortly after his reign ended in late 2015.
“The All-American” returned to winning ways in his most recent fight after a two-fight skid, defeating Bruno Silva by technical decision last March. Weidman admitted after the fight that if he had lost, he probably would have retired. Luckily for him, he performed better than expected with just one fight removed from his catastrophic leg fracture against Uriah Hall in 2021.
The Anders duo was booked for this Saturday at UFC 310, but only after Weidman learned there had been an attempt to repeat Dan Ige’s famous late intervention from UFC 303.
“I saw him the next day. I saw him walking through the hotel lobby and all that,” Weidman said of Anders. “We talked a little bit. Apparently he and his teammate (Marcus McGhee) also had food poisoning. [McGhee] fought. I guess maybe his wasn’t as bad.
“On the basis of what [Anders] said, what the UFC said, he told them early on that he got shaken up and couldn’t put his hands up in the morning. I think he said he didn’t think he would be able to fight, but they wanted him to get up and try to get to the locker room and see how he feels when he’s in the locker room . I think that ended up being the goal.
“[The UFC] also said that they were trying to find another opponent all day. They were looking for 205 pounders that were fighting that day or anyone in the area, trying to do one of those Dan Ige type situations, but apparently the New York commission wasn’t going to authorize anything in such a short time. So I think they did their best to find me some kind of fight that day and the New York commission, I guess, was difficult to deal with.”
After all the fuss, Weidman revealed that he basically had to decide what and when his edited appearance would be. If UFC 309 wasn’t feasible, the following weekend’s UFC event in Macau was, as was UFC 310 in December and UFC 311 in January.
Ultimately, Weidman didn’t want to get out of shape or repeat a grueling weight cut. Therefore, the fight remained against Anders, but instead at a catchweight of 195 pounds.
“The UFC, they were really good to me, ‘We can put you on the Macau card, in December, you want to fight in January? You want to fight in March?’ All these different opportunities, which is nice,” Weidman said. “I chose this one because I’m healthy right now, and I could have chosen one later to recover from camp and everything like that, but there is a risk of injury, so I I will have regrets.
“Right now I feel good. I just extended my camp a little longer at the reduced weight. Now we’re doing catchweight. They said I can pretty much fight at the weight I want .I could “
When it comes to compensation, it’s a bit of a different story – and slightly more complex for Weidman.
With a UFC tenure dating back to 2011, the Serra-Longo product no longer competes under a traditional show-win contract. Weidman gets a guaranteed scholarship with a fixed payout to run with no chance of a winning bonus. Although he missed out on the payday because of his opponent, he doesn’t quite get everything he should get. But it’s treated differently, he said.
Come fight Saturday night, everything should be taken care of.
“They’re going to take care of me, I say that,” Weidman said. “They’re doing something for me. I’ll make more money. I won’t have my purse full, I’ll say that, which is difficult.
“You show up, you do everything right and you don’t understand, but they’re giving me the opportunity to fight here again very soon to heal myself. So, I can’t complain too much. They’re still going to hook me up with something from this fight, for everything I went through to travel and get my coaches and everyone there Then I will have the opportunity to fight here a few weeks later, I will have it. fully aware. pay then I don’t know what’s going on. will pass if Anders doesn’t show up this time.
