The UFC booked Arman Tsarukyan to face UFC lightweight champion Islam Makhachev in the main event of UFC 311. However, Tsarukyan withdrew from that contest on weigh-in day, citing a back injury that left him unable to compete. UFC CEO Dana White said after the UFC 311 fight card that Tsarukyan would not get the next shot at Makhachev, who dispatched late replacement Renato Moicano in the first round of the UFC 311 headliner. UFC commentator Daniel Cormier, who called the January 17 event, disagrees with the UFC boss.
UFC 311: Dana White On Arman Tsarukyan
Speaking at the UFC 311 post-fight press conference, White was asked what was next for Tsarukyan, who is the No. 1 fighter in the official UFC lightweight rankings.
“He’s going back to the drawing board,” White said. “I don’t want anybody to fight hurt, ever. We’ve been in these positions before. We’re down there with the doctor, with Heather from (the UFC Performance Institute). You can ask any fighter – she’s the best in the world. You miss opportunities sometimes, and he did. We’ll see how this plays out for him next year.”
“He’s not getting the title shot, that means he’s going to have to fight his way back to the title,” White added.
UFC 311: Daniel Cormier On Arman Tsarukyan
Following UFC 311, former two-division UFC champion Cormier, who now works as a UFC commentator, offered his take on Tsarukyan’s situation.
“I believe it still needs to be Tsarukyan,” Cormier said on his YouTube channel. “Because I believe that Tsarukyan, even though it’s a rematch and even though we know Charles (Oliveira) is supposed to be next, I still feel like Tsarukyan’s size, his abilities, his skillset, could present the biggest problems for Islam Makhachev.”
UFC 311: Arman Tsarukyan
Tsarukyan (22-3) has a 9-1 mark since his 2019 decision loss, in his UFC debut, to Makhachev, which came in his UFC debut. He rebounded from that defeat with five consecutive victories before dropping a decision to Mateusz Gamrot in June 2022.
After the loss to Gamrot, Tsarukyan ran off four straight wins with two knockouts and two decisions. He is coming off a split-decision victory over Oliveira at UFC 300 in April.
“I didn’t have anything with my lower back [in training camp], like with my sciatic nerve, I didn’t have anything,” Tsarukyan told Ariel Helwani days after he withdrew from UFC 311. “I had from my neck to my back, but it’s a completely different thing. Of course, every camp we have something, like, I hurt my elbow, I hurt my knee,’ but it was not that bad that you couldn’t continue your training camp. Every fighter has a small injury.
“Everything was good. Wednesday, after training, I went to sleep and I start to feel my lower back, and I couldn’t sleep all night, and I thought something happened. I took some painkillers, and they didn’t help. The next day, I thought it’s going to be good and after press conference I’m going to start my weight cut. When I started my weight cut, I was doing bike, and then that moment my back stuck, and I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move, I just laid down in the hot tub, it was crazy pain. I couldn’t do cardio. And then UFC doctors came and started to help me, do some PT, and they said, ‘You’re going to be alright in the morning. If you’re going to feel the same, you can’t continue cutting your weight.’ I was, like, six pounds left when I went to sleep, and the pain was the same. Five a.m. I just told my manager it’s the same pain, I couldn’t move, my lower back stuck and I cannot continue.”
The UFC has not made an official statement on what’s next for Islam Makhachev or Arman Tsarukyan following UFC 311.
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