Fitch Released !

Talk about a surprise, Also released Wagner Prado, Mike Russow, Jacob Volkmann, Vladimir Matyushenko, Che Mills, Jay Hieron, Terry Etim, Paul Sass, Jorge Santiago, Mike Stumpf, Simeon Thoresen, C.J. Keith, Motonobu Tezuka, Josh Grispi and Ulysses Gomez.

The UFC have never really liked Fitch have they?? Come to think of it, neither have I...

But I do think he has been hard done by

Didn't see that coming. I know he's not the most exciting fighter to watch but that does seem harsh.

Glad to see Volkmann go.

I can understand all the others, but not Fitch. There are probably 50 other fighters i could name from all divisions more deserving of being cut.

Suppose they have to make room for the SF fighters and the roster is a bit clutered... still Fitch is an absolute shocker. He has a great UFC record and is still top 20 ranked. Bellator will put on Fitch vs Askren for the most boring fight of all time

I view Fitch like a cheat. He is exploiting the scoring system that UFC have no controll over fixing. Its a real shame MMA scoring in the US allows fighter to be a wet blanket with no stanup and win. Fitch needs to work on his standup and BJJ and get a few finishes for UFC to take him back. No matter what Dana White said it is 100% about his style

Some absolute shockers though, Ill be sad to see the back of Etim and Sass, Maby its time for the Janitor to retire?

Some surprises on that list

They will be making room for some women aswell and the lower weights are already stacked.

Few brits cut and Dana mentioned recently the difficulty in selling the UFC as a product in the UK - they are obviuosly looking at more events in brazil and the far east.

Think Sass needs to add a lot more to his game - great at what he does but he is always going to struggle with only one weapon in his armoury,

Mills i have always liked but he has 0 TDD in a weight class stacked with wrestlers and Etim looked so gun shy last week he needs to get some confidence back.

There will be a lot more cuts in the next few months so good news for bellator and WSOF and ONEFC etc and good news for MMA fans IMO.

I think some of the fighters cut can make decent money fighting 4 or 5 times a year as ooposed to one fight every 12 months in the UFC

Top men fighters being cut to make room for Women will backfire. I saw on Sherdog of a poll of over 1000 people fans seem split down the middle on wether they want Womens MMA.

Nearly every sports fan I know doesnt watch the womens version of that sport. I dont get why UFC will start putting on fights that half the fans will turn off.

rudeboyben84 wrote:Top men fighters being cut to make room for Women will backfire. I saw on Sherdog of a poll of over 1000 people fans seem split down the middle on wether they want Womens MMA.

Nearly every sports fan I know doesnt watch the womens version of that sport. I dont get why UFC will start putting on fights that half the fans will turn off.

Biggest Draw on Showtime & Exciting fights WMMA is here to stay Benny Boy, Deal With It !

I don't think the releases relate to WMMA necessarily Ben, The merger with Strikeforce surely has a bearing on It all. Although I'm still outraged they released Fitch I can sort of understand he isn't exciting not much of a draw also especially compared to the likes of Garcia (Who arguably hasn't won a fight since banging out Jens Pulver) and Dan Hardy.

We will see, I mean do you see a Womens Hw devision? I bet if there was a womens only card it would be a flop in comparison to the mens ones. I dont see why they dont keep the sports seperate. If more than half fans are against it I cant see it being a success. Ill make a prediction that they will sperate Mens and Womens cards.

Diego Nunes and Milton Vieira have been cut too and apparently there are more on the way.

rudeboyben84 wrote:We will see, I mean do you see a Womens Hw devision? I bet if there was a womens only card it would be a flop in comparison to the mens ones. I dont see why they dont keep the sports seperate. If more than half fans are against it I cant see it being a success. Ill make a prediction that they will sperate Mens and Womens cards.

I don't see a HW Women's division anytime soon TBH I'm not sure we will see anything outside of the Bantamweight division in the foreseeable future. The fact they wanted Cyborg to drop to 135 tells me they don't have any future plans for other divisions.

Diego Nunes is top 15 ranked, big mistake letting him go. UFC need to be carefull about releasing ranked guys in favor of keeping popular ones... in the short terms its great to keep the guys who are a PPV draw but their "Monopoly on MMA" will start to slip soon at this rate.

Nunes 15th
Fitch 17th

Nunes is probabally the highers ranked fighter they realeased. I dont think they should be cutting anyone top 20 ranked.

UFC actually had Fitch 9th ranked! cutting a top 10 guy is so fucked up. Im sure a few wins in WSOF and he will be back. He was aparently costing too much so maby if he gets a few wins and exciting ones at that he can come back.

Aparently there are about 100 fighters in total to get Cut.

Id say Wand will be one if he looses to Stann

I'm all for trimming the roster down, if it leads to fewer, more stacked cards.

But I don't like cutting top 20 ranked fighters like Nunes and Fitch.

I want the highest concentration of talent possible.


The massive (alleged) decline in UFC PPV sales is likely a driving factor behind this decision. The F0X move has been a disaster, from a UFC perspective and a fan perspective.

I preffered it when every PPV was (relatively) stacked with the occasional fight night card.