Middleweight gold will be on the line in a heated UFC 328 main event that sees champ Khamzat Chimaev take on Sean Strickland this weekend.
Strickland has been doing Strickland things ahead of the fight, calling Chimaev a “terrorist” (due in part to his ties with Chechen dictator Ramzat Kadyrov), and threatening to shoot the champion and his team should they engage him physically prior to the fight. Chimaev, for his part, has taken it all in stride, simply calling Strickland a clown and releasing footage of the pair sparring together previously.
Whether the feud is legitimate or manufactured, it certainly has fans talking, though whether that leads to them actually watching is another matter. There seems to be a bit of UFC fatigue in the air at the moment, with the upcoming Freedom 250 card met with eye rolls due to the inherent political angle, and Strickland’s particular brand of “say anything” seems to be turning off as many fans as it attracts. With that in mind, the event has yet to sell out, though talk of “blue dot fever” may be premature, given that as of Wednesday, only small pockets of seats remained.
Also on the card, a flyweight title fight between Joshua Van and Tatsuro Taira, the return of veteran Jim Miller, and a possible heavyweight contenders fight in Alexander Volkov vs. Waldo Cortes-Acosta.
Weigh-ins for UFC 328 take place Friday morning starting at 9PM ET, 6AM PT. Results can be found below.
UFC 328: Chimaev vs. Strickland Weigh-In Results
Main card
Middleweight: Khamzat Chimaev (c) vs. Sean Strickland – for the UFC middleweight championship
Flyweight: Joshua Van (c) vs. Tatsuro Taira – for the UFC flyweight championship
Heavyweight: Alexander Volkov vs. Waldo Cortes-Acosta
Welterweight: Sean Brady vs. Joaquin Buckley
Lightweight: King Green vs. Jeremy Stephens
Preliminary card
Middleweight: Ateba Gautier vs. Osman Diaz
Welterweight: Joel Álvarez vs. Yaroslav Amosov
Lightweight: Grant Dawson vs. Mateusz Rębecki
Lightweight: Jim Miller vs. Jared Gordon
Early preliminary card
Middleweight: Roman Kopylov vs. Marco Tulio
Featherweight: Pat Sabatini vs. William Gomis
Middleweight: Baisangur Susurkaev vs. Djorden Santos
Flyweight: Clayton Carpenter vs. Jose Ochoa