MMA News Roundup: UFC San Antonio stormed by fight cancelation and chaotic judging, Carla Esparza announces pregnancy, Andrew Tate's legal letter explained
Welcome to today's edition of Sportskeeda's daily MMA News Roundup, where we present the biggest UFC updates and other stories from the world of mixed martial arts.
In today's issue, we talk about the UFC San Antonio card, Andrew Tate's latest updates, and more.
#3. UFC San Antonio sees last-minute fight cancelation and multiple judging controversies
Saturday's UFC Fight Night event in San Antonio saw several unprecedented issues.
The flyweight fight between Alex Perez and Manel Kape, which was scheduled to kickstart the main card, fell through. Perez withdrew due to a medical issue not related to the weight cut. The fighter later revealed on Twitter that he had a seizure during a pre-fight warm-up and could not recover in time.
First and foremost, I want to thank everyone for all the support and concerns. I was doing my pre-fight warm up and had a seizure. I immediately received medical attention. My hydration, electrolytes, etc were all more than adequate. This has nothing to do with weight cut. It was
The tweet continues below:
one of the easiest cuts of my career. I will be undergoing further testing in the upcoming weeks to determine the cause. I would appreciate privacy. My apologizes to my opponent and fans. Thank you to the UFC medical team for their help and support.
However, the situation did not sit too well with Perez's opponent Kape. He took to his social media to complain about the pull-out and insulted Perez's genes while at it:
"We arrived at the Arena, warmed up, turned on my hands and only three fights left for our fight, he just gave up! Your DNA is an abomination. Unlike you, my DNA is from fearless warriors coming from Queen NJinga Mbande, my DNA has history."
Read the full statement here.
Elsewhere on the card, two different scorecards earned the MMA world's condemnation for being unreasonable. Dan Miragliotta got blasted for giving Maycee Barber a 30-27 score against Andrea Lee.
The main event of the night fell victim to controversial judging as well. Despite putting up an all-round performance against Marlon 'Chito' Vera, Cory Sandhagen had to settle for a split decision win because of an inexperienced Texas judge's 47-48 score. The other two judges, Sal D'Amato and Chris Lee, scored the bout 50-45 and 49-46 respectively in favor of 'Sandman.'
In neither case did the dissenting decision cost the deserving athlete the fight, but it just went on to show the seemingly deteriorating trustworthiness of judging in the UFC.
#2. Carla Esparza announces pregnancy, reveals return date
Carla Esparza is expecting her first child with her husband Matthew Lomeli. The former UFC strawweight champion announced the news on Instagram yesterday.
She revealed that she was 14 weeks pregnant and was due in September 2023. She also predicted a potential UFC return timeline for early to mid-2024.
Esparza married Lomeli after winning the title from Rose Namajunas and wore the strap on her wedding gown on the big day.
#1. Andrew Tate's lawyer explains viral news of cease and desist letter
it was recently revealed that Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan Tate are associated with a second court case on top of facing criminal charges in Romania.
Legal experts active on social media speculated that the threat to sue their two female accusers for $300 million was an attempt to intimidate the witnesses. However, their lawyer Tina Glandian cleared the air on the matter.
In a video obtained by Spy News, Glandian clearly stated that the "threat" in question was a completely legal "cease and desist" letter issued by U.S. civil attorneys in relation to a defamation lawsuit. She added that the letter had no connection to the criminal case proceedings in Romania:
"As US citizens, they decided to exercise their legal rights here in the US against the American woman. My company had no involvement in sending the cease and desist letter. Nor was the legal team of Romania involved in the representation of the Tate brothers in the criminal investigation. The cease and desist letter was sent by US civil attorneys because it relates to a defamation lawsuit that will take place here in the United States."
Glandian also said that the U.S. Embassy was finally looking into the situation. She previously disclosed that the Embassy had turned down a request to help the Tate brothers.