Jan 12, 2016 There will be two title fights headlining UFC 197 on March 5 in Las Vegas, it was officially announced Tuesday on UFC.com. UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor will move up and challenge Rafael dos Anjos for the lightweight title in the main event and Holly Holm will make her first title defense against Miesha Tate in the co-main. Brazilian media outlet Lance was the first to report the champion vs. champion fight Thursday. Soon after, Bleacher Report's Jeremy Botter had the news on both huge bouts. MMA Fighting confirmed with sources Thursday night that the fights were a go. McGregor (19-2) will try to make history at UFC 197. No other fighter has held two different UFC belts at the same time. Two men, B.J. Penn and Randy Couture, won belts in two different divisions, but not consecutively. Penn was the UFC lightweight champion in 2009 and moved up to fight welterweight champion Georges St-Pierrefor that title, but lost. The brash Irishman, who has finished all but one of his UFC opponents, already has collected a number of records in a short amount of time. McGregor, 27, won the featherweight title from Jose Aldo via 13-second knockout at UFC 194 in December. That event broke the UFC's gate mark at MGM Grand Garden Arena. McGregor's win over Chad Mendes at UFC 189 in July held the previous record. UFC 194 also reportedly went over 1 million pay-per-view buys and UFC 189 came close. Dos Anjos (25-7) has emerged over the last two years as a legitimately elite fighter after an uneven beginning to his UFC career. The Brazilian has won five straight and took the lightweight title from Anthony Pettis in a one-sided unanimous decision beating at UFC 185 in March 2015. Dos Anjos, 31, defended the title successfully with a 66-second destruction of Donald Cerrone at UFC on FOX 17 last month. Along the way, the Kings MMA product has defeated the likes of Benson Henderson, Nate Diaz and Cerrone again back in 2013. Holm (10-0) is coming off perhaps the most significant knockout in MMA history. She finished Ronda Rousey with a second-round head kick at UFC 193 in November. Previously, Rousey was not only undefeated, but thought to be nearly unbeatable. The UFC wanted Holm, the former three-division boxing champion, to wait for Rousey's return and an immediate rematch, but "The Preacher's Daughter" preferred to fight sooner. The 34-year-old will get her wish in just two months. That bout will come against Tate (17-5), Rousey's most hated rival. Tate, 29, was in line for the title shot against Rousey over the summer after she beat Jessica Eye. But the UFC tabbed Holm since Rousey had already beaten Tate twice. "Cupcake," though, was back in play in a big way after Rousey's loss. Tate, who was probably the second most popular woman in the UFC after Rousey before November, has won four straight and her only losses since 2009 came against Rousey (twice) and Cat Zingano. After a record-breaking 2015, the UFC is already stacking the deck again for a massive card and we're less than two weeks into 2016. http://www.mmafighting.com/2016/1/1...ael-dos-anjos-holly-holm-miesha-tate-mma-news The fights and date has been rumored for about a week, but the fight was supposedly on hold due to RDA wanting more money.
Jan 12, 2016 Great main card. Happy Conor is going for the lightweight belt, that should be his regular division anyway.
Jan 13, 2016 Bet Dana wouldn't be too happy if Tate won and ruined the Holm/Ronda rematch for the title *edit* although I guess it's kinda a win win since Tate/Ronda would draw plenty of interest too. But I definitely think they want Rondas next fight to be the Holm rematch. Nice main events though, definitely looking forward to this one.
Jan 13, 2016 after conor beats rda he's potentially going up to welterweight.. and all the people commenting on his "weak" ground game are clueless, he isn't gonna get submitted easily.
Jan 13, 2016 It's idiotic to even think he's going up to Welterweight if he wins. Don't even give that idea the time of day.
Jan 14, 2016 conor is in control over everything right now. If he said he wants welterweight nobody will say no.
Feb 25, 2016 Hey now, but to be fair I was talking about going up to challenge Robbie Lawler for the Welterweight title.
