UFC January card takes blows: Brock Lesnar has “mono,” Anderson Silva injured
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Ultimate Fighting Championship President Dana White says heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar has been stricken with the mononucleosis virus, and declared the champ’s already-delayed title defense against Shane Carwin on Jan. 2 as ‘off.’
‘Brock has mono,’ White texted The Times. ‘Can’t even train for six weeks.’
UFC owner Lorenzo Fertitta told The Times, ‘Until he shakes it, we can’t schedule a date,’ although March is the new goal. White said it ‘depends on Brock.’
Citing excessive fatigue and illness, Lesnar last month told White he couldn’t headline the Nov. 21 UFC 106 card at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. White scrambled and made Tito Ortiz‘s light-heavyweight rematch against Forrest Griffin as the main event.
The Jan. 2 card at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas was to have two title fights, with Lesnar-Carwin and Anderson Silva defending his middleweight belt against Vitor Belfort.
But Fertitta said Silva is ‘not quite ready,’ from what a UFC official would identify only as a ‘nagging injury.’
‘We’re going to have move Silva-Belfort to February, but that fight will happen’ Fertitta said.
What’s going to happen in January? Fertitta said he’s working on ‘something special’ but declined to divulge what he’s thinking of because ‘we’re putting the bout agreements together now and trying to fill the card. We’ve had to deal with sickness and injuries at a level we never have before.’
--Lance Pugmire
