While the MMA community waited to hear what would happen to Khamzatchimaev’s weight loss, Joe Rogan gave Jon Anik a heads-up that it might be rearranged.
At the event’s official weigh-ins, Chimaev missed weight by 7. 5 pounds for his scheduled main event bout with Nate Diaz. The blunder on the scale led to Diaz shifting to Tony Ferguson, Chimaev to Kevin Holland, and Li Jingliang to Daniel Rodriguez.
Before Chimaev hit the scale, Anik didn’t have things fully confirmed in any way, but thanks to Rogan, he was able to begin mentally preparing for the potential changes.
“I was sworn to secrecy by the great Joe Rogan, who called me at 9:30 in the morning and suggested that this was what Dana White was trying to do,” Anik told MMA Fighting. “I appreciated that because at that point in time, I was in the dark.
“Every time I would come out [during official weigh-ins], the media was looking for something and I’m saying, ‘Oh, no, Irene Aldana and Macy Chiasson are fighting at a catchweight at 140 pounds,’ and [everyone] was looking at me like, ‘Is that it, bro? Does that ?'”
update sound right now?
The rest of Anik’s day consisted of re-voicing the welcome for the UFC 279 ceremonial weigh-ins, along with other elements that would need to be instituted for the fight night broadcast.
While UFC 223 will always be the most hectic UFC event weeks ever, Anik thinks it will prove difficult for any future UFC 279 to take the No. 2 spot.
” It was wild, Anik stated. “My enthusiasm of this new fight card quickly went from a little bit of anxiety with some of the voice-over work that needed to be done with immediacy, but all’s well that ends well. Our entire live production crew is highly conditioned for such a situation. I agree that, at the least, the card has taken on a competitive appearance after this event.
“In terms of wildness during fight week, UFC 279 will be hard to top.”
