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Video: David Taylor retires after storming back to win bronze medal in wrestling World Championships

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Video: David Taylor retires after storming back to win bronze medal in wrestling World Championships

Losing at the U.S. Olympic trials back in April just didn’t leave a good taste in David Taylor’s mouth so the 2020 Olympic gold medalist returned for one last tournament.

While he fell in the opening round in a highly anticipated showdown against Russian mauler Abdulrashid Sadulaev, who went onto capture gold, Taylor stormed back to win bronze at 92kgs and become a five-time medalist at the wrestling World Championships.

With the win, Taylor called it a career as he prepares to resume coaching the Oklahoma State wrestling team with the collegiate season kicking off in just two weeks.

“It’s a tough decision to wrestle but I just didn’t want to end the way I did in April,” Taylor told FloWrestling after his win. “It didn’t necessarily mean I wanted to be here either. I want to have the chance to finish on my terms.

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“Coming into this knowing this is it, I was hyper focused on wrestling Sadulaev and the game script of what I thought and how the match went different, I should have wrestled it like that match. I felt like this was a chance at redemption.”

To win bronze, Taylor took out two-time World champion Kamran Ghasempour from Iran.

After going down 2-0 in the opening period, Taylor increased his activity and immediately put the Iranian on the defensive after scoring a pair of takedowns. Taylor wrapped up the victory with a final takedown with just three seconds left on the clock to go up 6-2 and secure the bronze medal.

It was an impressive rebound for Taylor, who had to wait until opening round matchups played out to know if he would get pulled back into repechage but once he got there, the former Penn State standout dominated the competition. He won 3-1 over Abubakr Abakarov of Azerbaijan and then delivered an 11-1 tech fall over Lars Schaefle from Germany.

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Taylor retires as one of the most accomplished wrestlers from the United States with two NCAA championships to go along with his Olympic gold medal and three golds at the World Championships.

After falling to fellow Penn State alum Aaron Brooks at the Olympic trials, Taylor said his competitive career was over after he accepted the head coaching job at Oklahoma State where he took over for fellow legend John Smith. But Taylor just couldn’t let his career end on a loss like that so he returned for one last run at the World Championships where he won the bronze medal in what is now his final match.

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MMA

Brandon Moreno, Amir Albazi get last look

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November 2, 2024

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Brandon Moreno, Amir Albazi get last look


EDMONTON, Alberta, Canada – There’s now only a matter of hours before Brandon Moreno and Amir Albazi meet in the UFC Fight Night 246 main event after the conclusion of their final faceoff.

Moreno (21-8-2 MMA, 9-4-2 UFC) and Albazi (17-1 MMA, 5-0 UFC) meet in a five-round flyweight headliner on Saturday at Rogers Place (ESPN+), and the winner will have momentum for a title shot behind them.

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The last step in the pre-fight process was a staredown at ceremonial weigh-ins, and you can watch the video above to see Moreno and Albazi interaction for the final time before the UFC Fight Night 246 main event.

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC Fight Night 246.

Be sure to visit the MMA Junkie Instagram page and YouTube channel to discuss this and more content with fans of mixed martial arts.

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Watch LFA’s best fight finishes from October 2024

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35 mins ago

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November 2, 2024

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Watch LFA’s best fight finishes from October 2024


Legacy Fighting Alliance stayed Stateside in October, but kept up its stellar finishing rate from months prior.

The promotion had events in New York and Colorado and tuned in another set of events near 70 percent finishes with 18 stoppages in 24 fights.

Check out the best stoppages from LFA’s two October shows with standing knockouts, chokes, armbars ground and pound and more.

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You can watch the highlights in the video above, courtesy of LFA.

Be sure to visit the MMA Junkie Instagram page and YouTube channel to discuss this and more content with fans of mixed martial arts.

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Was Garrett Wilson’s catch all-time best? | Speak

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59 mins ago

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November 1, 2024

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Was Garrett Wilson’s catch all-time best?



Was Garrett Wilson’s catch all-time best? | Speak | FOX Sports
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Was Garrett Wilson’s catch all-time best? | Speak

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Keyshawn Johnson dives into the discussion on whether Garrett Wilson’s spectacular catch ranks as the all-time best, analyzing its impact and significance in the Jets’ win over the Texans.

1 MIN AGO・speak・2:08



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The Ultimate Fighter 33 announced featuring welterweights and flyweights

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1 hour ago

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November 1, 2024

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The Ultimate Fighter 33 announced featuring welterweights and flyweights

The Ultimate Fighter, the UFC’s long-running reality television show competition, returns for its 33rd season.

Officials announced via a press release Friday that casting for TUF 33 is scheduled to run from Nov. 4 to Dec. 18, with producers and scouts on the lookout for fighters in the welterweight and flyweight divisions. Coaches for the upcoming season are yet to be determined, as is the date for the season premiere.

According to the release, “casting for TUF 33 will be remote with no physical tryouts” and decisions are expected to be made no later than January.

The most recent season of TUF saw flyweight stars Alexa Grasso and Valentina Shevchenko coaching teams comprised of middleweights and featherweights. American Ryan Loder won the middleweight tournament, while Brazil’s Mairon Santos was the champion at 145 pounds.

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Grasso and Shevchenko later met in a trilogy bout with Grasso’s flyweight title on the line at UFC 306 this past September. Shevchenko won by unanimous decision to become a two-time UFC champion.

Premiering in 2005, TUF has often been credited by UFC CEO Dana White as having helped to bolster interest in the promotion, particularly the thrilling TUF 1 finale bout between Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonnar, which is widely regarded as one of the most important fights in UFC history.

Other standouts to emerge from seasons of TUF include Nate Diaz, Michael Bisping, Tony Ferguson, T.J. Dillashaw, Robert Whittaker, Carla Esparza, Rose Namajunas, Julianna Peña, and many others, though the program has been supplanted somewhat by Dana White’s Contender Series, which serves a similar purpose as a prospect showcase.

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Beating Chimaev ‘warrants a double title fight’

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2 hours ago

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November 1, 2024

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Beating Chimaev ‘warrants a double title fight’

If Dricus Du Plessis can add Khamzat Chimaev’s name to his resume, he’s expecting big things.

Middleweight champion Du Plessis (22-2 MMA, 8-0 UFC) was angling to run things back with Sean Strickland for his next title defense, but after Chimaev (14-0 MMA, 8-0 UFC) ran through Robert Whittaker for a first-round submission this past Saturday at UFC 308, he’s now interested in undefeated “Borz.”

With his past three wins coming over Whittaker, Strickland and Israel Adesanya, Du Plessis thinks handing Chimaev his first career loss should set him up for a shot at the light heavyweight title – preferably in his home country of South Africa.

“If I beat Khamzat Chimaev – I beat Robert Whittaker, then I beat Sean Strickland, then I beat Israel Adesanya, then I beat Khamzat Chimaev, that warrants a double title fight,” Du Plessis told ESPN. “And I think that might just be it. I have a vision, and I can’t picture something more perfect than that.

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“But to be completely honest, I do not care who it is. South Africa would go crazy no matter who I fight. … At the end of the day, there’s a goal that needs to be reached, and that is fighting in my home country and getting that second belt. To do those on the same night, that would be pretty sweet.”

Du Plessis clarifies he’ll fight whoever the UFC offers, but after Chimaev’s impressive finish of Whittaker, the champion says that’s who the fans are clamouring for him to fight.

“The conversations were more about me fighting Strickland,” Du Plessis said. “But there was a very big reason no contracts have been signed, and I’m saying this as an opinion: I agreed – I said I’ll fight Strickland, perfect, and that’s the fight the fans want.

“But if you go on what the fans want right now, it’s definitely not the Strickland fight. If you ask what I want, I want to fight the best guy. I want to fight the guy the fans want me to fight, and that 100 percent is Khamzat. If they give me the Strickland fight, great, I’ll fight Strickland in February, March or whenever, and then fight Khamzat.”

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‘My career depends on’ UFC FN 247 fight vs. Blackshear

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2 hours ago

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November 1, 2024

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‘My career depends on’ UFC FN 247 fight vs. Blackshear

Cody Stamann sees UFC Fight Night 247 as a potential do-or-die situation.

Stamann (21-7-1 MMA, 7-6-1 UFC) will look to snap a two-fight losing skid when he takes on Da’Mon Blackshear (14-7-1 MMA, 2-3-1 UFC) Nov. 9 at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas.

Heading into the final fight of his UFC contract, 34-year-old Stamann aims to make a big impression against Blackshear.

“Every fight is the most important fight of your life,” Stamann told MMA Junkie Radio. “I approach every fight the same way, but this one has a lot of extra, I guess, pressure connected to it. (It’s the) last fight on my UFC contract. I’m in a situation where I need to win – I’m not going to sugarcoat it. I have to go out and win. My career depends on it, and I know that. I think that motivates me and scares the living crap out of me because I know if I don’t perform on that night, who knows?

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“I may need to look for a job, and I like my job, and I want to keep it. So I’m 100 percent mentally and physically preparing myself to get into a war, and just having that willingness, ability and gas tank to no matter where this fight ends up, just get the job done. I don’t care about my body, I don’t care about my health, I’m going in there with no plans of anything in the future. It’s come back with your shield or on it type of situation for me.”

This isn’t the first time Stamann has had his back against the wall. He was on a three-fight losing skid a few years ago, but says his willingness to fight anyone at anytime is what has contributed to his longevity in the UFC.

“I’ve been in this situation before,” Stamann said. “And I think my saving grace in this situation is the fact that the UFC knows very well – I mean, look at the guys I’ve fought. It’s like killer after killer after killer. They know for a fact that when they ring my line, it doesn’t matter if it’s six weeks, two weeks, one week, four days – it doesn’t matter. The answer is yes, and I just want to know how much I have to weigh.”

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC Fight Night 247.

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Be sure to visit the MMA Junkie Instagram page and YouTube channel to discuss this and more content with fans of mixed martial arts.

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