JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Ultimate Fighting Championship will make its Jacksonville debut next month — albeit without fans — with the promotion’s UFC 249 coming to town and the potential for more events after that, too.
The May 9 card was announced on Friday, with others following on May 13 and 16, also in Jacksonville. The bouts will be sanctioned by the Florida State Boxing Commission. The events will be held with only essential personnel due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but will be streamed and televised on ESPN and ESPN+.
“I can’t wait to deliver some great fights for the fans," said UFC president Dana White in a statement. “I want to give a big thanks to Mayor Curry, VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena and Florida State Boxing Commission Executive Director Patrick Cunningham for getting this thing done and giving us a venue to put on these incredible cards, as well our media partners including ESPN and ESPN+, for bringing it to fans. My team is ready to go and the fighters are excited to get back in there with these back-to-back events.”
The stop in Jacksonville, even without fans in attendance, is a major get for the area.
Featherweight fighter Calvin Katter hopes the UFC event encourages fans to consider mixed martial arts as a sport they can enjoy watching, whether it’s on television or in person when COVID-19 is no longer a threat.
“I hope it grows the sport. Every event seems to have more and more eyes on it, especially this one being the only show in town,” Katter said. "I think we stand to gain a lot of fans and definitely have the exposure.”
Combat sports are a big slice of the sporting pie and haven’t been held in the area on the scale of a UFC event in years. While smaller mixed martial arts events have been held on the First Coast, you’d have to go back to 1996 to find something as big as a UFC event making a stop here.
Roy Jones Jr. defended his IBF super middleweight championship on June 15, 1996 against Eric Lucas at the old Jacksonville Coliseum. The Coliseum also hosted the Gold to Glory boxing card in 1989, a night that included fighters and future champions like Riddick Bowe, Michael Carbajal, Ray Mercer and Tommy Morrison.
Mayor Lenny Curry said that the events are a small step back to normalcy as the world slowly tries to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As we move step-by-step on the path toward economic recovery, we are proud to host these UFC events at the Vystar Veterans Memorial Arena,” Curry said in a statement. “The UFC organization is a renowned entertainment brand that’s presented a safe and sensible plan to use this Jacksonville location, and we are thrilled to have our city highlighted nationally on ESPN and ESPN+. With Jacksonville continuing to outpace other cities and regions, we are excited to continue to lead as host to these world-class, international sports entertainment organizations.”
The originally postponed card will feature Tony Ferguson facing Justin Gaethje for the interim lightweight championship. Ferguson was originally scheduled to face Khabib Nurmagomedov on April 18, the fifth time the bout between those two has been scheduled. But travel issues for Nurmagomedov took him off of the card initially, and the COVID-19 pandemic later forced the UFC to postpone the event. White replaced Nurmagomedov with Gaethje on the card.
White attempted to move forward with holding UFC 249 on a casino on tribal land in California, but he said that was scrapped by higher-ups at ESPN and Disney. The UFC promotion has a partnership with ESPN, which is owner by Disney.
The remainder of the UFC 249 card:
• No. 2 ranked heavyweight contender Francis Ngannou (14-3) vs. No. 6 Jairzinho Rozenstruik (10-0)
• Lightweight No. 7 ranked Jeremy Stephens (28-17, 1 NC) vs. No. 9 Calvin Kattar (20-4)
• Welterweight Donald Cerrone (36-14) vs. Anthony Pettis (22-10)
• Heavyweight Greg Hardy (6-2, 1 NC) vs. Yorgan De Castro (5-0)
• Heavyweight Aleksei Oleinik (58-13) vs. former UFC champion Fabricio Werdum (23-7)
• Light heavyweight Ryan Spann (17-5) vs. Sam Alvey (33-13, 1 NC)
• Former UFC women’s strawweight champion and No. 7 ranked Carla Esparza (16-6) vs. No. 8 Michelle Waterson (17-7, fighting out of Albuquerque, N.M.)
• Middleweight Uriah Hall (16-9) vs. Jacare Souza (26-8, 1 NC)
• Welterweight No. 13 ranked contender Vicente Luque (17-7-1) vs. Niko Price (14-3, 1 NC)
• Featherweight Bryce Mitchell (12-1) vs. Charles Rosa (12-3)