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Max Holloway Out of UFC 223 Main Event

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The UFC 223 drama cycle continues to spin. Max Holloway is officially out of his UFC vacant lightweight championship bout against Khabib Nurmagomedov.

As originally reported by Brett Okamoto of ESPN, Holloway was “declared medically unfit to fight,” per Dana White.

Holloway took the fight on less than a week’s notice after interim lightweight champion Tony Ferguson withdrew from the bout with an injury.

It’s unclear what prompted officials to waive off UFC 223’s main event. The featherweight champion had a long weight cut ahead of him after taking the bout on short notice. Holloway was forced to pull out of a March 3 title defense against Frankie Edgar after suffering a leg injury.

What’s Next?

There’s currently no information on whether Nurmagomedov will remain on the card and fight another lightweight for the belt.

Paul Felder and Al Iaquinta were slated to fight on the main card in a lightweight match. Felder, who weighed in at 155 on the nose, has volunteered on Twitter to step up.

Per Ariel Helwani, Iaquinta has also thrown his hat in the ring:

However, the UFC appears to be inclined to give former champion Anthony Pettis the title shot against Nurmagomedov, as originally reported by MMA Junkie:

UFC 223 Chaos

The main event will be the fourth fight scrapped from the event in two days. Conor McGregor’s assault on a bus carrying half of the card’s fighters resulted in injuries to Michael Chiesa and Ray Borg. Their fights with Pettis and Brandon Moreno respectively have been cancelled.

Artem Lobov, McGregor’s friend and teammate, was also involved in the incident. He was removed from his bout with Alex Caceres as punishment.

Rose Namajunas, the UFC strawweight champion, was nearly hit in the attack. She was shaken up, but her title defense against former champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk will go on as scheduled.

Zabit Magomedsharipov vs. Kyle Bochniak has been moved up to the PPV main card to replace Chiesa vs. Pettis.

UFC 223 is set to go down at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York on Saturday night.

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Michael is a big MMA fan who enjoys interviewing the sport's athletes, writing about the sport, and just discussing it. He earned his Master's in Journalism at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism and his B.A. in Journalism at Stony Brook University. He also enjoys hockey, football and baseball. Feel free to hit him up if you want to discuss MMA, or any other sport!

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