UFC Fight Night – Moreno vs. Albazi 11/2/24

Brandon Moreno and Amir Albazi have healed. The flyweight contenders have had championship designs impeded by health issues. Moreno and Albazi headline UFC Fight Night in Edmonton, Canada on Saturday with a title shot within view.

Moreno (21-8-2) is excited for fight week. It's been a while since he's felt that way. The former UFC flyweight champion returns from his longest layoff since 2020 which is still, amusingly, only eight months long. Such is the life of a fighter it seems. But Moreno says time spent with his family and LEGO collection was tremendously rejuvenating as he looks to bounce back from consecutive losses to Alexandre Pantoja and Brandon Royval. "I had two or three years in a row on the grind. There were a lot of responsibilities fighting title fights,"At some point that exploded in my mind. If you put it together with a lot of physical injuries, I had to heal my mind and body to be able to fight again.

Albazi (17-1) returns after the toughest battle of his career. Albazi is a perfect 5-0 in the UFC but serious health problems sidelined him for more than a year. Albazi fought Kai Kara-France in June 2023 with what he later discovered was an irregular heartbeat. Many scored the fight for Kara-France. Albazi refused to make excuses for his sub-optimal performance but admitted he wasn't fully functioning. Albazi learned he'd require heart surgery after a serious health scare during training.

"There was no way I should've been that tired from two minutes of grappling. I checked my heartrate monitor on my phone and it read 239 [beats per minute]. I tried to fix it. I thought there must be something wrong with the heart rate monitor because I've never seen such a high number. I would get it up to 195 in an intense session. I tried to bring it down and it wouldn't go down." Fortunately, Albazi was at the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas. The medical staff helped lower his heart rate and he later underwent heart surgery. Albazi recovered and forged ahead to enemy territory, preparing to fight Moreno at UFC Fight Night in Mexico City on Feb. 24. Six weeks before, Albazi learned he was dealing with a separate health issue that nearly paralyzed him.

Namajunas has won two straight fights at 125 pounds. She faces a tough test against Blanchfield, who has won six of her last seven fights. Blanchfield lost her previous fight to Manon Fiorot in March. Namajunas and Blanchfield’s last loss was against the same opponent. Blanchfield’s loss to Fiorot was her first defeat since her fourth MMA fight against Tracy Cortez in 2019. Blanchfield is the more efficient striker, while Namajunas has an edge in takedown accuracy. Namajunas has much more experience than Blanchfield in the UFC. This is Namajunas’ 17th fight in the UFC, while it is Blanchfield’s eighth. Derrick Lewis was originally scheduled to face Jhonata Diniz. But on Friday night, it was revealed that Lewis had to pull out from the fight. Currently, it is unknown why Lewis is off the card.