Dana White announces Daniel Cormier-Jon Jones on UFC’s July 29 Anaheim card
The heated rivalry between UFC light-heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier and Jon Jones — the former division king whose reign ended by suspension, not in the octagon — will renew at Anaheim’s Honda Center July 29 in the UFC 214 main event, the organization announced Friday.
In a “Summer Kickoff” news conference in Dallas, site of Saturday’s UFC 211, UFC President Dana White also revealed that women’s bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes will make her second title defense, fighting No. 1 contender Valentina Shevchenko in a rematch, on the July 8 UFC 213 card at Las Vegas’ T-Mobile Arena.
It’s not clear yet whether Nunes-Shevchenko or the men’s bantamweight title bout between champion Cody Garbrandt and former champion T.J. Dillashaw will be the main event to cap International Fight Week.
UFC has yet to finalize where it will place the middleweight title fight between Orange County-trained champion Michael Bisping of England and Cuba’s No. 1 contender, Yoel Romero.
There’s no doubt, however, that the heated Cormier-Jones sequel stands as one of the year’s most anticipated bouts atop a card that will also include a featherweight meeting between “The Korean Super Boy,” Doo Ho Choi, and Andre Fili.
Tickets for UFC 214 are set to go on sale June 9.
The 38-year-old Cormier (19-1) has continually torched Jones (22-1) for his reckless lifestyle that saw him stripped of his belt in 2015 after defeating Cormier by unanimous decision.
The Nevada State Athletic Commission revealed after the fight that New York’s Jones had tested positive for cocaine less than a month before the bout. Then Jones crashed his car into one driven by a pregnant woman, injuring her and fleeing the scene with a wad of cash but leaving drug paraphernalia left behind.
By the time Jones had recovered from that episode, defeating Ovince Saint Preux in an uninspired decision in April 2016 to set up a Cormier rematch in July, he tested positive for a banned performance-enhancing substance also used for sexual enhancement, causing an eleventh-hour scrapping of that bout.
Cormier proceeded to defeat UFC legend Anderson Silva in the replacement bout — admitting his purse took an estimated $1-million hit thanks to Jones’ transgression — and he returned from a training-camp injury to submit top contender Anthony Johnson in the second round on April 8 in Buffalo, N.Y.
When Jones recently took to Twitter in a barber’s chair to ridicule Cormier for striving to be a good guy, adding the hashtag, “TheChampIsHere,” Cormier responded in a video interview by noting Jones’ “champ” status was relinquished by the car accident and dirty drug tests.
“I’d much rather have my back patted … than standing in front of a judge again and trying to pretend he’s sorry when he’s not,” Cormier said. “Telling him he’s a good guy is one thing you can’t do, because he’s not.”
As a precaution, White said top-10 light-heavyweight Jimi Manuwa will fight on the card, giving UFC a replacement option for the main event.
The Nunes-Shevchenko rematch is nowhere near as toxic, but is compelling nonetheless.
Brazil’s Nunes (14-4), on a five-fight winning streak that includes a first-round technical knockout of Ronda Rousey in December, set up her title shot against Miesha Tate by defeating Shevchenko by decision on March 5, 2016.
Shevchenko (14-2) responded impressively by defeating former champion Holly Holm by a wide decision in Chicago, then submitting rising contender Julianna Pena.
Holm, after losing to Germaine de Randamie in the new featherweight division’s first title fight in February, will return to bantamweight and seek to position herself for the Nunes-Shevchenko winner when she fights former title challenger Bethe Correia June 17 in Singapore.
White also announced two other fights Friday: No. 6 lightweight Michael Johnson (18-11) versus recent signee and former World Series of Fighting champion Juston Gaethje (17-0) will meet in the main event of “The Ultimate Fighter” finale card July 7 in Las Vegas.
And former middleweight champion champion Chris Weidman (13-3) will meet Southland product Kelvin Gastelum (14-2) July 22 in the main event of a UFC Fight Night card on Fox in Long Island, N.Y.
Twitter: @latimespugmire
UPDATES:
5:55 p.m.: This article has been updated with new information about the UFC 214 card.
It was originally published at 2:40 p.m.
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