Anthony Pettis misses weight, no longer competing for title at UFC 206
Disaster struck early Friday morning in Toronto as Anthony Pettis failed to make weight for his championship bout against Max Holloway in the UFC 206 main event.
Pettis stepped onto the scale at 148 pounds — a full three pounds over the limit for the interim featherweight championship bout headlining the UFC's return to Canada.
For the interim featherweight title fight, Pettis was required to weigh no more than 145 pounds, which means he will no longer be competing for UFC gold on Saturday night.
Meanwhile, Holloway came in on weight at 145 pounds for the fight.
The stakes for the fight have changed because now if Holloway wins, he would still become the interim featherweight champion. If Pettis wins — because he missed weight — he would not be eligible to become champion at the end of the night. Holloway's manager Brian Butler from Suckerpunch Entertainment also confirmed the news via Twitter on Friday.
Pettis becomes the first fighter since 2007 to miss weight for a championship bout that still moved forward as scheduled. Nearly a decade ago, Travis Lutter failed to make weight for his middleweight title shot against Anderson Silva.
On that night, Silva defeated Lutter by second round submission in a non-title fight.
Pettis will also be fined 20-percent of his purse for not making weight for the championship bout.
Pettis wasn't alone missing weight on Friday as two more competitors also failed to hit the mark when stepping on the scale, although the stakes for those fights were certainly much different than the championship main event.
Valerie Letourneau, who has suffered through some brutal weight cuts to get down to 115 pounds, came in at 117.5 for her bout against newcomer Viviane Perreira. Letourneau has struggled to get down to the strawweight limit before and this latest incident saw her missed the required weight by one and a half pounds.
Rustam Khabilov also came in over weight at 158.5 pounds — two and a half pounds over the limit for his bout taking place in the lightweight division.
Both fighters were fined 20-percent of their respective purses, which goes to the opponent on Saturday night.
Here are the full weigh-in results for UFC 206 on Saturday night in Toronto:
UFC 206: Holloway vs. Pettis Main Card (10 p.m. ET on pay-per-view-)
MAIN EVENT: Max Holloway (145) vs. Anthony Pettis (148)*
Matt Brown (171) vs. Donald Cerrone (170.5)
Dooho Choi (145.5) vs. Cub Swanson (146)
Kelvin Gastelum (185) vs. Tim Kennedy (186)
Emil Meek (170.5) vs. Jordan Mein (170)
UFC 206 Prelims (8 p.m. ET on FS1)
Misha Cirkunov (205) vs. Nikita Krylov (206)
Olivier Aubin-Mercier (156) vs. Drew Dober (156)
Valerie Letourneau (117.5)** vs. Viviane Pereira (114)
Mitch Gagnon (135.5) vs. Matthew Lopez (136)
UFC 206 Early Prelims (6:30 p.m. on UFC Fight Pass)
John Makdessi (155) vs. Lando Vannata (156)
Rustam Khabilov (158.5)** vs. Jason Saggo (155)
Zach Makovsky (125) vs. Dustin Ortiz (125)
* Pettis misses weight, no longer competing for interim featherweight title. Fined 20-percent of his purse.
** Fined 20-percent of the purse, which goes to their opponents.
Fight is on. @BlessedMMA will fight for the belt, Pettis will not. Max is unphased. "Get him to the cage at any weight" #maxforgold
— Brian Butler-Au (@BrianButler_Au) December 9, 2016
Anthony Pettis did NOT make weight for his title fight vs Max Holloway. #UFC206 https://t.co/RS4m3WHk4i
— FOX Sports: UFC (@UFCONFOX) December 9, 2016
Instead of a handshake from Matt Brown, @Cowboycerrone went in for the hug from @danawhite. #UFC206 https://t.co/Wnp7Wu4Udt
— FOX Sports: UFC (@UFCONFOX) December 9, 2016
