Bryce Mitchell will return to the weight class in which he made his professional MMA debut this summer.
Mitchell has been booked to face Said Nurmagomedov in a bantamweight bout at UFC on ABC 9 (ABC, ESPN, ESPN+) on July 26 at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi. UFC CEO Dana White announced the booking Wednesday morning. The fight was first reported by Red Corner MMA.
Mitchell (17-3 MMA, 8-3 UFC) will seek new life at 135 pounds after splitting his past six appearances and dropping two of his past three at featherweight. “Thug Nasty” is coming off a submission loss to Jean Silva at UFC 314 in April and will compete at bantamweight for the first time since January 2015.
Nurmagomedov (18-4 MMA, 7-3 UFC) has also lost two of his past three and will look to rebound. After a Performance of the Night submission of Muin Gafurov at UFC 294, Nurmagomedov lost a unanimous decision to Vinicius Oliveira in a Fight of the Night effort at UFC Fight Night 250.
The current UFC on ABC 9 lineup includes:
- Robert Whittaker vs. Reinier de Ridder
- Movsar Evloev vs. Aaron Pico
- Marcus McGhee vs. Petr Yan
- Bryce Mitchell vs. Said Nurmagomedov
- Marc-Andre Barriault vs. Shara Magomedov
- Amanda Ribas vs. Tabatha Ricci
- Bogdan Guskov vs. Nikita Krylov
- Asu Almabayev vs. Ramazan Temirov
- Ibo Aslan vs. Billy Elekana
