5 burning questions heading into UFC on ESPN+ 29
The second leg of the UFC’s three-shows-in-eight-nights relay goes down Wednesday, with the promotion fresh off a memorable evening at UFC 249.
Jacksonville, Fla., once again hosts the octagon, this time for UFC on ESPN+ 29. And while the card isn’t as deep as Saturday night’s pay-per-view offering, there are still plenty of items of interest during the evening’s festivities, including an intriguing light heavyweight headliner between former title challengers Anthony Smith and Glover Teixeira.
And besides, what else are you going to do on a random Wednesday night a couple months into isolation?
UFC on ESPN+ 29 takes place at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena. The card streams on ESPN+.
Without further ado, here are five burning questions heading into UFC on ESPN+ 29.
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Can Glover Teixeira make an improbable run to another title shot?
Glover Teixeira (red gloves) fights Nikita Krylov (blue gloves) last year. (Kyle Terada, USA TODAY Sports)
We recently passed the six-year anniversary mark of Glover Teixeira’s unanimous decision loss to Jon Jones in a light heavyweight title fight at UFC 172.
Teixeira (30-7 MMA, 13-5 UFC) was already 34 at the time and had a fair bit of tread on his tires with 25 fights at that point, and it seemed like, as a simple life inevitability, a slow decline would start here.
And yet, here we are, in May 2020, and a 40-year-old Teixiera has won three consecutive fights, four of five, and earned finishes in three of those victories. Granted, those wins haven’t been over the very top of the class in the division. But now Teixeira has a chance to prove, in a 205-pound weight class whose dynamics have shifted dramatically over the past year, that he has a real chance at joining the short list of contenders for Jones’ throne.
Is Teixeira the underdog against Smith (33-14 MMA, 8-4 UFC)? Sure, but never count out a man with the ability to turn things in his favor in the blink of an eye.