In a stunning development this past Friday in Phoenix, UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira missed weight for his title defense against Justin Gaethje.
Even though Oliveira had an extra hour to hit the championship max of 155 pounds, he failed to lose the extra half-pound with the additional time. Consequently, he was stripped of the title.
That meant the belt was only up for grabs at UFC 274 if he lost. But Oliveira (33-8 MMA, 21-8 UFC) submitted Gaethje (23-4 MMA, 6-4 UFC), which made the lightweight title vacant. We know Oliveira will get a chance to win it back later this year, but we don’t know whom it will be against.
The question, though, on a lot of minds was: Who is to blame for Oliveira missing weight? He claimed, as did other fighters on the card, that the official scale was recalibrated the morning of the weigh-ins, which caused many fighters who thought they were on weight to come in a little bit over. So is it the fault of whoever messed with the scale? Is it Oliveira’s fault for not taking every measure to be sure something crazy didn’t happen?
That’s what we asked our Spinning Back Clique panel of Brian “Goze” Garcia, Mike Bohn and Nolan King with host “Gorgeous” George Garcia. Check out their conversation in the video above, and don’t miss the full episode below.
Video: Charles Oliveira no longer is the UFC lightweight champ – but who’s to blame?