Brandon Moreno and Amir Albazi have healed. The flyweight contenders have had championship designs impeded by health issues. Moreno and Albazi headline UFC Fight Night in Edmonton, Canada on Saturday with a title shot within view.
Moreno (21-8-2) is excited for fight week. It's been a while since he's felt that way. The former UFC flyweight champion returns from his longest layoff since 2020 which is still, amusingly, only eight months long. Such is the life of a fighter it seems. But Moreno says time spent with his family and LEGO collection was tremendously rejuvenating as he looks to bounce back from consecutive losses to Alexandre Pantoja and Brandon Royval.
"I had two or three years in a row on the grind. There were a lot of responsibilities fighting title fights," Moreno told CBS Sports. "At some point that exploded in my mind. If you put it together with a lot of physical injuries, I had to heal my mind and body to be able to fight again.
"In my last fight -- and I don't want to make any excuses because Brandon Royval is an amazing fighter and deserves everything he's doing now -- but in my mind, trying to remember that moment in the fight, I wasn't there. My body was there and I was throwing punches but my mind wasn't there. I felt very frustrated because I knew I was much better than the guy who fought in February. That was the breaking point."
Albazi (17-1) returns after the toughest battle of his career. Albazi is a perfect 5-0 in the UFC but serious health problems sidelined him for more than a year. Albazi fought Kai Kara-France in June 2023 with what he later discovered was an irregular heartbeat. Many scored the fight for Kara-France. Albazi refused to make excuses for his sub-optimal performance but admitted he wasn't fully functioning. Albazi learned he'd require heart surgery after a serious health scare during training.
"I felt like I was going to die," Albazi told CBS Sports. "There was no way I should've been that tired from two minutes of grappling. I checked my heartrate monitor on my phone and it read 239 [beats per minute]. I tried to fix it. I thought there must be something wrong with the heart rate monitor because I've never seen such a high number. I would get it up to 195 in an intense session. I tried to bring it down and it wouldn't go down."
Fortunately, Albazi was at the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas. The medical staff helped lower his heart rate and he later underwent heart surgery. Albazi recovered and forged ahead to enemy territory, preparing to fight Moreno at UFC Fight Night in Mexico City on Feb. 24. Six weeks before, Albazi learned he was dealing with a separate health issue that nearly paralyzed him.
"I couldn't even shower. I couldn't lift my arm over my head," Albazi said. "My arm literally stopped working."
Albazi visited five different doctors, all of whom informed him he'd require neck surgery or recommended he stop fighting due to a damaged spinal cord. Albazi stubbornly refused to pull out of the fight. He learned his fight was canceled like everyone else, via social media. A UFC doctor made the recommendation and Albazi was swiftly removed from the card.
"When a doctor told me, 'Hey, brother to brother, try to find a 9 to 5 job.' I sat in the car for 15 minutes quietly thinking, 'Wait a second? I didn't come this far to stop now. Is this it?' That was hard going through. Even if I knew I was continuing, it was hard hearing it from a doctor. 'No, I'm not going to finish it like this. I can do better.' There were a lot of dark days."
Check out the full interview with Amir Albazi below.
Saturday's co-main event is driving more fan interest than the headliner. Erin Blanchfield and Rose Namajunas are within striking distance of a UFC women's flyweight title shot. Manon Fiorot and Alexa Grasso are ahead of them in the pecking order. Still, a strong showcase could benefit Blanchfield and Namajunas in an era where availability increasingly impacts UFC's matchmaking.
"Getting a finish on Saturday means everything. That puts me right back in the title picture," Blanchfield told CBS Sports as she hopes to recover from a unanimous decision loss to Fiorot. "It's not just winning, but how you win. Putting on a good performance puts me in an even better spot."
"Even with a good performance, well we could cross that bridge when get to it, but I'd still feel bad, for some reason, if I jumped her," former UFC women's strawweight champion Namajunas told CBS Sports about leapfrogging Fiorot, who beat Namajunas in her flyweight debut. "...Ultimately the UFC is kind of the judge of that and it's up to me to have a really good performance to make that case."
One of the featured bouts on Saturday was expected to be fan favorite Derrick Lewis taking on relative newcomer Jhonata Diaz at heavyweight. However, Lewis was forced to withdraw from the bout late on Friday night night because of a "non-weight cut related illness," according to the promotion. Jasmine Jasudavicius vs. Ariane da Silva was moved up to the main card for a flyweight contest.
Below is the rest of the fight card for Saturday, with the latest odds, before we make a prediction and pick the main event.
UFC Fight Night card, odds
| Favorite | Underdog | Weight class |
|---|---|---|
| Brandon Moreno -175 | Amir Albazi +150 | Flyweight |
| Erin Blanchfield -125 | Rose Namajunas +115 | Women's flyweight |
| Caio Machado -155 | Brendson Ribeiro +130 | Light heavyweight |
| Marc-Andre Barriault -205 | Dustin Stoltzfus +170 | Middleweight |
| Mike Mallott -320 | Trevin Giles +250 | Lightweight |
UFC Fight Night viewing information
Date: Nov. 2 | Start time: 8 p.m. ET (main card)
Location: Rogers Place -- Edmonton, Canada
TV channel: ESPN+
Prediction
Brandon Moreno vs. Amir Albazi: Albazi's heart issues tamper with useful data in the Kara-France fight. Albazi won a five-round split decision, but 19 of 21 media members scored the fight for Kara-France, plus 91.5% of fan votes via MMA Decisions. That won't change the result but it's worth noting. Albazi anticipates he'll have a wrestling edge over Moreno but the former champ is no slouch when grappling. Moreno statistically outpaces Albazi in every wrestling category -- takedown average, accuracy and defense. Moreno also wields greater striking output and accuracy. Pantoja landed six of 11 takedowns on Moreno, so I suspect Albazi will have some success, but not enough. Moreno has better finishing ability in a fight where both men have five-round endurance. Moreno via Unanimous Decision
Who wins UFC Fight Night: Moreno vs. Albazi, and how exactly does the fight end? Visit SportsLine now to get detailed picks and analysis from the incomparable expert who is up over $1,500 on his UFC main-card picks, and find out.