Overview
- All 26 fighters made weight for Saturday’s card at the UFC APEX, with prelims at 4 p.m. ET and the main card at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN+.
- Waldo Cortes-Acosta weighed 263 pounds and Ante Delija 237, confirming a gap of more than 25 pounds for the heavyweight co-main event.
- Delija enters off a first-round knockout of Marcin Tybura at UFC Paris that earned a Performance of the Night bonus and a No. 9 ranking.
- Cortes-Acosta is 14-2 (7-2 UFC) and seeks to rebound from a unanimous decision loss to Sergei Pavlovich while defending his No. 6 spot in a venue he considers home turf.
- At media day, Delija backed Tom Aspinall after the champion’s recent eye-poke no-contest and called for stricter penalties for fouls.
- Featherweights Steve Garcia and David Onama headline, both successfully hitting the non-title limit as they bring six- and four-fight win streaks, respectively.