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Former Middleweight Kingpin Tops UFC Seattle Lineup

Former middleweight champ Israel Adesanya has lost three straight fights. | Getty/UFC


Israel Adesanya will take center stage in the Emerald City.

The former middleweight champion will face Joe Pyfer in the UFC Seattle main event on March 28. UFC CEO Dana White announced the booking on Tuesday. UFC Fight Night 271 takes place at the Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle, Washington and also features a women’s flyweight scrap pitting Alexa Grasso against Rose Namajunas. The card will air on Paramount+.

Adesanya has lost four of his last five Octagon appearances dating back to November 2022. In his lone appearance of 2025, “The Last Stylebender” suffered a second-round technical knockout defeat to Nassourdine Imavov in the UFC Saudi Arabia headliner last February. Adesanya captured 185-pound gold in October 2019 and authored five successful title defenses before relinquishing the belt to kickboxing rival Alex Pereira at UFC 281.

A two-time competitor on Dana White’s Contender Series, Pyfer has gone 6-1 in the promotion since earning a UFC contract in 2022. After suffering his lone career Octagon defeat to Jack Hermansson in the UFC Fight Night 236 main event, “Bodybagz” has rebounded to post successive triumphs against Marc-Andre Barriault, Kelvin Gastelum and Abusupiyan Magomedov.

This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com


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