A welterweight fight between Sean Brady and Vicente Luque that was expected to headline UFC On ESPN 54 in Atlantic City, New Jersey on March 23rd has been cancelled.
According to reports Brady has been dealing with injury issues and as such didn’t actually officially sign up for the fight.
So Brady definitely won’t be competing at the event, but at this stage it’s unclear whether the UFC is looking into a potential replacement to keep Luque on the card, and whether he’d still retain his main event spot if they do.
The 6th ranked Brady had been coming off a submission win over Kelvin Gastelum after having suffered the first loss of his career against Belal Muhammad, leaving him with an overall career record of 16-1.
As for the 9th ranked Luque, he suffered a brutal KO loss to Geoff Neal in 2022 that led to a year-long layoff, before returning to the win column last August with a unanimous decision victory over Rafael dos Anjos.
While losing Brady vs. Luque is a big blow, UFC On ESPN 54 does currently have some other notable bouts already attached to it, including a potential women’s flyweight title eliminator between the No.2 ranked Erin Blanchfield and No.3 placed Manon Fiorot, while former middleweight champion Chris Weidman has hinted that his fight against Bruno Silva may serve as his swan song from the sport.
