Chidi Njokuani says a faulty scale, not a bad weight cut, is what nearly cost him his UFC 330 fight.
Njokuani stepped on the official scale in Philadelphia and came in a pound over the 171-pound non-title limit, despite having already checked in on weight backstage. He says the mix-up traces back to a discrepancy between the digital scale fighters use behind the curtain and the manual scale used for the public UFC 330 weigh-ins.
“They make us weigh in on the digital scale in the back first,” Njokuani said at the post-fight press conference. “They double-check, make sure you’re on weight before you go out there… I weighed in on the scale in the back with my underwear on and I was on weight. So, they were like, ‘Alright, go out there and weigh yourself.’ And then I was a pound heavy.”
Told by commission officials he’d need to cut more weight, Njokuani refused. He says he pushed back hard in the moment, more frustrated with the scale than worried about missing weight.
“I’m not going to cut anything,” Njokuani said he told officials. “I’ma cut this motherfucker if he doesn’t get his shit together. I’m not cutting no more weight.”
Officials adjusted the scale, Njokuani stepped on again, and this time it read on weight. He headed to fight night unbothered, and it showed. Njokuani took a clean, one-sided unanimous decision over Joel Alvarez in the night’s final preliminary bout, snapping a two-fight skid and improving to 26-12.
Alvarez stepped in on short notice after Geoff Neal withdrew from the original pairing, giving Njokuani less than two weeks to adjust his gameplan. He credited his experience for helping him handle the late change and the weigh-in chaos without losing focus on the job in front of him.
UFC 330 took place August 15 at Xfinity Mobile Arena in Philadelphia, with Islam Makhachev headlining a welterweight title defense over Ian Machado Garry.
