The UFC appeared to clean house Friday, apparently removing numerous fighters from its roster. The news comes by way of UFCFightersInfo, a Twitter account that monitors the database the promotion uses for fighters on its website. In all, over 30 names were removed.
Although some fighters removed had not been active with the promotion in quite a while, others were active recently, and their cuts will certainly be news. Among the names removed are Brock Lesnar (though this could easily be because his UFC 200 appearance was a one-off, and doesn’t preclude him signing another deal later), Lorenz Larkin (currently a free agent), and Cole Miller, who had been in a very public spat with the promotion late last year.
Another name that stands out: Sean Santella. Santella, a flyweight, was signed last Summer to face Wilson Reis on short notice, but his debut was called off as medical clearance wasn’t obtained in time. It appears the UFC has now cut him, without him ever having fought in the octagon.
Names like Meisha Tate and Antonio Silva were also removed, which obviously amounts to database cleanup as Tate has retired, and Silva is currently fighting in Russia. Recently retired Urijah Faber was also removed.
Also among those removed:
Anthony Birchak
Clay Collard
Maximo Blanco
Geane Herrera
Brock Lesnar
Taylor Lapilus
Seohee Ham
Takeya Mizugaki
Brendan O’Reilly
Erik Perez
Lorenz Larkin
Rick Story
Jessamyn Duke
Cole Miller
Elvis Mutapcic
Joe Gigliotti
Fredy Serrano
Fernando Bruno
Yao Zhikui
Lukasz Sajewski
Joby Sanchez
Roman Salazar
Anton Zafir
Sean Santella
Sean Spencer
Thiago Tavares
Tiago Trator
A complete accounting can be found here.
