Rosas Jr. Stops Barcelos in the Fifth, and Joshua-Fury Has a Dana White Problem

Raul Rosas Jr. was losing on all three scorecards when the fifth round started Saturday night at the Meta Apex. A minute and 38 seconds later he had won the fight, and Raoni Barcelos was being carried out of the Octagon on a stretcher. Barcelos was taken to a Level 1 trauma center, and the UFC said later that night that he was stable, alert and responsive, with full movement. That is the best news of the weekend, and it arrived before anything else did.

It was a busy two days everywhere else. Zuffa Boxing took its 11th card to the Copper Box Arena in London, where Johnny Fisher won a majority decision over Michael Pirotton in a fight that left Fisher too spent to do a post-fight interview. In Tokyo, Takuma Inoue got up from a seventh-round knockdown to beat Tenshin Nasukawa again and keep the WBC bantamweight title. And three days after Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury were finally announced for December 11 in Cardiff, the fight already has a promoter problem, and the promoter is Dana White.

A correction from our September 14 issue: we had the results of two Noche UFC fights backward. Alexa Grasso beat Manon Fiorot by unanimous decision (29-28 on all three cards), and Curtis Blaydes beat Waldo Cortes Acosta by unanimous decision (29-28 on all three cards). We regret the errors.

Raul Rosas Jr. stopped Raoni Barcelos at 1:38 of the fifth round on Saturday night at the Meta Apex in Las Vegas, slamming him to the canvas out of a clinch against the fence in a UFC Fight Night main event he was losing on all three scorecards. Referee Herb Dean saw that Barcelos was not moving and waved it off immediately. Rosas, 21, improved to 13-1 with his sixth straight win. Barcelos fell to 22-6.

It had been one of the best fights of the year until the ending took the air out of the building. Both men traded hard through the first round, and Barcelos caught a kick early in the second and turned it into a takedown. Rosas' corner told him to stop brawling before the third, and Barcelos made him pay for listening, jumping on him with right hands and trip takedowns from the clinch. By the fourth Barcelos was taking Rosas' back repeatedly, threatening a rear-naked choke and grinding a face crank while blood ran down Rosas' face. Barcelos was fighting through a badly swollen left eye and was one round from winning.

Rosas came out for the fifth like a man who knew it. He pressed forward, tied Barcelos up against the fence and lifted him. Barcelos' head appeared to hit the canvas or the cage on the way down, and he did not move afterward. He stayed on the mat for several minutes before he was stretchered out and taken to the hospital, where the UFC said he underwent a CT scan and remained under medical supervision. His coach, Davi Ramos, posted late Saturday that Barcelos was doing well.

"I'm 21 and putting on performances like that on main events. So, hey, I'm going to need those $100,000 [bonus checks] and a shot at the top 6 or top 7."

That was Rosas afterward, after he had also asked for prayers for Barcelos. The request is fair on the merits. A 21-year-old who wins a five-round main event he was losing on every card has earned a ranked opponent. The part he cannot control is what the stoppage looked like. A comeback win by slam will be replayed for the wrong reasons for a while.

Elsewhere on the card, Ailin Perez won a unanimous decision over Norma Dumont, 29-28 on all three cards. Luis Hernandez choked out Sedriques Dumas with a standing guillotine in 57 seconds. Ilimbek Akylbek Uulu won by disqualification when Mahammadali Osmanli landed an illegal knee at 2:19 of the first round. Montel Jackson stopped Ricky Simon in the second round, and Tina Black stopped Melissa Amaya in the second.

In London on the same night, Johnny Fisher (15-1) won a majority decision over Michael Pirotton in the main event of Zuffa Boxing 11, 98-92, 96-95 and 95-95 over ten heavyweight rounds, in his first fight with the promotion. Pirotton was cut over the left eye in the fourth. Fisher struggled off his stool late, needed a seat at ringside to recover after the decision was read and skipped his post-fight interview. Radivoje Kalajdzic won a unanimous decision over Craig Richards at light heavyweight, 97-92 on all three cards, and dropped Richards with ten seconds left for good measure. In Birmingham, Liam Davies stopped Nathaniel Collins in the seventh round.

In Tokyo, Takuma Inoue kept the WBC bantamweight title with a unanimous decision over Tenshin Nasukawa in their rematch, 116-111, 116-111 and 114-113. Nasukawa dropped Inoue with a left hand early in the seventh round. Inoue survived it, led 77-74 on all three cards under the WBC's open scoring after eight, and held on through a closer finish than the early lead suggested. More on him below.

CONFIDENCE 0.90

Conor Benn is not fighting again any time soon. His trainer said it on the record this weekend, calling Benn burnt out two weeks after Ryan Garcia stopped him in the second round in Las Vegas. When the man running the camp says it publicly, it is not really a rumor. It also means Zuffa Boxing's $15 million debut signing has no date on the calendar and no obvious next opponent.

CONFIDENCE 0.60

Joshua vs. Fury still happens on December 11 as announced. Mike Coppinger reported the fight could be called off over issues tied to Dana White's role, and that a replacement main event was being discussed. Fury went on social media to accuse Joshua and Eddie Hearn of trying to pull out. White, asked Saturday whether the fight would happen, said, "That, I don't know." Turki Alalshikh is paying for it, and fights he pays for have a way of getting made once the lawyers finish. The problem is contractual, not financial, which is why this is not higher.

CONFIDENCE 0.55

The WBA hangs its 'super' heavyweight title on Joshua vs. Fury. Oleksandr Usyk gave that belt up in June, and reports have the WBA ready to put it on the fight. Murat Gassiev already holds the WBA's 'world' heavyweight title, and his co-promoter Ivaylo Gotzev said his team is formally seeking clarification from the WBA. Sanctioning fees are a percentage of the purses, and Frank Warren says these are the largest paydays any British fighter has ever had.

CONFIDENCE 0.30

Manny Pacquiao vs. Shakur Stevenson lands on the Cardiff card as a second main event. The talks are real, but they are talks, and they depend on the main event surviving its own paperwork first.

UFC 332: Natalia Silva vs. Wang Cong (October 3)

Delta Center in Salt Lake City, main card at 8 p.m. ET on Paramount+. Silva and Wang fight for the women's flyweight title, vacated when Valentina Shevchenko gave it up with an injury that is expected to keep her out for up to a year. Silva is 8-0 in the UFC and has won 14 straight since 2018. Wang has won four in a row, most recently a unanimous decision over Tracy Cortez at UFC 329 in July. Former flyweight champion Deiveson Figueiredo (25-7-1) faces Payton Talbott (11-1) at bantamweight in the co-main.

Sebastian Fundora vs. Ermal Hadribeaj (October 17)

The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, on TNT, truTV and DAZN. Fundora (24-1-1, 16 KOs) makes a mandatory defense of the WBC junior middleweight title on a three-fight knockout streak. Hadribeaj (23-0-1, 8 KOs) earned the shot by upsetting previously unbeaten Bakary Samake in a final eliminator in May. Brandon Figueroa defends the WBA featherweight title against Tomoki Kameda on the undercard.

Daniel Dubois vs. Fabio Wardley 2 (October 17)

The O2 in London, on DAZN. Dubois (23-3, 22 KOs) defends the WBO heavyweight title in a rematch of a fight he won by getting up from two early knockdowns and stopping Wardley in the 11th round. Wardley (20-1-1, 19 KOs) has one loss, and it came after he had Dubois down twice. Queensberry promotes.

Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury were announced Thursday for Friday, December 11 at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff, a 12-round heavyweight fight that has been talked about for a decade. The press release named Dana White, working with Turki Alalshikh's The Ring, as the promoter. Within a day, reports said the fight was in jeopardy, and the reason was the name on the press release.

It has been widely reported that Joshua's contract bars White, Zuffa and TKO from promoting the fight. Joshua's promoter is Eddie Hearn of Matchroom. Fury, for his part, has said he scrapped a clause in his own contract so White could be involved. White took questions about it at the Zuffa Boxing 11 press conference in London on Saturday and did not enjoy them.

"Have I not answered this question 257,000 times? Same as it was yesterday. And the day before. And the day before that."

He said, "We're promoting the fight right now." Asked about the clause in Joshua's contract, White said, "Eddie Hearn says lots of things." He also said he did not book the stadium. Cardiff came into play after Wembley proved unworkable and Team Joshua rejected Madison Square Garden.

This is the business story underneath the fight. White and Alalshikh have spent 2026 building Zuffa Boxing as a promotion that owns its fighters and its title inventory. Joshua-Fury is the biggest fight in British boxing, and White's name on it would be the promotion's largest event yet. Hearn's leverage is a contract. Alalshikh's is the money. White's is that he is already on the poster.

There is also a belt to sell. Reports have the WBA preparing to put its 'super' heavyweight title on the fight, a title Usyk gave up in June, while Gassiev still holds the WBA's 'world' title. The WBA's own president said in December 2024 that 67 percent of the organization's gross revenue came from sanctioning fees, which are charged as a percentage of the purses. On a fight Frank Warren says will pay both men more than any British fighter has ever earned, that is a very good reason to find a belt.

Zuffa Boxing, meanwhile, keeps building in the UK without Joshua or Fury. Saturday was its third card outside the United States, and it has already announced a November 7 show in London.

Takuma Inoue got up from a seventh-round knockdown in Tokyo and won the rest of the fight. That is the short version of his unanimous decision over Tenshin Nasukawa, 116-111, 116-111 and 114-113, and it is the best evidence yet that the WBC bantamweight champion is more than the younger brother of Naoya Inoue.

He is 30 and now 23-2 with five knockouts, which tells you most of what you need to know about his style. Takuma does not end fights. He wins rounds, with fast combinations on the inside and a right hand that kept finding Nasukawa late. He won the vacant title against Nasukawa last November and defended it in May with a wide decision over Kazuto Ioka on the undercard of his brother's undisputed fight with Junto Nakatani at the Tokyo Dome.

The rematch tested something the first fight did not. Nasukawa, 28 and a former kickboxing champion, had improved enough to beat Juan Francisco Estrada in April, and his southpaw left hand won him several of the early rounds. Early in the seventh it put Inoue down hard. Referee Michael Griffin let it continue, Inoue got to the ropes, took more shots and made it to the bell. By the end of the eighth, the WBC's open scoring had Inoue ahead 77-74 on all three cards.

Nasukawa needed all four remaining rounds and did not get them. He made the late rounds closer, enough that one judge ended up at 114-113, but Inoue's right hand kept finding him and Inoue boxed carefully through the 12th. Survival is a skill, and plenty of champions with better knockout numbers have never had to show they have it. Takuma just did.