By: Frank Hyden, MMATorch Senior Columnist

There were no events this past weekend so I’ll just cover some MMA news. Sorry if this is short this week. There’s fight cards next week so bear with me.

Dana White was on Logan Paul’s podcast Impaulsive last week and he
talked about what 2026 will bring in the UFC and other aspects of his businesses.

In 2026 there will be-

44 UFC events
This means that there will only be 8 weekends out of the year in which
there isn’t a UFC event going on. That’s good for people who just want
something to watch. That’s not so good for people who are hoping for
better cards. However, now that the UFC is coming to Paramount+ and
all of their events will shown there for no additional charge, this is
less of a problem because a yearly Paramount+ subscription costs less
than a single UFC Pay-Per-View for the Essential (with ads) or less
than two UFC PPV’s for the Premium (no ads) plan.
As of now, there has been no clarification as to whether the UFC events will be limited to the Premium tier or if they’ll be available
on the Essential tier as well.

16-18 Zuffa Boxing events
For boxing fans, this hopefully means a lot of great boxing cards are
on the horizon. Whether it works out that way we’ll have to wait to
see but it’s certainly possible.
This is just my speculation but I would imagine that these 16-18
events would be structured similarly to the Alvarez vs. Crawford event, which was three separate cards (all on consecutive days) that
lead up to the big fight between Canelo Alvarez (63-3-2) and Terence Crawford (42-0).
In other words, 6 big boxing matches with a few other, smaller, events built around them.

14 UFC BJJ events
There have been two UFC Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu events so far, one in June
2025 and one in July 2025. The structure is similar to MMA in that
there are 3 five-minute rounds, with judges rendering their verdict
for bouts that go to the time limit. Four champions have been crowned so far-

Men’s Light Heavyweight Mason Fowler (1-0 UFC BJJ, 2-0 MMA)
Men’s Welterweight Andrew Tackett (4-0 UFC BJJ)
Men’s Lightweight Carlos Henrique (3-0 UFC BJJ)
Men’s Bantamweight Mikey Musumeci (25-2 BJJ,
includes 1-0 UFC BJJ)

12 Power Slap events
There’s been 17 events since 2023 in the history of Power Slap. There are six champions currently-

Men’s Super Heavyweight Dayne Viernes
Men’s Heavyweight Damien Dibbell
Men’s Light Heavyweight Ron Bata
Men’s Middleweight Branden Bordeaux
Men’s Welterweight Anthony Blackburn
Men’s Lightweight Robert Trujillo

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Rafael Fiziev (13-4) had to pull out of his scheduled main event fight against Charles Oliveira (35-11, 1 No Contest) at UFC Rio on October
11, 2025 due to an injury. A replacement is currently being sought, with many fighters throwing their names out there for consideration.

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Boxing legend Ricky Hatton (45-3) died last week. Hatton won numerous
titles over the course of his career and was immensely popular everywhere he went, though most noticeably in his home country of
England. His fans traveled, too. They would often make more noise than
Hatton’s opponents, even when the opponent was the hometown fighter.
My condolences to his family and friends.

My new epic fantasy book is out. It’s called Kingdom of Zarias: The End’s
Beginning. The exciting epic fantasy series Kingdom of Zarias returns with the 4th book in the series. After the harrowing events of
Book 3 the residents of the Kingdom of Zarias continue on their paths.
Serena Summers continues to learn and grow as a fighter, desperately
seeking to become stronger before she loses anyone else in her life.
Daniel Summers discovers new parts of the world that open his eyes to
just how little he truly knows. A new hero, Lamar Abeers, arrives to join the fight against evil. Plus, Zach Summers, Tiana Highsmith, and
Xavien Ekens continue their journeys with their friends, and a new
ruler of Vhaharen is crowned. The world has found a little peace.
However, that peace is only temporary. In a shocking act of violence,
the monstrous villain Galren strikes from the shadows and changes the
world forever. This is Book 4 in the series. There’s lots of action, magic, and monsters in the Kingdom of Zarias. It’s like a tabletop
game in novel form. It’s on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and many other
places. If you’re interested, I would greatly appreciate it if you would check it out and support me.Thank you very much, have a good day.

Comments and suggestions can be emailed to me at
hydenfrank@gmail.com and you can follow me on Twitter at @hydenfrank.
Thanks for reading and have a good day.