Junior dos Santos out of grappling match with Fabricio Werdum

Junior dos Santos has withdrawn from a scheduled grappling match against fellow former UFC heavyweight champion Fabricio Werdum, cancelling their August 8 bout at Kings Championship in Florianopolis, Brazil. Dos Santos announced the withdrawal on Monday, though he indicated openness to facing Werdum in grappling competition at a future date. Kings Championship has not yet confirmed whether Werdum will be reassigned to a different opponent or removed from the card entirely.

The two heavyweights have a storied history under MMA rules. Dos Santos scored a stunning 81-second knockout victory over Werdum at UFC 90 in 2009—a major upset at the time. Fourteen years later, they rematched in bare-knuckle MMA, with dos Santos winning by decision. Werdum's loss in that bareknuckle encounter marked his return to combat sports after retiring from MMA in 2024, which followed a controversial bout under the PFL banner against Renan Ferreira.

Dos Santos has been competing sporadically in recent years. After wins at Gamebred Bareknuckle MMA—including the victory over Werdum and a heavyweight title triumph via knockout of Alan Belcher in 2024—he stepped into the MMA cage again this past May on an MVP show streamed on Netflix, where he suffered a knockout loss to Robelis Despaigne. The grappling match against Werdum would have marked another venture outside traditional MMA for the former champion.