It’s been a wild journey for Jack Hermansson (21-5) leading up to the UFC Vegas 16 main event. The promotion’s fourth ranked middleweight is getting his third headlining fight, but he’s had to stay on his toes on who he’d be facing.
Originally, the UFC announced that Hermansson would be taking on Darren Till at UFC Vegas 16. These two men had some fun back and forth over social media and it was a fight that the fans were really excited for.
However, Darren Till sustained an injury and he was forced to pull out of the fight. The UFC went to work and decided to have Hermansson fight Kevin Holland. Holland has made a strong case for fighter of the year going 4-0 in 2020 thus far.
Kevin Holland was nicknamed loudmouth by Dana White because he simply doesn’t stop talking in the cage. Holland was getting the biggest opportunity of his career headlining against a top UFC middleweight like Hermansson.
Hermansson had no issues taking the fight against Holland. Then, last week, Holland tested positive for COVID-19 and he was forced out of the UFC Vegas 16 main event. That is when the promotion turned to Marvin Vettori (15-4-1).
Vettori was scheduled to take on Jacare Souza at UFC 256, but the promotion wanted him to move up. Once again, Hermansson didn’t care about who the replacement was. Without even thinking about it, Hermansson accepted the fight.Â
It’s just about a UFC fight for Hermansson
There has been so many cases in the history of the UFC where a fight gets scrapped altogether if one person falls out. Sometimes the UFC can’t find a replacement opponent and other times the main event fighter doesn’t want to fight the replacement.
Hermansson is not one of those guys. He appeared on Ariel Helwani’s MMA show today to talk about the wild ride leading up to this weekend. Helwani asked Hermansson about the opponent changes and if he ever thought of saying no.
“It didn’t matter who it was, you know? As long as I have a fight, I’m all good. I’m here in Vegas to fight and they can put anyone in front of me now,” Hermansson told Helwani.
If you weren’t a fan of Hermansson before, how could you not love the guy after an answer like that. One of the best middleweights in the UFC and he doesn’t care about who the opponent is, he just wants to fight.
Marvin Vettori is no joke and this fight is not expected to be an easy one for Hermansson. However, as he said, he doesn’t care about who the opponent is or how hard the fight will be. For Jack Hermansson, it’s just about getting in there and fighting on Saturday night.