Aljamain Sterling vs. Henry Cejudo Fight Being Finalized; Likely for UFC 288 Card
UFC is targeting May 6 for a bantamweight title fight between Aljamain Sterling and Henry Cejudo.
Sterling announced the fight on his Weekly Scraps podcast:
Cejudo also discussed the proposed fight on the debut episode of Demetrious Johnson's YouTube show, writing on Instagram he doesn't trust anything until the contract is officially signed.
Per ESPN's Brett Okamoto, May 6 is expected to be the UFC 288 pay-per-view at a location still to be determined.
Cejudo caught many people by surprise when he announced his retirement from fighting immediately after defeating Dominick Cruz to retain the 135-pound championship at UFC 249 in May 2020.
The move was stunning because Cejudo, who was only 33 at the time, was a double champion with the bantamweight and flyweight titles.
After two years away, Cejudo tweeted in April 2022 he was coming back after Alexander Volkanovski called out everyone in the featherweight division:
Nearly 10 months since his statement, Cejudo has yet to step back into the Octagon.
Okamoto noted UFC has had an interest in a showdown between Sterling and Cejudo since Sterling retained his title against T.J. Dillashaw at the UFC 280 event in October 2022.
"The fight likely would have happened sooner, potentially next month, but Sterling has been rehabbing a lingering injury to his bicep," Okamoto wrote.
Sterling is in the best stretch of his career. Funk Master has won eight consecutive fights dating back to 2018. He won the bantamweight title from Petr Yan at UFC 259 when Yan was disqualified late in the fourth round for an illegal knee.
"Everything I worked for to this point, and to have the fight go like that," Sterling said after the controversial victory. "I thought the fight was very close; I thought I was down two rounds. That's not the way I wanted to win. That's not the way I envisioned this. I just took the belt off."
Sterling became the undisputed bantamweight champion with a split-decision win over Yan at UFC 273.
