UFC 176 Main Fight Card Aldo vs Mendes Cancelled

It's official. After days speculating what bout will take place after Jose Aldo was withdrawn from the main event against Chad Mendes, UFC finally announced that UFC 176 will not push through on August 2.

"The featherweight championship fight between Aldo and Mendes is expected to take place later this year and all other fights previously slated for UFC 176 are being rescheduled for upcoming cards," the UFC statement said. This marks the second time--the first is UFC 151 in 2012--that the present ownership cancelled a pay-per-view event, Yahoo Sports says. 

Aldo suffered an injury in July 1 that took him out of the fight card, a rematch of UFC 142 in January 14, 2012, but UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta said mid-October is a good tentative schedule at this point, the report adds. According to MMA Fighting, Aldo's injury will not allow him to train for three to four weeks. 

"At the end of the day, this doesn't happen very often, but in pay-per-views, we want to maintain where we have a title on the line," Fertitta told Yahoo Sports on the postponement. But Bleacher Report is thinking it is as good as cancelled. 

After a KO at UFC 142, Aldo now has a 17-fight winning streak, the Bleacher Report says. Since losing, on the other hand, Mendes has a five-fight streak, four off a knockout. The way it stands, it will take more patience for fans to see which streak will have to stop at the other's success.

The report said that UFC 176 would also have featured matches between Danny Castillo and Tony Ferguson, Bobby Green and Abel Trujillo, and Fabricio Camoes and returning Gray Maynard. The Ronaldo Souza and Gegard Mousasi fight has to be rescheduled, too. 

Fertitta confirmed in the Yahoo Sports report what fans have been talking about since Aldo was out of the match: Ronda Rousey was mulled as a replacement. It hasn't progressed though, with the backup plan doomed after Rousey broke her right hand in her shortlived match against Alexis Davis and was scheduled for a knee surgery. 

According to the UFC statement: "Ticket refunds [for UFC 176] will be offered at the original point of purchase." Tickets bought via www.axs.com or Purchase By Phone will be refunded automatically. Beginning July 9, tickets purchased from Staples Center box office will be refunded there. 

Meanwhile, still taking from the statement, UFC 177, a bantamweight championship duel between T.J. Dillashaw and Renan Barao, will resume at Sleep Train Arena in Sacramento, California, and tickets will be on sale on July 18.