The UFC’s newest division, the women’s flyweight division, has been off to a slow start. Since a premature announcement that the division was being formed, the women’s 125-pound division has been in an odd state of hiatus as the UFC awaits the conclusion of the 26th main season of The Ultimate Fighter to crown the division’s first champion.
During UFC 217, popular UFC strawweight competitor Paige VanZant announced via her Twitter that she will be fighting for the strawweight title in her next fight. That turned out not to be true, as VanZant admitted on Monday’s episode of The MMA Hour, but VanZant did confirm that she would be fighting Jessy Rose-Clark at UFC Fight Night 124 on January 14th.
Before VanZant officially announced her upcoming bout, there had been reports that VanZant already turned down a fight with Valentina Shevchenko in what would have been a Strawweight fight. Now, another UFC fighter claims to have agreed to a fight with VanZant, just to have VanZant refuse to fight them.
Jessica Eye took to Twitter to post a photo of the contract that she was given by the UFC that would have locked her in with a fight opposite VanZant. The contract details a $25,000 purse with an equal win bonus. The date of January 14th is confirmed as well as a $60 per diem allowance from the UFC for fight week expenses. Eye included a caption for the photo which called VanZant out for having been offered the fight with Eye, but apparently turning it down.
Eye has since deleted the post from her account.
Hey @arielhelwani since you only have PvZ can I come on to tell what really happen .That’s contract number 2 because @ufc just sends us random fight contracts. GTFOH SMH pic.twitter.com/7Q4iarpF6G
— Jessica Eye (@jessicaevileye) November 27, 2017
Eye is set to fight Kalindra Karia on the same card as VanZant.
This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 11/27/2017.