The UFC is back to business in Busan, South Korea on Saturday with the anticipated UFC Busan card.
UFC Busan will be headlined by a featherweight fight between Korean legend “The Korean Zombie” Chan Sung Jung and Frankie Edgar. The Korean Zombie was originally expected to fight Brian Ortega. However, the 28-year old suffered a partially torn ACL during a sparring session. He is still eyeing a fight against Sung Jung in early 2020 but he had to pull out, leaving Frankie Edgar to step up as a last-minute replacement.
In his last bout, the former UFC lightweight champion Edgar attempted to dethrone the former featherweight champion, Max Holloway. His attempts were futile as Edgar lost via unanimous decision. He was expected to fight No 4 ranked bantamweight Cory Sandhagen at UFC Raleigh, but shifted his focus to UFC Busan instead, leaving Sandhagen disgruntled and without an opponent.
In the UFC Busan co-main event, Swiss knockout artist Volkan Oezdemir will face Aleksandar Rakic in a light heavyweight showdown. Rakic has a near-perfect (12-1) with his only loss dating back to 2011 during his professional MMA debut. He hasn’t lost a fight since, but Oezdemir will look to change and recreate the same success he had in his last fight against Ilir Latifi. The heavy hitter finished Latifi with punches in the second round of their August 2019 bout. Rakic, meanwhile, is riding a Knockout of the Year contender over Jimi Manuwa.
The rest of the UFC Busan fight card is filled with Korean fighting talent. This includes Doo Ho Choi. This rising featherweight star has earned first-round finishes in all of his first three UFC wins and earned Performance of the Night awards in two. However, “The Korean Superboy” came up short in his last two UFC fights, losing to seasoned fighters Cub Swanson and Jeremy Stephens. He will be looking to vindicate his recent losses against Charles Jourdain in his UFC Busan fight.
Get the full UFC Busan fight card below:
UFC Busan Fight Card:
UFC Busan Main Card | 5:00am ET on ESPN+
145 lbs.: Frankie Edgar vs. “Korean Zombie” Chan Sung Jung
205 lbs: Volkan Oezdemir vs. Alexander Rakic
145 lbs: Doo Ho Choi vs. Charles Jourdain
205 lbs: Da Un Jung vs. Mike Rodriguez
185 lbs: Marc-Andre Barriault vs. Jun Yong Park
135 lbs: Kyung Ho Kang vs. Liu Pingyuan
UFC Busan Prelims | 2:00am ET on ESPN+
265 lbs: Tanner Boser vs. Ciryl Gane
145 lbs: Suman Mokhtarian vs. Seungwoo Choi
155 lbs: Dong Hyun Ma vs. Omar Morales
125 lbs: Alexandre Pantoja vs. Matt Schnell
135 lbs: Raoni Barcelos vs. Said Nurmagomedov
115 lbs: Miranda Granger vs. Amanda Lemos
135 lbs: Heili Alateng vs. Ryan Benoit
This article first appeared on BJPENN.com on 12/20/2019.