There was a lot of confusion surrounding the UFC 205 weigh-ins on Friday.
The first big news that started filtering through earlier in the day was that it looked like top welterweight Kelvin Gastelum wasn't going to make weight.
Sure enough, Gastelum, who has a history of missing weight, never weighed in and his main card fight against Donald Cerrone was scrapped. Cerrone successfully made weight, tipping the scales at 170.4 lbs.
Cowboy will receive his show money, but will not be fighting on the landmark card.
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Both Thiago Alves and Jim Miller missed weight for their lightweight bout on the preliminary card. The Brazilian came in at 162.6 lb and will be fined 20% of his purse as a result.
Interestingly, Miller was on course to make weight but began rehydrating early to weigh in at 157.6 lb. This was because the Commission requires fighters to be within five pounds of each other in order to let the fight actually happen. He will not be fined for missing weight and the duo will be duking it out in a 163 lb catchweight bout. However, if Alves weighs more than 173 lb on fight night, it will be scrapped entirely.
Then we come to the big surprise of the day. Top-ranked middleweight Jacare Souza who showed up and weighed in four pounds over the middleweight limit despite not having a fight booked for the card.
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There were rumblings that the Brazilian may have been brought in to replace Rashad Evans, who was
pulled from his fight with Tim Kennedy due to an issue with his medical testing. This rumour intensified when Kennedy weighed in at 185.6 lbs, but he will not be fighting on the card and he only weighed in to get his show money.
Jacare was actually waiting in the wings as an alternate for the potential middleweight title eliminator bout between former champion Chris Weidman and Olympian Yoel Romero. Since there were no issues with either Weidman or Romero, that fight will still go ahead as planned and Jacare will not be competing on the night.
Once he had heard that both fighters were healthy and had come in on weight, Jacare stopped cutting, but still weighed in to secure compensation for his bout against Luke Rockhold that had been scheduled for UFC Melbourne at the end of the month, but fell through when the former champ got injured.
