Big Ben out, Hapa in at UFC 203

Travis Browne gets the opportunity to jump right back up into heavyweight title contention next month at UFC 203 after he was named as Ben Rothwell’s replacement to face former champion Fabricio Werdum.

‘Big’ Ben was pulled from the Cleveland, Ohio, co-main event bout yesterday due to a knee injury. Reports indicate it could be a torn meniscus or damage to his ACL. Rothwell has yet to make any public comment on this unfortunate set back.

However, no sooner had the news broke than heavyweight’s Derrick ‘The Black Beast’ Lewis and Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva both went to social media to throw their names into the hat. Yet minutes later it was revealed that ‘Hapa’ Browne was the man who got the call from the UFC and will now step in on four-weeks notice.

Browne will get his chance at redemption following a unanimous decision loss to Werdum on a UFC on Fox show in April of 2014. Since then it’s been a rocky road for ‘Mr Ronda Rousey’, picking up wins against Brendan Schaub and Matt Mitrione, but also suffering losses against Andre Arlovski and most recently Cain Velasquez at UFC 200.

For Werdum, a win in the co-main event at UFC 203 could earn him another title shot against champion Stipe Miocic before the end of the year, with local hero Miocic attempting to make the first defence of his title against Alistair Overeem.