Mario Piazzon returns to Dana White's Contender Series with another shot at earning a UFC deal, and he likes the atmosphere built around his heavyweight clash with Guilherme Uriel on Aug. 25 in Las Vegas.

The Brazilian heavyweight duo will collide Saturday night at the Meta Apex, and there seems to be bad blood between camps. Piazzon and Uriel touched foreheads during the final face-off following Monday's official weigh-ins.

“He blocked me and everyone around me on Instagram, but I kept my Instagram exactly the way it was,†Piazzon told MMA Fighting. “I've never said anything about him. From my side, there's nothing, but if he looks at me differently when the time comes, things are going to get ugly. I'm already going to be throwing down on Tuesday like that, so imagine if he looks at me the wrong way. It's going to start at the faceoff.â€

Piazzon had similar experience on his first DWCS appearance in September 2023, when he left victorious after Alexander Soldatkin was disqualified for landing an illegal knee in the third round. Piazzon said the Russian and his team were acting cocky and disrespectful throughout fight week.

“I like that hostile atmosphere,†Piazzon said. “Last season, Soldatkin would walk past me with a lot of attitude. He would disrespect me, look at me like I was nothing. Serghei Spivac was with him, and he would look at me and disrespect me too, and that started making me really angry. I was like, fuck, he's not going to have all those guys around him on Tuesday. It's just going to be me and him there. Once that cage closes, we're going to throw down. There won't be anyone else, and he's going to see that he can't just keep looking at me like that.â€

Neither fighter signed with the UFC that night, but Piazzon felt that “opportunity†helped him get better in many aspects.

“It was a mix of emotions,†Piazzon said of competing on DWCS in 2023. “I went into it thinking it was the opportunity of my life, against a very tough guy. That was the toughest heavyweight fight on that season. He was the guy who was about to get into the UFC, and I was the biggest underdog that night. The difference between us in the odds was huge. I went in, trusted my work and my team. I came out of there with the experience that I'm tough too, that I'm good too. I believe in myself, and I have the potential to be fighting among the top 15 in the UFC.â€

The road back to DWCS was a long one, enough time for Piazzon to suffer a brutal upset loss in Brazil and rebound from that. Piazzon's third post-DWCS fight was a clash with MMA journeyman Alex Junius in Sao Paulo, and he was stopped in under three minutes by a fighter who had lost 20 of his previous 24 fights for a record of 15-39.

“It was the biggest learning experience of my life, man,†Piazzon said. “I really needed to go through that loss. I was on a run where I kept winning, winning, winning, and I thought I was unbeatable. And it happened against a guy that, today, I know that if we fought 10 times, I'd beat him 11 times. But I also took a huge lesson from it. There's no reason to underestimate another person. There's another fighter in there who is chasing his dream too. I just wasn't myself. I was more apathetic. That loss made me better as a person. Not just as an athlete, but I think the biggest change I went through was as a person.â€

Since then, Piazzon won't enter any fight thinking it's going to be an easy win. That doesn't mean, however, he's not confident in his skills against Uriel, who was finished by Josh Hokit in his previous Contender Series fight in 2025.

“I don't like underestimating anyone,†Piazzon said. “He's doing his job, just like I am, but there are levels in this sport. I had a very tough journey to get back to Contender Series. Guilherme is a tough guy and all that, but once I get my hands on him, he won't stay on his feet. When I take him down, I'm going to slice his face open.â€

ESPN is once again raising prices on its subscription services, including both the unlimited and select plans for customers.

The price increase goes into effect on Sept. 17 with ESPN Unlimited —the service that includes all of ESPN's programming from linear networks like ESPN and ESPN2 plus WWE premium live events and the PFL lineup of events — going from $29.99 to $31.99 per month.

The annual cost of the plan is increasing from $299.99 to $319.99 per year.

ESPN Select — the scaled down version with less options — is going from $12.99 to $13.99 per month with the annual plan increasing from $129.99 to 139.99 per year.

ESPN has not stated how many subscribers are currently signed up for the new Unlimited service.

Of course the timing of the price increase isn't all that surprising with the NFL season about to kick off in two weeks' time with ESPN also recently integrating all the programming from the NFL Network onto the subscription service as well.

For combat sports fans, the PFL is the only major MMA promotion still airing fights on ESPN after the UFC's seven year deal with the Disney owned network came to an end and all programming moved to Paramount. PFL recently merged with Jake Paul's MVP with plans to launch a rebranded MVP MMA in 2027 but the promotion is still searching for a new broadcast deal.

PFL's current contract with ESPN runs through the end of 2026 but there's no word if the promotion is still discussing a possible extension or potentially focused on moving onto a new network starting in 2027.

Gregory Rodrigues is one of the biggest middleweights on the entire UFC roster, but he barely outweighed Anthony “Fluffy†Hernandez for their five-round main event at UFC Sacramento this past Saturday night.

On Monday, the California State Athletic Commission shared the fight night weights for all of the athletes on the card with MMA Fighting. The commission started tracking fight night weights in an effort to curb extreme weight cutting in combat sports.

At the top of the card, Rodrigues hit the scale at 185 pounds on Friday before packing on an additional 19.4 pounds to weight 204.4 pounds on fight night. As for Hernandez, he was 186 pounds on Friday before adding 16.2 pounds to weight 202.2 pounds for his fight.

Further down the card, Reinier de Ridder made his light heavyweight debut in the UFC after previously competing at 185 pounds in the promotion. On Friday, de Ridder hit the scale at 205 pounds exactly before adding 16.8 pounds to weigh 221.8 pounds for fight night.

His opponent Roman Dolidze was 206 pounds on Friday before adding 20.2 pounds to weigh 226.2 pounds for the fight on Saturday.

The biggest weight gain on the card came from Brazilian Marcio Barbosa, who weighed 145.5 pounds for his featherweight fight and he added a whopping 25.5 pounds to weigh 171 pounds for fight night. His opponent Ryan Kuse weighed 153.2 pounds on fight night, which means Barbosa outweighed him by nearly 20 pounds.

Here are the full fight night weights for UFC Sacramento including the percentage of weight gained:

Gregory Rodrigues: 185 to 204.4 (19.4 pounds), 10%

Anthony Hernandez: 186 to 202.2 (16.2 pounds), 9%

Vitor Petrino: 246 to 252.2 (6.2 pounds), 3%

Serghei Spivak: 257 to 254.6 (-2.4 pounds), -1%

Roman Dolidze: 206 to 226.2 (20.2 pounds) 10%

Reinier de Ridder: 205 to 221.8 (16.8 pounds), 8%

Mason Jones: 156 to 177.2 (21.2 pounds), 14%

Marquel Mederos: 156 to 177.4 (21.4 pounds), 14%

Jeisla Chaves: 124.5 to 137.4 (12.9 pounds)

Carli Judice: 125.5 to 136.6 (11.1 pounds), 9%

Terrance Chatman: 266 to 269.2 (3.2 pounds), 1%

Anthony Wint: 231 to 232.8 (1.8 pounds), 1%

Lerryan Douglas: 145.5 to 162.8 (17.3 pounds), 12%

Jamall Emmers: 143.5 to 156.8 (13.3 pounds), 9%

Shamil Gaziev: 261 to 267.4 (6.4 pounds), 2%

Kennedy Nzechukwu: 244 to 241.6 (-2.4 pounds), -1%

Nasrat Haqparast: 155.5 to 173.4 (17.9 pounds), 12%

Chris Padilla: 156 to 170.2 (14.2 pounds), 9%

Ryan Kuse: 144.5 to 153.2 (8.7 pounds), 6%

Marcio Barbosa: 145.5 to 171 (25.5 pounds), 18%

Stan Dorsainvil: 155.5 to 179 (23.5 pounds), 15%

Gauge Young: 155.5 to 180.2 (24.7 pounds), 16%

Jackson McVey: 185 to 207.8 (22.8 pounds), 12%

Wes Schultz: 186 to 209 (23 pounds), 12%

Elise Reed: 115 to 125 (10 pounds), 9%

Shanelle Dyer: 116 to 125 (9 pounds), 8%