It was only a matter of time before Jorge Masvidal and Colby Covington locked horns. Judgment day is now coming.
DAZN News has learned from multiple sources that Masvidal and Covington will headline UFC 272 on March 5 from T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. UFC chief business officer Hunter Campbell broke the news first to ESPN. Initially, UFC 272 was set to have a main event of Aljamain Sterling and Petr Yan in a bantamweight title unification bout. However, that fight is expected to be moved to UFC 273 in April, the same sources told DAZN News.
Masvidal and Covington have a storied history. They were training partners and excellent friends outside the American Top Team gym in Coconut Creek. Fla. Masvidal and Covington were close to the point where the former interim welterweight champion moved in with the BMF titlist and they appeared at one another's fights. But a dispute over a non-payment of a coach forced a break-up between the parties, with Masvidal alleging Covington stiffed the coach. Covington has always denied the accusation.
The verbal sparring continued and got highly personal to the point where ATT founder Dan Lambert made a rule forbidding teammates from spewing trash talk towards one another except when they were scheduled to fight. In addition, Lambert took extra precautions to ensure that Masvidal and Covington didn't cross paths.
Not happy about the new rules, Covington left the gym.
Masvidal's (35-15) and Covington's (16-3) most recent fights were both defeats to current welterweight champion Kamaru Usman. "Gamebred" lost via second-round knockout to Usman at UFC 261 last April. In November, Covington came up short, losing via unanimous decision to Usman at UFC 268.