Former bantamweight champion Cody Garbrandt just doesn’t seem to catch a break. After multiple pullouts by his opponents last year, the 31-year-old is yet again left without an opponent for UFC 285. As per reports, Julio Arce, who Garbrandt was meant to face on 4th March, has had to pull out of the event due to an injury. Now, this would have been a great opportunity for the former champ to make a comeback after losing five of his last six fights. But Arce’s withdrawal means the 31-year-old is left with an uncertain future, at least in the short term. 

UFC 285 is meant to be one of the biggest cards of the year. Headlined by a returning Jon Jones, it would have been the perfect stage for Cody Garbrandt to catch a win and shut down his haters.

Cody Garbrandt left without an opponent yet again for UFC 285 after opponent withdraws; Fans react to the news 

The news was first broken by a tweet from Marcel Dorff of Eurosport. Although he did not give away any further details, Dorff did reveal that UFC would prefer to have Garbrandt on the card.

“Julio Arce is injured. He is out of his scheduled fight against Cody Garbrandt at #UFC285 on March 4th.” read his Tweet.

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Now, as fans caught hold of the news, reactions started pouring in, most of which were just suggestions as to who could fill in Arce’s spot. Let’s take a look at some of the reactions.

Let’s start with a couple of surprising responses which suggested a rematch with Dominick Cruz.

Someone even wanted UFC to re-sign Kris Mountiho in order to give Cody Garbrandt a chance to win. Moutinho, as fans will remember, was picked apart by Sean O’Malley at UFC 264.

A couple of fans wanted Deiveson Figueiredo to climb up a division and face Garbrandt.

For some reason, a few fans felt Umar Nurmagomedov would be a good match-up for ‘No Love’. I think we all know how this ends.

Although one clearly didn’t want the fight.

One individual wondered if the former champ had some sort of curse on him.

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How could there not be a joke on Garbrandt’s chin? 

Third time since July 2021, Garbrandt’s opponents have pulled out

Unfortunately for the 31-year-old, this is the third time since 2021 that he has seen his opponent withdraw. Last year, his fight against Rani Yahya fell away twice, once in July and again in October. Although he ended up fighting Kai Kara France in December, Garbrandt eventually lost the fight in the first round. With his current losing skid, this fight would have been a must-win situation for the former bantamweight champ, but unfortunately, he might either have to sit out of the event or face a completely different opponent.

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Considering all the jokes that usually go around when he loses, the reactions were not surprising. Although some of the names that were thrown around were quite surprising, there’s no doubt that a possible rematch with Dominick Cruz does sounds like an intriguing one.