After fighters in the main and co-main events were forced Tuesday to withdraw from UFC 153 with injuries, only one thing remained certain: UFC president Dana White will, under no circumstances, postpone the card scheduled for Oct. 13 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Other than that, though, little is known about what will happen to the pay-per-view card after featherweight champion Jose Aldo (ankle) and ex-light heavyweight champion Quinton "Rampage" Jackson (elbow) were forced to pull out.
Aldo was originally scheduled to headline against Erik Koch at UFC 148 in Calgary on July 21, but had to pull out of that fight with an injury. Then, last week, Koch was injured and had to pull out of UFC 153. The UFC replaced him with former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar.
The Aldo-Edgar fight added a lot of sizzle to the top of the card, which also included a highly anticipated light heavyweight match between Jackson and the highly regarded Glover Teixeira.
First, White tweeted Tuesday that Jackson had to pull out because of an injury, reportedly to an elbow. Then, minutes later, he tweeted the news that injuries Aldo suffered when the motorcycle he was driving was hit by a car would force him to withdraw from the card.
A report surfaced later Tuesday on a Brazilian website quoting Aldo as saying he wasn't injured and would still fight.
I do not know anything about that.?I'm fine, I just train. No [the accident didn't hamper my training], I'm training normal. For me there was nothing spoken. Even on one leg I would fight.
A UFC spokeswoman returned a call for White. She said that Aldo had been told to keep quiet about his injury until the UFC could make a determination about what to do and that Aldo was unaware White released the news. She said he was just following orders when he denied being off the card.
[Related: Glover Teixeira without an opponent after 'Rampage' hurts elbow]
After having last month been forced to cancel UFC 151, which was scheduled for Sept. 1 in Las Vegas, because of an injury to Dan Henderson, White was determined to never cancel another show. That was the first cancelation in UFC history. Reports are that the cancelation cost the UFC more than $20 million.
White said Tuesday during a brief stop at the Yahoo! Sports offices in Santa Monica, Calif., that he had just learned of the news and didn't have anything to announce.
The only thing to be sure of is that he will under no circumstances cancel this card.
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