UFC Women’s Bantamweight Champion Amanda Nunes was pulled from a title defense against Valantina Shevchenko at UFC 213 because she was dealing with a bout of chronic sinusitis.
Conan Silveira, the longtime coach of Nunes, blames the Las Vegas heat for contributing to the condition that caused her to miss the fight.
"She was already feeling it before the weigh-ins,” Silveira told MMA Fighting. "Las Vegas is too hot, so I think that contributed to her chronic sinusitis, and the weight cut doesn’t help since you dehydrate. I don’t want to blame the weight cut, but it definitely doesn’t help. That has happened before, but we managed to come back, but it wasn’t as hard as this time. People don’t understand that that’s a big responsibility. You invest a lot to get to this position. You have to be 100 percent."
Nunes is no longer going to be headlining UFC events according to the UFC President in Dana White, which is the same thing White said about former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones after the UFC 200 fiasco.
Silveira isn’t much of a fan of White at the moment, wondering just why he is giving his fighter so much hell.
"If you have a mouth you can say whatever you want,” Silveira said. "Every person has their own opinion. What he said is what a promoter says. It was enough for him to hear the doctor clearing her, but at the end of the day, Amanda is the one who steps in there to fight. Opinions from everyone else are nothing but opinions. You have to respect her decision. She’s the champion. What everyone else says means nothing. If any other fighter is ill, nobody says anything. Everyone has this right. But she doesn’t because the champion? She has no right to get ill? He’s the promoter and has his opinion. That’s what he got from the doctor. Amanda went back to the hospital the next morning (Saturday) and did other tests and they saw she had chronic sinusitis and gave her antibiotics."
White also said the bout may be rescheduled for UFC 215, which takes place this coming September in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
