Brock Lesnar vs. Junior dos Santos, a high-profile summer UFC fight which had been the hype focus of the current “Ultimate Fighter” season, will no longer be happening, thanks to the unfortunate return of Lesnar’s diverticulitis.
White confirmed that the illness, which kept Lesnar out of action for an extended period of time in 2009 and 2010 and even hinted at threatening his career, has returned, forcing UFC to substitute Shane Carwin into the bout.
“Former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar has diverticulitis again,” said White. “He spent all day yesterday over at the Mayo Clinic and he’s gone through a bumper to bumper of tests. This thing acted up on him again, he’s got some serious choices to make in the next couple of weeks on whether to fight this thing or take the surgery.”
While the illness will sideline Lesnar and keep him out of the immediate title picture–it now appears either Dos Santos or Carwin will clinch an Octagon date with Heavyweight Champion Cain Velasquez–the wrestler-turned-UFC champ is confident his career is not over.
“I’ll tell you one thing: I’m not retiring. This isn’t the end of my fight career. I have a strong faith that there’s a solution to every problem. I just gotta find the right solution to fix this problem. I love this sport and I love what I do. This isn’t the end of Brock Lesnar.”
Lesnar also issued an extended statement to UFC.com:
“I want to thank the UFC and Mr. White, and I want to apologize to Junior dos Santos and Spike TV…This is an unfortunate situation for me. I dodged a bullet about two years ago with diverticulitis by not having the surgery. But diverticulitis is an illness that never goes away. It’s something that I’ve dealt with since my first occurrence and have been battling with it. I’ve been able to maintain it to a point where it’s tolerable, and I was able to go through two training camps. I’ve been dealing with some symptoms over the last three months, and during the course of this training camp, I felt another infection and got a CT scan done on my stomach, where there was visible inflation. It didn’t allow me to train to my full capabilities, and I was forced to make a decision to go back down to the doctor this week to figure out how far this thing was along. It’s not as serious as last time. It just didn’t allow me to train the way I needed to train for a number one contender’s bout. I am forced with the decision to either have surgery or to deal with this for the rest of my life. So I’m fighting a different fight here. It was a hard decision (to pull out of the fight), I’m choked up about it, but there’s nothing I can do.”