Khamzat Chimaev, who made a meteoric rise with three stunning performances in his first two months in the UFC, has faced significant setbacks recently.
Specifically, Chimaev has had only four fights since the beginning of 2021.
And, even though the fans were eagerly anticipating his bout against former middleweight champion Robert Whittaker at UFC Saudi Arabia, Chimaev was forced to withdraw at the last minute due to illness.
So is there a possibility that Chimaev will never fight again?
Dana White says that every time Chimaev is close to a fight, he gets ill:
The problem is we really don’t know.
Every time this guy gets close to a fight, I saw video footage of him on the ground violently ill.He was hospitalized again.
He hadn’t trained for three or four days or five days, I don’t know exactly what the number was but we could not put him into a fight next weekend.
Chimaev has previously struggled with long-term complications from COVID-19, even contemplating retirement at one point.
And, although he managed to recover and return to the octagon, his inactivity has somewhat stunted the momentum he built:
Every time he gets close to fighting, he gets really sick.
I don’t know [how long he’s going to be out].
I don’t know what to say.It’s not like he’s over here in this country and we’ve had doctors here look at him or anything like that.
He’s sort of out of touch so it’s tough to deal with.
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