Things could not have gone better for McGrillen (13-2), however, as he came away with a thrilling unanimous decision victory over Brandon Lewis in Charlotte that has seemingly wiped away all memory of the loss.

Speaking to media outlets including Cageside Press backstage at the Bojangles Coliseum in Charlotte, NC, England’s McGrillen revealed that he decided to make a quick turnaround immediately after that July loss.

“Soon as I got out of the cage, bro. Last fight, not this one, last fight, five minutes, [my team] was like ‘we need to go again.’ And I’m like ‘yup, straight away,'” McGrillen recalled.

“At the end of the day, I wasn’t happy with the result three weeks ago, and I was going to make the changes. Go again, man. I’m the guy that will take risks, I’m the guy that will step out of my comfort zone. When people walk down the path, I’ll take my own path, because I’m by own person, I’m my own man, but I get guided by the right people.”

On improving in just a matter of weeks, McGrillen believes that “you can learn a lot in 20 days if you know what you’re looking for,” he added. “If you know what you need to work on, if you stay honest and true with it. You can be self-aware, some people can be self-aware with what you need to work on, but then when you get in there with the pressure and the lights and the audience and stuff like that, people go back to old habits and cracking and things. I know I need to work on that, I was always thinking ahead. Patience, patience.”

It’s all about fine-tuning the in-cage artistry, it seems.

“I’m the threat, I don’t need to rush it,” he continued, making an analogy to the world of fine art. “I’m painting it, I’m making art. Don’t rush it. Before you know it, you’re just making a nursery or a preschool sketch, instead of a Van Gogh. I’m doing a Van Gogh painting, you know what I mean?”

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with Lewis McGrillen above.

The post PFL Charlotte: Lewis McGrillen Wants His Art to be Van Gogh, Not Preschool Sketch appeared first on Cageside Press.

Fremd earned his second win under the PFL banner after stopping the Brazilian by TKO in the sound round, but not before he took some punishment of his own in the opening frame. “I wanted to come out there and not be as sloppy, but man once you get in there and the doors lock and someone tries to hurt you, it all goes to instinct,” Fremd (13-6) told media outlets including Cageside Press following the fight. “And as soon as my coaches told me ‘clean that sh*t up in the second round,’ I finally threw a right hand that was clean, and it got him. It got him.”

Fremd, who exited the UFC in 2024 with a 2-4 record and back-to-back losses, has now won three straight contests: two under the PFL banner, and one in BKFC in the bare-knuckle boxing realm.

Asked whether, after fighting in the UFC and bare-knuckle, the PFL was his home, Fremd replied “no. MVP is, if you think about it. I fought for Bellator, I fought for UFC, bare-knuckle, PFL. Hopefully by the end of the year, next year, MVP.”

The PFL is in the process of merging into Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions, and will begin to operate under the MVP banner in 2027. “I want this to be my home, I want to go after— this is a title run,” exclaimed Fremd. “I’m number nine, I got that win, we’ll see where they put me now.”

With four other middleweights competing at PFL Charlotte on Friday, Josh Fremd was game to face any one of them. That despite being on good terms with one half of Friday’s main event, Dalton Rosta.

“I want anybody. Anybody and everybody. I said it out there, I said, one of the greatest poets, one of the greatest poets of our time once said ‘b*tch, don’t get too comfortable,'” stated Fremd.

He’d later add that when it came to the middleweights in action on Friday, “I want to fight any single one of them. You can give me the Canuck, you can give me the Daddy’s boy, you can give me the retard, or you can give me the egomaniac. Dalton, I love you, you’re my boy, but we all know you got a big ego.”

The Canuck in question, Aaron Jeffery, defeated Josh Silveira, son of American Top Team coach Conan Silveira, on Friday. Rosta, the supposed egomaniac, fell to Bryan Battle by split decision.

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with Josh Fremd above.

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Powell improved to 13-2 with the split decision win, and is 4-1 over his last five fights. Speaking with media outlets including Cageside Press backstage at the Bojangles Arena in Charlotte, North Carolina, Powell noted that he was “just focused on getting the job done” in the face of the crowd reaction.

“I’ve been around now for a long time now,” England’s Powell added. “I’m a vet.”

Explaining the lack of action on Friday, Powell noted that Yagshimuradov is “a very explosive counter-striker. So I knew it could potentially be like that. There’s going to be a lot of points where we’re twitching, and it looks like there’s not very much going on.”

“I’m a counter-striker, he’s a counter-striker. That’s what happened. He didn’t give much, I just gave more,” he added.

What Simeon Powell wants next is simple, and that’s a title shot. “I want the champion, I want Corey Anderson,” he exclaimed. “And if he’s not available and he wants to go to heavyweight, he should vacate, and then me and Shoeface [Antonio Carlos Jr.] can rematch.”

Former UFC star Antonio Carlos Junior, a tournament winner in the PFL, represents the lone loss in Powell’s last five fights. The pair met in June 2025, with “Shoeface” winning a unanimous decision. Carlos went on to win the PFL World Tournament later that year, and hasn’t competed since. Champ Corey Anderson, meanwhile, won the inaugural PFL light heavyweight title back in October with his own win over Yagshimuradov, but has floated the idea of a move to heavyweight, competing there once in the PFL prior to his 205lb title win.

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with Simeon Powell above.

The post PFL Charlotte: Simeon Powell Wants Title Next, Be It Against Anderson or Shoeface appeared first on Cageside Press.

With the main card expected to air on ESPN following prelims on the ESPN App, things quickly went sideways as the Savannah Bananas game went over its allotted time. ESPN, however, killed the ESPN App stream, airing the movie Dodgeball, while the PFL main card apparently went to ESPN 2, not that viewers were aware, until it finally switched back to the main ESPN channel.

It’s a situation that PFL CEO John Martin has been frequently frustrated by in recent months.

“That’s live TV,” Martin admitted, speaking with media outlets including Cageside Press following the event. “We work collaboratively with ESPN. When you’re in the live TV business and you have prior programming that runs over, that’s a little bit unfortunately the nature of live TV. But bouncing us around in between all of the networks though is just maddening, quite honestly.”

“Again tonight I was getting texts from friends of mine like ‘the app ended, it doesn’t tell you where to go.’ They didn’t know to go to EPSN2 where we started, we had to rearrange some of our fights just to try to accommodate just so we could start the main card on the primary ESPN.”

It doesn’t help that the PFL Charlotte card had such a strong build, with early fights exceeding expectations, only for the main card to get off to a rocky start.

“Issues and problems continue, but we can’t use that as an excuse. My own opinion of the card tonight was, the star of tonight was the undercard. There were some amazing fights on the undercard, and the main card was a little more uneven.”

With the PFL’s merger into Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions underway, however, Martin does see a silver lining.

“I still love being on EPSN, they are the juggernaut in sports, and I think with our announcement with MVP, maybe we have an opportunity to talk with them and try to reset a little bit- what they may want, what we may want. I’m hopeful for that. So we’ll see.”

Martin was also pleased with the turnout at the Bojangles Coliseum in Charlotte, North Carolina on Friday.

“We may have set a gate record for PFL, which obviously we’re MVP now, but for PFL events, we had a really, really strong gate,” he stated. Martin was also impressed with the crowd engagement in Charlotte, and admitted that while he knew it was a great sports town, “I didn’t know it was a really, really great MMA town. So that was a pleasant surprise for me.”

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with John Martin above.

The post PFL CEO John Martin: “Bouncing Around” Across ESPN Channels “Maddening” appeared first on Cageside Press.

Battle did, indeed, pick up a split decision win to claim his first victory inside the Professional Fighters League. Though “The Butcher” felt all three judges should have scored the fight for him.

“When it ended, I thought I won the fight for sure. It was tough, it was close but I feel like I landed way more strikes,” Battle (13-3, 1NC) said following the win, which came in his own back yard and went the full 15 minutes. “If you count the total number of strikes, I landed way more strikes and I’d be curious to see the control time.”

“You talk about being in the clinch, when we’re in the clinch, I was active in the clinch. Versus when he had me in the clinch, I defended the takedown. That’s one of the things that’s going on, if I don’t do what I have to do to stop the takedown, I end up on my back. And so I gotta do what I gotta do to stay on my feet, stop him from doing what he wants to do. And that’s not going to be entertaining all the time, if that’s what they’re trying to do.”

Battle touched on it, and fans at the Bojangles Coliseum certainly let it be known that the fight wasn’t always entertaining. Still, Battle felt he had the win, though he could be seen trying to sneak a peak at the judges’ scorecards prior to the official announcement.

“For sure, I definitely thought I did. I was looking over because it was taking way too long. Normally if it takes that long, normally someone’s getting screwed. So I was like, ‘what the hell is taking so long? Let’s get out of here.'”

Battle later added that “I won. I felt like I won three out of three judges should have thought that, but two out of three is all that you need.”

To fan online suggesting the fight was a robbery, Battle was blunt. “Bro I don’t care. Next question.”

Bryan Battle is now 1-1 since arriving in the PFL earlier this year and dropping his debut against Johnny Eblen. He’s looking to fight once more in 2026.

“Another fight before the end of the year. Doesn’t matter who. Impa, Impa just lost, that’s something, me and him have floated around each other for a long time,” Battle suggested, referring to fellow UFC alum Impa Kasanganay. Josh Fremd, who also won on Friday, was another name Battle brought up.

“Welterweight’s not out of the question either.”

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with Bryan Battle above.

The post Bryan Battle on Judges’ Scorecards at PFL Charlotte: “Two Out of Three Is All You Need” appeared first on Cageside Press.

Speaking with media outlets including Cageside Press backstage at the Bojangles Coliseum in Charlotte, North Carolina following a decision win, Jeffery (17-6) reflected on the fight, and his choice to continue on in his career.

“I would always like to make it a pretty fight, show off my skills a little bit more because I swear I have some. But I’m getting to know myself a little bit better every time I fight,” Jeffery said of the affair, which saw him working over Silveira against the fence for a good chunk of time. “If I was a betting man, I would have bet on the fight looking like that.”

The Niagara Top Team athlete, who trains alongside the likes of Jasmine Jasudavicius and Mike Malott, wasn’t surprised by much in the fight.

“No. I would like to say I’m surprised that I didn’t have questionable moments in the fight, like I got wobbled once, he had me in a front head lock pretty tight once,” stated Jeffery, going on to add “it’s a fight, and sh*t happens.”

It almost didn’t happen. Meaning the fight, period. Dealing with an injury and out of action for over a year, Jeffery came close to walking away from mixed martial arts, at least as an active fighter.

“I’ve been saying it all week that I didn’t think I’d be back here. I had a sh*tty injury that, I didn’t know if I would fight again. And I kind of had made the decision at one point that I wouldn’t, and tried to move on with my life and I wasn’t happy and I decided to come back. I’ve been saying it all week, and it sounds cliché and boring and stuff, but I was just happy to be here.”

Jeffery, who was offered a fight while injured, would like to fight again by the end of the year. At the same time, he joked, “I feel horrible. I mean very happy I won, but I don’t feel good at all.”

The good news is, Jeffery appears ready to fight on. And he does so under a new-look PFL, soon to be rebranded as MVP as it merges with Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions. That should bring some opportunities with it. Jeffery might jump at the right one, though he admitted that “it depends on the match-up.”

“Fighting a pro boxer, maybe not. Fighting an MMA guy in a boxing match, sure.”

Watch the full PFL Charlotte post-fight press conference with Aaron Jeffery above.

The post Aaron Jeffery Nearly Walked Away From Fighting Prior to PFL Charlotte appeared first on Cageside Press.

Both Battle and Rosta are looking to get back in the win column, with Battle falling to current interim champ Johnny Eblen in his promotional debut earlier this year. As for Rosta, the former Bellator MMA standout who went 9-1 in that promotion is 2-2 in the PFL and looking to shake off back-to-back losses against Impa Kasanganay and Fabian Edwards, both finishes.

Also on the card, ex-UFC talent Josh Fremd faces Jhony Gregory, while Canadian Bellator alum Aaron Jeffery takes on former PFL finalist Josh Silveira.

Full results from Thursday’s official weigh-in can be found below.

PFL Charlotte: Battle vs. Rosta Weigh-In Results

Main Card

Middleweight: Bryan Battle (185.6) vs. Dalton Rosta (185.8)
Light heavyweight: Simeon Powell (204.6) vs. Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov (205)
Middleweight: Josh Silveira (186) vs. Aaron Jeffery (185.6)
Bantamweight: Brandon Lewis (136) vs. Lewis McGrillen (135.6)
Middleweight: Josh Fremd (185.8) vs. Jhony Gregory (184.4)

Preliminary Card

Heavyweight: Denis Goltsov (251.4) vs. Hasan Mezhiev (220)
Featherweight: Cheyden Leialoha (146) vs. Robbie Ring (145.6)
Women’s flyweight: Cheyanne Bowers (125.4) vs. Elora Dana (125)
Lightweight: Michael Boylan (155.4) vs. Landry Ward (155.6)
Light heavyweight: Bruno Cappelozza (205.6) vs. Valentin Moldavsky (206)
161lb Catchweight: Wilson Lopshire (161) vs. Jonathan Martin (160.6)
Heavyweight: Maxwell Djantou Nana (264.2) vs. Eduardo Neves (261.8)
Welterweight: Trukon Carson (170) vs. Trey Waters (170.8)

The post PFL Charlotte: Battle vs. Rosta Weigh-In Results appeared first on Cageside Press.

Walking to the cage in clothes in the style of the kings of Senegal, light heavyweight Diakhate (6-0-1) turned heads in more ways than one, and was greeted following the fight by MVP’s Jake Paul. That’s thanks to the newly announced merger between the PFL and Most Valuable Promotions, with the two moving forward under the MVP banner next year.

“I’m very happy for the news,” Diakhate told media outlets including Cageside Press following the bout at the UBS Arena. “Jake Paul is a good guy, I like Jake Paul. Jake Paul is my guy.”

In the cage, recalled Diakhate, “I said to Jake Paul, ‘I’m the new king of PFL.'”

Paul responded by saying “I believe you,” according to the massive Senegalese wrestler.

Comparisons are already being made between Diakhate, who fights out of Belgium, and Francis Ngannou, who made his way to France, and later the U.S., en route to MMA stardom.

“Ngannou is a legend of Africa, of the world. I like Francis Ngannou. It’s my dream to fight on the same card with Francis Ngannou,” Diakhate said of his fellow African star.

As for his own future, “I’m a beginner of this sport, maybe, but you see the performance I did,” noted Diakhate, who added that he’d like to “maybe do a movie in the future.”

He certainly has the look down.

Watch the full PFL New York post-fight press conference with Moustapha Diakhate above.

The post Moustapha Diakhate Told Jake Paul He’s the “New King of PFL” appeared first on Cageside Press.

That news, announced this past week, has a different air around the promotion, which was in Long Island for PFL New York on Friday.

Following the event, which saw Usman Nurmagomedov and Dakota Ditcheva pick up key wins, PFL CEO John Martin addressed the media, tackling a wide range of merger-related and talent-related questions, as expected.

Is it a title fight for Dakota Ditcheva next? That was one of the first questions put to Martin, and it sounds like that is indeed the plan. Likely against Liz Carmouche, the 2025 PFL World Tournament winner and former Bellator women’s flyweight champ.

“Yes. Yeah. She is, we’ve talked to her, I’ve talked to her. She wants to stay busy. She’s been out of the cage for a year, and I think in the first round tonight she was kind of feeling out Denise [Kielholtz], and there is a little bit of cage rust maybe, but she got over that really quickly,” noted Martin. “So yeah she’s going to be back pretty soon, and I think Liz is the fight we make.”

A bidding war looks set to kick off for the services of Usman Nurmagomedov, the PFL lightweight champion, who defeated Archie Colgan on Friday care of a first-round knockout in the PFL New York main event.

“It sounds like he was starting to negotiate in the cage tonight,” Martin joked in reference to Nurmagomedov’s post-fight interview, where he noted that Jake Paul had been a frequent critic of the UFC’s fighter pay. “We had mutually agreed to hold off discussing his future with us or anywhere else until after tonight. So now I look forward to sitting down and finding out what he wants to do.”

“22-0, he’s an extraordinary young fighter, he’s still in his late 20s. So I’d love to be able to keep him here.”

“I really legitimately think he’s the best 155lb’er in the world,” Martin added.
“Justin Gaethje [UFC lightweight champion] was in the cage in Archie’s corner, Justin’s an outstanding fighter. If I had to take a wager on if those two fought, I would go with Usman. So we’ll see. We’ll see.”

Other topics brought up with Martin included the potential of a flyweight division in MVP, and whether crossover fights with the likes of RIZIN will continue. Muhammad Mokaev, for one, openly called for MVP to add a flyweight division, saying he’d sign with the company long term if they were to add one.

“I think it’s something we’re going to seriously consider. I was seriously considering it for PFL before this. I saw the Mokaev call out, and I think it’s something we’re going to take a very serious look at,” responded Martin. “It has the possibility to become a very dynamic division.”

When it comes to talent lending and crossovers, Martin remains “absolutely” open to continuing to talent share with the likes of RIZIN.

The fate of the PFL’s regional leagues, PFL Africa and PFL MENA, is a different matter. And a more murky one it seems.

“To be decided. Haven’t discussed it yet,” admitted Martin. “I’m a little bit of a mixed mind. I think in some respects, having a global brand and then JV development brands all being branded the same has caused some confusion in the marketplace.”

And so while there have been some congratulatory messages from the PFL’s backers, “that’s something that we’ll sit down and talk with the other investors. Because those leagues actually have other outside investors, I just sit on the board of them. So we’ll discuss that at the board level.”

Watch the full PFL New York post-fight press conference with PFL CEO John Martin above.

The post PFL CEO John Martin: Ditcheva Likely Back Soon Against Carmouche, MVP Open to Crossovers appeared first on Cageside Press.

After a year out of action, Ditcheva (16-0) returned to the cage at Friday’s PFL New York in Long Island, defeating former Bellator title challenger Denise Kielholtz in a three-round decision. Most expect a title shot next for Ditcheva, given the belt sits vacant, but what that title looks like is the question: the PFL is set to merge into MVP (Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions), but there are still several PFL-branded events to play out.

Speaking with media outlets including Cageside Press following PFL New York, Ditcheva gave her reaction to the merger, which she did not have advanced knowledge of. “I don’t know. I don’t really understand the merger, really. MVP is great, what Jake Paul does is amazing, what he does is amazing. I’m not really sure what it looks like for me yet, I haven’t spoken to anyone because obviously I was just concentrating on my fight this week.”

“I didn’t know one single thing about it until it got released on the internet. So I don’t know, I haven’t really got any comments on it yet. I’m hoping it’s a good thing for the fighters, and that’s all I can say right now.”

She’s not interested in waiting for the inaugural MVP card (or second, if you count the Rousey-Carano event on Netflix this past May). “No I’ll take another fight. I’m not really bothered by what it’s under, as long as I’m fighting the best. And then yeah. It’s whoever’s got the belt type thing.”

The belt isn’t held by anyone right now, though most expect Ditcheva to be fighting Liz Carmouche for it later this year. Ditcheva didn’t have any message for the former Bellator champ backstage, nor did she have anything to say about what’s next in the cage after her victory on Friday— because she wasn’t given a post-fight interview. The snub was immediately noticed by media members and fans online, and Ditcheva made clear it wasn’t her decision to avoid the mic. “I didn’t refuse it,” she said, pointing to it being the PFL’s decision, whether it was a broadcast issue or something else.

It may in part have been based on crowd reaction to Dakota Ditcheva’s return. With her fight with Kielholtz going the distance, fans grew restless in the third round. The boo birds came out. And Ditcheva heard them.

“It bothered me, only because I’m passionate about the work I do, and I wanted a stoppage myself,” Ditcheva admitted, before falling back on words her brother and coach told her. “We don’t care what everybody else thinks.”

“It’s me that’s in there fighting. I’m the one that’s in there,” she noted, adding that “to think about the boos for one second” could result in her getting knocked out.

“I don’t want them to boo because I want to be exciting and entertaining for you guys. At the same time, I’m in there fighting. I’m not in there performing a dance. I have to do what’s right for me to get the win and come out on top, and that’s what I did today.”

Watch the full PFL New York post-fight press conference with Dakota Ditcheva above.

The post PFL New York: Dakota Ditcheva Not Waiting on MVP, Wants Quick Return appeared first on Cageside Press.