Sherdog is running live play-by-play and round-by-round scoring for UFC Vegas 124 on Saturday, Nov. 7. The fight at the top of the card didn’t exist two weeks ago. Waldo Cortes-Acosta, the top-ranked man in the pairing, meets Johnny Walker in a heavyweight main event at the Meta APEX in Las Vegas. The matchup came together on eight days’ notice after Sean Brady got hurt and his headliner with Gabriel Bonfim fell off the card.
Walker told MMA Fighting he did “a little negotiating” and “asked for a few perks” before he signed. Then he treated the whole thing like a holiday gift. “I asked for Derrick Lewis in January. I was planning to spend Christmas in Ireland with my wife’s family,” he said. “Now it’s even better. I get to fight now, and my year is taken care of. This is a Christmas present.”
The turnaround is wild. Walker is five weeks removed from his heavyweight debut at UFC 332 in October, where he flattened Mick Parkin with a flying knee. UFC Brasil reposted that knockout Wednesday and pointed out he’d fought exactly a month earlier. He weighed 108.4 kg (about 239 pounds) at Friday’s official weigh-ins, according to the same account. The two heavyweights faced off for the first time later that day, in a clip Championship Rounds posted on X.
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Cortes-Acosta needs this one badly. His last win was a knockout of Derrick Lewis, and he’s dropped decisions to Alexander Volkov and Curtis Blaydes since. That’s where it gets awkward for him. Walker now trains with Volkov in Las Vegas, in a camp he described to MMA Fighting as a dream team, and he told the outlet that Volkov will probably be in his corner Saturday.
Walker admitted he hadn’t broken down Cortes-Acosta’s tape when he spoke to the outlet. He’d only watched the Lewis fight, and he waved it off as a reference point because Lewis stands still and eats jabs. “He’s like a wall in front of you, so when you throw a jab, you’re going to land it, right?” Walker said. He still credited Cortes-Acosta’s fast jab, his overhand and his heavy hands. Then he made his pitch: “he’s never fought a guy like me, someone who moves, kicks, throws knees, elbows, has wrestling, has jiu-jitsu.”
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He also leaned on mileage. “I’ve had 17 fights in the UFC, five main events, so there’s nothing that surprises me anymore,” Walker said.
A win puts Walker at 2-0 at heavyweight one week before Ciryl Gane defends the title against Josh Hokit. Alex Pereira, Sergei Pavlovich and Tom Aspinall are all in the title picture already. Walker said he’d take a shot if one came (“It’s already time to go for the belt”), but he’d also wait a year or two. He’s given himself three or four more years at most to win it.
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My take: I’m all in on this one. Short-notice headliners have a way of skipping the feeling-out nonsense, and Walker at range with long kicks and knees gives Cortes-Acosta a real puzzle for that jab to solve. The guy who has already beaten Cortes-Acosta will be shouting instructions from Walker’s corner. If Walker really didn’t study film, that voice on the stool between rounds might be worth more than any tape session. Sherdog’s round-by-round card will tell us early whether WCA’s hands can close that distance.
