Raoni Barcelos has not decided whether he’ll fight again, and right now he can’t. The Brazilian bantamweight told MMA Fighting that retirement remains on the table while he waits for doctors to explain why his body shut down during his UFC Vegas 121 main event against Raul Rosas Jr. on Sept. 26.
“It hasn’t been ruled out,” Barcelos said of retirement. He was just as firm about what he wants: “I want to make it clear right now that I don’t want to stop.”
The medical picture is still blank. Barcelos was ahead on the scorecards inside the Meta APEX when he lost consciousness and was rushed to a Level 1 trauma center. He told MMA Fighting he felt his whole body going numb and remembers nothing until he came to in the ambulance, asking his father what had happened. “Unfortunately, we don’t know what happened,” he said. He had another MRI on a Monday and is still waiting on those results, which he said are being kept confidential. He visits the UFC Performance Institute every day for physical therapy and neurological testing, and the UFC flew his family in from Rio de Janeiro to stay with him in Las Vegas.
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The early treatment was aggressive and painful, he said, though he’s now completely off medication. “The most important thing is that my heart is doing well,” Barcelos said. He’s serving a six-month suspension with no head contact, and his heart rate has to stay in a healthy range while he’s monitored.
He described a long conversation with his father, Davi Ramos, Andre Felipe and Glover Teixeira, who told him to enjoy being healthy and save the retirement question for later. Barcelos also said UFC chief business officer Hunter Campbell followed the ambulance to the hospital, came back the next morning with the doctor, and told him he’d won a bonus. He thanked Dana White in person at a recent Contender Series taping, and White told him he’d be back before he knew it. Barcelos added, with a laugh, that “A lot of people have already retired me before my time.”
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One of those people was Paulo Costa. Costa wrote on X that Barcelos is in his 40s and “PROBABLY retired” because of the injury, and he guessed the Brazilian earned somewhere around $80,000 to $100,000 for the five-round fight. Those figures are Costa’s speculation, and Barcelos hasn’t confirmed any pay numbers.
Barcelos is 39 and has 28 pro fights, 16 of them in the UFC. Rosas, meanwhile, is moving on fast. The 22-year-old has six straight wins, and MMA Fighting reported he’ll make his RAF debut against UFC Hall of Famer Clay Guida at RAF 15 on Nov. 28 at NOW Arena in Chicago. That’s his fifth combat sports booking of 2026.
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My take: Barcelos is handling this exactly right. He’s taking the suspension seriously, he’s waiting on the scans, and he’s refusing to let anybody, including Costa, answer the question for him. A fighter who was winning a main event on the cards earns the right to make the call himself, and he can’t make it until the MRI comes back. Until then, the only fight on his schedule is keeping his heart rate in range.
