Adrian Yanez is off UFC 334. The bantamweight posted on Instagram that he’s been hospitalized and won’t compete on November 14 at Madison Square Garden. That leaves Juan Diaz without an opponent a few weeks out from fight night.
Yanez gave no details about what put him in the hospital and no timeline for a return. He followed up with an Instagram story from his hospital bed, and that’s the whole public record right now. At least nobody’s hiding behind anonymous whispers on this one. The news came straight from the fighter.
It stings for the prelims. Yanez vs. Diaz was shaping up as one of the better fights on the early portion of the card, the kind of pairing you circle as a bonus candidate before anyone touches the scale. Yahoo Sports, running a piece from SI’s FanNation, called it a Fight of the Night contender, and that’s hard to argue with.
A card that keeps shrinking
UFC 334 opened with 14 bouts. Injuries to Nazim Sadykhov and Jefferson Nascimento cost the card one fight. Baisangur Susurkaev also pulled out of his matchup with fellow unbeaten middleweight Donte Johnson, though the UFC rescued that one by bringing in Cesar Almeida. If the matchmakers can’t find someone for Diaz, the lineup lands at 12.
The top half is still loaded. Ciryl Gane opens his run as undisputed heavyweight champion against undefeated Josh Hokit in the main event, and Kayla Harrison finally meets returning Hall of Famer Amanda Nunes in the rescheduled co-main with Harrison’s women’s bantamweight title on the line. Kevin Holland vs. Uros Medic, Stephen Thompson vs. Charles Radtke and Jim Miller vs. Terrance McKinney are all still on the board too.
How Yanez got here
The 32-year-old Texan earned his contract on the 2020 season of Dana White’s Contender Series by knocking out Brady Huang in 39 seconds. He kept rolling once he got to the big show, going 5-0 between 2020 and 2022 with four knockouts and five post-fight bonuses.
Then the competition got real. Rob Font finished him in the first round at UFC 287, and Jonathan Martinez chopped him down with leg kicks in the second. Yanez bounced back by knocking out Vinicius Salvador, then dropped a split decision to Daniel Marcos and sat out a long stretch. He came back in March and drew with Ricky Simon, then stopped former bantamweight champ Cody Garbrandt at UFC 329. By my count that’s 7-3-1 inside the Octagon, with the arrow pointing up again.
Which is why this one hurts. Yanez had just put a former champion away and was getting a Garden slot on a stacked card, and now he’s posting from a hospital room instead of finishing camp.
My take: get Diaz a fight. A few weeks is plenty of runway for a bantamweight who’s been staying ready, and there’s always somebody on the roster who’d crawl to New York for a spot at MSG in November. Whoever raises a hand first should get the call, and Yanez should get the time he needs to come back healthy.
