John Lineker News

Drake Riggs - March 22, 2019

As news generally does, especially in the MMA world, it can come with some serious shock value. This week was no different. On Wednesday, UFC bantamweight champion TJ Dillashaw revealed that he had been flagged by USADA for a violation regarding one of his drug tests prior to his last fight. That last fight having come in January when he suffered defeat to the flyweight champion, Henry Cejudo.

Chris Taylor - January 12, 2019

UFC bantamweight standout John Lineker has issued a statement after an injury forced him out of his slated bout with Cory Sandhagen at next weekend’s UFC on ESPN+1 event. The injury, which still remains unknown to media at this time, forced “Hands of Stone” to pull out on just nine days notice. Thankfully for Cody Sandhagen, undefeated promotional newcomer Mario Bautista has agreed to fill in for Lineker at Saturday’s event in Brooklyn.

Drake Riggs - January 10, 2019

It’s been a bit of a rough journey to get to the UFC’s very first show on ESPN programming. First, there was the trouble finding the main event which resulted in the UFC pulling UFC 233’s main event to put it on UFC Brooklyn (the first show on ESPN+). This led to the cancelation of UFC 233 entirely.

Tom Taylor - December 17, 2018

Former UFC bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz was briefly expected to make his return to the cage opposite John Lineker at the now-cancelled UFC 233 on January 26. Unfortunately, Cruz was sidelined with yet another unfortunate injury. Speaking on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show this week, the former champion opened up on the severity of this injury and how he sustained it.

Cole Shelton - December 5, 2018

Former UFC bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz will finally make his long-awaited return to the Octagon at UFC 233. The promotion made the bout official on Twitter on Wednesday. Cruz is back!@DominickCruz returns to face 'Hands of Stone' @JohnLineker at #UFC233 in Anaheim on Jan. 26! pic.twitter.com/SunaIvoev9

Drake Riggs - November 7, 2018

Just when you thought that UFC 233 couldn’t be getting a better building start, we get one hell of a bantamweight matchup thrown into the mix. It will have been two years once the end of December rolls around that we’ll have seen the former bantamweight king Dominick Cruz (22-2) compete inside the Octagon.

Tom Taylor - August 29, 2018

UFC bantamweight contender John Lineker wants a fight. Unfortunately, he’s having a hard time finding a willing dance partner. In fact, Lineker is getting so desperate for a fight that he recently offered to step in against towering featherweight contender Zabit Magomedsharipov at UFC 228 — though this idea was shut down by the UFC.  Still without an opponent for his next bout, Lineker recently took to Twitter to put his fellow bantamweight contenders on blast. He also joked that if nobody agrees to fight him, he might just move up two weight classes to the lightweight division.

Tom Taylor - August 24, 2018

Yesterday afternoon, the MMA community was rocked by the unfortunate news that Yair Rodriguez had been forced out of his anticipated UFC 228 featherweight showdown with rising Russian star Zabit Magomedsharipov. From there, the UFC began a frantic search to find a replacement opponent for Magomedsharipov on short notice. As always, several fighters spoke up and offered to step in. None, however, could rival the cojones of Brazil’s John Lineker.

Drake Riggs - March 13, 2018

The UFC’s next event in Brazil is really shaping up to be quite the banger. Already stacked with Brazilian legends, the card is now getting a fight that will be guaranteed fireworks between bantamweight title hopefuls. Fresh off his huge win over former champion, Renan Barao is Brian “Boom” Kelleher who called out John Lineker after his win at UFC on Fox 28 in Orlando, Florida. And as reported by Combate and confirmed by several other sources as well as the fighters themselves, that it shall be.

Justin Golightly - December 26, 2017

Leading up to the suspenseful weigh-ins approaching quickly on Friday, we already had a roller coaster of emotions kicking into UFC 219 fight week just after Christmas. Jimmie Rivera has been going back-and-forth with Marlon Moraes about being his replacement this Saturday, but despite multiple attempts to agree on increasingly higher catchweights, it never worked out. It all started when his former opponent John Lineker had to pull out of their fight with a serious tooth infection. Speaking recently to Guilherme Cruz of MMA Fighting, Lineker opened up about the situation. “I noticed this when I came to Las Vegas earlier. I didn’t know how bad it was a week ago. I started to feel the pain, but I thought it was something related to the root canal treatment I did three weeks ago. When I talked to a second doctor — the first one didn’t have an answer for the pain — they found this infection. I kept training hard despite the pain, but the pain kept getting worse a week before fight week. I decided to go to Vegas early so the UFC doctor could see how I was because I wanted to fight no matter what, but he saw that I wasn’t fit to fight and would have to do something about it.”

Russell Ess - December 24, 2017

A pivotal matchup set for UFC 219 has been scrapped from the end of the year card taking place in Las Vegas, Nevada on December 30. The exciting matchup between current number 4 UFC ranked bantamweight Jimmie Rivera and number 6 ranked John Lineker has been canceled due to Lineker being forced to pull out of the bout. According to MMA Fighting, multiple sources have confirmed that Lineker was removed from the bout due to a tooth infection and will have to undergo emergency surgery.

Justin Golightly - December 8, 2017

Georges St-Pierre just left the middleweight division in just a month after becoming champion. TJ Dillashaw is training right now to change weight classes and challenge Demetrious Johnson. Meanwhile, John Lineker is about to fight Jimmie Rivera and he’s not happy. He recently expressed his dislike over fighters jumping around and thinks they should stay where they are at. …Especially guys he wants to fight against. “This business of challenging people in other divisions, I don’t like this. Every fighter has to stay quietly in his division and stay in his corner. But the UFC is now giving these opportunities to fight in other weight categories. Stagnation will not happen, because [TJ Dillashaw] still has the bantamweight belt. Either way, he’ll have to defend the title. But in my opinion, everyone should stay in their division instead of challenging people elsewhere to fight.”

Justin Golightly - November 16, 2017

Jimmie Rivera has done everything to earn himself the biggest fights at bantamweight and UFC clearly agreed. He was matched up against former champion Dominick Cruz, but Cruz had to end up pulling out due to a broken arm. Just like that, Rivera loses out on the biggest fight in his career. He’s since called out TJ Dillashaw to replace Cruz to stay on the UFC 219 card, but John Lineker has a different plan. “I would fight with Jimmie Rivera. I’m at the UFC’s disposal to fight him. I’m ready. I want to fight again, and it’ll definitely be a different fight from my last performance against Marlon Vera. I’ll be more in the rhythm and John Lineker will fight as he always has: aggressively. All the time, I am ready. […] I think I’m not far from a title fight and a rematch with [TJ Dillashaw]. I think that my victory over Marlon Vera has put me back into the mix, and I believe that another one or two wins and I’m in talks again to fight the champion.”

Tom Taylor - September 19, 2017

John Lineker, one of the UFC bantamweight division’s most exciting contenders, is now scheduled for a return to the cage. According to a report from Combate, which was subsequently confirmed by MMAFighting.com, Lineker will make his return at UFC Fight Night 119 this October 28 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. His opponent will be Ecuador’s Marlon “Chito” Vera. This will be Lineker’s first fight in nearly a year, as his last steps into the cage occurred in December of 2016, when he came up short in a bantamweight scrap with former champion  TJ Dillashaw. This loss to Dillashaw was preceded by four-straight wins in the bantamweight division, as he submitted Francisco Rivera, defeated Rob Font by decision, knocked out Michael MacDonald, and defeated John Dodson by decision. The Brazilian bantamweight knockout artist is 29-8 overall.

Tom Taylor - August 14, 2017

Bryan Caraway hasn’t stepped into the cage since May of 2016. From the sounds of it, he’s eager to change that very soon. On Monday morning, the long-time bantamweight contender, who currently holds the number-6 spot in the official UFC bantamweight rankings, made a call out of brick-fisted Brazilian John Lineker.

Tom Taylor - December 30, 2016

Former UFC bantamweight champion TJ Dillashaw is the owner of one of the most unique fighting styles in MMA. As such, he is an extremely difficult opponent to prepare for. Tailoring a game plan for his specialized blend of footwork, head movement, and takedowns is an undeniably stark challenge. Dillashaw’s UFC 207 opponent John Lineker, however, is not particularly panicked about this challenge. In a recent interview with MMAJunkie.com, he shed some light on his very simple strategy for Dillashaw. In his last fight, which saw him narrowly defeat John Dodson, Lineker said he spent too much time chasing his opponent. Against Dillashaw, he plans to avoid doing this, thereby forcing Dillashaw to come to him. From there, he can get to work with his absurd punching power.

Chris Taylor - November 2, 2016

We now know that UFC 207 will be co-headlined by a men’s bantamweight title fight between reigning champion Dominick Cruz and streaking challenger Cody Garbrandt. Well, as it turns out, this co-main event won’t be the only high profile men’s bantamweight scrap on the December 30 card, as a bout between former champion TJ Dillashaw and stone fisted contender John Lineker was just made official for the event. T.J. Dillashaw vs. John Lineker official for UFC 207! Boom!#UFC207

Tom Taylor - November 2, 2016

We now know that UFC 207 will be co-headlined by a men’s bantamweight title fight between reigning champion Dominick Cruz and streaking challenger Cody Garbrandt. Well, as it turns out, this co-main event won’t be the only high profile men’s bantamweight scrap on the December 30 card. According to a report from ESPN.com, a bout between former champion TJ Dillashaw and stone fisted contender John Lineker is also in the works for the event. Sources close to both competitors have apparently confirmed that the fight is nearly finalized. If this fight is indeed booked, it’ll be a nice consolation prize for Dillashaw, who has been ceaselessly campaigning for a rematch with Cruz. The two talented bantamweights first met in January of this year. On that night, Cruz walked away with a hard-fought split decision win, and the bantamweight belt. Since that razor close loss to Cruz, Dillashaw has rebounded nicely with a dominant decision win over former foil Rafael Assuncao on the undercard of UFC 200.