White: Aldo withdrew over weight concerns, cracked rib was old injury
Dana White: “He had a bruised rib and cartilage. And the big problem for Aldo in taking the fight, wasn’t the fight. It was making weight.”
UFC president Dana White recently did a Fan Q&A and discussed whether UFC feathwerweight champion Jose Aldo pulled out of UFC 189 due to an injury as stated, or for another reason.
“So what happened was, when the pictures went out onto the internet, right, and you saw this rib down here, that was an old injury,” said White, as transcribed by Shaun Al-Shatti for MMAFighting.com. “That was an old injury that was calcified white. The real injury was the bruised rib and cartilage. He had a bruised rib and cartilage. And the big problem for Aldo in taking the fight, wasn’t the fight. It was making weight.
“He had to cut something like 24 pounds, and if he couldn’t physically do it the way that he does it, he was afraid that he couldn’t make weight. That was really the issue. But he did not have a broken rib. It was a bruise. Every x-ray he sent out was of an old injury. What you saw right there on his body was an old injury, not a new injury.
“It wasn’t UFC doctors, either. It was three different doctors.”
However, Brazilian orthopedist Dr. Rickson Moraes, the first doctor to diagnose Aldo’s broken ribs, said that the fighter’s ribs are indeed broken. The doctor was cleared by Aldo to discuss specifics of his medical condtion.
“It’s hard for a doctor to evaluate an injury by looking at a medical report only,” said Dr, Moraes to Guilherme Cruz for MMAFighting.com. “Aldo has an occult rib fracture and the MRI shows that, but I believe the UFC only got the x-ray exams at first.”
“I examined Aldo again when they had doubts. He has an acute injury, and you can have it exactly where you had injuries before. That’s what happened. He had an injury there before, and fractured a rib this time.”
Aldo expects to fight the winner of Conor McGregor vs. Chad Mendes at UFC 189 on Saturday night.