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Before looking to make a return in the octagon, Garbrandt has already ended up losing another event. The anticipated fight between Cody Garbrandt and bantamweight veteran Julio Arce at the forthcoming UFC 285 event on Saturday, March 4, 2023, at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, has been canceled due to a knee injury that will require immediate medical attention.
Following the early statement by Eurosport NL, Arce acknowledged the information. His knee's ACL and other ligaments were injured, necessitating surgery and a six-month recovery period.
The 31-year-old Garbrandt decided to get back to 135 pounds. During his flyweight introduction at UFC 269 in December 2021, Kai Kara-France stunned the former bantamweight champion. Later "No Love" was slated twice to face Rani Yahya, however, both of their fights were called off after Yahya backed away. Since November 2017, Garbrandt has fought six times, going 1-5 in those contests.
Arce, 33, dropped to 18-6 upon surrendering to Montel Jackson by unanimous decision at UFC 281 in November. After an auspicious start of the journey of his UFC career that saw consecutive victories over Dan Ige and Daniel Teymur, the New Yorker struggled throughout his next seven fights, posting a lackluster 3-4 score and being unranked at 135 pounds.
It's understandable to assume that issue to be resolved sometime in the next week or so, but there is currently no news regarding whether the organization intends to hold Garbrandt on the UFC 285 fight card against a different opponent or reserve a seat for a mutually convenient time.