UFC added another promising fighter to its roster on Friday. According to ESPN, the promotion struck a deal with Brazilian kickboxing star Alex Pereira, who will start the UFC journey in the middleweight division.
Pereira confirmed the news on social media, sharing a clip of himself signing a UFC contract on Instagram.
“Hey guys, now it’s official! @ufc thank you very much, I am very happy to be part of this family,” Pereira wrote in the caption of the video.
Pereira is set to have his debut at UFC 268 on November 6th. His first opponent will be Andreas Michailidis, who currently owns a 13-4 MMA record and a 1-1 UFC record.
Alex Pereira is considered one of the best pound-for-pound kickboxers of his generation. He has a 33-7 record and has won multiple championships in Glory, the world’s largest kickboxing promotion.
Pereira had his first MMA fight in 2015 when he lost to Quemuel Ottoni at Jungle Fight 82. Since then, he fought three more times in MMA and won all three of his bouts.
As ESPN points out, Pereira is also the only man who knocked out UFC’s Middleweight champion Israel Adesanya, who is also a former kickboxer. The two met on a couple of occasions, with Pereira winning the first bout by a unanimous decision in 2016 and knocking out Adesanya in a rematch in 2017.
