James Krause regularly says he’s ready to step in on short notice for the UFC, and he’ll do it again later this month.
Krause (27-8 MMA, 8-4 UFC) will step in as a replacement for Muslim Salikhov (17-2 MMA, 4-1 UFC) to take on Claudio Silva (14-1 MMA, 5-0 UFC) in a welterweight bout at UFC on ESPN+ 38. MMA Junkie confirmed the news with people close to the booking following an initial report from MMAFighting.com.
UFC on ESPN+ 38 takes place Oct. 17 at Flash Forum at Yas Island in Abu Dhabi. The card streams on ESPN+.
Krause will be back at welterweight after moving up to middleweight for a short-notice fight against Trevin Giles at at UFC 247 in February. He lost that fight by split decision, and not without controversy, to see a four-fight winning streak snapped.
Silva hasn’t lost since his pro MMA debut in November 2007. He first fought in the UFC in 2014 and had two decision wins over Brad Scott and Leon Edwards. But then he didn’t fight for three and a half years till a May 2018 return with a submission win over Nordine Taleb. He had two more submission wins in 2019 to give him 14 straight wins, but his fight with Krause will be his first in more than 14 months.
Salikhov was looking for his fifth straight win after a submission loss to Alex Garcia in his UFC debut in November 2017. After that setback, he had a TKO win over Ricky Rainey, a knockout of Nordine Taleb and decisions over Laureano Staropoli and Elizeu Zaleski on his way up the level of competition in the welterweight division. Now his quest for five straight is on hold.
With the change, the UFC on ESPN+ 38 lineup now includes:
MAIN CARD (ESPN+, 7 p.m. ET)
- Brian Ortega vs. Chan Sung Jung
- Krzysztof Jotko vs. Makhmud Muradov
- Ante Delija vs. Ciryl Gane
- Jessica Andrade vs. Katlyn Chookagian
- Modestas Bukauskas vs. Jimmy Crute
- Mounir Lazzez vs. David Zawada
- Nikita Krylov vs. opponent TBA
PRELIMINARY CARD (ESPN+, 4 p.m. ET)
- Mateusz Gamrot vs. Magomed Mustafaev
- James Krause vs. Claudio Silva
- Jun Yong Park vs. John Phillips
- Jamie Mullarkey vs. Fares Ziam
- Gadzhimurad Antigulov vs. Maxim Grishin
- Said Nurmagomedov vs. Mark Striegl