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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
A major last minute blow has been dealt to Saturday's UFC 111 card, as Thiago "Pitbull" Alves has been pulled from his scheduled main card rematch with Jon Fitch.
According to a report from TMZ.com this morning, Alves underwent a pre-fight CAT scan that showed an irregularity in the 26 year old fighter's brain. The report further states that the irregularity involves an artery in the brain.
UFC President Dana White told TMZ that he would be flying Alves out to a specialist to be further evaluated. He also left an ominous sign on what the news could ultimately mean for Alves: "If it's true, it can be career-ending."
No replacement will be found for Fitch with the event just two days away, and one of the night's preliminary card bouts will likely be promoted to the pay-per-view portion of the card.
Penick's Analysis: First and foremost this is devastating for Alves, who was coming into this fight on Saturday with a very real opportunity to avenge one of his few career losses against Fitch. We can only hope that whatever has been found here can be remedied and that it's not a career-ending issue. He's far too young and far too talented to have this taken from him this early, and like this.
At the same time, thankfully this was found before the fight, and Alves didn't step into the cage on Saturday night with something that could have potentially been very dangerous for him to compete with. It really sucks for the card overall and the fans that wanted to see this fight, as well as the UFC when they had this as one of their top fights for the card. Again, none of that really matters, as the main concern is the health of Alves and him hopefully being able to still fight again.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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