New and (re)invented.
Top Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Bantamweight prospect Payton Talbott
finally returns to action against former UFC Flyweight champion Deiveson Figueiredo in UFC 332’s co-main event this weekend (Sat., Oct. 3, 2026) inside Delta Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.The 28-year-old has not competed since last December, when he scored the biggest win of his career by defeating former two-division champion Henry Cejudo via unanimous decision.
Instead of capitalizing on that momentum,
Talbott was forced to sit on the sidelines for nearly one year. It wasn’t for a lack of trying, either. Talbott wanted to compete and remained ready, but the phone call he was waiting for never came.
Talbott revealed this week that he was offered a showdown with Sean O’Malley for UFC’s historic White House card in June, but the matchup never materialized.
Rather than waste his unwanted time away, Talbott used the layoff to self-reflect, return to his roots and make some major changes.
“It’s kind of weird because this is still so new to me, but I just stayed training,” Talbott told UFC.com. “I stayed ready and trained pretty much the entire year, and I feel like I kind of reinvented myself. I went back to my roots — went inward.
“You pick up all of these techniques as you develop in the sport,” Talbott continued. “You go out of town and pick people’s brains. Sometimes you take things and implement them into your game, but sometimes the reason why you got where you are is because of you. So, you have to correctly learn how to implement it, not let it fully change you and use the best of what you’ve learned.”
It will be interesting to see exactly what Talbott’s reinvention looks like because he has been nearly flawless inside the Octagon outside of his massive upset loss to Raoni Barcelos.
That defeat exposed some holes in Talbott’s game, particularly against a relentless grappler. However, he already displayed significant improvements in his wrestling defense against Cejudo.
Figueiredo now presents another stiff test and the perfect opponent to reveal how much Talbott has evolved during his extended absence.
Fortunately, the wait is almost over.
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