Sean Brady won't be competing in the main event of UFC Fight Night 293 due to a gnarly knee injury that forced him to stay in the hospital for multiple days.
Brady (19-2 MMA, 9-2 UFC) was set to face Gabriel Bonfim in the Nov. 7 headliner at the Meta APEX in Las Vegas, but was forced out due to an infection and fluid buildup in his knee. The welterweight contender hopes to keep the matchup with Bonfim (20-1 MMA, 7-1 UFC) together, but isn't certain what will happen just yet.
Brady detailed the reasons for the fight's cancellation on "The BradyBags Show".
"So last week, Tuesday, I practiced in the morning," Brady explained. "Everything was going completely fine. By nighttime, I was going to do my next workout. I jumped on my bike. My knee was a little
bit swollen afterwards. By 9 o'clock at night, I couldn't walk. So, that's Tuesday. Wednesday morning, I already knew because I've been in this situation before, like I've dealt with bursitis and sh*t, and I knew this wasn't bursitis – I knew it was an infection.
"So, I knew right away from dealing with my arm and my leg, the feeling that you get, it's just different. It's just a different pain. Like, I could barely walk. So, Wednesday morning, 6 a.m., first thing I do, I got to the hospital, and they start drawing blood, doing everything. They put me on IV antibiotics."
That was the start of Brady's knee complications. He had fluid drained from his knee in order to determine what type of infection he was dealing with. Given the amount of time it takes for the tests to complete, Brady had to stay in the hospital for days.
"They have to wait for bacteria to grow, so it takes like two days for it to grow," Brady said. "So, I had to obviously stay in the hospital. I was there for three days. But it started to come back that it was growing staph."
Brady showed an unpleasant picture of his knee being drained, complete with a full syringe of red-orange fluid – and apparently, that was just the "first batch." He explained his knee was drained like that multiple times, but it would continue to fill up again.
After receiving treatment, Brady is confident that the issue will be resolved in just a couple of weeks' time. He said he asked the UFC for a spot on the Dec. 12 card, but was told that there was no room. Every other card coming up is fully booked as well, but Brady remains hopeful that he can compete on the first card of 2027 in Dallas.
This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Sean Brady details injury that forced him out of UFC Fight Night 293
