{"id":37928,"date":"2026-04-26T17:09:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T17:09:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sherdog.com\/news\/news\/Victor-Valenzuela-nearly-lost-hope-of-having-UFC-career-200969"},"modified":"2026-04-26T17:09:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T17:09:52","slug":"victor-valenzuela-nearly-lost-hope-of-having-ufc-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/victor-valenzuela-nearly-lost-hope-of-having-ufc-career\/","title":{"rendered":"Victor Valenzuela nearly lost hope of having UFC career"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

Victor
\nValenzuela<\/a> got a second chance at a
\nUFC<\/a> career and made the most of it.<\/p>\n

Valenzuela (14-4) made his UFC debut in a welterweight clash
\nagainst Max Griffin<\/a>
\n(20-13) at
\nUFC Fight Night 274<\/a> on Saturday at the Apex in Las Vegas.
\nDespite getting knocked down, Valenzuela fought back and earned a
\nunanimous decision win in a violent affair. <\/p>\n

\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Valenzuela initially got a chance at a UFC career on
\nDana White’s Contender Series<\/a> last year. However, the Chilean
\nprospect suffered a second-round stoppage loss against Michael
\nOliveira<\/a>. Valenzuela recently revealed that he had nearly given
\nup on a UFC career following his loss on the Contender Series.
\nHowever, Valenzuela\u2019s teammates assured him that more opportunities
\nwould come his way if he continued to work hard. \u201cPsicosis\u201d bounced
\nback with a stoppage win over Yusaku
\nKinoshita<\/a> on the regional circuit last month. Just weeks after
\nhis win over Kinoshita, Valenzuela was offered an opportunity to
\nmake his UFC debut against Griffin on five days\u2019 notice. Valenzuela
\nsays that just the second chance was enough for him to accept the
\nfight, regardless of the opponent or the weight class.<\/p>\n

Never Giving Up<\/h2>\n

\u201cTo be really honest with you, after my opportunity at Contender
\nSeries, I thought this was done and I wouldn\u2019t have another shot at
\nthe UFC,\u201d Valenzuela said in a post-fight interview with the UFC.
\n\u201cBut every single one of my teammates said, \u2018Listen, you don\u2019t give
\nup on this. You are young. You have so many opportunities. This is
\nwhat you like to do.\u2019 And that\u2019s what I continued to do it. I love
\ndoing this. I continue to work hard\u2026 Just the fact that I was gonna
\nget the opportunity to fight in the UFC, against whoever it was,
\nwhatever weight division it was, doesn\u2019t matter. The fact that I\u2019m
\nhere and getting another opportunity, I was gonna get the
\nwin.\u201d 

<\/p>\n
\n

“Hard work really yields the fruits of your
\nlabor.”<\/p>\n

Victor
\nValenzuela<\/a> capitalizes on his short-notice opportunity,
\ndefeating Max Griffin<\/a>
\nto kick off his UFC career at
\n#UFCVegas116<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Results, highlights & more \u27a1\ufe0f https:\/\/t.co\/uYudtJTvgH<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/kOjAFxNHBG<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 UFC News (@UFCNews)
\nApril 25, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/center> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Victor Valenzuela got a second chance at a UFC career and made the most of it. Valenzuela (14-4) made his UFC debut in a welterweight clash against Max Griffin (20-13) at UFC Fight Night 274 on Saturday at the Apex in Las Vegas. Despite getting knocked down, Valenzuela fought back and earned a unanimous decision […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37929,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-martial-arts-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37928","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37928"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37928\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}