ONE Championship boss: Luis Santos missing weight for Askren had staff 'completely disgusted'

Ben Askren and Luis Santos

The clock is ticking for Luis Santos – and it may be ticking in more ways than one.

Earlier today, Santos (61-9-1) missed weight for his welterweight title fight rematch against champion Ben Askren (14-0) at ONE Championship 32. With the title fight scrapped, Askren gave Santos until 1 p.m. Friday local time in Singapore for a second weigh-in – one at which both fighters would need to be 190 pounds or less just to have a non-title fight.

Ahead of that weigh-in, though, ONE Championship CEO Victor Cui told MMAjunkie Santos’ future with Asia’s largest MMA promotion does not look bright.

“This is singlehandedly one of the most unprofessional things I’ve ever seen from a fighter in the history of ONE Championship,” Cui told MMAjunkie. “He’s had months to prepare for this fight. Months. Basically, since the first fight, we said we’re going to do a rematch as soon as his eye heels. To come in that much overweight is really unprofessional. I can’t believe a professional fighter at this level, with this much at stake, would not make weight.”

Santos weighed 172 pounds for the 170-pound title fight. Immediately after the weigh-ins, the fight was “still under negotiation,” according to ONE officials. Now everything appears to hinge on “Sapo” coming in under Askren’s suggestion of 190 pounds for a catchweight fight. The bout is scheduled to headline ONE Championship 32, which streams as an online pay-per-view in North America from Singapore Indoor Stadium in Singapore.

Santos first challenged Askren in April at ONE Championship 26. After defending the wrestler’s takedowns in the first part of the first round, Askren caught Santos with an accidental eye poke. When the Brazilian couldn’t continue, the fight was ruled a no-contest.

Cui said he wants to ultimately put the two together in a title fight. But since that won’t happen this time with Santos missing weight, it may never happen since Santos appears to have rubbed Cui and others with the promotion the wrong way this week.

“I do want to make this fight happen down the road,” Cui said. “But that said, he’s completely tainted himself. Our staff is all completely disgusted with his lack of professionalism.”

Moreover, Cui said Santos offered no explanation for coming in heavy – not even a dog-ate-my-homework type of excuse for the infraction on the scale.

“He’s not sick, he has no injuries – in fact, when he landed several days ago, I saw him eating, so I thought, ‘Good, he’s on weight,'” Cui said.

Perhaps most perplexing to Cui is that Santos is not new to the concept of making weight for a fight. “Sapo” has 71 fights on his record, including bouts for the WEC and Bellator before he came to ONE Championship.

Cui’s 170-pound champion, on the other hand, had no issue with the scale.

“Ben’s put in the time for this fight,” Cui said. “A fighter’s got two jobs: make weight and put on an entertaining fight. (Santos) didn’t do his job. Ben’s not known for holding back his opinion. Obviously he’s upset. If this was a prelim fight, or guys who have a record of 3-1, it would be one thing. But (Santos) has over 70 fights in his career, and this is the biggest fight of his life. To promote this event and fly him out to Singapore for an event televised to a world audience, it shows what an utter lack of professionalism he has (to miss weight).”

Following the weigh-ins, Askren, who’s ranked No. 5 in the NOS Energy Drink MMA welterweight rankings, unleashed a flurry of tweets about Santos on Twitter:

For more on ONE Championship 32, check out the MMA Rumors section of the site.

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