Manager claims John Lineker made weight days prior to fight, but then gained back too much

PORTLAND, Ore. – John Lineker’s longtime manager claims the Brazilian bantamweight made weight days ago for his UFC Fight Night 96 headliner opposite John Dodson.

But a “stupid error” caused Lineker to regain too much weight, Alex Davis today told MMAjunkie, and he was unable to lose it again before he officially hit the scale.

“What’s been happening is he’s been coming and making weight two or three days before, which happened this time,” said Davis, who’s worked with Lineker since his UFC debut in 2012. “So he’s measuring himself on his scale, he saw he was underweight, and he started consuming not to drop weight too much.”

Lineker, the No. 8 fighter in the USA TODAY Sports/MMAjunkie MMA bantamweight rankings, weighed in just seconds before the cutoff for the official weigh-ins and came in at 136.5 pounds, or one half-pound over the limit for non-title fights. Under the UFC’s new early weigh-in procedures, fighters are not allowed any more time to make weight.

Davis said Lineker discovered this morning he’d gained too much weight and began the frantic process of trying to shed the extra pounds. But because it was essentially the second time he was cutting weight, the manager claimed, the process was exponentially more difficult.

“He would have made it, we just ran out of time,” Davis said. “If we had another hour, he would have done it.”

Lineker (28-7 MMA, 9-2 UFC) now forfeits 20 percent of his show purse to Dodson (18-7 MMA, 7-2 UFC) for the FS1-televised main event at Moda Center in Portland, Ore. More seriously, it’s the fifth time he’s missed weight for a contracted UFC bout.

The heavy-handed Brazilian was heavy on four occasions while fighting in the flyweight class. His persistent weight-cutting problems took a potential title shot off the table, and after a fourth miss, he was ordered to move up to the bantamweight division.

Lineker wasn’t the only Brazilian to miss weight; three of six fighters coming from the country came in heavy, forcing three catchweight fights, including a co-main event bout between Will Brooks (18-1 MMA, 1-0 UFC) and Alex Oliveira (14-3-1 MMA, 4-2 UFC) .

Brooks immediately vented on the weight miss, calling Oliveira’s professionalism into question.

“All the Brazilians had a very hard time making weight because it’s a long flight,” Davis said. “It’s nine hours to Miami, and another seven hours here. So what happens is you dehydrate during the flight. It’s not an excuse. It’s just a problem that exists and we need to handle it.”

For more on UFC Fight Night 96, check out the UFC Rumors section of MMAjunkie.