Kevin Holland will face Jacare Souza at UFC 256 after Marvin Vettori replaces him against Jack Hermansson

UFC middleweight Kevin Holland was pulled from his main event fight against number 4 ranked middleweight Jack Hermansson just a week away from UF Vegas 16 on December 5th.

To say that Kevin Holland was distraught after testing positive for COVID 19 and missing out on the biggest opportunity of his MMA career would be an understatement.

pic.twitter.com/eWcqRAhBKo

— Kevin Holland (@Trailblaze2top) November 28, 2020

However, Kevin Holland can now find some solace in the fact that he has been booked again at UFC 256.

‘The TrailBlazer’ is now booked to take on Brazilian BJJ specialist Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza in his next UFC outing.

Jack Hermansson vs. Marvin Vettori official for next week. And Kevin Holland, who had to pull out of that fight against Hermansson, is now already scheduled to fight Ronaldo Jacare Souza a week later at UFC 256, per UFC.

— Brett Okamoto (@bokamotoESPN) November 29, 2020

Souza has not fought since November 2019 when he moved up a weight division and fought the current light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz.

Jacare did put on a motivated performance but the size difference was evident as the Brazilian lost to Blachowicz via a split decision.

Souza’s form of late has been erratic in the highly competitive UFC middleweight division and Kevin Holland would want to take full advantage of that.

Jacare is 2-4 in his last 6 UFC outings. However, 3 of those were decisions. Incidentally, he also suffered a loss at the hands of Holland’s original opponent, Jack Hermansson, in April 2019.

While Holland will not be main eventing any longer, he will rejoice having been given a shot against another big name on a stacked card headlined by a flyweight title bout between champion Deiveson Figueiredo and Mexican challenger Brandon Moreno.

Kevin Holland’s phenomenal 2020

Holland was chosen as Darren Till’s replacement to fight Jack Hermansson after winning 4 straight fights in the pandemic-hit 2020.

He started in style knocking out Anthony Hernandez in the first round in May.

He would go on and claim another KO win over viral sensation Joaquin Buckley, before a closely contested decision win over Darren Stewart in December.

Charlie Ontiveros was his latest victim as Kevin Holland became the first UFC fighter with 4 wins in 2020.

If he recovers well and goes on to fight Souza at UFC 256, he will join an elite company of fighters with 5 fights in a calendar year.

While a win against Hermansson would have been great, he is sure to break into the top 15 in UFC middleweight rankings with a win over Brazilian Jacare Souza as well.