{"id":620346,"date":"2026-04-21T01:26:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T01:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/620346\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T01:26:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T01:26:10","slug":"ufc-releases-shem-rock-after-post-fight-punch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/620346\/","title":{"rendered":"UFC releases Shem Rock after post-fight punch"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Today (Mon., April 20, 2026), it was revealed that two fighters have been removed from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/ufc-roster-watch-cuts-tracker-free-agent-aquisitions-mma\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">UFC\u2019s active roster<\/a>, meaning they have been released from their respective contracts and\/or the promotion decided not to extend them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The two fighters who lost their jobs are: 22-fight Octagon veteran, Pedro Munhoz, and Shem Rock.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cThe Young Punisher\u201d is riding a three-fight losing streak and hasn\u2019t competed since a unanimous decision loss to Aiemann Zahabi at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/2024\/11\/2\/24281323\/ufc-edmonton-full-results-live-streaming-updates-brandon-moreno-vs-amir-albazi\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">UFC Edmonton<\/a> back in 2024.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The long-time Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) veteran and former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/ufc-mma-rankings\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Top 15 Bantamweight<\/a> contender leaves behind a lengthy and battle-tested run in the 135-pound division, where he shared the eight-walled cage with a \u201cWho\u2019s Who\u201d of elite competition, including Aljamain Sterling, Jose Aldo, Dominick Cruz, Sean O\u2019Malley, Frankie Edgar and Cody Garbrandt, among others.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">During his UFC tenure, Munhoz earned four \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/2021\/2\/28\/22304929\/official-ufc-vegas-20-bonus-winners-results-mma-espn-rozenstruik-gane-munhoz-rivera-lawrence\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Fight of the Night<\/a>\u201d bonuses, three \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/2017\/10\/29\/16565304\/ufc-fight-night-119-results-from-last-night-pedro-munhoz-vs-rob-font-fight-recap-mma\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Performance of the Night<\/a>\u201d bonuses, and compiled 22 appearances inside the Octagon \u2014 the second-most in Bantamweight history behind Marlon Vera.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Munoz exits the promotion with a 10-10-2 record.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Rock (12-3-1), meanwhile, never got going.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The outspoken teammate of Paddy Pimblett entered UFC with buzz following a strong run in OKTAGON, but went winless (0-2) inside the Octagon. He dropped a decision to Nurullo Aliev in his debut, then suffered another lopsided loss to Abdul-Kareem Al-Selwady at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmamania.com\/ufc-results\/428809\/ufc-london-live-results-highlights-play-by-play-evloev-vs-murphy\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">UFC London<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">It was what happened after that second loss that likely sealed his fate.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Not a good look \u2026 and now he\u2019s gone. Rock exits the promotion winless, while Munhoz walks away after a long, respected run.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Two very different departures \u2026 same result.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Today (Mon., April 20, 2026), it was revealed that two fighters have been removed from UFC\u2019s active roster,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620347,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,40762,785,85,1396,61417,6656],"class_list":{"0":"post-620346","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc-news","15":"tag-ufc-roster-cuts","16":"tag-ufc-results"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=620346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=620346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=620346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=620346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}