{"id":835279,"date":"2026-07-31T08:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T08:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/835279\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T08:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T08:48:09","slug":"dakota-ditcheva-how-injury-changed-her-outlook-on-fighting-and-life-beyond-mma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/835279\/","title":{"rendered":"Dakota Ditcheva: How injury changed her outlook on fighting and life beyond MMA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ditcheva has been a dominant force in the organisation, winning all 10 of her fights and securing seven of those victories in the opening round.<\/p>\n

That has led to suggestions that a move to the UFC could be on the horizon, though Ditcheva told BBC Sport she still has five fights remaining on her contract.<\/p>\n

But earlier this month, Ditcheva’s manager said her current PFL deal would make her one of the highest-paid female fighters in the UFC.<\/p>\n

“I’m enjoying my career. I’m living a good life. I’m changing my family’s life here at the PFL, and I feel like it is suiting me right now,” Ditcheva said.<\/p>\n

“Will I go over to the UFC one day? I don’t know. Maybe that’s not in my plan any more. Maybe I’ll box. I don’t know.”<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the PFL announced it had agreed to merge with Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions<\/a> – making staying put an even more attractive prospect.<\/p>\n

That opens the door to potentially moving into the sphere of boxing and could also produce opportunities of super-fights in MMA.<\/p>\n

“You see every fighter say they want to go to the UFC, and that used to be me,” Ditcheva said. <\/p>\n

“I don’t know whether it is any more. I feel like my goals are changing all the time, and the opportunities I’m getting I’m really enjoying.<\/p>\n

“Is the UFC the be-all and end-all? I don’t know any more.<\/p>\n

“It’s not something that will ever define me. If I end my career and I have never been to the UFC, nobody is going to make me feel bad online about it.<\/p>\n

“If I end my career having been undefeated, I’m still undefeated and the number one flyweight whether I go to the UFC or not.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ditcheva has been a dominant force in the organisation, winning all 10 of her fights and securing seven…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":835280,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85],"class_list":["post-835279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835279","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=835279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/835280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=835279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=835279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=835279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}