UFC contender Michael Morales has undefeated record restored

It turns out UFC welterweight contender Michael Morales is undefeated after all.

Earlier this week, combat sports record-keeping database Tapology announced that it would be changing Morales’ 19-0 record to 20-1. The cause, the company said, was some recently unearthed footage from a Latin American reality show similar to the Ultimate Fighter, which showed Morales losing one fight, and winning another.

It did not take long for Tapology to reverse course.

Apparently, there is quite a bit of room for debate as to what constitutes a professional fight, which is where the trouble began.

Tapology walks back Michael Morales record change

“Update on the ‘Ultima Pelea’ league in Ecuador and its impact on Michael Morales MMA record,” Tapology posted on X (via MMA Mania). “We will reverse and classify these as exhibition. We look forward to many colorful replies on social media about how stupid we are. Thank you in advance. But above all we want to be fair and get this correct. We add hundreds of fights daily to Tapology and try to evaluate them consistently. This is difficult to do given the different kinds of fights and circumstances that are sent our way. One category of fight that we have been getting far more strict about is EXHIBITION fights.

“For the last several years we have been very restrictive about allowing fighters or leagues to claim exhibition status,” Tapology added. “It has become a loophole for keeping legitimate fights off of records. It allows fighters to compete in otherwise professional bouts without it counting. As a result, new events being sent to us, even if a reality show format, are generally not exempt from counting on Tapology win/loss record. This is the standard we applied to reviewing the ‘Ultimate Pelea’ events that we found footage of this week.”

Sherdog, another MMA recordkeeping database, did not change Morales’ record.

Michael Morales does not currently have a fight booked. However, following a knockout win over Sean Brady, he’s one of the top contenders for a crack at welterweight champ Islam Makhachev.