{"id":592886,"date":"2026-04-09T17:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T17:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/592886\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T17:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T17:03:15","slug":"canadian-fighter-jamie-siraj-to-debut-at-ufc-winnipeg-after-health-scares","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/592886\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadian fighter Jamie Siraj to debut at UFC Winnipeg after health scares"},"content":{"rendered":"

Canadian fighter Jamie Siraj has finally made it to the UFC.<\/p>\n

The featherweight has been added to the upcoming UFC Fight Night event in Winnipeg, where he will face American John Yannis in a 145-pound preliminary matchup.<\/p>\n

The UFC officially announced Siraj\u2019s addition to the card Thursday morning.<\/p>\n

The 31-year-old is from Lower Mainland in B.C., and has trained out of the famous Tristar Gym in Montreal alongside current UFC contender Aiemann Zahabi plus former two-weight champion Georges St-Pierre, among other talent throughout Canadian mixed martial arts.<\/p>\n

Siraj made his professional debut in 2014 and holds a 14-3 record, but his career has seen significant interruptions and setbacks.<\/p>\n

Most notably, there was a four-year span from mid-2019 to mid-2023 during which Siraj did not compete due to life-threatening health issues.<\/p>\n

\"UFCUFC on Sportsnet<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s Mike Malott and Brazil\u2019s Gilbert Burns headline a Fight Night in Winnipeg. Watch all the UFC action on Saturday, April 18 on Sportsnet 360 and Sportsnet+ with coverage beginning at 6 p.m. ET \/ 3 p.m. PT.<\/p>\n

Watch UFC on Sportsnet<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cIn 2020, I ended up getting a brain infection,\u201d Siraj told UFC.com back in 2023<\/a> ahead of his scheduled comeback fight at the time. \u201cI had to go into a coma, and in healing from that, my body developed an auto-immune disease that was attacking my body\u2019s connective tissues. I ended up septic in the hospital a bunch of times, and then I was put in another coma and almost died at the beginning of 2022. \u201c(From 2020 to 2023) I probably spent a year-and-a-half in the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

He has gone 6-1 since returning to competition less than three years ago and most recently has been competing in B.C.\u2019s Battlefield Fight League.<\/p>\n

Siraj is coming off consecutive second-round submission victories and his only loss since 2016 was early last year against Diego Brandao, a UFC veteran and past winner of The Ultimate Fighter. Other than that defeat, Siraj is 11-1 in the past decade.<\/p>\n

Yannis, 31, is a 9-4 pro who lost his UFC debut last August when he was submitted by Austin Bashi in the opening round.<\/p>\n

Siraj is one of nine Canadian-born fighters set for the UFC Winnipeg card, which is headlined by Ontario welterweight Mike Malott facing one-time title challenger Gilbert Burns of Brazil in a five-round main event.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Canadian fighter Jamie Siraj has finally made it to the UFC. The featherweight has been added to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-592886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=592886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}