Amanda Cooper: Mackenzie Dern a disgrace to all professionals for UFC 224 scale fail

The marketing minds at Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) put a lot of hype behind 23-year-old grappling sensation Mackenzie Dern, who was expected to become the next big thing at 115 pounds.

And by “big” they were thinking “celebrity” not “big” as in “shoulda been a flyweight.”

Dern missed weight today for her now-catchweight fight against Amanda Bobby Cooper at their UFC 224 pay-per-view (PPV) showdown tomorrow night (Sat., May 12, 2018) inside Jeunesse Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Not that her opponent was surprised.

“Not shocked Mackenzie Dern missed weight but 7.4 pounds over is a disgrace to all professionals,” Cooper wrote on social media. “She’s not getting out of this fight that easy. Fight is still on. ABCNation get ready. UFC 224 strawweight vs. flyweight tomorrow night in Brazil.”

Dern was fined a percentage of her fight purse after coming in seven pounds heavy. While she was afforded an extra hour to try to cut the excess weight (lol), she instead went right to the snack table for lunch, resigned to her scale fail (video).

“I visualize every part of the fight,” Cooper told MMA Junkie. “I visualize being in bad positions and getting out of them. I visualize me knocking her out. I visualize me breaking her nose. In my visualization, I finish her in the second round.”

For a closer look at their upcoming showdown click here.