Stamp Fairtex won’t get to defend her atomweight title in June, and she’s also been forced out of a champion vs. champion fight that was set to take place when ONE Championship returns to the United States in September.
The 26-year-old multi-sport champion from Thailand suffered a serious knee injury in one of her final sparring sessions that required her to undergo surgery. As a result, Stamp won’t face Denice Zamboanga on June 7 and she’ll also be forced out of her scheduled fight against ONE strawweight champion Xiong Jingnan on Sept. 6 in Denver.
ONE CEO Chatri Sityodtong revealed the news when speaking to MMA Fighting on Monday.
“It’s a sad thing,” Sityodtong said. “One of her final sparring sessions prepping for the big event in a couple of weeks, she blew out her knee. 80 percent of her meniscus was torn off her knee, and it was on a nasty takedown where her leg got caught. Her knee buckled. She just went for surgery, very successful surgery [on Sunday].”
There’s no exact timeline for Stamp to return to action and Sityodtong hasn’t had the chance to speak to her directly since the underwent surgery to repair the damage done.
It’s possible that she could make a comeback sooner than expected but there’s no chance that Stamp fights in June or September due to the knee injury.
“I’ve talked to the Fairtex team, looks like it’s going to be six months but I really don’t know,” Sityodtong said. “I haven’t talked to the doctor. Let’s see what happens. It’s kind of sad but at the same time Atlanta is six months away so who knows. Stamp is a super athlete. You never know.”
Losing Stamp is definitely a blow to ONE’s future plans as the former kickboxing and Muay Thai world champion has quickly become one of the promotion’s fastest rising stars.
She was already a major draw for ONE during her striking career but since crossing over to MMA and claiming the atomweight title, the attention on Stamp has only continued to grow.
Her growing popularity played a part in Stamp getting the opportunity to become a two-division champion as well as headlining ONE’s return to the U.S. in September. Sadly, those plans are now cancelled with ONE looking to replace Stamp at the top of the card prior to the event in Denver.
“These things happen,” Sityodtong said. “The most important thing right now is for Stamp to rest and recover and rehab her knee so she’s back and hopefully she’s back in several months even potentially for our Atlanta show and there’s more shows in the states for next year. So I’m pretty relaxed about that from a timing perspective and plus we have such a stacked card.
“We haven’t even announced our card, but we have such a stacked card for Denver, 100 percent the event is going to sell out. With zero marketing, we’re more than half sold out, which is mind bogging to me. It’s a 20,000-seat arena where the world champion Denver Nuggets play. It’s a full blown NBA stadium. We’ve done zero marketing, All we’ve done is announce that we’re coming and put a ticket link up and a couple of fights and it’s more than half sold out already. So I think four months to go, we’ll probably sell out with several weeks to go just like we did for our last Denver event. We’re very excited.”
