The show's main event was supposed to involve a middleweight championship bout between the New Zealand-born Australian fighter Robert Whittaker against the challenger Kelvin Gastelum, but Whittaker, the reigning champion, withdrew from the fight in the eleventh hour because of an injury.
The main event was subsequently pulled from the UFC 234 show, with White confirming the news that Whittaker had been hospitalized with a hernia.
"He's in the recovery room with his wife and his family," White said on Saturday, according to MMAFighting.com . "His bowel and his intestines poked through the hole and it's one of those situations had it popped out during the fight, it could have been fatal."
White added that it "is really serious" and was a "freak, freak injury."
It is unclear whether a bout between Whittaker and Gastelum will be rearranged, but one thing is clear Damon, who played a doctor, botanist, and astronaut in the 2015 hit movie "The Martian," expects Whittaker to be sidelined for more than a month.
That is according to White, who relayed the Hollywood actor's medical advice at the post-fight press conference.
White was expecting Whittaker to recover in four to six weeks but Damon told White he once had hernia surgery and a four to six-week recovery rate is "ridiculous." Damon said the champion could be out of action for longer.
With the main event in disarray, a middleweight fight between former champion Anderson Silva and rising star Israel Adesanya was promoted as the headline attraction. Adesanya won an impressive three round decision.
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