Vallejos seeks star-turning win vs. Emmett in first UFC main event

If you were to list all the fighters under the age of 25 currently on the UFC roster and power ranked them based on overall talent and ceiling for potential, Kevin Vallejos would be near or at the top of that list.

The 24-year-old standout featherweight from Argentina is 17-1 in mixed martial arts and off to a blistering 3-0 start to his UFC career.

On Saturday in Las Vegas, Vallejos will step into the Octagon for his first UFC main event when he takes on veteran knockout artist Josh Emmett. 

Vallejos earned a UFC contract in September 2024 with a first-round technical knockout on Dana White’s Contender Series. He made a successful UFC debut six months later and by the end of 2025 he had picked up two additional wins and had earned a spot in the official 145-pound fighter rankings.

Vallejos capped off his rookie campaign with a December spinning backfist knockout finish of touted kickboxer Giga Chikadze in a Fight Night co-main event, and now UFC brass feels he’s ready for a main event spotlight.

Vallejos has occasionally received some stylistic comparisons to Ilia Topuria, the former undisputed featherweight champion and current lightweight titleholder. 

One of Topuria’s breakthrough performances on his journey to winning UFC gold was in his Fight Night main event against Emmett in June of 2023. Topuria styled on Emmett for five rounds and won a unanimous decision that earned him a title shot in his next outing and the rest is history. Topuria followed up his rout of Emmett with consecutive knockout victories over Alexander Volkanovski, Max Holloway and Charles Oliveira.

Now, while no one is suggesting a win over Emmett in 2026 will push Vallejos into immediate title contention, a decisive win over Emmett would certainly put him on the doorstep of the top 10 contenders at 145 pounds.

Vallejos enters the weekend ranked No. 14, three spots behind the No. 11-ranked Emmett, who turned 41 at the beginning of the month.

Emmett has lost two in a row and four of his last five over the past three years but said Wednesday he has felt refreshed in the training room lately.

“I just need to go out there and be me,” Emmett said. “I’m back to enjoying this. I’m back to having fun. I just have to go out there and just be me, and it’ll be an easy night at the office.”

To date, the only loss Vallejos has experienced in MMA was a competitive 2023 decision to Jean Silva in his first of two Contender Series appearances. Silva has gone 6-1 in the UFC since beating Vallejos and is currently ranked No. 6 in the featherweight division, which is to say the loss has aged very well.

Although oddsmakers are expecting Vallejos to extend his winning streak this weekend – he’s more than a five-to-one betting favourite per BetMGM odds – Vallejos has been respectful of his opponent this week.

Vallejos called Emmett “a legend in the sport” yet also made the bold claim that he thinks he can finish the durable Emmett with strikes.

“It's a huge challenge and I love fights like this,” Vallejos said via a translator when speaking with media Wednesday. “I do think that I can knock him out. I'm not going to say that I can’t. This is MMA. Anything can happen.

“He can knock me out. I can knock him out, but to be honest, I feel like this is going to be a dream come true in the sense that, like many other fighters, I want to have that dream of just having a dirty, bloody war for five rounds where we just kill each other and that's what I'm pretty much expecting.”

This will be the fifth consecutive fight at the Meta Apex for Vallejos. His Contender Series win and all three of his fights last year also took place at the venue. This will mark Emmett’s fifth UFC Fight Night main event and his first trip to the Apex since his five-round decision loss to Lerone Murphy 11 months ago.

Saturday’s card has 14 matchups scheduled, including a co-main event featuring one of Canada’s top talents.

Robertson closing in on title shot

Canada’s Gillian Robertson and Brazil’s Amanda Lemos were originally supposed to meet at the final UFC event of 2025 but the bout was cancelled mere hours before they were set to walk to the cage due to a “a medical issue” with Lemos.

Robertson has won four in a row and six of her past seven, including a second-round TKO win over Marina Rodriguez 10 months ago in her most recent appearance. The 30-year-old from Niagara Falls, Ont., has risen to No. 8 in the 115-pound contender rankings during her current streak. 

Lemos, 38, is a one-time title challenger that has alternated wins and losses over the past three years since her championship loss to Zhang Weili. She is ranked No. 5 in the division and looking to bounce back from a unanimous decision loss to Tatiana Suarez in September. Robertson is roughly a two-to-one betting favourite to beat Lemos despite being a lower-ranked contender.

Projected bout order for UFC Fight Night: Emmett vs. Vallejos (subject to change)…

Main card

-- Josh Emmett vs. Kevin Vallejos

-- Amanda Lemos vs. Gillian Robertson

-- Ion Cuțelaba vs. Oumar Sy

-- Andre Fili vs. Jose Delgado

-- Marwan Rahiki vs. Harry Hardwick

-- Vitor Petrino vs. Steven Asplund       

Preliminary card

-- Charles Johnson vs. Bruno Silva

-- Brad Tavares vs. Eryk Anders

-- Chris Curtis vs. Myktybek Orolbai

-- Bolaji Oki vs. Manoel Sousa

-- Luan Lacerda vs. Hecher Sosa

-- Beatriz Mesquita vs. Montserrat Rendon

-- Elijah Smith vs. Suyoung You

-- Piera Rodriguez vs. Sam Hughes