Oops he did it again: Hendricks done with welterweight

On Thursday former UFC welterweight champion Johny Hendricks gave an erratic media scrum in which he appeared depleted and dehydrated, complained of cotton mouth, and challenged the assembled media to a weight cutting contest. If you ever worked as a doorman, Hendricks appeared like that guy who isn’t shut off yet, but will be.

There is a culture of extreme weight cutting in MMA that has proven to be lethal. This is yet another exhibit, among countless others, in the irrefutable case that more needs to be done to address it.

Then at Friday’s weigh-ins, he came in at 173.5 pounds, 2.5 pounds over non-title fight welterweight limit. He will forfeit 20% of his purse to Neil Magny.

This was not the first time Hendricks missed the contracted weight.

His last fight was against Kelvin Gastelum; it was switched to a catchweight after he failed to make weight. And that was a triumph compared to the fight before that. His #1 contender bout with Tyron Woodley was canceled at the final moment after Hendricks went to the hospital with kidney stones.

Today’s weigh in video shows the grim pressure he is under.

“I’m done fighting at welterweight,” said the fighter to MMA Fighting. “Unless they open up a 175-pound division, I’m moving up to middleweight.”

Hendricks was confident he would be successful at middleweight.

“The lord blessed me with great strength,” he said.

Two years and four weeks ago, Johny Hendricks was the UFC welterweight champion. Now he’s 33, and won just one of his last four fights. At UFC 207 on Friday, he fights Neil Magny, who won three of his last four.