Jon Fitch cut by UFC along with 15 other fighters

Tough times for Jon Fitch and fifteen others.

Today, the UFC announced sixteen fighters that would be dropped from their current roster, the most notable among them being Jon Fitch. MMA Fighting had the full list:

UFC president Dana White also confirmed with MMAFighting.com that the following fighters were also let go: Wagner Prado, Mike Russow, Jacob Volkmann, Vladimir Matyushenko, Che Mills, Jay Hieron, Terry Etim, Paul Sass, Jorge Santiago, Mike Stumpf, Simeon Thoresen, C.J. Keith, Motonobu Tezuka, Josh Grispi and Ulysses Gomez.

A harsh development, indeed.

Aside from Fitch, the cut list was bizarre in some other ways. Paul Sass, an exciting submission fighter who was 3-2 in the UFC was cut after a unanimous decision loss to Danny Castillo this weekend. Jacob Volkmann, with a 6-2 run in the UFC's lightweight division also received his pink slip in another rather odd release.

The only rationalization I can make for these releases is the UFC cutting costs. With an influx of highly-paid Strikeforce talent, the UFC had to make room for them, and that meant some bad news for these fighters.

Each of these men is coming off at least one loss, but some of these cuts seem uncalled for nonetheless. It's pretty weird to see this when you consider fighters like Leonard Garcia and Dan Hardy going on four fight skids and still keeping their job.

With cuts like these, every fighter on the roster might have a lot to worry about in their next fights.