WHAT'S HAPPENING:
*So, UFC 205 pretty much lived up to the hype - the only criticism you can offer is that the first two of the three title fights going to decision led the card to drag into the late hours, but given that they both wound up being pretty great fights, it's sort of hard to complain. Plus all that washed away after the main event, as Conor McGregor did indeed become the first man to be UFC champion in two weight classes simultaneously, making yet another bit of history with a second-round knockout of Eddie Alvarez. McGregor made it look easy, as Alvarez pretty much had nothing for the Irishman - Alvarez got dropped in the first exchange of the fight, and that was pretty much it, as corner audio from the fight paints a harrowing picture of Alvarez pretty much completely abandoning his gameplan and getting tagged, and Alvarez even admitted as much after the fight. I really don't know what there is to say about McGregor that hasn't already said - it kind of gets lost amidst his personality and how he's completely changed the way people think about big-money fights in MMA, but he really is an excellent fighter and, with this win, is probably already on the short-list of greatest MMA fighters of all time, with more years to grow that legacy even more. As for what's next for McGregor, that's apparently fatherhood and ownership - McGregor confirmed rumors that his longtime girlfriend, Dee Devlin, is pregnant, and during the post-fight scrum openly mused about how he deserves points in the company at this point, given that he's done a better job of promoting himself than UFC has. And it's hard not to argue with that at times, with the chaos after the fight putting that into stark contrast - UFC somehow didn't have a second belt ready for McGregor, but thankfully McGregor pretty much browbeat Dana White into sending a flunky to run backstage and get a second belt (from Tyron Woodley, apparently) so we could get some iconic images from the post-fight celebration. Who knows where McGregor goes from here - if UFC forces him to cut back down to featherweight to keep that belt, a rematch with Jose Aldo is possible, a trilogy fight with Nate Diaz for the lightweight title is the biggest money fight, Khabib Nurmagomedov is probably now the most deserving contender, and then there's the darkhorse possibility of McGregor trying to get a third belt against Tyron Woodley - the two jawed a little bit backstage during weigh-ins, and the shorter, stockier Woodley is probably the best matchup McGregor can ask for in a high-level welterweight fight. The sport is McGregor's oyster.
*As for Tyron Woodley, his crazy back-and-forth fight with Stephen "Wonderboy" Thompson, appropriately enough, went to a draw, and wound up being the consensus best fight of the night. Things were a bit slow early - Woodley used his wrestling to pretty much dominate the first round, and then Thompson pretty much used his length to keep Woodley at bay for rounds two and three, but then things popped off into a back and forth war, as Woodley basically almost finished Thompson for two straight minutes in the fourth round, battering Wonderboy and then sinking in a guillotine that would've tapped out most men. Thompson rebounded at the end of the round and the result was pretty clearly a draw, with Woodley winning two rounds, the fourth one 10-8, and Thompson getting the balance of the fight. And that's indeed what happened, although that wasn't announced at first - two scorecards had a draw, and a third had a Woodley win (giving him round three with all rounds 10-9), and Bruce Buffer was instructed to read it as a split decision win for Woodley. Which it wasn't - two cards being tied means it's a majority draw, as everyone soon figured out, and it was re-announced as such. Either way, the result is that Woodley keeps the belt, and assuming McGregor doesn't decide to crash this division, a rematch is imminent, and it should be a fun one. I'm curious to see if Woodley or Thompson wound up getting any sort of rub from being in such a good fight on this big a card - Woodley's always seemed willing to show some personality, although it's never quite clicked, and Wonderboy does seem to have an innate likability thanks to his "aw shucks" charm and the fact that he's a flashy karate dude in 2016.
*And the third title fight on the card pretty much followed the same blueprint as the second one, as Joanna Jedrzejczyk battled Karolina Kowalkiewicz in a battle of Polish strawweights. The crowd loved Joanna Champion coming out, but once the fight started and it became apparent Kowalkiewicz had little to offer, the momentum in the arena pretty much died down until the fourth round, when Kowalkiewicz suddenly stunned the champ with a hook and had her on the ropes before Jedrzejczyk recovered. That was pretty much Kowalkiewicz's one shot to win the fight, but it was still a hell of a performance from the challenger, who would have some success exploiting an opening before Jedrzejczyk would charge back, plus Kowalkiewicz showed that she's pretty much indestructible, as she never really got stunned during the course of the fight, even though Jedrzejczyk hit her with some pretty hard shots. So Kowalkiewicz still remains among the top contenders, and it wouldn't surprise me if UFC put on a title rematch in Poland somewhere down the line, although Jedrzejczyk has struggled to connect with her home country the same way, say, McGregor has. Poland's been a weird market for UFC - the country basically treats its local promotion, KSW, which is admittedly one of the stronger non-UFC leagues out there, as the primary MMA promotion out there, and sort of considers UFC a secondary curiosity. And some of the numbers coming out of Poland for this fight are absolutely stunning - at 5 AM local time, apparently only 252 people in Poland watched the Jedrzejczyk/Kowalkiewicz fight live on television. Not 252 thousand, just 252. Admittedly, the card was available via other means, like UFC Fight Pass, but that's a horrifyingly low number. Anyway, Poland's obviously becoming one of the stronger MMA markets in Europe (possibly the strongest outside of the UK and Ireland - past that, it's either Poland or Sweden, if you don't count Russia as European), and, strangely, having a dominant champion such as Jedrzejczyk doesn't seem to be doing UFC any good there.
*Speaking of local favorites and disappointments, poor Chris Weidman. With Rashad Evans getting pulled from the card, Weidman was the lone native New Yorker on the show, and got the big hometown entrance featuring a whole bunch of New York-related songs. And despite coming off a massive, career-threatening neck injury, Weidman actually looked rather excellent for two rounds against Yoel Romero, as his wrestling proved to be effective even against Romero, and he outworked Romero on the feet. But then Weidman dove in for a takedown to start the third round, and Romero hit him with one of the most violent flying knees you'll ever see - watching it on the replay, the crack that Romero's knee made against Weidman's skull was absolutely sickening, and a ridiculous amount of blood was immediately flowing from Weidman's head. To add insult to injury, UFC then announced after the fact that this fight was to determine the #1 contender for Michael Bisping, so Bisping/Romero is up next at 185. Bisping was in the crowd as part of his FS1 duties, which led to some fun back and forth, with Romero screaming unintelligibly while Bisping pretty much just flipped him off. Yeah, it's gonna be sad when Bisping's title run comes to an end.
*Oh, Miesha Tate retired. It says something about how deep this card was that this is fifth from the top, and it easily could've been one or two down. Tate just looked ridiculously bad in a decision loss to Raquel Pennington - the first round was the usual story of Tate getting hit on the feet before realizing she's a wrestler, but then the wrestling just wasn't there, and by the end of the fight Tate was just diving for low-percentage submissions in search of a finish. So, uh, I guess Raquel Pennington is a title contender now, and Tate's loss just makes a thin division even thinner. That said, this was probably the right time for Tate if her heart isn't in it anymore, and based off this fight, it isn't - it's just weird to think that she experienced a career high in winning the UFC title off Holly Holm this past March, and just eight months after that, and four months after headlining UFC 200, she's out of the sport of her own volition.
*And then there were the prelims, which were fun, if not quite as earth-shattering as a lot of results on the main card. The big story from the prelims was Khabib Nurmagomedov, and his dominant win over Michael Johnson to pretty much prove, yep, he's fully back from his knee injuries and once again looks like an absolute murderer at lightweight. Johnson actually had some success early, as Nurmagomedov looked hittable on the feet, but the Russian took Johnson down and pretty much broke him in pretty short order, chaining takedown after takedown and just laying an absolutely brutal beatdown on Johnson. Even worse, corner audio picked up Khabib basically telling Johnson to quit because he knows Khabib serves a title shot in between punches and just ragdolling him around, and even between rounds, Nurmagomedov was talking trash to Dana White at ringside about how he is going to destroy Dana's "son," Conor McGregor. After basically mercy-killing Johnson with a Kimura in the third, Nurmagomedov continued in one of the better moments of the night, where he went completely 1980's pro wrestling on the mostly Irish crowd, talking about how McGregor "tapped like a chicken" against Nate Diaz in March but is rewarded with a title shot, and citing the population difference between Russia and Ireland before cutting a promo in Russian and then re-affirming that, in fact, he wants to fight "your chicken." Live, I couldn't even hear any of this through the boos, and that's pretty much the dream fight now among the hardcores, between a high-level striker and a high-level grappler both looking unbeatable. And while Nurmagomedov certainly has done his part in talking up the fight, I'm still not sure it's worth McGregor's while. As far as other fights on the prelims, the headliner of sorts was Frankie Edgar win one of the better fights of the night over Jeremy Stephens. The second round made for classic Edgar, and Stephens basically had him on the ropes before Edgar rebounded back with his wrestling and won the second half of the fight. Edgar later revealed that he was fighting on a torn MCL and was getting shots into his back, but there was no way he was missing a fight at MSG, because Frankie Edgar is an insane person. As far as other stuff, Tim Boetsch and Vicente Luque each scored quick knockouts over Rafael Natal and Belal Muhammad, respectively, and Jim Miller and Liz Carmouche won perfectly fine decisions over Thiago Alves and Katlyn Chookagian to kick the card off.
*Noticeably absent from that rundown is the slated fight between Donald Cerrone and Kelvin Gastelum, which was scrapped due to Gastelum blowing weight once again, and this time, it looks like Gastelum will be forced up to middleweight permanently. (Which may actually be good in the long run, since middleweight needs prospects.) There was some weirdness here that led to Cerrone/Gastelum being scrapped, but not Miller/Alves, even though Thiago Alves also blew weight in his first attempted cut to lightweight. Basically, in the latter case, Alves weighed in first, and New York apparently has thresholds where a fight is automatically called off past a certain weight difference, even if the parties are willing. So once Alves weighed in at 162.5 pounds, Miller actually had to put some weight back on to make it back up underneath that threshold, and then the fight was on. But for Cerrone/Gastelum, Gastelum basically didn't tell anyone he was having trouble cutting weight, so Cerrone was one of the first guys to weigh in - at 170 - so once it became clear Gastelum wasn't getting anywhere near there, there was no way for Cerrone to weigh in at a higher weight. Vicente Luque apparently took the fight against Cerrone before UFC decided not to go in that direction, and Alan Jouban was apparently willing to do the thing on one day's notice, since he was in New York doing some modeling stuff, but it's probably for the best that UFC scrapped the fight, given how late the card ran even without it.
*Not much else in non-UFC 205 news, outside of two suspensions for longtime veterans - Lyoto Machida has finally gotten his suspension from a drug issue back in April where Machida declared an illegal substance for his fight against Dan Henderson; Machida will be suspended for eighteen months, so he's eligible to return in October of 2017. And Roy Nelson has been handed a nine month suspension - through late June - for kicking John McCarthy following Nelson's win over Bigfoot Silva in September. Quaintly, the Brazilian commission has allowed for three months to be docked off that suspension - provided Nelson publicly apologizes to McCarthy either in the cage during a UFC event, or in an official UFC press conference. Please do this.
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BOOKINGS:
*Not much in terms of quantity here, but UFC has some interesting stuff booked. UFC 205's loss has been UFC 206's gain - what looked like a thin card in Toronto was bolstered by the scrapped Rashad Evans/Tim Kennedy fight getting moved there, and with Donald Cerrone off UFC 205 as well, he's also now fighting at UFC 206 (because it's a UFC bylaw that Cerrone must always have a fight booked) against Matt Brown in a fun bit of violence. Brown was slated to face Tarec Saffiedine at UFC 207, the Ronda Rousey card, but Saffiedine will now face Dong Hyun Kim, who gets rebooked after his main event with Gunnar Nelson in Belfast fell through. Outside of that, there's some undercard shuffling - a fight between Chad Laprise and Jingliang Li has been taken off UFC 206 thanks to a Laprise injury, and the Albany card the night before had some changes; Oluwale Bamgbose is out of a fight with Joe Gigliotti, and regional veteran Gerald Meerschaert will instead make his UFC debut there, and as part of USADA's plan to flag every Russian fighter on the roster, Zubaira Tukhugov has been pulled from a slated bout against Tiago Trator, who may or may not remain on the card. And the Fox card in Denver has its first bout, a pretty fun middleweight bout between Sam Alvey and Nate Marquardt.
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ROSTER CUTS:
1) Miesha Tate (18-7 overall, 5-4 UFC, last fought 11/12/16, L vs. Raquel Pennington):
As mentioned, Tate retired after a flat performance in a loss to Raquel Pennington, seemingly ending a wild ride of a career. As it became apparent that Gina Carano wasn't fighting again, and before anyone really knew who Ronda Rousey was, Tate looked to be the next big marketable star in women's fighting. Admittedly, at the time, a lot of that was her looks - I remember the big thing around the time being that while Carano looked way more photogenic, if you were at a bar or something, Tate would be way more attractive in person. But anyway, beyond her looks, it suddenly became apparent that, hey, Tate can actually fight, as 2011 saw her shockingly upset Marloes Coenen via submission to claim Strikeforce's women's bantamweight title. And, well, her next fight wound up being against Ronda Rousey, and after a lot of trash talking back and forth about whether or not Rousey deserved the shot and was a product of hype, Rousey pretty much bent Tate's arm into a pretzel - though she had to do it a few times, proving once again how ridiculously tough Tate is - for yet another first round armbar. UFC absorbed Strikeforce shortly thereafter, and Rousey/Tate II loomed as a money fight, but it looked like those hopes were dashed after Cat Zingano beat Tate in a fight to determine who would coach on TUF opposite Rousey. But Zingano wound up tearing her ACL, and Rousey/Tate II happened anyway, and wound up being the big rivalry that put Rousey on the map. The two absolutely hate each other, and it made for an amazing dynamic week in and week out between Tate's smugness and Rousey's insane...Rouseyness, and when the fight finally came in December of 2013, it's not a stretch to say it even overshadowed the big Anderson Silva/Chris Weidman main event. Tate got tapped again - though not before having some success on the feet and becoming the first person to take Rousey out of the first round - and sort of wound up in limbo, as even though Rousey/Tate III was easy money, UFC never seemed all that eager to make that fight again. Tate was essentially promised a title shot after four straight wins, culminating with a July 2015 win over Jessica Eye, but openly contemplated retirement when the rug was pulled out from under her yet again, and UFC went way down the rankings to pull Holly Holm as Rousey's next opponent. And we all know what happened next - Holm knocked Rousey out, and Tate was suddenly a viable title contender yet again, and wound up choking Holm out in come-from-behind fashion in the fifth round, though in typical Tate fashion she got hit a lot before getting there. It was a pretty great moment, and, well, it was all downhill from there. After the comedy of errors leading up to UFC 200, Tate defending her belt against Amanda Nunes suddenly became the main event, and it became apparent in short order that something was up with Tate - she almost missed the early weigh-ins, and even coming down to the cage, you could see that Tate was getting a bit shook. Whether or not that hurt her in the cage, we'll never know - Nunes's fast-starting style was always a bad matchup with Tate's slow starts - but Nunes blitzed Tate and took her title in fairly short order. There was none of that obvious weirdness leading up to this fight against Pennington, but once Tate got into the cage, you could see she looked way worse than usual - and if her heart's not in it anymore, there's really no reason to go on. The only thing on the horizon would've been one last big-money fight against Rousey, but even if Rousey stuck around for more than one or two more fights, which looks less and less likely, Tate's loss to Pennington pretty much closes the door on that as a realistic possibility. So good on Tate for getting out while the getting's good - she has nothing to prove.
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UPCOMING UFC SHOWS:
11/26 - UFC Fight Night 101 - Melbourne, Australia - Derek Brunson vs. Robert Whittaker
12/3 - TUF 24 Finale - Las Vegas, NV - Demetrious Johnson ( c ) vs. Tim Elliott, Joseph Benavidez vs. Henry Cejudo
12/9 - UFC Fight Night 102 - Albany, NY - Shamil Abdurakhimov vs. Derrick Lewis, Anthony Hamilton vs. Francis Ngannou
12/10 - UFC 206 - Toronto, ON - Daniel Cormier ( c ) vs. Anthony Johnson, Max Holloway vs. Anthony Pettis
12/17 - UFC on Fox 22 - Sacramento, CA - Paige VanZant vs. Michelle Waterson, Urijah Faber vs. Brad Pickett, Mickey Gall vs. Sage Northcutt
12/30 - UFC 207 - Las Vegas, NV - Amanda Nunes ( c ) vs. Ronda Rousey, Dominick Cruz ( c ) vs. Cody Garbrandt, Cain Velasquez vs. Fabricio Werdum, T.J. Dillashaw vs. John Lineker
1/15 - UFC Fight Night 103 - Phoenix, AZ - Court McGee vs. Ben Saunders, Erik Koch vs. Tony Martin
1/28 - UFC on Fox 23 - Denver, CO - Sam Alvey vs. Nate Marquardt
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UFC Fight Night 99 - November 19, 2016 - The SSE Arena - Belfast, Northern Ireland
So, after what might've been the biggest card in company history, UFC has apparently decided to follow things up with quantity, not quality. For the first time in about two years, UFC's running a double-header, and the first leg of it is a Fight Pass card from Belfast. There's not really much in terms of local ties - the event was initially built around Icelander and honorary Irishman Gunnar Nelson facing Dong Hyun Kim in the main event, but after Nelson suffered a freak foot injury during an open workout for the press, UFC did well to throw together a pretty solid Gegard Mousasi/Uriah Hall fight for a headliner. And then, I guess for some more local flavor, they added another two fights with ties to Ireland and the UK, giving this card a fairly insane fourteen fights. There have been a few times when UFC has teased a fourteen-fight card, only for one or two to fall apart in the weeks leading up to it, but if this goes through, it'll be the most fights of any UFC card outside of UFC 2. And then we have another full card to go. Bananas.
MAIN CARD (UFC Fight Pass - 4:00 PM ET):
Middleweight: (#5) Gegard Mousasi vs. (#10) Uriah Hall
Lightweight: Ross Pearson vs. Stevie Ray
Heavyweight: (#14) Tim Johnson vs. Alexander Volkov
Featherweight: Teruto Ishihara vs. Artem Lobov
PRELIMINARY CARD (UFC Fight Pass - 12:00 PM ET):
Flyweight: (#5) Ian McCall vs. Neil Seery
Middleweight: Magnus Cedenblad vs. Jack Marshman
Flyweight: (#4) Kyoji Horiguchi vs. (#8) Ali Bagautinov
Lightweight: Kevin Lee vs. Magomed Mustafaev
Women's Strawweight: Amanda Cooper vs. Anna Elmose
Heavyweight: Mark Godbeer vs. Justin Ledet
Welterweight: Zak Cummings vs. Alexander Yakovlev
Women's Bantamweight: (#15) Marion Reneau vs. Milana Dudieva
Bantamweight: Brett Johns vs. Kwan Ho Kwak
Welterweight: Abdul Razak Alhassan vs. Charlie Ward
THE RUNDOWN:
Gegard Mousasi (40-6-2 overall, 7-3 UFC, 4-1-1 Strikeforce, 2-1 PRIDE) vs. Uriah Hall (12-7 overall, 5-5 UFC, 1-0 Bellator):
It's a weird little bit of matchmaking, given that Gegard Mousasi looks like he's ascending towards a middleweight title fight, and Uriah Hall is coming off two straight losses, but still, this is pretty solid for a main event thrown together at the last minute due to injury. It was just a little bit over fourteen months ago that Hall hit one of the more scintillating finishes you'll ever see in a fight against Mousasi - Mousasi had spent most of the first round outwrestling Hall, and was diving in for a takedown to start the second, when Hall hit a picture-perfect jumping spin kick right into Mousasi's face, stunning Mousasi enough that Hall was able to follow it up with a flying knee straight out of Tekken. Interestingly though, while in the moment it appeared like Hall might finally be turning the corner, it was Mousasi that actually looked much-improved after that fight - Hall has remained an inconsistent talent, losing two straight to Robert Whittaker and Derek Brunson, while the often laid-back Mousasi has, to be quite frank, turned into much more of a motherfucker, fighting way more aggressive than usual in wins over Thales Leites, Thiago Santos and Vitor Belfort. So, honestly, this fight should be a bit of a blowout - the first round of their first fight was a clear 10-8 and completely one-sided, as Mousasi just mauled Hall on the ground for five minutes, and this figures to be more of the same, unless Hall once again manages to hit one of his fight-ending bursts of offense. Which, hell, he did it once - but the most likely result is Mousasi by stoppage, either ground and pound or submission - I'll say he gets a submission in the second round.
Ross Pearson (19-12 [1] overall, 11-9 [1] UFC) vs. Stevie Ray (19-6 overall, 3-1 UFC):
A fun little fight here, with an interesting angle, as it pits England's Pearson against Scotland's Ray in Northern Ireland, which is neutral territory, I suppose. Pearson never really popped as the first big post-Michael Bisping British star like UFC probably hoped after he won TUF 9, but he's been a lightweight division stalwart and a pretty fun action fighter, fighting pretty frequently (this will actually be his fifth fight of 2016) and typically putting on a pretty fun bout. But Pearson, suddenly, badly needs a win here - he acquitted himself well in a loss to Will Brooks this past July, and decided to basically try and rebound as soon as possible, moving up to welterweight to fight Jorge Masvidal on just a three-week turnaround. Masvidal more or less tuned Pearson up, and as reliable a hand on these European cards as he's been, Pearson might be in danger of getting cut if he loses again here. Stevie Ray badly needs a rebound win here himself - Ray looked like an interesting rising talent in his first three fights, as he pretty much dominated low-to-mid-tier UFC competition, but in his last bout, Alan Patrick was able to rely on his wrestling and grappling, and showed that as offensively skilled as Ray can be, things don't really go that well for the Scotsman when he's trying to fight off his back. Ray's kind of doing what Pearson did in July, taking a short turnaround fight as a late injury replacement to try and rebound quickly - hopefully it works out a bit better for him. It's a tough fight to call - thus far, both guys' main weakness seem to be against opponents willing to take them down, but only Pearson has to worry about that here, since Ray's shown a solid grappling top game here and there while Pearson almost never looks to take things to the mat. But, as long as this is on the feet, Pearson does seem to be the more diverse and talented striker. I'll assume this stays a striking match, either by Pearson being able to keep it there or just Ray outright obliging, so I'll take Pearson by a narrow decision, but Ray taking this to the ground and winning a clear decision wouldn't surprise me.
Tim Johnson (10-2 overall, 2-1 UFC) vs. Alexander Volkov (26-6 overall, 6-3 Bellator):
A solid heavyweight fight here as the middle tier of the division starts to shake itself out. This is the UFC debut for former Bellator champ Alexander Volkov, who could make some noise in the division - despite being around for years, he's still just 28, and being a 6'7" kickboxer should pose a lot of problems for a lot of opponents. The Moscow native made his debut with Bellator in 2012 and was champion by the end of the year, and after losing the title in his first defense against Vitaly Minakov, Volkov hung around a few more years as one of the company's top contenders before losing two close fights and getting cut in late 2015. Volkov's signing with UFC seemed imminent, and after returning to Russia and finishing two more fights there, Volkov did indeed sign with the company and makes his debut here. He faces North Dakota's Tim Johnson, a brick house of a wrestler who's had a solid three-fight tenure thus far, as wins over Shamil Abdurakhimov and Marcin Tybura have aged rather well. In a deeper division, he probably wouldn't be ranked, but as it is, Johnson has enough size and general well-roundedness to make a little bit of a run in the current heavyweight landscape. As much of an interesting talent that Volkov is, I don't think his debut here is going to go all that well - while Volkov looks excellent when he can kickbox at range, he tends to get in a lot of trouble when opponents are just willing to bull him against the fence or take him down, and Johnson seems more than capable of doing just that. Volkov's long limbs may make him tricky on the mat, and he's not completely unskilled on the ground, but I just see this fight as a lot of Johnson pressuring him and bulling him to the ground and Volkov not being able to offer much resistance. Volkov has a shot at a finish, but Johnson by decision seems to be the safe pick.
Teruto Ishihara (9-2-2 overall, 2-0-1 UFC) vs. Artem Lobov (12-12-1 [1] overall, 1-2 UFC):
A fun bout here. Artem Lobov isn't a bad fighter, but he's not really a UFC-level one, as the Russian-turned-adopted-Irishman is only really here because he's a friend and training partner of Conor McGregor. Hell, that was even made blatantly obvious on the season of TUF Lobov came through - Lobov actually lost his fight to get into the house, so UFC basically scrambled to change the rules to allow Lobov to get back into the house. Lobov at least got the chance to show what he can do - he's a solid enough striker, although not a physically dominant one, and he's a fine gatekeeper in the sense that he's the kind of guy fighters should beat to get into the UFC - but his UFC tenure proper has mostly seen him get outgunned, either via grappling or physically disadvantages, outside of a gimme win against Diaz teammate Chris Avila. Thankfully, UFC put Lobov in the right role here - he's pretty much here as a test for Japanese prospect Teruto Ishihara, and it should make for a fun standup fight for as long as it lasts. "Yashabo" was the clear standout on UFC's one-off "Road to UFC Japan" series, both because of his athletic potential and his playboy persona - the man, apparently, loves his bitches. (Though, to their credit, UFC stepped in and sort of warned Ishihara to cool it a bit - now the man also loves his ladies.) Ishihara fought veteran Mizuto Hirota to a draw in the finals of that show, and since then, Ishihara's flashed some talent with knockout wins over Julian Erosa and Horacio Gutierrez. Both those guys are fringy (and were in fact cut after losing to Ishihara), so Lobov provides a small step up, although I figure the result won't be much different, even if Lobov only has one knockout loss - I'll say Ishihara lands something that finishes Lobov in, say, the third round.
Ian McCall (13-5-1 overall, 2-3-1 UFC, 1-2 WEC) vs. Neil Seery (16-12 overall, 3-3 UFC):
A really fun, fascinating fight here. The UFC career of Ian McCall has been quite snakebit, some of his own doing - the Californian often fights up or down to his level of competition - and a lot of it not. It even goes back to his first UFC fight, against Demetrious Johnson - McCall was brought in as part of a four-man tournament to crown UFC's first flyweight champion, and after a bout that saw Johnson win the first two rounds and McCall come back to win a dominant third, it was announced in the cage that Johnson was narrowly the victory. But, of course, it turned out that someone added the scores wrong, and the fight should've gone to a fourth round, which, given the shifting momentum, McCall was likely to win. McCall lost a rematch, and after another loss to Joseph Benavidez, he's pretty much drifted, only fighting three times in roughly the last four years thanks to injury, and looking pretty inconsistent when he does so. Even in his last fight, a January 2015 bout against John Lineker, McCall used his wrestling to a great advantage early and looked like he'd get a win to get him back in the thick of things at flyweight - but for whatever reason, later in the fight he found himself abandoning his gameplan and getting suckered into a brawl, eventually throwing away enough rounds to lose the decision. McCall then spent another long layoff nursing injuries, and his recent attempts at fighting have been a nightmare - in August, he was slated to face Justin Scoggins when Scoggins was unable to make weight, at which point McCall was rebooked against Ray Borg in September, only for Borg to come down with the flu just a few days before the fight. So, third time's the charm, and that'll come against Dublin's Neil Seery, who's already announced that this will be his last fight. Seery's had a pretty fun run, despite not much being expected of him when UFC picked him up as an injury replacement in 2014 - after a rough start to his career, Seery rallied to get into UFC in his late thirties, and while he hasn't really had a signature win, he's had one of the better fights on the card every time out, and carved out a niche as a tough as hell, well-rounded action fighter. At 37, and after a long career, I don't blame Seery for calling it quits, but it'll be sad to see him go. As far as the fight, who the hell knows - McCall should win this based off his athleticism on the feet and his solid wrestling, but that's pretty much the case with every McCall fight, and as the Lineker bout showed, even when McCall is doing well, he can often drift back into a losing strategy. Add in the injuries and years of hard living, plus the fact that McCall himself has openly contemplated retirement, and there's a ton of red flags that McCall could be going downhill at any moment. Of course, with Seery announcing this'll be his last fight, there's also some of the same concerns - as Miesha Tate showed last weekend, as soon as a fighter starts thinking it's the end, things start going downhill quickly. Still, I'll actually favor Seery to win an upset decision in his last fight - I'm past trusting McCall, and Seery is enough of a well-rounded gamer that I could see him taking advantage of every opportunity that McCall provides.
Magnus Cedenblad (14-4 overall, 4-1 UFC) vs. Jack Marshman (20-5 overall):
A solid middleweight bout here. His debut loss to Francis Carmont in 2012 wasn't anything impressive, but since then, Sweden's Magnus Cedenblad has quietly put together a solid four-fight winning streak, and after missing all of 2015 with injury, flashed some solid striking in a one-sided win over Garreth McLellan this past May. He'll face the debuting Jack Marshman, who's pretty much killed it on the European circuit, and is the first Welsh fighter to be signed by the UFC, even though countryman Brett Johns will beat him to the cage on this card. Marshman's a solid enough fighter - he gets by on being a solid, fundamental striker who's tough as hell, with a functional submission game to fall back on, but he doesn't really have the sort of projected upside that'll carry him into title contender status. Still, he's a fun addition to the weird morass of average middleweights that seems to make up most of the division. It's a fairly close fight, but I favor Cedenblad, particularly if those striking gains are legit and not just a product of facing McLellan - Cedenblad's tall and lanky for the division, and should be able to keep Marshman at bay, and if not, he should be able to fall back on his grappling background and outclass Marshman there. A Marshman win is entirely possible - while he's not an amazing athlete for the UFC overall, I could see him sticking and moving and outpointing Cedenblad - but the Swede just has way more of a fleshed-out game to fall back on, so I'll say Cedenblad takes a decision.
Kyoji Horiguchi (17-2 overall, 6-1 UFC) vs. Ali Bagautinov (15-5 overall, 4-2 UFC):
All in all, this may be the most relevant fight on the card outside of the main event, two former flyweight title challengers look to work their way back to that spot in what should be a fun as hell fight. Pretty much as soon as Kyoji Horiguchi was announced as Demetrious Johnson's title challenger in early 2015, everyone lamented that it was too much, too soon - Horiguchi was pretty much the best option available given how Johnson is running through the division, but he was way more in the prospect phase, and it seemed like UFC wasting what could be a viable title challenger down the line just to fill a spot in the short-term. And indeed, Johnson pretty much blew through Horiguchi, and indeed, Horiguchi has kept improving greatly since, using his quick striking game to pretty much coast to victory against Chico Camus and Neil Seery. Horiguchi is improving enough - and Johnson keeps running through challengers enough - that a title rematch isn't out of the question, and Horiguchi looks to keep climbing towards that against Russia's Ali Bagautinov. Bagautinov came into UFC in 2013 much more of a fully formed veteran, and after running through three pretty solid opponents, got his own shot at Johnson in June of 2014. That went about as poorly as possible - the flyweight champ dominated the proceedings, and then Bagautinov got popped in his steroid test, not returning until late 2015. After a one-sided loss to Joseph Benavidez, Bagautinov rebounded in June with a win over Geane Herrera, and looks to keep that momentum going here. It's a solid fight, but I do favor Horiguchi - I'm pretty sure you could hit Bagautinov with an axe and he'd keep fighting, so a stoppage is pretty much out of the question, but Horiguchi's speed and athleticism on the feet should be too much to deal with. Bagautinov has a ton of accolades in various Russian grappling arts, so if he can get his hands on Horiguchi, he could easily dish out a beating, but, well, that's easier said that done. I'll say Horiguchi by decision, and this should be a pretty great bout.
Kevin Lee (13-2 overall, 6-2 UFC) vs. Magomed Mustafaev (13-1 overall, 2-0 UFC):
A pretty great fight here between two intriguing lightweight talents. Detroit native Kevin Lee was super raw when UFC decided to pick him up and throw him in the deep end - just 21 years old and with under two years of experience at the time, UFC made him debut against Al Iaquinta, and while Lee lost a clear decision, he acquitted himself quite well against one of the better rising lightweights in the division at the time. Since then, Lee's improved in fits and starts - what was first a pretty grinding wrestling game soon gave way to some submissions, and Lee's striking has clearly improved, while there's still kinks to work out - his last fight in 2015 saw Lee get shockingly upset by BJJ player Leonardo Santos when Santos was able to crack Lee with a knockout punch. But Lee's rebounded with wins over Efrain Escudero and Jake Matthews, in which he's been able to flash that wrestling game some more - and that win over Matthews was probably a career-best performance, as Lee was able to use Matthews's takedown momentum against him and eventually win via ground and pound. Lee's the type of rising talent that has you asking "when" more than "if" he'll be a contender, but he has a tough test in front of him in Magomed Mustafaev, one of the seemingly endless amount of Dagestani standouts taking over the sport. Mustafaev has a background in freestyle wrestling, but what really stands out is his striking - more than a lot of his counterparts from the Caucuses, Mustafaev just throws heat, cutting Piotr Hallmann open and causing a doctor stoppage in his UFC debut, and then absolutely obliterating Joe Proctor with a bunch of hard strikes last December. There's still a lot to be proven as Mustafaev moves up the ranks, but the dude's an absolute tank, and his striking power alone is probably enough to get him pretty far. It's a tough fight to call - Proctor offered Mustafaev nothing, but Hallmann was able to have some success grinding and wrestling with Mustafaev, although the Russian was typically strong enough to power out of any tough positions. Lee's also a beast of an athlete, so I can see a scenario where Lee has enough size and strength to neutralize Mustafaev and just winds up grinding out a decision while working for a submission. And that may actually be what most of the fight looks like - but I still think Mustafaev is more than capable of tagging Lee with one of those bombs, and given how quickly he crumbled against Santos, there are some questions about how Lee will react if he gets nailed with a solid shot. It may be more of the come-from-behind variety than a dominant performance, but I'll take Mustafaev by knockout, let's say sometime in the second round.
Amanda Cooper (1-2 overall, 0-1 UFC, 0-1 Invicta) vs. Anna Elmose (3-1 overall, 0-1 UFC):
An interesting fight here, if only because both women are so extremely raw, since they each have 0-1 UFC records and only five pre-UFC fights between them. UFC pretty much threw Anna Elmose into a no-win situation when they signed her - the Dane is a short, thickly built kickboxer, and they made her debut against tall, long, world-class kickboxer Germaine de Randamie in de Randamie's home country of the Netherlands. De Randamie ran through Elmose, as expected, and Elmose - somewhat surprisingly, given how muscular her frame was at 135 - cuts down to 115 here to face Amanda "Bobby" Cooper. Cooper was the runner-up on last spring's season of TUF, and she looked alright enough, getting by on a combination of size, wrestling, and just enough submission ability to be dangerous, but when she faced world-class wrestler Tatiana Suarez in the final, Cooper found herself absolutely outclassed. It's a hard fight to call - there's still a lot of questions about both women, and even moreso with this being Elmose's first cut to strawweight, and both are inexperienced enough that they could improve a ton between fights. At its core, this seems to be a striker-versus-grappler matchup - Elmose has striking experience and just sort of charges forward with powerful shots, while Cooper looks to get things to the ground, and in fights she's been losing, has seemed dangerous off her back throwing up armbars and the like. I'll say Elmose just blitzes Cooper and scores a first-round knockout, but this fight going any number of different ways wouldn't surprise me.
Mark Godbeer (11-2 overall, 0-1 Bellator) vs. Justin Ledet (7-0 [1] overall, 1-0 UFC):
A solid enough fight here, as UFC continues to throw heavyweights against the wall to see who sticks. Mark "The Hand of" Godbeer is excellently named, and UFC's latest signing in the heavyweight division, a tall Brit who gets by with a solid, one-shot striking game, although his lone Bellator fight against Cheick Kongo brought up a lot of questions about Godbeer's ability to handle any sort of grappling game. But Godbeer didn't really have to worry about that in Britain, and it doesn't seem like he'll have to worry about it against Justin Ledet, who looked good in his UFC debut against Chase Sherman in August. Ledet was sort of a mystery man - pretty much any footage of Ledet that was out there was from before 2012, when Ledet took four years off of MMA to apparently focus on a boxing career - but in his fight against Sherman he showed the ability to put together a lot of quick combinations, although it's unclear how much of that was Sherman's rather apathetic defense. It's a hard one to call, except that all fifteen minutes or less will probably take place on the feet, but I'll favor Ledet by decision based off his ability to throw those combinations, although Godbeer seems to be the lighter guy on his feet. Either way, should be a fun fight, even if we may not see a knockout.
Zak Cummings (19-5 overall, 4-2 UFC, 0-1 Strikeforce, 1-0 Bellator) vs. Alexander Yakovlev (23-7-1 overall, 2-3 UFC):
A solid fight here between two solid under-the-radar veterans, but with each coming off a loss, each may need a win to stay on the UFC roster. Zak Cummings has been putting together a pretty solid run since coming off TUF 17 - mostly known as a veteran grappling specialist, Cummings has also developed some pretty solid striking, and went 4-1 in his first five UFC fights, with the one loss being a surprisingly game effort against Gunnar Nelson. But Santiago Ponzinibbio pieced up Cummings rather well this past August, and now Cummings looks to rebound against Alexander Yakovlev. Yakovlev put together an excellent record in his native Russia before his UFC debut, and his reward for that was getting thrown immediately into the fire, as he was matched against Demian Maia. Yakovlev managed to survive, even though it was primarily a grappling match, and has been a solid middle-of-the-road fighter since. The big knock on Yakovlev is his lack of physical power, but it looked like he might be turning the corner with a knockout of George Sullivan this January - though those hopes were promptly dashed this past July, where Kamaru Usman absolutely rag-dolled Yakovlev and brought back a lot of those concerns. And that's why I favor Cummings here, even though it's a close fight - Cummings is probably the better striker, and even if Yakovlev's length gives him problems, Cummings is a more than capable grappler who can probably just overpower and pin Yakovlev down. Yakovlev's tough, so I don't see him being finished, so my call is Cummings by decision.
Marion Reneau (6-3 overall, 2-2 UFC) vs. Milana Dudieva (11-4 overall, 1-1 UFC):
A solid enough fight here at bantamweight. Marion Reneau was a fun story when she burst onto the UFC scene in early 2015 - already in her late thirties, she was snubbed for TUF because she was considered too old, and once she eventually got the call, she pieced up Alexis Dufresne in a brutal decision win and then got a stunning submission win over Jessica Andrade. But Reneau's momentum soon stalled - a subsequent fight against Holly Holm pretty much left Reneau too overwhelmed to do much of anything, and her fight against Ashlee Evans-Smith...well, Reneau probably did enough to beat Evans-Smith, but the judges gave Evans-Smith a controversial decision win. At age 39, if Reneau wants to move back up the ranks, she's gotta start moving ASAP, and that starts here against Milana Dudieva. Dudieva's had a rather unnotable two-fight UFC tenure - she won a narrow split decision over Elizabeth Phillips on the deep undercard of a show in Macau, got annihilated by Julianna Pena in Pena's comeback fight, then took the last year and a half off due to pregnancy. Dudieva came into UFC with a little bit of hype as an interesting Russian prospect, but so far her game has looked...well-rounded and functional, but not particularly great anywhere. I just think Reneau's length and physicality will be too much for Dudieva, even though I'm not sure it'll be enough for Reneau to put her away - I'll say Reneau by decision, with the caveat that at age 39 and rather reliant on her athleticism, things could fall apart for Reneau at any moment.
Brett Johns (12-0 overall) vs. Kwan Ho Kwak (9-0 overall):
A fun as hell prospect fight here, as UFC signed two of the top bantamweights available and has pitted them against each other. Brett Johns has been on the radar for a while, thanks to his time as bantamweight champion for both Cage Warriors and Titan FC - he's not always the most exciting fighter, since his game is mostly based on wrestling, with some fundamental boxing to set that up - but he's excelled against a pretty great slate of competition, all things considered. The only problem for Johns has been the scale - he's missed weight a few times, including in what would've been his Titan FC title defense last year against Anthony Gutierrez. He faces South Korea's Kwan Ho Kwak, who actually breaks a bit from the usual Korean mold - rather than being a straightforward fighter that pretty much wades through abuse in order to dish it out, Kwak is pretty purely a stick-and-move striker, bouncing all around the cage and throwing a vast array of hard strikes. But there's some concerns about how Kwak will do against someone who can take him down, and, well, that's where Johns comes in. It should be a fun fight, but more likely than not, Johns should be able to get Kwak down, and from there things should get pretty one-sided - Johns by decision.
Abdul Razak Alhassan (6-0 overall, 2-0 Bellator) vs. Charlie Ward (3-1 overall):
This fight should be...something, as it was thrown onto the card on about a week's notice after Ireland's Charlie Ward was having issues getting a visa to fight in Albany next month. Ward was a bit of a strange pickup, made somewhat understandable when you see he's a teammate of Conor McGregor, but I'm surprised UFC would risk the bad press - Ward made headlined last spring when a fighter he knocked out, Joao Carvalho, passed out shortly after the fight and wound up dying due to the injuries sustained. It seemed to be somewhat of a freak thing - the stoppage was apparently regarded a bit late, but it doesn't seem medical staff or anyone were reckless - and it's not like it's Ward's fault, but still, you put yourself at risk of headlines about a fighter that killed his opponent, particularly on a card in New York so soon after the sport got legalized in the state. But anyway, Ward is here, and I'm even more shocked UFC signed him after watching him fight - he's only 3-1, so you hate to criticize the guy too much, but he's basically a run-of-the-mill aggressive brawler that really doesn't show a ton in terms of skill at the moment. He faces Abdul Razak Alhassan, who's somewhat hard to find tape on, despite having two Bellator undercard bouts under his belt. (Some of that is due to the existence of Razak "Razor" Al-Hassan, who had a brief UFC run from 2008-09 and last fought in Bellator himself.) Based off what little is out there, Alhassan looks like a strong athlete, and his 6-0 record features six knockouts, all under two minutes, which is both impressive and makes you wonder what happens when Alhassan runs into some adversity. But I'm not really sure Ward is the guy to show us that, so the safest bet looks to be Alhassan by first round knockout.
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UFC Fight Night 100 - November 19, 2016 - Ginasio de Ibirapuera - Sao Paulo, Brazil
And now, another fight card. This one's fine, and there's some fun stuff here and there, but it doesn't really move the needle, especially on a day that has two cards - maybe if there was a more interesting main event, rather than a somewhat reheated rematch of a fight that wasn't particularly good in the first place. On the plus side, at least it's starting an hour earlier than usual, which means we'll be wrapping up around midnight eastern rather than 1 AM - though, of course, that means there's a somewhat likely overlap between the end of the Belfast card and the beginning of this one. Overkill.
MAIN CARD (Fox Sports 1 - 9:00 PM ET):
Light Heavyweight: (#4) Ryan Bader vs. (#9) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira
Bantamweight: (#11) Thomas Almeida vs. Albert Morales
Women's Strawweight: (#1) Claudia Gadelha vs. Cortney Casey
Middleweight: (#11) Thales Leites vs. (#15) Krzysztof Jotko
Welterweight: Warlley Alves vs. Kamaru Usman
Welterweight: Sergio Moraes vs. Zak Ottow
PRELIMINARY CARD (Fox Sports 1 - 7:00 PM ET):
Middleweight: Cezar Ferreira vs. Jack Hermansson
Light Heavyweight: Gadzhimurad Antigulov vs. Marcos Rogerio de Lima
Bantamweight: (#13) Johnny Eduardo vs. Manvel Gamburyan
Heavyweight: Christian Colombo vs. Luis Henrique
PRELIMINARY CARD (UFC Fight Pass - 6:00 PM ET):
Bantamweight: (#11 Flyweight) Justin Scoggins vs. Pedro Munhoz
Light Heavyweight: Francimar Barroso vs. Darren Stewart
Ryan Bader (21-5 overall, 14-5 UFC) vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira (22-7 overall, 5-4 UFC, 8-2 PRIDE):
This is certainly a fight that's happening - it's not a complete joke of a main event, but it's also not particularly inspiring, but such is the state of light heavyweight at the moment - the more interesting drama might be outside the cage, since this is the last fight on Ryan Bader's UFC contract. Bader's had a strange UFC run, more notable for its failures than its successes, as Bader's wound up being a punchline while also still being pretty good. I bring this up with almost every Bader fight, but in February of 2011, Bader faced off with Jon Jones in what wound up being a #1 contender's fight, and at the time, they were regarded as the two top prospects at 205 - while Jones was almost unanimously first on that list, there wasn't too wide of a gap. Jones went on to tap Bader out and become one of the greatest fighters of all time, and Bader went on to suffer one of the more embarrassing losses in high-level UFC history, as he got shockingly submitted by Tito Ortiz in under two minutes, in what was Ortiz's first submission win in eleven years. If that started the narrative of Bader as someone who chokes in big fights, his bout a year later against Lyoto Machida cemented it - Machida pretty much toyed with Bader on the feet, ending in a brutal one-punch knockout as Bader dove in to get close to Machida; Joe Rogan's commentary on the replay, where he yells "Clang!" just as Machida connects with Bader, just cements the moment of embarrassment. To his credit, Bader kept plugging along, greatly improving his striking in the process - for a while there, after Jon Jones got stripped of his belt and Daniel Cormier took over as light heavyweight king, Bader was probably the most deserving contender after wins over Phil Davis and Rashad Evans, but UFC kept passing him over because, well, he's Ryan Bader. It looked like Bader might finally get a title fight with a win over Anthony "Rumble" Johnson this past January, but, well, Bader embarrassed himself once again, diving for a horrible takedown and pretty much getting pounded out on the ground in just 86 seconds. Yet, somehow, light heavyweight is thin enough that after Cormier and Johnson face off in December, Bader's still probably one of the top contenders after a brutal knockout win over Ilir Latifi, if he gets a win here. Yet, now his contract is up, and if he does win, or hell, even if he loses, I have no idea what UFC is going to do - Bader's one of those guys whose talent is much bigger than his box office, and he's not particularly exciting, so he's the type of guy UFC seems willing to let go, but given how thin 205 is, the division just needs contenders, and while letting Phil Davis walk hasn't really helped Bellator, it's still hurt UFC in terms of just having one less viable fighter. Oh, and after all this, I suppose I should mention Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, who's, you know, also fighting. Nogueira's nowhere near as shot as his since-retired brother was at the end of his career, but "Little Nog"'s inactivity has become an ongoing joke at this point, as this is the first time since 2011 that he's fought twice in a calendar year (and after that, he wound up skipping all of 2012). It looked for a while like Nogueira was pretty shot - his big 2013 win over Rashad Evans was more due to Evans's complete lack of activity than anything else, and he returned about a year and a half later to get absolutely annihilated by Rumble, but he's looked relatively spry in a close loss to Shogun Rua and his win this past May against Patrick Cummins. The key word there is "relatively," though. It'd be peak Ryan Bader to get tuned up by Nogueira in like, a second round knockout, and part of me really does want to pick it here, but the most likely scenario is Bader just boxing up Nogueira where he can and using his wrestling to grind out a rather lackluster decision win. And then the real intrigue starts.
Thomas Almeida (20-1 overall, 4-1 UFC) vs. Albert Morales (6-0-1 overall, 0-0-1 UFC, 2-0 Bellator):
Coming off a knockout loss to Cody Garbrandt in a FS1 main event this past May, it was going to be interesting to see where UFC went with Thomas Almeida - he was someone the company had obviously targeted as their next potential Brazilian star, and it's easy to see why, given that Almeida's dynamic striking combinations are among the most beautiful pieces of violence in the sport. And, well, rather than try to keep Almeida among the mix of fringe contenders, for the time being the company has just decided to have him smoke Albert Morales. Morales is a fine enough fighter - like a lot of recent UFC signings, he's a big athlete with some decent skill and some knockout power - but he's less than two years into his MMA career and still extremely raw. Morales's size and athleticism may give Almeida a bit of trouble, and Morales's chin is still relatively untested, so he might wind up being a guy who can actually take Almeida's offense, but it should be still be Almeida by knockout - and let's give Morales a little benefit of the doubt and say it comes in the second round.
Claudia Gadelha (13-2 overall, 2-2 UFC, 1-0 Invicta) vs. Cortney Casey (6-3 overall, 2-2 UFC):
A fun fight here, since it's nice to see Claudia Gadelha get a showcase fight, and it's good to see Cortney Casey get a big opportunity. Gadelha's pretty much the consensus number two strawweight in the world behind Joanna Jedrzejczyk, and at the moment, seems to be the only opponent out there with a realistic shot of beating her - and if you ask some people, she already did, as her 2014 fight against Jedrzejczyk, which earned Joanna her title shot, was a fairly controversial split decision loss. After beating Jessica Aguilar in rather one-sided fashion, Gadelha earned a title shot proper at Jedrzejczyk, and once again, she got as close as anyone has to beating the champ, easily winning the first two rounds with her grappling before tiring out and losing a one-sided striking match as the fight went on. As excellent of a camp as Nova Uniao is, one of the biggest criticisms towards them has been their somewhat reckless attitude towards cutting weight, so Gadelha left her longtime home and has now been splitting time between a few camps in Albuquerque, and it'll be interesting to see how she looks here against Cortney Casey. A Hawaii native born in Arizona, it was good to see Casey get another shot in UFC after two losses to Joanne Calderwood and Seohee Ham - both were fairly close fights and absolute back and forth wars, as Casey's toughness, aggression, and athleticism is tailor-made for great fights provided her opponents can keep up. 2016 has seen Casey turn it around, with rather quick finishes over Cristina Stanciu and Randa Markos, so Casey's now a going concern at strawweight, even if she's in a bit over her head here. Casey's length and aggression should keep her in this, and might give Gadelha a bit of a scare, but Gadelha's sheer strength when it comes to grappling should be able to take over as needed. So the pick is Gadelha by decision, even though it should be pretty interesting to watch the fight play out.
Thales Leites (26-6 overall, 11-5 UFC) vs. Krzysztof Jotko (18-1 overall, 5-1 UFC):
An interesting bout here, as Krzysztof Jotko gets a chance to break into the ranks of middleweight contenders against one of the best gatekeepers in the division. Thales Leites has had a bit of a weird run of things - he earned a title shot against Anderson Silva all the way back in 2009, mostly thanks to a lack of other options, and the ensuing fight was so awful that Leites was cut by the promotion by the end of the year. And that figured to be pretty much it for Leites's UFC tenure - he fought sparingly on some smaller shows - until then-featherweight champ Jose Aldo basically pulled a power play to get Leites re-signed in 2013. So Leites was back, and was suddenly surprisingly successful, reeling off five straight wins and showing some shockingly impressive striking ability, scoring knockout wins over Trevor Smith and Francis Carmont. It looked like Leites was on his way to becoming a contender once again, but after a narrow loss to Michael Bisping and a blowout loss to Gegard Mousasi, that dream seems to be over, and Leites has now settled into a gatekeeper role, starting with a fairly one-sided ragdolling of Chris Camozzi this past August. He's in that role again against Poland's Jotko, who's had a quietly successful run, racking up wins primarily on UFC's European cards. Jotko fought Tamdan McCrory in Ottawa this past spring, and that was Jotko's most impressive win yet, a 59-second knockout that shows that Jotko is ready for his shot. It's a hard fight to call, but it's one of those bouts where we'll probably know how it's going to go within the first minute, since it'll probably be predicated on if Jotko can keep the fight standing - Leites's fight with Camozzi showed that he's basically recommitted to just taking opponents down and putting them through an unwilling grappling seminar, while Jotko should be the more dangerous striker. Jotko has some grappling skill - his clinchwork has been quite solid in a lot of his fights - but in his one UFC loss, Magnus Cedenblad pretty much had his way with Jotko grappling, which suggests he won't be able to hang with Leites. So I'll say Leites takes this by decision, though a submission is surely possible.
Warlley Alves (10-1 overall, 4-1 UFC) vs. Kamaru Usman (8-1 overall, 3-0 UFC):
A fascinating bout between two top welterweight prospects here. Warlley Alves was one of the big hopes for the next great Brazilian fighter coming off season 3 of TUF: Brazil - Alves just absolutely ran through the competition, as the then-23 year old mixed brutal striking with powerful submissions, and no opponents really had an answer. But as quickly as his first post-TUF fight, some of the cracks began to show - Alves blitzed Alan Jouban early in their bout the following November, and then gassed horribly as Jouban took over the second half of the fight - the judges still gave the decision to Alves, but even with the controversial win, people started to get worried. Two explosive wins over Nordine Taleb and Colby Covington helped assuage some of those fears, but they came back in a huge way this past May against Bryan Barberena, where Alves offered a huge burst of offense early, but then had nothing the rest of the fight and lost a one-sided decision. You'd think UFC might want to give Alves a bit of an easier fight next, but instead they've put him in there with Nigeria's Kamaru Usman, who might be the best prospect going at welterweight. Usman came into UFC as a blue-chipper and has lived up to that, being relatively untested in his three UFC wins, although he's getting a rep as a bit of a boring fighter - Usman is a wrestler, first and foremost, and while he's shown some decent striking at points, it hasn't really come into play too much, as he's just been able to ragdoll everyone around. So this is one of those fights where it's pretty obviously going one of two ways - either Alves blitzes Usman and scores a first-round finish, or he gasses badly and we get Usman cruising to a decision win with his wrestling, with a chance of a submission. The latter seems more likely, so I'll say Usman takes it by decision.
Sergio Moraes (10-2-1 overall, 4-1-1 UFC, 1-0 Bellator) vs. Zak Ottow (14-3 overall, 1-0 UFC):
A solid enough fight here, though it may not be all that pretty to watch. Sergio Moraes finished as runner-up in the middleweight bracket of TUF Brazil 1, and the BJJ veteran has had one of those successful runs that's been relatively quiet due to a complete lack of activity, as Moraes has only fought five times in the ensuing four-and-a-half years. Moraes's bread and butter is his jiu-jitsu, thanks to his decorated BJJ career, but oddly, Moraes has relied on his sort of janky striking game in recent fights to some success - it scored him an upset knockout of Omari Akhmedov, though he probably should've done better than a draw against Luan Chagas. He faces Zak Ottow, a well-rounded Wisconsinite who made his UFC debut with a win against Josh Burkman about a month and a half ago, although that probably had more to do with Burkman's frustrating inactivity - Ottow didn't really stand out, good or bad, in any aspect of the fight. This feels like it'll be an ugly fight - if it goes to the ground, we may get some fun exchanges, but this really seems like the sort of bout where two guys who are more comfortable on the ground will just choose to kickbox rather sloppily. I'll call for a minor upset and say Ottow takes a decision, since he seems more athletic on the feet, but who knows.
Cezar Ferreira (10-5 overall, 6-3 UFC) vs. Jack Hermansson (14-2 overall, 1-0 UFC, 0-2 Bellator):
A decent enough middleweight fight here, as we continue to try and get some clarity in between the contenders and the chaff. You can see why UFC decided to push Cezar "Mutante" Ferreira as a future star coming off season one of TUF: Brazil, given the explosive offensive ability of the Vitor Belfort protege, but it didn't really work for a variety of reasons - for one, the Brazilians didn't really seem to take to Mutante, going so far as to chant the Portuguese equivalent of "faggot" during one of his fights, and for another, it soon became obvious that Ferreira was a glass cannon, as once he got past a certain level of competition, opponents were obliterating him on the first solid punch of the fight. To his credit, after an ill-advised cut to welterweight and a KO loss to Jorge Masvidal, Ferreira took some time off and retooled, fighting a bit more conservatively on the feet and relying on a strong wrestling game to get wins over Oluwale Bamgbose and Anthony Smith. The question will be if he can do the same against Sweden's Jack Hermansson, who had a ton of success in Europe before making a victorious UFC debut over Scott Askham in September. Hermansson's a solid striker, if not overwhelmingly impressive, and over the course of his career he's also shown some decent submission ability. Whether or not he can keep it standing here is still an open question, but I'll say he's up to the task, and if he can keep this standing, he's probably putting Mutante's lights out. So I'll say Hermansson takes this via second-round KO.
Gadzhimurad Antigulov (18-4 overall) vs. Marcos Rogerio de Lima (14-3-1 overall, 3-1 UFC, 0-1 Strikeforce):
A fun fight here, and the rare reminder that light heavyweight does have some decent depth, even if the top-flight contenders aren't there. Marcos Rogerio "Pezao" de Lima has had a solid run since coming off TUF: Brazil 3 - Pezao pretty much looks for the finish the entire fight, with some excellent knockout power and just enough submission skill to be dangerous, and the result has been all four of his UFC fights ending in the first round, win or lose. Russian newcomer Gadzhimurad Antigulov seems to have a similar mindset, all-offense, all-heading downhill, though he pretty much chooses to bull opponents in the clinch with an eye towards eventually getting them down for a ground and pound. So these two dudes are gonna charge at each other, and who knows what's going to happen - I'll favor de Lima just because he has the more high-level experience and is much more physically imposing (Antigulov's dabbled with middleweight here and there), and without knowing how good Antigulov's chin is, I guess I'll just go with de Lima's career trend and say it's a first-round knockout, although this really is pretty much a pick 'em.
Johnny Eduardo (27-10 overall, 2-2 UFC, 1-0 Bellator) vs. Manvel Gamburyan (15-9 [1] overall, 6-7 [1] UFC, 3-1 WEC):
A weird little fight here between two fading vets. Johnny Eduardo's been doing the damn thing for 20 years, making his debut on November 1, 1996, and while there's some gaps here and there, it's not like he's been entirely inactive for that stretch of time. That said, he does fight fairly sparingly nowadays - he's primarily a striking coach for Nova Uniao, and he only pops up about once a year or so, but he's made those fights count - a huge upset knockout win of Eddie Wineland in 2014 suddenly made him a contender. Aljamain Sterling beat him late last year, and now Eduardo looks to rebound against fellow veteran Manvel Gamburyan, who's the novice in this matchup despite having started his career in 1999. Gamburyan lost to Nate Diaz in the finals of TUF 5 all the way back in 2007, and it's pretty ridiculous looking back that he was fighting at lightweight, given that the Armenian is still short and stout at lightweight. Gamburyan had his best success after cutting to featherweight and moving to WEC, where he was able to make it to a title shot against Jose Aldo, and since then he's sort of hung around as a veteran grinder, eventually cutting to bantamweight along the way. This is a pretty classic striker versus grappler match, and at this point in both's careers, it's sort of hard to call who's diminished less. I'll favor Gamburyan via decision - I'm not so sure Eduardo would be that highly regarded if it wasn't for that win over Wineland - but if Eduardo just keeps the stocky Gamburyan at bay and coasts to a decision himself, that wouldn't be surprising.
Christian Colombo (8-1-1 overall, 0-0-1 UFC) vs. Luis Henrique (9-2 [1] overall, 1-1 UFC):
A fun fight here between two lower-level heavyweights. Denmark's Christian Colombo was a bit of an odd signing when he debuted in September - he's 36 years old and spent most of the last few years kickboxing - but he acquitted himself well in a draw against Jarjis Danho, as he showed some solid striking technique, even if Colombo is glacially slow. He'll face Brazilian prospect Luis Henrique, not to be confused with light heavyweight prospect Henrique da Silva (although Henrique was also a light heavyweight before moving up to heavyweight in UFC - okay nevermind, this is confusing) - Henrique has showed some solid wrestling in his first two fights, although there were two drastically different results, as Francis Ngannou obliterated him standing in his UFC debut, but Henrique was able to take down and choke out Dmitrii Smoliakov with little problem in fight number two. And this'll probably look the same as that - Henrique is just way quicker and more athletic than Colombo, and should have little problem getting him to the mat. Who knows what Colombo looks like on the ground, but I'm not optimistic, so I'll say Henrique gets a first-round submission.
Justin Scoggins (11-2 overall, 4-2 UFC) vs. Pedro Munhoz (12-2 [1] overall, 2-2 [1] UFC):
A really solid prospect bout here to headline the Fight Pass prelims. Justin Scoggins looked like an interesting prospect ever since coming into UFC, and while the company rushed the South Carolinian into some tough fights early on, Scoggins eventually appeared to be coming into his own, particularly after a rather dominant win over Ray Borg in February - Scoggins's size and karate striking style just kept Borg from doing much of anything, and Scoggins coasted to an easy win against one of his fellow top flyweight prospects. Scoggins seemed to be pretty close to a shot at Demetrious Johnson - a win against Ian McCall this past July probably would've put him one fight away - but Scoggins was unable to get anywhere near weight, and Scoggins has decided to move to a full-time bantamweight. And he gets a hell of a tough first test here against Pedro Munhoz, who's a blue-chip prospect in his own right. Munhoz has had sort of a similar path as Scoggins, as UFC has thrown him in there with top contenders a bunch of times - hell, Munhoz made his debut as a late replacement against top contender Raphael Assuncao in early 2014, and after some lower-level wins, UFC threw him right back into the fire last year against Jimmie Rivera. At his best, Munhoz looks like an absolute killer thanks to his grappling, as he's able to pounce on some vicious, powerful chokes, but against guys like Assuncao and Rivera, his striking has looked like a work in progress. And that's why I'm picking Scoggins - he was giant for flyweight, so size probably won't be an issue moving up, and his karate stance just allows him to fight long and give a lot of guys a lot of problems. I suspect this looks a lot like the Borg fight, with Munhoz trying to get inside for takedowns and not having much success, but it should be a fun fight and it's an excellent matchup on paper.
Francimar Barroso (18-5 overall, 3-2 UFC) vs. Darren Stewart (7-0 overall):
This will probably either be an impressive debut or a horrible fight. Francimar Barroso is, frankly, one of the least exciting guys to watch on the UFC roster - he fights sort of like, I don't know, a boulder, as the Brazilian is a gigantic light heavyweight that has enough striking skill to neutralize his opponents, but never throws anything, and seemingly just wants to get by on taking his opponents down or grinding them into the fence, and then not doing much of anything. On the other side of things, we have British newcomer Darren Stewart, who has quite the opposite approach - Stewart's fights just see him basically explode towards opponents and try to destroy them with ground and pound, and the results have been pretty good, with five knockouts in seven fights. So either Stewart will be able to pull that off against Barroso, or we'll just get another Francimar Barroso slog, and given that Stewart's a rather small light heavyweight, I might have to favor the latter. So I'll say it's Francimar Barroso by decision, and it probably won't be all that pretty.
