Like riding a bike.
For nearly seven minutes on Saturday, it appeared Anthony Pettis was going to have trouble shaking off the rust. Then—for just a few seconds—the returning lightweight champion was his old, brilliant self again, and the fight was over.
Pettis became the first man ever to finish No. 1 contender Gilbert Melendez at UFC 181, snatching a guillotine choke from thin air and forcing Melendez to tap out a few ticks shy of two minutes into the second round. As they raised his hand and wrapped the title around his waist, it suddenly felt as though he’d never left.
“It’s been 15 months. A long layoff,” Pettis told UFC color commentator Joe Rogan in the cage moments later. “It was a tough last year, but I reminded everybody who I am. I’m the champ for a reason—king of the hottest division in the UFC.”
It was undoubtedly an excruciating year-and-a-half off for Pettis, as the UFC lightweight champion rehabbed and recuperated from knee surgery. Since coming to the UFC in 2011 as the last reigning WEC champion, he’s spent extended periods on the shelf.
This week, UFC president Dana White said he felt all Pettis would have to do to claim a spot among the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world would be stay healthy. In his return to the cage, Pettis appeared fit as a fiddle—and looked every bit the part of the young, exciting superstar the fight company hopes he can become.
Early on, it seemed Melendez might succeed in making their co-main event bout a grinding, protracted affair. He clinched Pettis against the fence from the opening, nicking him with short knees and attempting to drag him to the mat.
Pettis periodically broke free and fired off some of his flashy offense—a spinning kick here, a running knee there—but for a time Melendez managed to corral him against the chain link when he wanted to do it.
In the second, though, Pettis edged free long enough to sting Melendez with a punch and force him into an ill-advised takedown attempt. As he stuffed it, Melendez tried to scramble, and Pettis locked up the choke with an abrupt, frightening quickness. He rolled to top position and Melendez—a longstanding black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu under Cesar Gracie—was forced to tap.
“He’s a fast, slick youngster, man,” Melendez told Rogan. “He made me feel a little old today with his speed. But he knocked me pretty good and I just took an ugly shot. There was a lot of chaos in there, and he capitalized.”
It was also Melendez’s first fight since October 2013. Ten months ago, he seemed on the verge of walking away from the UFC in favor of a contract offer from Bellator MMA. To get him to stay, it’s believed the UFC made him a handsome new offer, including a coaching gig opposite Pettis on Season 20 of The Ultimate Fighter as well as Saturday’s title shot.
Counting his controversial split-decision loss to Benson Henderson last April, Melendez’s has now twice come up short in recent championship opportunities. He’s also just 1-2 in the UFC so far. That could make his future path through the stacked 155-pound division unclear, though the terms of his new deal dictate he’ll be fighting mostly on pay-per-view and being handsomely compensated for it for the foreseeable future.
For Pettis, the win marked back-to-back submission victories over consensus Top Five lightweights, not to mention four consecutive stoppages. He took the title from old WEC foe Henderson in August 2013 before his latest injury forced him back to the injured reserve. Trent Reinsmith expressed optimism that if Pettis can “stay healthy,” his upside is “immeasurable”:
What’s next for him now remains to be seen. There is certainly no shortage of contenders for him at 155 pounds, though he was also recently linked to a superfight against featherweight champion Jose Aldo.
Now that he is healthy, it appears he may be on the verge of tapping into the considerable potential he’s flashed during six previous UFC appearances. So long as he’s able to avoid future delays, he’ll be a perfect fit for a starring role in the fight company’s important 2015 schedule.
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