Photo by Christian Petersen/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC
Winner of seven of his last eight bouts inside the Octagon, Jan Blachowicz is one more win away from finally realizing his dreams of becoming Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) title holder. This Saturday night (Sept. 26, 2020), the Polish bruiser will face off against Dominick Reyes for the vacant Light Heavyweight strap on Yas Island, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
One of Jan’s biggest wins on his current run was one over former Middleweight champion, Luke Rockhold. In July of 2019, Blachowicz welcomed Rockhold to the Light Heavyweight division after spending his entire career at 185 pounds.
In the first round, Rockhold was content with trying to take the fight to the ground, though Blachowicz showed that not only is he a great striker, but his grappling skills are very underrated. That being said, Jan rocked Luke in the closing seconds of the first frame to ensure the first round would go to him.
In round two, a clearly-dazed Rockhold once again went to his grappling, though Blachowicz managed to clip him with a nice left hook coming off a break. He followed up his downed opponent with two huge bombs to put an end to the fight. Now, the Polish-born combatant will look to do the same to Reyes in hopes of claiming the 205-pound strap vacated by former longtime champion, Jon Jones.
In the main event of UFC 253, Israel Adesanya will defend his Middleweight title against Paulo Costa.
Remember that MMAmania.com will deliver LIVE round-by-round, blow-by-blow coverage of the entire UFC 253 fight card this weekend, starting with the early ESPN 2/ESPN+ “Prelims” matches online, which are scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. ET, then the remaining undercard balance (also on ESPN 2/ESPN+) at 8 p.m. ET, before the PPV main card start time at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+.
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