Cung Le was the big winner at UFC: Macau, pocketing an extra $40,000 for his main event victory over former middleweight champion Rich Franklin.
It was one of only two finishes on the nine-fight card, as Le caught Franklin flush on the jaw with a powerful right hook. Franklin promptly went out on his feet, crashing to the mat in devastating fashion in his return to the 195-pound division.
MMA Junkie reports from the UFC post-fight press conference that Thiago Silva, Takanori Gomi and Mac Danzig will also go home with extra bonus money, rounding out the rest of the awards:
- KO of the Night—Cung Le
- Submission of the Night—Thiago Silva
- Fight of the Night—Takanori Gomi & Mac Danzig
Thiago Silva staved off a tight grappling-heavy offense from formerly undefeated Stanislav Nedkov, stopping the Bulgarian in round three with an arm triangle on the mat.
Japanese MMA legend Gomi gritted his way to a split decision win over Danzig, fighting off takedowns and slugging it out on the feet to heavy applause from the crowd. Both men will take home a combined $80,000 for their trouble, with Gomi getting his first two-fight winning streak since 2009.
With six decisions between the prelims and main card, the battle for “Fight of the Night” was a close race between Gomi vs. Danzig, John Lineker vs. Yasuhiro Urushitani and Jon Tuck vs. Tiequan Zhang—the only Chinese fighter on the UFC roster.
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