Hyping a young fighter in a sport as volatile as MMA is dangerous.
Today’s prospect who just left town toting a $50,000 Performance of the Night bonus can morph into tomorrow’s roster-cut special in a flash, leaving fans and critics wondering how we made such a colossal error in judgement.
It happens more than you may even realize. Sometimes their decline is abrupt—a series of knockout losses leads to their permanent release—while other times three or four consecutive close calls on the judges’ scorecards sends ’em packing.
It’s an unfortunate result of having deep talent pools across every division in a top-flight organization like the UFC, but this is the nature of the beast.
It’s also precisely what makes the happenings at UFC on Fox 15 so impressive and refreshing.
Four prospects aged 25 or younger stepped into nearly identical situations. Aljamain Sterling (25), Beneil Dariush (25), Paige VanZant (21) and Max Holloway (23) faced older, wiser, more experienced veterans Saturday evening in Newark, New Jersey.
Maybe the youngster had some advantages on paper in each case, but many questioned if he or she would be able to get it done when the lights went down and the action began.
We’ve read this story before, and we recall the ending well. You’re not fooling us again, marketing machine.
Only M. Night Shyamalan wrote this script.
Every contender met and surpassed expectations. There was no let down, no feeling of “Yeah, we should’ve known better” with these fighters.
When we take a look at these four rising contenders, I get the feeling we’re taking a glimpse at at least one—and probably more than one—future title contender.
Aljamain Sterling
The 25-year-old Serra-Longo product Sterling was the first of our four prospects to take the stage Saturday evening.
His opponent, Takeya Mizugaki (20-9-2), had fought some of the bantamweight division’s best throughout his near-10-year professional MMA career. Over the years, Mizugaki had become a high-level gatekeeper at 135, taking care of the pretenders with ease and establishing himself as a top-10 talent who would lose only to the finest competitors.
Sterling proved he belongs in that class of opposition, as he controlled the pace and the action for two rounds before submitting Mizugaki with an arm-triangle choke from the bottom in Round 3.
The young star was never in trouble, and he became just the third fighter to finish Mizugaki during the Japanese standout’s six-year run under the Zuffa banner.
The other two—Dominick Cruz and Urijah Faber—are two of the best bantamweights of all time, and they boast impressive championship pedigrees.
At 11-0 with three increasingly impressive wins inside the UFC Octagon, Sterling now finds himself traveling his own path toward gold.
With a top-flight training camp, a well-rounded game and all the intangibles—mental fortitude, athleticism for days and a fun-loving personality—Sterling appears ready to become one of the division’s brightest stars.
Beneil Dariush
Training at Kings MMA under the tutelage of Rafael Cordeiro—who is directly responsible for the recent successes of UFC lightweight champ Rafael dos Anjos and heavyweight contender Fabricio Werdum, among others—isn’t a bad idea for a rising prospect.
Dariush represents a shining example of this fact.
The 25-year-old stepped in on short notice to take on a rugged, tough and aggressive veteran in Jim Miller at UFC on Fox 15, and he passed his test in near-flawless fashion.
For three rounds, Dariush outwrestled Miller and used his superior technical grappling to advance and control positions on the mat, nearly finishing the fight with a rear-naked choke on multiple occasions before eventually taking home a clear-cut unanimous decision.
The last person to beat Miller in this fashion, Benson Henderson, went on to win and defend the lightweight title three times before coughing it up to Anthony Pettis at UFC 164.
Despite taking on Miller just 30-odd days after defeating Daron Cruickshank at UFC 185, Dariush rose to the occasion and pulled off the victory.
And it must be noted: Miller is not an easy out by any stretch. Coming into the fight, the New Jersey native was ranked 12th in the division, and his fight against Dariush was his 19th straight under the UFC banner. He’s exactly the scrappy, dangerous vet young fighters need to defeat to vault into title contention, and Dariush did just that with apparent ease.
Now 5-1 in the UFC and 11-1 overall, Dariush will undoubtedly find himself in the top 15 of the shark tank that is the UFC’s lightweight division. Serious challenges await, but if his performance against Miller is any indication, Dariush can rise to the occasion and perform when the heat is on.
Paige VanZant
VanZant possesses all the necessary makings of a star—and I’m talking a massive, big-time, household-name type of star.
Coming into her UFC on Fox 15 bout opposite Felice Herrig, VanZant faced significant doubt and criticism.
Narratives of the “She’s just a pretty face,” “A veteran like Herrig will smash her” and “It’s all just hype” variety ran wild heading into VanZant‘s main card opening scrap, and she proved the doubters wrong in emphatic fashion.
While the fight was mostly a grappling battle, with VanZant controlling top position and raining down ground-and-pound, there were plenty of scrambles and transitions that proved she knows her way around all facets of the MMA game.
From the bout’s onset, VanZant pressed forward and took it to the 16-fight veteran, winning exchanges and bullying her way to a dominant decision victory. Her cardio was relentless. Her aggression was unbridled.
Add in her bubbly, all-smiles-all-the-time personality, her evolving skill set at Team Alpha Male and the fact she just turned 21, and it becomes clear that we’ll be seeing a lot more of VanZant—both inside the Octagon and out—in the upcoming years.
She may not receive a title shot just yet (and she’s probably not ready for that yet, anyway), but in the shallow and new strawweight division, VanZant is already on the short list of future contenders with her 2-0 UFC record.
Max Holloway
I want to take nothing away from the first three breakout performances discussed here when I say this, but Max Holloway did something special at UFC on Fox 15.
If Sterling, Dariush and VanZant received A’s on their respective tests, Holloway got an A+ and secured his spot as the class valedictorian.
First off, the 23-year-old Holloway had already won five straight inside the Octagon, and he was already ranked in the top 10 of the 145-pound division. Everybody knew Holloway was good, but nobody could predict he’d be this good, this fast.
He’s making gigantic leaps forward with each fight he takes, and his scrap opposite Cub Swanson Saturday evening was a star-making performance of the highest order.
While Mizugaki, Miller and Herrig are all relevant and solid opponents, Swanson is on a slightly different level. He was ranked higher than Holloway at sixth in the division going in, and he was on the cusp of a title shot as recently as last November.
Despite dropping that fall bout to Frankie Edgar, everyone knew Swanson was legit anywhere a fight went. He’s dynamic and powerful, and besting him in any one area of the game is a tall task for many featherweights in the UFC.
Holloway destroyed him everywhere.
For three rounds, Holloway controlled the action in the stand-up game, out-striking and frustrating Swanson by smoothly switching stances and landing all sorts of pinpoint strikes, a point noted and dissected by fight analyst Jack Slack.
In Round 3, Holloway stamped, sealed and delivered his victory, forcing Swanson to tap out with a brutal mounted guillotine choke.
It’s not just that Holloway won, it’s how he won and who he won against that makes his UFC on Fox 15 performance so impressive.
Now the winner of six straight inside the Octagon, look for Holloway to become a title contender by early 2016.
These four victories at UFC on Fox 15 proved the disappointing script starring Cezar Ferreira, Colton Smith, Josh Grispi and countless others can be rewritten.
You just have to put the pen in the right hands, and right now, the UFC is ripe with contenders ready to put words to paper, composing their masterpiece for the masses.
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