UFC 203 went down tonight (September 10, 2016) in Cleveland, OH, from the Quicken Loans Arena, and was headlined by a heavyweight title tilt between champion Stipe Miocic and Alistair Overeem. The one-round war between the two big men netted each an additional $50,000 in bonus money, as the main event earned ‘Fight of the
UFC 203 went down tonight (September 10, 2016) in Cleveland, OH, from the Quicken Loans Arena, and was headlined by a heavyweight title tilt between champion Stipe Miocic and Alistair Overeem.
The one-round war between the two big men netted each an additional $50,000 in bonus money, as the main event earned ‘Fight of the Night’ honors. Overeem dropped Miocic and pounced on the champ, seeming to lock up a tight guillotine, but Miocic escaped. The two heavyweight sluggers went on to rock one another in that epic opening five minutes. But a caught kick spelled doom for Overeem. Miocic moved to top position and pounded away until the fight was stopped, retaining his heavyweight title in the process.
Elsewhere, strawweight contender Jessica Andrade took home one of the two ‘Performance of the Night’ bonuses – and an extra 50 grand – for her guillotine choke victory over Joanne Calderwood. The two 115-pound strikers opened up the main card in style before an Andrade takedown ultimately led to the finish.
The final bonus went to the lone winner on UFC Fight Pass. Yancy Medeiros and Sean Spencer were supposed to be the featured Fight Pass prelim, but injuries decimated the card during fight week. When Saturday night eventually came, there was only one fight left that would not be televised. That did not stop Medeiros from turning in an exquisite performance. In the second round of his strikers’ delight with Spencer, a Medeiros head kick dropped Spencer. The Hawaiian would pounce and lock up a rear naked choke, locking up the second ‘Performance of the Night’ bonus as well.
TUF alum Joanne Calderwood has her next official Octagon assignment.
Calderwood, who is coming fresh off an epic performance against Valérie Létourneau in a UFC women’s flyweight fight last month, will return at UFC 203 to fight Jessica Andrade.
The Calderwood-Andrade bout will be taking place in the UFC women’s 115-pound strawweight division.
UFC 203 is scheduled to take place on September 10th in Cleveland, Ohio, and will feature Stipe Miocic vs. Alistair Overeem for the UFC Heavyweight title, as well as CM Punk’s Octagon debut against Mickey Gall.
TUF alum Joanne Calderwood has her next official Octagon assignment.
Calderwood, who is coming fresh off an epic performance against Valérie Létourneau in a UFC women’s flyweight fight last month, will return at UFC 203 to fight Jessica Andrade.
The Calderwood-Andrade bout will be taking place in the UFC women’s 115-pound strawweight division.
UFC 203 is scheduled to take place on September 10th in Cleveland, Ohio, and will feature Stipe Miocic vs. Alistair Overeem for the UFC Heavyweight title, as well as CM Punk’s Octagon debut against Mickey Gall.
Jessica Andrade will give strawweight a go, taking on one-time title contender Jessica Penne at UFC 199 this summer. The Los Angeles Daily News first reported the contest.
Andrade (13-5) has gone 4-3 as a bantamweight in the UFC, including three str…
Jessica Andrade will give strawweight a go, taking on one-time title contender Jessica Penne at UFC 199 this summer. The Los Angeles Daily News first reported the contest.
Andrade (13-5) has gone 4-3 as a bantamweight in the UFC, including three straight wins at one point. She is just 1-2, though, over her last three, with both defeats coming via submission.
Penne (12-4) is a former Invicta FC champion who advanced to the semifinals of The Ultimate Fighter before falling to eventual champion Carla Esparza. She also suffered a loss to current UFC champion Joanna Jedrzeczyk for the title.
UFC 199 includes Luke Rockhold defending his middleweight title vs. Chris Weidman and Urijah Faber challenging Dominick Cruz for the bantamweight strap.
(The knee can be a cruel mistress. One day you’re provocatively bending it against a pole, without a care in the world. And the next day…betrayal. / Photo via Julianna’s Facebook page)
Pena is scheduled to undergo surgery next week, and doctors have already assured her that her knee will return to full strength following surgery and rehab. Not that it’s any consolation to UFC president Dana White, who was pissed last night:
(The knee can be a cruel mistress. One day you’re provocatively bending it against a pole, without a care in the world. And the next day…betrayal. / Photo via Julianna’s Facebook page)
Pena is scheduled to undergo surgery next week, and doctors have already assured her that her knee will return to full strength following surgery and rehab. Not that it’s any consolation to UFC president Dana White, who was pissed last night:
For the record, Pena trains at Sik-Jitsu in Spokane, and her actual recovery timetable is unknown. And unless Pena’s team rented her out as a training partner for Rousimar Palhares, we’ll hold off on burying them for now.
The UFC 171: Hendricks vs. Lawler card is filling up fast, Nation, and has recently added a pair of intriguing bouts featuring TUF winners as well as matchup between top featherweights. Let’s get right to it…
“The Venezuelan Vixen” may not have made many friends in the TUF household (which we imagine she wasn’t there to do in the first place), but her performances in the octagon spoke for themselves. With stoppage victories over Shayna Baszler (rear-naked choke), Sarah Moras (guillotine) and Jessica Rakoczy (TKO), Pena is riding high on momentum at the moment, and she’ll need plenty of it against Jessica Andrade.
Currently 10-3 and 1-1 in the octagon, Andrade is submission specialist who has tangled with the likes of Liz Carmouche, Rosi Sexton and Jennifer Maia. She has only been the distance twice in her professional career, and while the holes in her wrestling game were exposed by Carmouche at UFC on FOX 8, she should easily make for the toughest test of the TUF winner’s career come March 15th.
The UFC 171: Hendricks vs. Lawler card is filling up fast, Nation, and has recently added a pair of intriguing bouts featuring TUF winners as well as matchup between top featherweights. Let’s get right to it…
“The Venezuelan Vixen” may not have made many friends in the TUF household (which we imagine she wasn’t there to do in the first place), but her performances in the octagon spoke for themselves. With stoppage victories over Shayna Baszler (rear-naked choke), Sarah Moras (guillotine) and Jessica Rakoczy (TKO), Pena is riding high on momentum at the moment, and she’ll need plenty of it against Jessica Andrade.
Currently 10-3 and 1-1 in the octagon, Andrade is submission specialist who has tangled with the likes of Liz Carmouche, Rosi Sexton and Jennifer Maia. She has only been the distance twice in her professional career, and while the holes in her wrestling game were exposed by Carmouche at UFC on FOX 8, she should easily make for the toughest test of the TUF winner’s career come March 15th.
In his first post-TUF appearance, season 17 winner Kelvin Gastelum showed that his victory over Uriah Hall was no fluke, dominating and submitting the now retired Brian Melancon in just two minutes at Fight Night 27 last August. The win kept Gastelum’s unblemished record intact, but unfortunately, bad luck would rear its head in the form of a PCL tear that would force him out of his UFC on FOX 9 fight with fellow TUF winner Court McGee.
Thankfully, Gastelum’s legs are not held together by tissue paper and dental floss, so he will be making a quick turnaround against veteran Rick Story. “The Horror” has been struggling with consistency for the past couple of years, going win-loss over his past five contests, but recently scored a unanimous decision victory over the returning Brian Ebersole at UFC 167. A win over Gastelum would easily make for his biggest since defeating Thiago Alves at UFC 130, so expect an all out war for this one, Nation.
Call me crazy, but this is the matchup I’m most excited to see out of the three. Despite a minor setback against Marcus Brimage last year, Hettes has been on fire since entering the UFC, scoring submission wins over Alex Caceres and Robert Whiteford and dominating Nam Phan en route to a decision at UFC 141. Bermudez, on the other hand, has notched five straight victories since coming up short in the TUF 14 finals.
We all know Bermudez and Matt Grice put on a Fight of the Year contender at UFC 157, but “The Menace” also scored highly-entertaining decision victories over Max Holloway and Steven Siler in 2013 as well. The winner of this fight could easily find himself facing a top 10 opponent next, is what I’m getting at. In fact, if I were to GIF-rank this fight, I’d have to give it a solid
Can’t argue with the facts, folks.
UFC 171 goes down on March 15th from the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Texas.
Flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson delivered another exciting, winning performance last night in the main event of UFC on Fox 8. The champ defended his title successfully with a fifth round arm bar submission win over challenger John Moraga.
Long before the submission, however, it looked like Johnson was going to walk away with a clear-cut victory. The Washington resident used his footwork, take downs, ground striking and submission attempts to put on a show for his home town crowd in Seattle Saturday night. Johnson took the two-time All-American wrestler Moraga down at will and worked him over with choke and arm bar attempts before finally securing the fight-ending hold in the last round.
For his part, Moraga never appeared to break or give in. He simply was no match for the champion.
Post fight, Johnson said that, while he is satisfied to continue to defend his 125 pound belt, he is open to doing “super fights” with champions of heavier divisions. “[A superfight] is just something to throw out there,” Johnson said at the post-event press conference. “I’m still focused on my weight division. I know there’s up-and-coming fighters who are trying to come up and take what’s mine, and I’ll be there to defend it for the fans.”
“I think everybody is focused on Anderson Silva, ‘GSP’ and all those guys,” Johnson continued. “But I think we can make some fun super fights down in a lighter-weight division with the flyweights fighting the bantamweights. I know the bantamweights have some things to work out, and then we’ll see what happens. I’m just here to fight and have a good time and put on a good performance for the UFC and the fans.”
Rory MacDonald and Jake Ellenberger’s war of tweets came to a relatively muted climax in the co-main event. MacDonald used masterful foot work, angles and a stiff, precise jab to out-point Ellenberger and win a decision. Scores were 30-27 (twice) and 29-28 for MacDonald.
MacDonald managed to stay elusive while stalking Ellenberger for much of the fight. Ellenberger swang hard in spurts with his hooks behind a peek-a-boo posture, but mostly whiffed. Late in the third round, Ellenberger was finally able to catch Rory with a big shot and take down but the young Canadian immediately switched to offense from his back, threatening to get up with butterfly guards and with triangle choke and oma-plata shoulder lock attempts, before taking his opponent’s back at the final horn.
Flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson delivered another exciting, winning performance last night in the main event of UFC on Fox 8. The champ defended his title successfully with a fifth round arm bar submission win over challenger John Moraga.
Long before the submission, however, it looked like Johnson was going to walk away with a clear-cut victory. The Washington resident used his footwork, take downs, ground striking and submission attempts to put on a show for his home town crowd in Seattle Saturday night. Johnson took the two-time All-American wrestler Moraga down at will and worked him over with choke and arm bar attempts before finally securing the fight-ending hold in the last round.
For his part, Moraga never appeared to break or give in. He simply was no match for the champion.
Post fight, Johnson said that, while he is satisfied to continue to defend his 125 pound belt, he is open to doing “super fights” with champions of heavier divisions. “[A superfight] is just something to throw out there,” Johnson said at the post-event press conference. “I’m still focused on my weight division. I know there’s up-and-coming fighters who are trying to come up and take what’s mine, and I’ll be there to defend it for the fans.”
“I think everybody is focused on Anderson Silva, ‘GSP’ and all those guys,” Johnson continued. “But I think we can make some fun super fights down in a lighter-weight division with the flyweights fighting the bantamweights. I know the bantamweights have some things to work out, and then we’ll see what happens. I’m just here to fight and have a good time and put on a good performance for the UFC and the fans.”
Rory MacDonald and Jake Ellenberger’s war of tweets came to a relatively muted climax in the co-main event. MacDonald used masterful foot work, angles and a stiff, precise jab to out-point Ellenberger and win a decision. Scores were 30-27 (twice) and 29-28 for MacDonald.
MacDonald managed to stay elusive while stalking Ellenberger for much of the fight. Ellenberger swang hard in spurts with his hooks behind a peek-a-boo posture, but mostly whiffed. Late in the third round, Ellenberger was finally able to catch Rory with a big shot and take down but the young Canadian immediately switched to offense from his back, threatening to get up with butterfly guards and with triangle choke and oma-plata shoulder lock attempts, before taking his opponent’s back at the final horn.
MacDonald continued to move forward in the UFC welterweight rankings behind champion and teammate Georges St. Pierre. However, the twenty three year-old reiterated on the Fuel TV post event show that, while he wants to be champion by the age of twenty five, he will never fight St. Pierre.
Robbie Lawler took out his late-notice opponent, Strikeforce veteran Bobby Voelker with head kick and strikes on the ground early on in the second round of their welterweight fight. The KO win is Lawler’s second consecutive knock out since returning to the organization.
Liz Carmouche notched her first UFC win with a second round TKO over Jessica Andrade. Carmouche used repeated take downs to ground her opponent and survived an early guillotine choke before finishing with strikes from the mount.
Fight of the Night $50,000 honors and bonuses went to Trevor Smith and Ed Herman for their undercard war. Demetrious Johnson earned Submission of the Night recognition and the $50k prize that went with it. Melvin Guillard took home the same amount in bonus money for his Knockout of the Night win over Mac Danzig.
