What really mattered at UFC on ESPN+ 3 on Saturday? Here are a few things …
1. Hammer gonna hammer
I won’t say that Jan Blachowicz had a perfect game plan, but through two rounds it at least seemed like he didn’t have an awful one. He was staying patient, avoiding the early blitz by Thiago “Marreta” Santos, and seemed like he might be trying to frustrate the Brazilian into doing something dumb.
Then early in the third he decided he’d had enough of that and went running into Santos’ fists.
Like any hammer confronted with a nail, Santos knew just how to handle that situation. A few seconds later he had another violent stoppage to his credit, bringing his current winning streak to four straight fights.
And, wait, did I hear that right? Is he really looking to challenge the winner of Jon Jones vs. Anthony Smith for the light heavyweight title? I guess it makes sense, when you consider the way the division stacks up. Either way that goes, sounds like a recipe for entertaining violence in the end.
2. Is Struve … done?
Despite getting dropped flat on his back in the opening seconds of the fight, Stefan Struve came strong in the second and submitted Marcos Rogerio de Lima for his first win since 2016. Then the big man took off his gloves and got emotional while revealing that this might be his last fight, maybe. You know, possibly. But also maybe not.
Not unlike Georges St-Pierre’s retirement announcement, you have to give it points for honesty. Sometimes it seems like the most any fighter can realistically tell us is that this might be it. Anything beyond that is purely speculative bordering on an outright lie.
We know Struve has struggled with heart problems. We know he’s probably not going to ever be heavyweight champ. Maybe a win in the European theater is the best ending he could hope for. Maybe he’s right to admit that there are no absolute certainties with something like this.
3. ‘No Mercy’ is no joke
Petr Yan said he was going to fight John Dodson like he didn’t particularly respect him, and turns out he wasn’t lying. Yan got right up in Dodson’s face and never stopped bringing the fight to him until the unanimous-decision win was essentially a foregone conclusion.
That’s four straight for Yan in the UFC, and seven straight overall. He only has one career loss – a split decision to a guy with two Magomeds in his name – and he later avenged it. In a bantamweight division that’s heating up, we might soon have to add his name to the list of exciting potential contenders. Now we just need a champ to show up and start fighting them.
4. Sometimes it’s tough to be an out-of-towner
Let’s be honest, Liz Carmouche didn’t exactly dominate her fight with Lucie Pudilova. She did, well, the usual Carmouche stuff. We’re talking takedowns, top control, basically all the stuff that an aggressive blanket would do if it became sentient and started attacking you. Pudilova did more of the meaningful striking, and even more important is that she did it in front of a home crowd in the Czech Republic.
So when all three judges gave the fight to Carmouche, yeah, she heard about it from the crowd in Prague. In fact, it was all she could hear. The boos were so loud they drowned out Dan Hardy’s attempt at a post-fight interview. Carmouche kept a smile through it all, but that can’t be a fun way to bask in victory. Then again, how much can we really blame that crowd for being disappointed by that?
5. Turns out Austria has a ‘Wonderboy’ of its own
Ismail Naurdiev was the biggest underdog on this card for his fight with Michel Prazeres, who came into the bout riding an eight-fight winning streak. Apparently no one told “The Austrian Wonderboy” that he wasn’t supposed to win, because he wore Prazeres out like it was just another night of work, at times showing a surprising poise for a 22-year-old fighter.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves or anything, but that’s good stuff for a UFC debut. Now we have to wait and see whether it’ll be good enough to get him some work in the UFC’s main rotation next, or whether he’ll only get a call when the European circuit ramps up again.
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