Another fight weekend is in the books. Saturday night’s UFC 262 pay-per-view provided us with a moment that we’ll remember for a long time, when Charles Oliveira roared back from the brink of defeat to knock out Michael Chandler and win the UFC lightweight title. I’ll have more about Oliveira’s unbelievable victory this week, but for now, here’s a look at three fighters outside the main event who boosted their stock over the past couple days.
Saturday’s UFC 262 pay-per-view was a relatively weak one on paper, all things considered. While we knew the main event would be money, the rest of the main card was suspect. It’s hard to get excited for Tony Ferguson fights considering how bad he’s looked over the past year, it’s been hard to get excited for Katlyn Chookagian fights pretty much ever, and Matt Schnell vs. Rogerio Bontorin – while a solid matchup – wasn’t getting anyone to tune in on its own.
But you knew, you just KNEW, that Edson Barboza-Shane Burgos was going to be money. Take Barboza, a Muay Thai woodchipper with some of the most violent kicks in the sport’s history, but one who’s had distinct issues facing aggressive pressure fighters. Then take Burgos, an aggressive pressure fighter who has had one of the highest striking output rates in UFC history, but who’s eminently hittable and often ends up in wars.
Fireworks seemed guaranteed. And in what was easily the Fight of the Night and one of the best fights so far of 2021, the featherweight matchup exceeded expectations. After about 11 minutes of violence, Barboza caused Burgos’ brain to shut down in real time with one of the craziest delayed reaction knockouts ever.
Barboza has always been extremely dangerous due to his razor sharp Muay Thai striking, and his legendary leg kicks. He’s also faced perhaps the single most ridiculous strength of schedule in UFC history, fighting a laundry list of killers at 155 over the last decade. And at 35 years old, still relatively fresh into his first run at 145, he looks more dangerous than ever.
Barboza’s kicks made him famous and feared, but the popular perception was that his boxing ability had lagged behind throughout his career. Not so on Saturday. Barboza’s hands looked fantastic against a fighter who seemed tailor-made to give him trouble: he did an exceptional job reading Burgos’ jab and countering with the right hand, and wobbled him a couple times with stiff punches before putting him out with the one-two.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a Barboza fight without some leg violence. Barboza attacked Burgos’ lead leg with such ferocity that he split his own shin open. In the third round, with his right leg bleeding all over the canvas, he simply switched to kicking him with the left. Burgos did an admirable job poker-facing his way through Barboza’s attack throughout the fight – in fact, he was poker-facing until the very end, when his body decided that he shouldn’t have been fighting anymore. But make no mistake, the leg kicks took a ton of the zip out of Burgos’ entries, and made it incredibly difficult for the pressure fighter to assert his style.
The book has been out on Barboza for years: we thought we knew his strengths and weaknesses. But against the type of fighter that Barboza has struggled against for far too long, he instead came out looking like an incredibly dangerous featherweight contender. And after a decade in the UFC, it looks like Edson Barboza has plenty more violence to bestow.
Heading into his featured prelim bout on Saturday night, 31-year-old Brazilian Andre Muniz told commentators that he thought he had a grappling advantage over his opponent. You can see where the confidence comes from: Muniz is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt who’s had great success on the ground throughout his MMA career, entering his fight last weekend with 13 career submission wins, including a first-round armbar of Bartosz Fabinski in his most recent UFC appearance.
That comment wouldn’t have been particularly notable except for the fact that his opponent on Saturday night, the one he thought he had a grappling advantage over, was Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza. Jacare is an unimpeachable BJJ legend, an eight-time world champion, a two-time ADCC gold medalist, and one of the greatest grapplers in the history of mixed martial arts.
Muniz’s assertion appeared to personally offend UFC announcer Joe Rogan, who made mocking mention of it a couple times during the fight. You can understand why that comment would resonate with Rogan, specifically: Rogan’s a BJJ black belt himself, someone very immersed in that world. He loves grappling. As such, he reveres Jacare. And to him, as to most people, the idea that a little-known Contender Series product like Andre Muniz would be the first person to tap out Jacare Souza in a mixed martial arts arena was laughable.
So, naturally, Andre Muniz broke Jacare Souza’s arm. Wait, what?
Sound up for that one if you want to hear Jacare’s arm snap, making a sound like Mike Trout hitting a 450-foot dinger. If not, I completely understand. But it can’t be understated the gravity of Andre Muniz’s accomplishment on Saturday, as grody as it might have been. Not only did Muniz become the first fighter to submit a true legend of grappling, and a mixed martial artist who’s had a fantastic run of success, he might have just made his own career.
The MMA meta has shifted away from great submission threats somewhat, and fighters with Muniz’s style are always welcome. And he just introduced himself as a truly fearsome ground specialist in about the most stunning way possible. At 3-0 in the UFC’s middleweight division, he’s got some big fights ahead. And if you didn’t know who Andre Muniz was before, hit play on that video, and turn the sound up.
For many UFC fans, Arjan Bhullar has been out of sight, out of mind for the last couple years. An Olympic wrestler and Commonwealth Games champion representing Canada, where he was born and raised, Bhullar signed with the UFC in 2017. Against the lower rankings of the UFC heavyweight division, he looked credible, going 3-1 on his original four-fight contract. In a pretty thin division, it looked like Bhullar’s wrestling pedigree and surprising quickness could carry him far.
But, you see, Arjan Bhullar is of Indian descent. That made him a big free agent target for ONE, which has made a habit of snapping up any fighter with an ethnic background that could make them marketable to the Asian markets it wants to dominate. India, specifically, is seen as an area of big potential growth. Safe to say, Bhullar is making a heck of a lot more money than he would have been making fighting guys like Maurice Greene in the UFC Apex.
He can also call himself a world champion. Because on Saturday, in a show that was built specifically around ONE’s Indian stars, Bhullar bullied once-hyped UFC prospect Brandon Vera to end a heavyweight title reign that lasted *checks notes* FIVE YEARS?
That’s right, Brandon Vera – best known as the UFC’s really hot heavyweight flavor of the month circa 2006 – had held ONE’s heavyweight championship since 2015. He had only defended it three times in that timespan, and never against a fighter with a Wikipedia page. Younger, more athletic, and simply way more talented, Bhullar was always going to be the man to take the belt.
But the man that MMA Internet extraordinaire Jack Slack dubbed “Bollywood DC” at least made sure to look damn good doing it. Bhullar has that Fedor, Cormier-type heavyweight body – shorter, and a little pudgy – but like those two legends, it hides a very surprising quickness and explosion. A 43-year-old Vera has little to offer except for some still-impressive punching power, and Bhullar approached him intelligently, using his superior movement and giving Vera nothing.
And after turning Vera into a static target on the feet, Bhullar started to tee off. And after he started to tee off, he went to his bread-and-butter. Bhullar took Vera down with ease and went to work with steady ground and pound, forcing the stoppage and taking home the belt.
It was exactly what you wanted to see from Bhullar, and with that division as weak as it is, it could be a long time before he lets go of that belt.
The Big Fight 