Another fight weekend is here, baby, and we love to see it. This weekend’s slate of MMA action is relatively bare, but we do have a UFC Apex show on Saturday night highlighted by a pretty fun featherweight main event. There’s a pretty full slate next weekend, and this UFC show – while relatively thin – is going to have to do to hold us over.
So, as usual, here’s a look at the three fights I’m going to watch closest this weekend:
When the UFC announced the Korean Zombie vs. Dan Ige as the main event of the June 19 show a few months ago, it was one of those moments where everything just sort of felt right. It’s a perfect main event for a weekly fight night card: while it may not have immediate title implications in one of the deepest divisions in the MMA world, it’s an appealing stylistic matchup featuring a longtime action star fan favorite facing a talented up-and-comer, one that not a single person will complain about being five rounds instead of three.
Especially considering that in his decade in the UFC, the Korean Zombie has never once failed to deliver. It’s almost impossible to believe that Chan Sung Jung has only fought nine times in the UFC – various injuries and a mandatory stint in the South Korean military kept him out for nearly four years from 2013-17 – but his last fight, a loss to Brian Ortega in October, was the first that went to a decision.
Seven out of his nine UFC appearances have ended in him getting Fight of the Night or Performance of the Night bonuses, including his 2012 Fight of the Year war with Dustin Poirier in the only UFC event I’ve ever gotten to attend in person. (I got lucky.) And although his time in the cage has been pretty well-spaced out, we’ve gotten to see a lot of meaningful development from Jung: he’s evolved from the hard-headed brawler that earned the “Korean Zombie” name, to a seasoned, tricky counter-striker and grappler who has a lot of ways to win.
Even so, it’s worth questioning how much Jung has in the tank. Guys who have nicknames with the word “zombie” in them don’t tend to age particularly well. In crazy brawls against guys like Poirier, Leonard Garcia and Yair Rodriguez, he amazed with his inhuman ability to take punishment and continue to move forward. But he’s eaten a few KO losses along the way, most recently when Rodriguez turned his skeleton to jelly with an absurd, one-of-a-kind reverse elbow to beat the fifth-round buzzer at the end of 2018.
Jung rebounded with two quick wins in 2019 against Renato Moicano and Frankie Edgar – in the latter fight, he sent Edgar scurrying off to the bantamweight division with his withering counters. But against Ortega, Jung was rocked badly by a fantastic spinning elbow early in the fight and never really recovered, being outstruck comprehensively in a major breakout performance for Ortega. There are reasons to doubt whether that fight was a true representation of Jung’s skills in the present moment – I think everyone, Jung included, was surprised by how different Ortega looked after nearly two full years out of the cage, and he never really got his legs back under him after that elbow.
But still, the Korean Zombie took a big shot, and wasn’t able to recover. That, in and of itself, was troubling. It was also very limiting to his immediate title prospects – with a win over Ortega, he’d have had an argument for his first championship shot since 2013. Instead, he’s in there with Ige, a talented Hawaiian who’s coming off a 22-second sparking of Gavin Tucker in March.
Clever and tough on the feet, Ige has impressed with his showings against elite strikers in recent years, eking out a controversial split decision win over Edson Barboza last May and doing some very good work in a competitive five-round loss to strong technical boxer Calvin Kattar two months later. If I had seen anything that was holding him back before the Tucker fight, it was significant punching power to go with his tricky movement and good timing.
Then he slept Tucker, who had never been stopped in his pro career, with his first real punch of the fight. So, there’s that.
This has a very high potential to be fun, both guys have shown that they have the ability to carry an action-packed pace into the late rounds, and it’s two top-10 fighters in one of the best divisions in the UFC. Can’t do a whole lot better than that.
Alexey Oleinik vs. Sergey Spivak
And even though the co-main event doesn’t have a whole lot of real importance to the heavyweight division as it exists in 2021, I’m still expecting to enjoy it: we just don’t know how many times we have left to appreciate Alexey Oleinik, a true original, an out-of-place artifact from MMA’s earliest days who’s somehow still competitive at the highest level.
Oleinik is 43 years old and began his fighting career in 1997 – he’s one of just three fighters left on the UFC roster to have fought in the 20th century. After almost a quarter-century as a professional mixed martial artist, he’s still a more or less completely hopeless striker. Always has been, always will be. And yet, he’s still ranked in the top 15 of the UFC heavyweight division, and poses a significant threat to anyone he faces.
That’s because Oleinik is a grappling genius, a master of applying obscure submission techniques in the cage to devastating effect. Most MMA fans have never even heard of an “Ezekiel choke” before – Oleinik has won with it 14 times, including twice in the UFC. He has two neck crank wins in the UFC as well, to go with more common submissions like armbars and rear-naked chokes.
He’s a master of combat sambo and one of the most effective pure submission grapplers that exists in the sport. He’s old as hell – he didn’t even debut in the UFC until he was 37 years old, with over 60 pro fights – and completely one-dimensional. And yet, he’s had a winning record in the world’s biggest MMA organization. That’s insane!
Now, if you can find a way to avoid him putting you to sleep with some move you’ve never even conceived of in the first round, you’ll probably wind up beating him: again, he’s old, his gas tank isn’t great, and he can’t punch to save his life. But he’s still damn dangerous, even to the very best – he nearly had Derrick Lewis with a neck crank in the first round of their fight last August, but unfortunately, Derrick Lewis is made out of adamantium.
Alexey Oleinik learned that night that you can’t neck-crank a grizzly bear. But can you neck-crank a Sergey Spivak? That sounds more likely, especially considering Spivak’s best chance to win is usually to use his wrestling. The 26-year-old Spivak may have been a toddler when Oleinik started his pro career, but he’s really big and strong, knows how to establish good top pressure, and flashes good ground-and-pound and top submissions.
That’s how he arm-triangled Tai Tuivasa to sleep for his first UFC win in 2019, and it’s how he absolutely mauled poor Jared Vanderaa half to death when we last saw him in February. So, will Spivak just decide to try and do what he does best and get into a clinch with Alexey Oleinik? There be dragons, folks. I really, really hope he does it.
Another potential fun little banger here at bantamweight. Last week was all about the big rematches: Israel Adesanya–Marvin Vettori II, Deiveson Figueiredo–Brandon Moreno II, hell, even Eryk Anders–Darren Stewart II. (Man, I did not expect that fight to suck that bad!) They’re serving us up another one right here, as we at last, by popular demand, run back the epic between Marlon “Chito” Vera and Davey Grant from 2016.
OK, I’m kidding. I do not blame you one bit for not remembering that Vera and Grant have actually fought once before, but I’m interested to see what the second go-around looks like. These two first faced off on the undercard of the Anderson Silva–Michael Bisping show in London over five years ago, a 30-26 unanimous decision win for Grant – he pushed a great pace, hurt Vera a couple times with heavy hooks, and just outworked him. I only kind of remembered this one because Vera got deducted a point for repeatedly sticking his fingers in Grant’s gloves, which you almost never see.
That fight turned out to be a diverging point for two pretty talented 135-pounders. Vera has become a very active mainstay of the middle ranks of the bantamweight division, briefly entering the MMA mainstream after becoming the guy to crash the Sean O’Malley hype train last year. At every turn, he’s been a fun, heavy-handed banger, although clearly a cut below the very best – he got a matchup with the great Jose Aldo after his win over O’Malley, and his lack of technique on the feet was completely exposed by one of the very best to ever do it.
Meanwhile, Grant has been barely seen. Vera has fought 13 times in the five years since his first meeting with Grant, while Grant himself has been in there just five times, owing to a number of injuries. The 35-year-old Englishman seems to have finally shaken those off, and he may be in the process of a late-career renaissance. He’s won his last three and looked great over the past year, scoring one-hitter quitter KOs against Martin Day and Jonathan Martinez.
Grant was previously regarded as more of a grappler, albeit one who flashed some punching power and an interesting striking style – it was how he beat Vera, after all. During his win streak, however, he’s committed more completely to throwing the bombs. The best part is, he’s landing the bombs! Look at how goddamn crispy this right hook to the body-left hook to the face combo is that put Martinez down:
Grant’s development, after all these years, into a guy who we actually need to pay attention to is low-key one of the most interesting storylines in the UFC bantamweight division right now. Now, Marlon Vera is once again standing in his way. I’m really invested in seeing how this one plays out.
The Big Fight 