SATURDAY, AUGUST 5 FROM THE BRIDGESTONE ARENA IN NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE
PRELIMS 3 PM PDT / 6 PM EDT | MAIN CARD 6 PM / 9 PM VIA ESPN+
After the preposterous violence of last week's pay-per-view, we have a comparatively lower-key card this week, although it's one born from the ashes of other, weirder fights. The main and co-main events tonight both got switched around over the last five or so weeks, and the replacement fights are...arguably better, actually?
I'm not sure what it says about the UFC's booking that this isn't the first time in recent memory that forced replacement fights they didn't actually want have turned in fights that are both more fun and more divisionally relevant than the things they actually intended to promote. That's probably a bad sign!
But it's working, so hey. Enjoy it while you can.
MAIN EVENT: KILLING TIME
CATCHWEIGHT, 140 LBS: Cory Sandhagen (16-4, #4 at Bantamweight) vs Rob Font (20-6, #7 at Bantamweight)
What do you think being Cory Sandhagen is like right now?
Place yourself in his shoes for a moment. You're 9-3, you've got two world champions under your belt, and the only losses of your UFC career are a hard-fought but clear decision loss to Petr Yan, a split decision loss that could very, very easily have gone the other way to TJ Dillashaw, and a near-instantaneous submission loss to Aljamain Sterling. Those are the last two Bantamweight champions and the current and arguably best champion, and you arguably beat one of them.
And since that last loss, you've been put against two contenders the UFC would have liked to push up to a championship bout--Song Yadong, the UFC's best hope for a male champion out of China, and fan favorite Marlon "Chito" Vera, riding the biggest winning streak and by far the most momentum he's ever had in his career. You didn't just beat them, you crushed them. You tore a hole in the side of Song's face and you outstruck Vera 187-73--and somehow STILL got a split decision, because judges are funny things, but you won and the entire world knows the score.
You're, at worst, the third-best contender in the division. You've proven it repeatedly, and you want the shot at the top you've clearly, once again, earned.
And then Sean O'Malley does worse than you did fighting Petr Yan, except somehow, he wins. And the UFC makes it clear that he's going to get a title shot. Except he's not ready! He needs to recover. It's your time to shine!
Actually, it's not. Henry Cejudo got off his couch after three years of retirement and walked right into a title match. He loses, and the UFC books him right into a title-implications fight with Marlon Vera, the guy you beat. Well, shit, if Marlon Vera's getting a contendership match after you dismantled him, that must mean they've got a real opportunity in store for you!
They do. You're fighting Umar Nurmagomedov. He's the #11 fighter in the division. You're #4.
People ask you why you're fighting this fight. You release a video from your car explaining to the "haters" that you are, quote, "a beast," and you're the best so it doesn't matter who you're fighting because you need to be able to beat everyone or you don't belong here anyway. So it's fine.
It's fine! It's fine that you're the rightful contender and you're fighting down in the rankings. It's fine that it took Umar getting injured for you to actually fight someone in the top ten as a late replacement.
It's fine.
By contrast, if you imagine you're Rob Font, this has to be pretty fucking great. You've been toiling away in the UFC for years--next year will mark a full decade with the company--and you've always been very, very good, but just not quite good enough to get to the top. Back in the day it was John Lineker and Pedro Munhoz and Raphael Assunção; guys who were just able to break you with pressure, or catch you with a mid-transition choke, or simply outwrestle you. But you kept grinding, and you kept improving, and soon you were back in the top ten, and you dropped Marlon Moraes before it was fashionable, and you were ready for your big, belated coming-out party as a contender.
But the party wasn't actually, ultimately, for you. The party wound up taking place entirely in the Jair Bolsonaro Memorial Minions-themed bedroom in José Aldo's house, because, as it turns out, even an aging Aldo one fight away from retirement is still just too much for you to handle.
And then things get worse, because you fight Chito Vera--and you outstrike him in every single round! You run up a 273-167 differential that looks like it should be a rout. And it is--but you're the one getting routed, because no matter how much you touch him up, every single round he fucking floors you with a big punch or a foot upside your head, and all your work evaporates.
You take a year off. By the time you come back you're still ranked at #6, but the UFC sees the writing on the wall with you. You're damaged goods. You're done. And you know they feel this way, because they're not matching you up with contenders--they're matching you up with the #13 ranked Adrian Yanez, winner of one notable fight almost an entire year prior.
Because you're not a contender anymore. You're a stepping stone for people they think might be more marketable than you.
So you obliterate him. One round, three minutes, and Adrian Yanez is a footnote. You're nobody's fucking stepping stone.
But you are someone's late replacement. It's a risk, but it's an opportunity. The UFC wanted you fighting Song Yadong--another guy ranked under you. If you beat Cory Sandhagen, that game finally stops. You're in the top five. You're one good fight away from a championship. No one can deny you anymore.
Will that risk pay off? The world doesn't think so. Cory Sandhagen is a -270 favorite, and, honestly, that feels about right. The transitive property of MMA math isn't all that reliable--fighter A beating fighter B who beat fighter C doesn't actually mean fighter A will beat fighter C--but both of these men fought Marlon Vera within just about the last year, and one of them shut down every aspect of his game with range management, counterstriking and carefully applied pressure, and the other got their head repeatedly knocked off their shoulders and only survived the fight at all by the skin of their teeth.
It doesn't mean Sandhagen will fare as well against Font. He's a much different type of fighter and his technical, jab-heavy approach is tougher to time and defuse than Vera's looping strikes. But the back-pocket wrestling that assists Font's pressure game isn't likely to get him very far here, either, and Marlon Moraes will gladly attest that Cory Sandhagen is just as good at putting a foot on your face as Marlon Vera.
Ultimately: CORY SANDHAGEN BY DECISION. Font's incredibly tough to stop, and I don't see Sandhagen breaking his never-been-knocked-out streak, but I don't see Font getting his rhythm going against Sandhagen either. Put yet another notch on Sandhagen's belt, and hope that maybe this time it justifies him getting a shot at the upper echelon of the division--like, say, Sean O'Malley.
CO-MAIN EVENT: A FIGHT THAT SHOULD HAVE HAPPENED FOUR YEARS AGO
WOMEN'S STRAWWEIGHT: Jéssica Andrade (24-11, #5) vs Tatiana Suarez (9-0, #10)
Ordinarily, when I am mad at a fight, I am mad because it's a bad fight. It's unfair, or it's slanted towards a promotional favorite, or there's some other sort of personally-perceived injustice I'm choosing to get rankled about.
This is not a bad fight. It's actually a really good fight. I'm just mad at it because Jéssica Andrade is going to lose and it's bumming me out.
Andrade is one of my favorite fighters, and I'll tell you, 2023 has been a difficult year to be a Jéssica Andrade fan. She ended 2022 in a fantastic position--near-top of the rankings at strawweight, all she'd have to do is just wait for a title shot--but she decided to bump back up to flyweight instead and try to get in at a second division, just to diversify her options. Great plan with the side benefit of less weight cutting.
And then Erin Blanchfield tore her apart and choked her out while barely breaking a sweat, and the flyweight door shut itself as tightly as it possibly could. So she bounced right back down to strawweight--and came in like a flailing wrecking ball against Xiaonan Yan, and got cut in fucking half. Yan bounced her head off the canvas and knocked her out in one round. Five months ago, Jéssica Andrade was a potential contender at two weight classes: Five months later, Jéssica Andrade is coming off two stoppage losses in a row and is locked out of a championship fight no matter where she goes. The woman she beat one year ago is about to fight for the strawweight title, and Jéssica Andrade is about to get mauled by Tatiana Suarez.
In another universe, Tatiana Suarez was a world champion four years ago. She choked out current flyweight champion Alexa Grasso and TKOed two-time strawweight champion Carla Esparza in 2018, took a hard decision against Nina Nunes in 2019, and vanished completely into the land of constant, unending, horrifying injuries. It took three and a half years of surgery, stem cells and rehab to get Tatiana Suarez back in the saddle, and the UFC very wisely let her dip her toes in the water first--her big return bout this past February wasn't against a former champion or top contender, but rather, Montana De La Rosa, a solid, journeywoman grappler.
And it was necessary. Suarez looked a little hesitant and rusty in the first few minutes--it'd be near-impossible not to be, honestly--but by the end of the round she'd found her groove again and was wrestling De La Rosa to the ground, pursuing every offensive opportunity she found, and ultimately settling for just jumping a guillotine and choking her out. Just like old times. They gave her a test, and she passed with flying colors.
Jéssica Andrade is not a test. She's a powerful, terrifying fighter who can punch your ribs through your spine. She won a UFC championship by lifting the champion over her head and dropping her on her neck. She's long been one of the scariest women at not one but two separate weight classes.
But she's finally looking worn. The Andrade who came out throwing wild, barely-aimed haymakers against Xiaonan is a step behind the Andrade who terrorized two divisions. And the Andrade who got outgrappled and turned into a pretzel by Blanchfield--a woman who, despite fighting at flyweight, is actually smaller than Suarez--feels distressingly relevant here. TATIANA SUAREZ BY TKO and I'm not happy about it.
MAIN CARD: WE'LL MAKE TANNER BOSER A THING OR DIE TRYING
LIGHT-HEAVYWEIGHT: Dustin Jacoby (18-7-1, #14) vs Kennedy Nzechukwu (12-3, #15)
Is this a fight to determine one of the fifteen best Light-Heavyweights in the world, or is this a fight to determine if someone's job is at risk? Trick question: It's both!
After spending the first five years of his mixed martial arts career getting bullied around at middleweight, Dustin Jacoby decided cutting weight was a sucker's game and moved up to 205. Within a year he was in the UFC, and within two, he was ranked as one of the best in the world thanks in no small part to his use of arcane tactics like "throwing combinations" and "moving, sometimes." He was, in fact, undefeated in the UFC through a genuinely impressive seven fights--though that includes one split draw to Ion Cuțelaba, who smashed him on the ground for a round before getting beaten up for the rest of the night--up until last October. A split decision that most of the world scored for Jacoby went to Khalil Rountree instead, ending Jacoby's streak in the least satisfying fashion possible. Fortunately for us, his next fight saw him much more fairly and unequivocally beaten by Azamat Murzakanov, rendering the injustice moot. Jacoby's rise up the rankings has stalled out, and now he has to defend his territory.
Kennedy Nzechukwu is experiencing the opposite trajectory. One of the earlier people to roll off the Contender Series conveyor belt and into the UFC proper, Kennedy--and they can call him "The African Savage" as much as it wants but I refuse to be that awkward--entered the company with a bunch of hype behind his giant, 6'5" stature and powerful punches and all of that was instantaneously forgotten because he got fucked up by Paul Craig. Nzechukwu went to the back of the line, built himself back into a prospect over the next two years and three victories, and upon finally flirting with a ranking he proceeded to get elbowed to death by Da Un Jung and split out of a questionable decision by Nicolae Negumereanu, and hey, look at that, you're back at the start all over again. Two more years, three more victories, and once again, Kennedy Nzechukwu is trying to fight his way back into relevance and contendership--except this time he's already ranked, because, boy, the light-heavyweight division sure has fallen the fuck apart over the last couple years, hasn't it.
Jacoby's been running into trouble lately regarding people walking him down, and for as clean as his technique can sometimes be, watching him get continually outpowered and outmaneuvered by Murzakanov, on whom Jacoby had almost half a foot of height and reach, does not give me a great sense of confidence in his ability to cope with Kennedy, against whom Jacoby is giving up more than half a foot of reach. Kennedy is going to try to walk him down and out-power him, and he's got a very, very good chance of doing it unless Jacoby can slip away and force him into a chase. But his recent tendency to get walked down doesn't give me a great sense of confidence, nor does his tendency to shoot straight-line takedowns that could play very poorly against a much bigger, stronger, longer guy who also likes guillotine chokes an awful lot. KENNEDY NZECHUKWU BY SUBMISSION.
FEATHERWEIGHT: Gavin Tucker (13-2) vs Diego Lopes (21-6)
And now, your regularly scheduled fight between Guy Who's Been Gone For Years and Guy Who Just Got Here And We Don't Know What To do With Him.
Gavin "Guv'nor" Tucker, which, sure, fine, I guess, was considered a pretty solid prospect when the UFC signed him back in 2016. I would say "his first UFC fight coming against Sam Sicilia dates him pretty badly," but most of the people reading those won't actually have ever heard of 12-fight UFC veteran Sam Sicilia, and that's the point. Tucker was a very solid, well-rounded fighter with an aggressive submission game and an appreciable commitment to knees on the liver, but his schedule has been sporadic, he's missed multiple years of his career, he got flattened in twenty-two seconds by Dan Ige the last time we saw him, and he's returning to a tougher division than ever--a month after his 37th birthday. Time is not on his side.
And neither is Diego Lopes. Lopes was brought into the UFC this past May as a regional pickup making his debut on four days' notice against the undefeated, #10-ranked Movsar Evloev, and at the time, this was my take:
A lot of people on the internet are celebrating, citing Lopes as a diamond in the rough and an immediate threat to the division. Having spent time watching his fights: I'm skeptical. Much is made of his 21-5 record and his 19 stoppages, but like so many regional competitors, when you look up the competition he's finishing, some of the luster fades.
For once, both I and People Who Are Actually Smart were right. Lopes couldn't beat Evloev--it was a real, real big ask--but he was a constant threat, wobbling Evloev on the feet once and nearly submitting him twice en route to a decision loss. For fighting Movsar Evloev with less than a week to prepare, that's pretty fucking good.
And the UFC thinks so, because, boy, they sure are giving him a less proven wrestler who hasn't fought in two years who's also giving up 5" of height and 6" of reach to a guy who rolled off his couch and almost became one of the ten best Featherweights on the planet. DIEGO LOPES BY SUBMISSION.
LIGHT-HEAVYWEIGHT: Tanner Boser (20-10-1) vs Aleksa Camur (6-2)
We're giving this Tanner Boser thing one more shot. Tanner Boser was a briefly exciting heavyweight prospect back in 2019 based on his ability to string multiple punches together, which, hey, that gets you ahead of the curve on most of the division, but then it turned out he couldn't beat 2020 Andrei Arlovski or 2021 Ilir Latifi, and that's a bit of a death knell for your status as an up-and-comer to keep an eye on. After going 4-4 in the heavyweight division Boser took half a year off to make his way down to 205 pounds. Which, y'know, points for trying, but when your big advantage is speed and your big weakness is wrestling, going to the division where most fighters are faster and better wrestlers seems like an iffy move. And it was! He made his Light-Heavyweight debut this past April and Ion Cuțelaba beat him senseless in two minutes. It wasn't great. And now Boser is 1 for his last 5, and winning this fight is almost certainly the difference between keeping or losing his contract.
So--stop me if this sounds familiar--he's fighting a guy we haven't seen in more than two years. Aleksa Camur was only 4-0 when he landed in the Contender Series back in 2019, and as it turns out, being a 6'1" guy who can throw flying knees gets you signed fairly quickly. But William Knight's many muscles outwrestled him, and Nicolae Negumereanu took him to a split decision because no matter how many times Camur hit him in the jaw Nicolae just would not fucking fall down, and somewhere in the middle of having his fingerbones repeatedly dashed on a Romanian man's iron skull, Camur busted his hand and had to go get it fixed. It took two god damned years to get back in fighting shape, and now that he's finally managed to get his metacarpals to line up properly again, it's time to break them all over again, because the human hand just was not made to punch things, but we refuse to collectively listen.
I'm on the fence with this one. From a skill and mobility perspective, I think Camur has Boser beat: He's faster and his counterpunching is much crisper. But Boser's tough and, dare I say, herky-jerky, and given space to work, he's good at using leg kicks to make space for his hands. The people who beat Boser tend to be the people who refuse to allow him that space--so Camur should be trying to channel his flying-knee knockout days, and not his patient counterpunching days. But it's also been two god damned years, so as always, how Camur looks is anyone's guess. I'm still going with ALEKSA CAMUR BY TKO but it's a tossup.
LIGHTWEIGHT: Ignacio Bahamondes (14-4) vs Ľudovít Klein (19-4-1)
Okay, really, was this entire card made for dramatic size mismatches? Is that just what we're doing here? Ignacio Bahamondes a 6'3" Lightweight, which really just should not happen, and aside from a split decision to John Makdessi back in his 2021 debut he's looked great thus far, between wheelkick knockouts, diving on brabo chokes, and a one-sided but not particularly entertaining decision victory over Trey Ogden this past April. The UFC's clearly trying to build him, because they'd sure like to have a fun, successful 6'3" Chilean lightweight kicking people in the face for awhile.
So he's fighting Ľudovít Klein, a 5'7" striker who...just had a fight with a tall lightweight in Jai Herbert that he clearly would have lost were it not for a point deduction thanks to multiple groin strikes letting him get away with a draw. And this is the second time they've tried to book this fight! They had them scheduled for last July and visa issues scratched it, and now that Klein's gotten himself visibly beaten by a big, tall, rangy kickboxer, well, hell, why don't we give you a taller, rangier kickboxer? Sure, you were SUPPOSED to fight Jim Miller, but hey: stocky aging grappler, young 6'3" guy who throws wheelkicks, they're basically the same deal.
And I like Ľudovít Klein! He's got really fun, clean technique and I've really enjoyed watching him fight. But swinging on a guy who's most of a foot taller than you doesn't happen very often for a reason. IGNACIO BAHAMONDES BY DECISION.
PRELIMS: THE ACTUAL MAIN CARD
BANTAMWEIGHT: Raoni Barcelos (17-4) vs Kyler Phillips (10-2)
Raoni Barcelos is the one I just can't let go of. I had great expectations for Raoni heading into 2021: He was 16-1, he had atomized multiple opponents, his hands and his grappling both looked thoroughly impressive and I foresaw a top ten run for the man. Since I began believing in Raoni Barcelos, he is 1-3. The only man he has managed to beat in the time I've been fightwriting is Trevin Jones, last seen somehow losing a strategically sound fight to Cody Garbrandt. Maybe it's Raoni entering his late thirties, maybe it's the step up in competition, or maybe he was broken under the weight of my belief. I've never been a huge Kyler Phillips guy. Which is probably unfair--he's perfectly fine. He's a very talented wrestler with a very successful grappling attack who's been chipping people down with elbows and throwing in the occasional headkick just to keep people guessing. And that's normally my exact kind of fighter, so honestly, I'm not sure why I never got on the Kyler Express. Maybe it's the hair. Maybe it's my envy for the concept of having hair.
Either way, he'll probably win here, too. But I just cannot pick him. I've come this far on the Raoni Barcelos tour, I have to see it to its end, even if that means picking him knowing he's probably getting ground into dust. RAONI BARCELOS BY TKO, somehow, and my hopes and dreams go with him.
WELTERWEIGHT: Jeremiah Wells (12-2-1) vs Carlston Harris (18-5)
See, this? This is good. Jeremiah Wells is on the best run of his life: He knocked out Warlley Alves, he choked out Mike "Blood Diamond" Mathetha, he knocked out the impossibly tough Court McGee with one punch, and he scraped a split decision out over Matthew Semelsberger despite getting dropped twice. He's looked equal parts talented, powerful, and tough as hell, and a four-fight winning streak at welterweight in the UFC is a tough, tough ask. Carlston Harris isn't far behind, either. He's only 3-1, but that one loss came against the ridiculously good Shavkat Rakhmonov, so aside from getting beaten by one of the best fighters on the entire planet, he's been throwing everyone else in the garbage. He rebounded by dominating late replacement Jared Gooden this past March in a fight that was as impressive for its onesidedness as for proving just how many hooks to the head Jared Gooden can inexplicably absorb without falling down.
So you've got two wrestleboxers who are both very good at spamming hooks and very difficult to knock out. The result should be fun. Harris has a bit of a size advantage, but Wells seems to carry more actual force in his punches, and I'm not sure Harris will be able to wrestle Wells to get an advantage the way he has with other people. JEREMIAH WELLS BY DECISION.
FEATHERWEIGHT: Billy Quarantillo (17-5) vs Damon Jackson (22-5-1 (1))
And here, we have the grave of the would-be contenders. The UFC has wanted Billy Quarantillo to be a thing for a couple of years now. He's a fun, frenetic brawler with a visible glee for getting into firefights but he's not loose enough to get outright sloppy about it, which is admittedly pretty rare and admirable. But this past April saw his third attempt at breaking into the top ranks, and just like the other two, it got shut down along with the rest of his body, as Edson Barboza knocked him out cold with a knee in about two and a half minutes. Damon Jackson is unfortunately familiar with this dance, having been ejected from possible contention by an Ilia Topuria knockout three years ago, and he's dancing it with Billy right now: A four-fight winning streak and a lot of momentum got halted by a Dan Ige left hook in January. Jackson's life-sapping clinch attacks and aggressive choking game have gotten him repeated opportunities, but you just can't arm triangle someone while they're knocking you out on the feet, unfortunately.
BILLY QUARANTILLO BY TKO. I'm a big fan of Damon Jackson, but his success largely comes from stopping his opponents in their tracks and forcing them to fight from a standstill--or, preferably, their back--and mobility is Quarantillo's entire game. Edson Barboza was able to use that mobility to catch Quarantillo and knock him out, and I just don't think Damon Jackson has that in him, particularly after Quarantillo chips him down for two rounds.
FLYWEIGHT: Jake Hadley (10-1) vs Cody Durden (15-4-1)
Hey, look, it's two guys I don't really like! Which isn't particularly fair, they're both very good fighters who hit real hard and have real solid wrestling games to back up their angrily swinging lunchbox fists, but I just get put off by them both from a personality standpoint, and by god, I already absorb so much bad-personality energy from covering the main event scene of this sport and its constant arms race of bullshit that I just don't have space in my heart for these two. Like, Jake Hadley is a wrestleboxer who knocked his last opponent out with a liver punch! I SHOULD love Jake Hadley! But it's just not there. I look at this fight and I see a blindingly white void, and all I can do is observe it, and nod at its presence, and hope that one day I come to terms with the void's place in my life. I don't mean to spurn you, my void roommate. I just don't know what to do with you right now.
Anyway, JAKE HADLEY BY TKO but I constantly underestimate Cody Durden so if he fucks Hadley up add it to the file of things I'm persistently wrong about.
FEATHERWEIGHT: Sean Woodson (9-1-1) vs Dennis Buzukja (13-1)
This is the fourth opponent Sean Woodson has been scheduled to fight on this card. Fourth! He was going to fight 6' power brawler Steve Garcia, but Garcia pulled out, so the UFC switched it up and rebooked him against Jesse Butler, the last-minute replacement Jim Miller knocked cold in twenty seconds, only for the Tennessee State Athletic commission to very correctly ask the UFC why on Earth it was trying to book a fight for a guy who just lost consciousness sixty days ago when he shouldn't even be back to full-contact sparring yet, so they said "yeah I guess that's true" and matched Woodson up against the LFA's 5'9" all-around standout Mairon Santos, but Santos couldn't get a visa. So now, at long last, Sean Woodson, the 6'2" featherweight who looked like he had real good boxing right up until his last fight where he seemingly forgot how to use it, is fighting Dennis "The Great" Buzukja, a prospect out of Staten Island who was fighting 6-4 and 7-7 guys a few months ago. Buzukja is, in fact, just seven weeks removed from a two-round fight of his own.
So you've got a UFC veteran who's had to swap out three separate opponents, all with wildly varying styles, who is now fighting an unknown regional fighter who just competed less than two months ago. I love this dumbass sport. SEAN WOODSON BY TKO, but Buzukja doesn't seem like a bad prospect. Hopefully he'll have more than three days to prep for his next fight.
FLYWEIGHT: Ode’ Osbourne (12-5) vs Asu Almabaev (17-2)
And once again, we're closing on another of these fights. Ode' Osbourne is a very good but irritatingly inconsistent kind of fighter. He's got dynamite in his hands and a great sense of timing--most of the time. Sometimes, he shoots a bunch of no-chance takedowns and comes away with a barely-there split decision or, worse, he jumps up and down in place trying to gauge distance for a flying knee and gets obliterated with a hook before he touches the ground again. The skills are there; the decisionmaking is sometimes questionable. Asu Almabaev, like so many international prospects, is kind of a question mark. I've watched as much tape on him as I can find, and like most flyweights, he's, y'know, pretty good at most aspects of fighting, but his striking defense is just a bit on the lax side. He's got real solid timing for shooting takedowns and he's very fast at snatching up chokes, but he also eats a bunch of bread-and-butter 1-2 combinations and his method for dealing with them tends to be moving backward into the cage, where he continues to get punched until he tries to get the fight on the floor.
But that's the thing: His competition is woefully inconsistent. In his last four fights he went from a 10-4 prospect to a 6-1 rookie to a 21-11 former Bellator champion (nice to see you again, Zach Makovsky) to a 3-3 jobber with multiple fake fights on his record. I know I get too into the weeds on records, but the thing is, fighting is so subjective and momentary that the only reliable way to gauge it is performance vs peers, and when your peers are constantly vacillating between real fighters and guys the promoter found in a Campbell's Soup crate, it's that much harder to evaluate your skills.
So ODE' OSBOURNE BY DECISION, but it's wholly possible Almabaev wrestles him around and gets a nod. I just don't have enough faith in the fights I've seen to come down on his side.