Stipe Miocic made sure that at least one title won’t be leaving Cleveland.
While Miocic-Overeem was the official main event, former WWE talent CM Punk’s Octagon debut was the evening’s featured attraction for many observers. The bout itself didn’t provide much of interest statistically, however, as opponent Mickey Gall dispatched his celebrated foe in short order. Here is a by-the-numbers look at UFC 203, with statistics courtesy of FightMetric.com.
34: Significant strikes landed by Miocic in the abbreviated heavyweight affair. By comparison, Overeem landed just nine, although one of those resulted in the bout’s only knockdown.
600: Career significant strikes landed by Miocic, who on Saturday night moved past Cheick Kongo (574) and Tim Sylvia (585) and into third place among UFC heavyweights all-time. Only Cain Velasquez (718) and Junior dos Santos (887) have landed more.
10: KO/TKO losses among 15 career defeats for Overeem. Four of those losses have come in the Octagon, as the Jackson-Wink MMA product has also been knocked out by Ben Rothwell, Travis Browne and Antonio Silva as well as Miocic.
3: Consecutive first-round KO/TKO victories for Miocic, who has finished Overeem, Fabricio Werdum and Andrei Arlovski during that run.
31: Significant strikes to the head landed by Miocic. Overeem, meanwhile, landed five.
12: Significant ground strikes landed by Miocic, who finished the fight with ground-and-pound.
1: Successful title defense for Miocic, which puts him just one defense behind the UFC record for heavyweights held by Randy Couture, Tim Sylvia, Brock Lesnar and Cain Velasquez.
47: Significant strikes by which Fabricio Werdum outlanded Travis Browne in their bizarre heavyweight rematch. “Vai Cavalo” outlanded his foe 37 to 12 in round one, 19 to 11 in round two and 28 to 14 en route to winning a unanimous decision.
.590: Significant striking accuracy for Werdum, who landed 84 of 142 attempts. By comparison, Browne landed just 37 of 143 significant strikes, a 25 percent success rate.
108: Overall significant strike advantage for Werdum against Browne over the course of eight rounds in bouts at UFC 203 and UFC on Fox 11.
20: Significant strikes landed by Mickey Gall before he submitted former professional wrestling star Phil Brooks, aka CM Punk, with a rear-naked choke 2:14 into the opening round of their welterweight clash. Punk failed to land a significant strike but did land six total strikes in the bout.
37: Age of Punk, making him the second-oldest fighter on the UFC 203 card behind Werdum, who is 39 years old. Werdum, however, has 28 professional fights to his credit. Punk has one.
4: Consecutive bantamweight victories for Jimmie Rivera, who outpointed division staple Urijah Faber in a featured 135-pound showdown. That figure ties him with Cody Garbrandt for the second-longest active streak in the division behind reigning champion Domnick Cruz (five).
19: Consecutive professional triumphs overall for Rivera. Only Khabib Nurmagomedov, with 23, has more among fighters in the UFC.
32: Significant strikes by which Rivera outlanded “The California Kid.” Overall, Faber landed just 22 of 112 significant strikes, a 19 percent success rate. Rivera, meanwhile, went 54 for 150, a 33 percent clip.
13: Years without suffering consecutive losses in MMA competition for Faber, who has fallen to Rivera and Cruz in his last two UFC appearances.
111: Combined total strikes by which Jessica Andrade has outlanded her opponents in two bouts since moving from bantamweight to strawweight. The Brazilian outlanded Joanne Calderwood by a 44-to-23 count before submitting her Scottish foe with a guillotine choke 4:38 into round one on Saturday.
6: Wins via guillotine choke among 15 career professional triumphs for Andrade. In addition to besting Calderwood, “Bate Estaca” also used the guillotine to put away Larissa Pachecho in UFC competition. The other four guillotine choke triumphs came outside the Octagon.
7: UFC appearances for Jessica Eye, tying her with Ronda Rousey for the second most in the history of the women’s bantamweight division behind only Miesha Tate (eight). The Cleveland native lost her fourth straight in the Octagon on Saturday night, dropping a split verdict to Bethe Correia in a preliminary contest.
12: Unofficial media scorecards, of the 18 tracked by MMADecisions.com, that had the fight in favor of Eye.
3: Significant strikes by which Eye outlanded Correia. Eye outlanded her foe 20 to 18 in round one and 18 to 16 in round three, while Correia held a 15-to-14 edge in round one. All told, Eye held a slight 52-to-49 advantage against her Brazilian foe.
26: Significant ground strikes landed by Nik Lentz in his second-round technical knockout victory over short-notice foe Michael McBride at lightweight.
5: Takedowns landed in six attempts by Lentz, who dominated the action on the ground against McBride. “The Carny” also passed guard eight times.
59: Career takedowns for Lentz, tying him with Demetrious Johnson for fourth most among active UFC fighters. Only Gleison Tibau (84), Frankie Edgar (61) and Clay Guida (61) have more.