Preview: UFC Fight Night 119 ‘Brunson vs. Machida’

Middleweight

Jack Hermansson (16-3) vs. Thiago Santos (15-5)

ODDS: Hermansson (-125), Santos (+105)

ANALYSIS: One unintended positive of the Michael Bisping-Georges St. Pierre main event at UFC 217 holding up the division -- and Robert Whittaker’s knee surgery and recovery -- is that it has given matchmaker Mick Maynard some time to start pairing random top-25 middleweights, letting the cream rise to the top and providing some natural promotional progression to many fighters who seem like they have perpetually been fighting in circles. This is the crucial process that will eventually allow Daniel Kelly to fight for the UFC middleweight title. Believe with me, people.

Since a brief 0-2 run in Bellator MMA, Hermansson has gone 11-1 over his last dozen bouts, refining his skills and becoming a more wholesale effective dirty boxer. The Norway-based Swede lands a staggering 5.82 significant strikes per minute, working behind an improved jab, throwing punch flurries to get into the clinch and then busting up opponents in the phone booth. While he has looked sterling in his first-round knockouts of Alex Nicholson and Bradley Scott this year, his lopsided loss to Cezar Ferreira in November seems to provide some worrisome clues about how the “Marreta” encounter might go.

Ferreira is four years removed from his own win over Santos and four years removed from anyone considering him a serious prospect. Yet he played “The Joker” for a fool, befuddling him with southpaw boxing, kicking offense, clinch tactics and eventually fight-ending top position. Santos is not going to wind up choking out Hermansson, but the success he enjoyed fighting left-handed, his ability to catch Hermansson’s kicks and dump him on the mat -- the lone aspect of wrestling at which “Marreta” excels -- and his knack for intercepting Hermansson’s grabs for the clinch, dinging him in close then pushing him away, are all points of technique that Santos employs well, and he does so with vastly superior power.

If Hermansson is willing to duel with kicks standing, which would be idiotic against one of the hardest kickers in the sport, he could eat that trademark liver shot. Hermansson needs to get inside sooner rather than later, use his dirty boxing for as long as he needs to set up a decent look at a clinch takedown and then press the issue. Santos’ sprawl-and-brawl game has gotten better, so if Hermansson can force him to eat the canvas and fight up the fence to regain his footing, he can help take the wind out of the Brazilian’s sails. However, the disparity in power and technique -- “Marreta” just destroyed Jack Marshman with a wheel kick, after all -- is troubling, especially when combined with the fact that Santos has already shown the ability to deal with high-volume clinch-oriented fighters in the past. See: Elias Theodorou. Santos eats some wake-up shots from Hermansson before finding his horsepower and using it to crack the jaw or the ribcage of the Swede in the first 10 minutes.

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