On Saturday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, the latest victims of what seems like an almost weekly occurrence this year were UFC Fight Night 213 headliners Calvin Kattar and Arnold Allen. “The Boston Finisher” and “Almighty” were just getting going when, late in the first round, Kattar landed awkwardly after a jumping attack, apparently damaging his right knee. He gutted out the remainder of the frame, but was no better off after the between-rounds break. With Kattar unable even to stand, let alone fight, referee Herb Dean called off the contest just eight seconds into Round 2.
Incredibly, Allen vs. Kattar wasn’t even the only bout on Saturday card that was truncated by a knee injury. The top prelim at “UFC Vegas 63,” an intriguing matchup featuring middleweight fringe contenders Roman Dolidze and Phil Hawes, ended in a brutal first-round knockout by Dolidze, but the finish was facilitated by an injury to Hawes’ left knee, sustained during an awkward-looking sequence earlier in the round that left “No Hype” on one functioning leg. Add to that a couple of questionable judges’ decisions, and the major theme of the evening was that almost none of the most important bouts ended conclusively or without controversy.
Nonetheless, these fighters still need a next assignment, so here are matches that ought to be made for some of the notable winners at UFC Fight Night 213 “Kattar vs. Allen.”
Arnold Allen vs. Josh Emmett
Saturday’s main event was supposed to be a possible title eliminator—and it still is, only now it’s much harder to position the winner as a legitimate contender. With featherweight champ Alexander Volkanovski apparently set to try for two-division glory by challenging for the lightweight belt, what his division needs is a clear No. 1 contender bout or an interim title, which amount to more or less the same thing in today’s UFC. There are four logical candidates for that fight, but Max Holloway, having lost three times to the champ, is probably on the outside looking in unless Volkanovski decides to stay at 155 pounds indefinitely. That leaves Allen, Emmett and Yair Rodriguez, who reaffirmed his status as a top contender by defeating former title challenger Brian Ortega—by TKO due to injury, ironically—at UFC on ABC 3 in July. All three are outstanding fighters whose cases for an immediate title shot are nonetheless flawed: Rodriguez and Allen are both coming off wins aided by low-percentage injuries to their opponents, while Emmett’s split-decision win over Kattar in June was not exactly authoritative.
Allen, Emmett and Rodriguez all have points to recommend them as well. Emmett is the oldest of the three, which may lead UFC matchmakers Sean Shelby and Mick Maynard to strike while the iron is hot. Allen is the hottest, competitively speaking, with his perfect 10-0 Octagon record and 12-fight overall win streak. Rodriguez is the most sellable; his high-flying, aggressive fight style is a crowd pleaser, as a native Mexican he holds the key to one of the UFC’s most coveted markets and despite not being a native English speaker, he has far more sizzle on the mic than the extremely understated American and Brit. However, Rodriguez’s competitive output over the last couple of years definitely lags behind the other two, so let Allen and Emmett fight it out for an interim belt, and let “Pantera” continue to make his case with another high-level contender fight—Rodriguez vs. Holloway 2 would have “Fight of the Year” written all over it.
Max Griffin vs. Muslim Salikhov-Andre Fialho winner
Don’t look now, but Griffin may be turning a corner at age 36. Long one of the welterweight division’s enigmas, “Max Pain” has traditionally blended impressive physical gifts and well-rounded offensive weapons with frustrating defensive lapses, poor reactions to pressure and inconsistent cardio. That is what makes his win over Tim Means in Saturday’s co-main event so impressive, however. “The Dirty Bird” is one of the welterweight division’s quintessential tough outs, difficult to beat and even harder to look good against, the exact type of fighter who had always been a miserable matchup for Griffin. This time, however, Griffin not only dropped Means in Rounds 1 and 2, he held on against adversity in the third, picking up a victory that was not nearly as close as the split verdict would seem to imply.
Coming off the best win of his UFC career to date, Griffin has the look of a fighter who may be a Top 15 talent, in search of consistency and confidence. He has earned at least a matchup with another welterweight fitting that description, and Salikhov and Fialho, who meet at UFC Fight Night 215 in three weeks, qualify.
Roman Dolidze vs. Anthony Hernandez
Dolidze may not have quite the sizzle with casual fans of a Khamzat Chimaev or Kevin Holland, but he has quietly been one of the most pleasant surprises of the last three years. The burly Georgian made his debut in mid-2020 to little fanfare, won his first two fights in the UFC and then decided to fix what wasn’t broken and drop from light heavyweight to middleweight. After a misstep in his 185-pound debut against Trevin Giles, he has rattled off three straight wins, culminating in his destruction of Hawes on Saturday. Impressively, not only has Dolidze made the physical transition to his new weight class seamlessly, he has improved from fight to fight, evolving from a mid-tempo grinder to a terrifying knockout artist.
While this most recent win was clearly facilitated by Hawes’ knee, it wasn’t exactly a non-contact injury; Hawes’ knee blew up because Dolidze had him in an awkward-looking leglock and Hawes either didn’t realize his peril or was unable to escape. It isn’t pretty, but that’s one way to win a fight. The question now is whether you believe in Dolidze as a rising contender. If you classify the Hawes win as a fluke, then Dolidze at least deserves another run at a fighter of that same approximate level, perhaps the winner of the Andre Petroski-Wellington Turman bout two weeks from now at UFC 281. However if you believe Dolidze to be the better fighter, if you think he would probably beat Hawes in a rematch even though that particular outcome was one in a million, then he has won three straight at 185 pounds and should be entering the rankings with one more win. Hernandez, who choked out Marc-Andre Barriault last month at UFC Fight Night 210, has won three in a row himself and is in a similar spot. He also knows a thing or two about dealing with physically imposing grapplers, if you recall.