Ben Duffy/Sherdog.com illustration
This year, despite a relative lack of mangled limbs or what-do-we-even-call-that techniques in top-level MMA, there were plenty of solid candidates, and in fact the voting panel nearly turned in a three-way tie, thanks to a couple of historic tapouts. In the headliner of UFC Fight Night 205 on April 23, Jessica Andrade flexed the raw power and killer instinct that make her perhaps the scariest pound-for-pound woman in MMA, squeezing Amanda Lemos purple with a standing arm-triangle choke, the first finish of its kind in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. At Bellator 281 in May, Oliver Enkamp snared Mark Lemminger in a rare buggy choke—the first in Bellator MMA history—turning a blown spinning attack into sudden victory before Lemminger appeared to realize what was happening.
To find this year’s winner, however, we must leave the UFC Octagon as well as the signature red, black and white Bellator canvas, and visit the trademark “SmartCage” of Professional Fighters League, for a submission that was eye-opening on several levels: not only because of what happened, but who did it, how they did it and to whom.
Heading into PFL 5: 2022 Regular Season on June 24, Steven Ray and Anthony Pettis were two men in search of professional redemption generally, and looking specifically to validate their 2022 seasons by clinching a playoff berth. Former UFC and World Extreme Cagefighting champ Pettis had joined the PFL the previous year as a prize free agent, but his 2021 season had been a disaster, going 0-2 and missing the playoffs. He had won his 2022 season debut, tapping out Myles Price in the first round, and carried that momentum into the matchup with fellow UFC veteran Ray, who had joined the PFL in 2022 after a two-and-a-half-year layoff, only to drop his promotional debut to Alex Martinez. “Showtime” was assured of a playoff spot with a win of any kind, while “Braveheart” would need a finish to even have a prayer of making the tournament. To say that expectations were modest for the 32-year-old Scot would be putting it mildly, and he entered the contest as a two-to-one underdog.
After a back-and-forth first frame that appeared to favor Ray, the second round opened with Pettis getting the better of the striking exchanges when, during a scramble, Ray took Pettis’ back. In short order, Ray secured a body triangle from back mount. Pettis tried to spin up and out of the position, but Ray stayed calmly in control, cinched the body triangle even tighter, and looked to set up a twister. A second later, stuck in mid-transition with his left arm trapped underneath him, Pettis tapped Ray’s back with his free hand. As Ray released the hold and sprang up to celebrate, Pettis rolled to his back in pain, the PFL commentary booth exploded, and the rest of us were left to dissect what we had just seen.
STEVIE RAY GETS THE TAP!!!!
— PFL (@PFLMMA) June 25, 2022
RAY IS GOING TO THE #PFLPLAYOFFS!!#2022PFL5 LIVE on ESPN & ESPN+
🌎 https://t.co/jPNvomkWj8 pic.twitter.com/AIwfNlWFtS
It was a sensational finish. Twisters are exceedingly rare in high-level MMA and anytime one happens, it is guaranteed to receive serious consideration for this award at the very least. Bryce Mitchell’s twister submission of Brandon Sayles won Sherdog’s “Submission of the Year” in 2018, and when Chan Sung Jung pulled off the first one in UFC history at the expense of Leonard Garcia in 2011, it would probably have been the winner in any year that did not also feature Frank Mir breaking Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira’s arm.
However, to call Ray’s submission simply a twister sells the moment short. While Ray had been attempting to generate the spinal tension that usually elicits the tap in a twister, he was working for it from the opposite side of the usual, and when Pettis submitted, the primary source of pain had clearly been Ray’s legs compressing his ribs, which were turned perpendicular to Ray’s. As such, the submission has almost as much in common with Pettis’ 2017 body triangle submission loss to Dustin Poirier as to Mitchell or Jung’s work. For a fighter in Pettis whose calling card had for years been his slick grappling defense, and in particular a seemingly supernatural ability to spin out of back mount and into his opponent’s guard, it was a stunning reversal of fortune.
For Ray, the win was an instant game-changer. No longer an afterthought in the PFL lightweight race, he landed a playoff berth, where he would once again meet Pettis. “Braveheart” prevailed once more in the rematch, and punched his ticket to the championship fight, where he came up short against 2022 winner Olivier Aubin-Mercier, but picking up a few votes for Sherdog’s “Comeback Fighter of the Year” nonetheless. As the opening salvo of that comeback season, Ray’s modified twister submission of Pettis is our “Submission of the Year.”