UFC Fight Night 161 Post-Mortem: False Alarm
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After several media outlets reported that Joanna Jedrzejczyk might miss weight for her UFC Fight Night 161 headliner opposite Michelle Waterson on Saturday in Tampa, Florida, the former Ultimate Fighting Championship women’s strawweight titleholder not only made her contracted weight but put on a vintage performance.
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It marked Jedrzejczyk’s return to the 115-pound weight class after a one-fight stop at flyweight, where she dropped a decision to Valentina Shevchenko in a battler over gold at 125 pounds. Having emerged victorious in a division she dominated for years, she now shifts her focus to newly minted champion Weili Zhang.
“I was very impressed with her performance with Jessica
Andrade,” Jedrzejczyk said during the ESPN+ post-fight show.
“She has such crispy and juicy punches. She’s very fast. She’s a
very dangerous fighter. I’m ready. I lost my belt two years ago,
[and] we have already a third champ. I held the belt for almost two
years, and it means a lot to me, to the people. Rose [Namajunas]
defended once, [and] Jessica could not defend the belt. It is not
easy to become the UFC champ, but it is more difficult to defend,
because there are more distractions, more obligations. It’s not
like we are not focused, but there is so many things to do and you
have to deal with it, and I love it. I feel like I was born for
that.”
SLIDE STOPPED
UFC featherweight staple Cub Swanson managed to get back in the win column, as he took a unanimous decision from Kron Gracie in the co-main event. The victory was the 35-year-old Swanson’s first since April 2017 and snapped a four-fight losing streak.
“I think four losses in a row … I was trying to not let it get in my mind, but it does,” Swanson said. “I have questioned myself many times, and the pressure was off. I was like, ‘whatever.’”
The Swanson-Gracie fight was promoted as a striker-versus-grappler showdown, but it did not go down as many expected. The two slugged it out on the feet for a majority of the 15-minute affair, with the World Extreme Cagefighting veteran getting the better of the exchanges. The two were rewarded with a “Fight of the Night” bonus -- the sixth time of Swanson’s career.
“Yeah, I’m happy in the way I delivered and got the W,” Swanson said. “I thought he hit me way more than I thought he should have. I thought he did a really good job on capitalizing while I was trying to exit. I was trying to stick and move. That was the game plan. When I was exiting, he took advantage and touched me quite a bit. They weren’t the hardest shots, but they were accumulating.”
The two combatants have a long history with each other, as they have faced off previously in Brazilian jiu-jitsu tournaments. Gracie is the son of the legendary Rickson Gracie and the grandson of the late Helio Gracie, one of the founders of Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Because he was tasked with fighting a member of the iconic family, Swanson struggled to find training partners.
“I was training all over California just trying to get my game up,” he said. “A couple of schools said, ‘You’re fighting a Gracie. They wouldn’t approve that, so we’re not going to train you for this fight. No offense, but you can’t come here anymore.’ That brought up some old memories and really pissed me off.”
Swanson handed Gracie his first professional defeat by unanimous decision. The Brazilian entered MMA as one of the most respected grapplers in history. In fact, the 2013 Abu Dhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling Championships gold medalist was so accomplished on the ground that he was favored to beat Swanson despite having 31 fewer bouts.
“I was very confident [on the ground],” said Swanson, who also holds the rank of black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. “I just didn’t think that would be the very best thing for me to be there.”
While Swanson refused to call out his next opponent, he did end any discussion about his retiring soon.
“I would like to fight until I’m 40,” he said. “I love to be in front of the crowd. If I can continue to live this lifestyle, I enjoy it. If I can continue to keep fighting at the highest level, then I will continue to do it, because I am passionate about it, but if I keep losing, I don’t want to be a charity case. I don’t want them to say, ‘Oh, you’re popular. We will give you another fight.’ I want to earn it.”
PLATINUM TARGET
The wildest moment of the entire show saw Niko Price knock out James Vick with an upkick while lying on his back. The highlight-reel finish earned “The Hybrid” a performance bonus and a chance to call for a fight with a fellow offensive-minded Floridian.
“I yelled at Mike Perry,” Price said during the ESPN post-fight show. “I can’t say what he said. He doesn’t have too big of a vocabulary. It was pretty obstructive. I’m looking for another BMF belt, so what’s up? Me and Perry are totally down for that. It would be great. We are going to punch each other in the face and see who falls first.”
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