Madison Square Garden in New York, New York, was home to a great night of fights, with 4 (T)KOs, 2 submissions, and 5 decisions, including 1 split-decision and 1 majority draw.
UFC 230 went through a litany of card changes, driven by injury, arguments over card placement and fan (dis)interest. At one point, the main event was going to be Sijara Eubanks vs. Valentina Shevchenko, which would have been a non-title fight thanks to Eubanks missing weight. Fortunately, we were spared from that fate, as Daniel Cormier and Derrick Lewis filled in the spot, and the (replacement) co-main event of Chris Weidman vs. Jacare Souza ended up being one of the best fights of 2018 so far.
Attendance: 17,011
Gate: $2,841,718.68
Fight of the Night: Chris Weidman vs. Jacare Souza
Chris Weidman and Jacare Souza, two of the most accomplished grapplers in all of MMA, put on a back-and-forth kickboxing bout tonight that delivered some of the best excitement, tension and drama in recent memory.
Jacare’s head movement and ripping body shots came up against Weidman’s ultra-solid defense and straight punches, and the real winner of each exchange was the fans. Normally, the level of striking in grappler-kickboxing bouts is poor, but these cats can swing leather, and swing it they did.
Weidman started landing hard uppercuts and short elbows in the clinch to open Jacare up in the third. Souza was tiring, but still managed to roll with the shots. After letting Weidman throw everything he had, Jacare returned fire, lighting Chris up with shots in the clinch, followed by a huge flurry of punches. Weidman survived just long enough to see a huge Jacare right hand hit him on the temple. Weidman fell like a tree, totally out and Jacare tried to call the fight off, but Tan Dan Miragliotta wanted to see a death and forced Jacare to continue. Souza landed four half-hearted hammerfists to a defenseless Weidman and Miragliotta finally realized it was his job to prevent fighters taking unnecessary damage, and waved the fight off.
Jacare and Weidman both made a cool 50 Gs for their respective roles in the fight, and whomever hired Dan Miragliotta to assassinate Chris Weidman got a refund thanks to Jacare’s mercy.
Performances of the Night: Israel Adesanya and Jared Cannonier
Israel Adesanya and Derek Brunson immediately engaged with kicks and takedown attempts. Brunson tried to pants the Stylebender, who responded with the middle finger. They get back in the clinch, and Brunson lands a left but not much else, as Adesanya stuffs his takedown attempts. Brunson dives in and eats a big knee, and He. Is. Rocked! Another big knee and head kick and Brunson is crumbled again. He’s up quickly, though, and lands a nice left, but Izzy cracks him and he’s back on the mat counting the blood spots. Herb Dean has seen enough and stops the fight. Adesanya gets the round 1 win and 50,000 smackers for his effort.
David Branch looked great for the majority of this fight, but like so many before him, he looked fantastic all the way until he got stopped. Branch was able to take Cannonier several times, constantly looking for submissions. He was all over Jared and landing plenty of hard shots while the underdog looked to land some punches of his own as the first round drew to a close.
Round two opened with Cannonier landing a nice jab-leg kick combo, and Branch fired back, but as he did, Jared found an opening and landed a thunderous bomb that dropped David like a sack of bricks. Cannonier jumped on him, landing several big blows before the referee mercifully called a halt to the action. Jared Cannonier gets the round 2 win and $50,000 big ones to celebrate with.