Holloway pounds way to UFC title
Stunning TKO lifts featherweight crown from hometown favourite Aldo in Rio beat down
The Max Holloway era has arrived. He’d rather us call it the “Blessed Era,” though, so maybe you should call it that instead.
After Saturday night, Holloway gets what he wants.
In a stunning performance, the 25-year-old walked into Jose Aldo’s home turf in Rio de Janeiro and claimed the UFC’s featherweight belt with a brutal beat down in the headliner at UFC 212. It wasn’t a surprise. It couldn’t be. Not when Holloway had won 10 fights in a row and had beaten the likes of Ricardo Lamas and won an interim 145-pound title by smashing Anthony Pettis.
But at UFC 212, Holloway put an exclamation mark on his ascension. Yes, Conor McGregor knocked out Aldo 18 months ago in only 13 seconds, but McGregor’s not around anymore.
And besides, McGregor caught Aldo with a perfect shot.
What Holloway did Saturday was figure out a man who had made a career out of being impossible to figure out.
Aldo connected with a couple big shots early, and for a second it seemed as if Holloway might just be one of the many contenders who fell short against the Brazilian great.
Instead, Holloway did what Holloway does. He adjusted. He found his range. He found his opponent’s weakness and then exploited them, landing a gorgeous right hand that dropped Aldo — and then followed it up with an unending barrage of shots on the ground.
“It’s the Blessed Era,” Holloway said in the octagon after the fight.
With the win, Holloway established himself as the dominant 145-pound fighter of his time.
Yes, he lost to McGregor, but it is ridiculous to talk about McGregor as an active fighter at this point. The UFC stripped him of his belt, and he’s been inactive for way too long.
McGregor might be the biggest name on the UFC’s roster, but for now Holloway is the featherweight king.
NO. 2 BY A LONG SHOT
Claudia Gadelha may not get a third shot at Joanna Jedrzejczyk.
Gadelha’s already lost twice to the UFC’s women’s strawweight champion and the company doesn’t tend to give third-chances no matter how heated the rivalry.
In Saturday night’s co-main event at UFC 212 in Rio, though, the Brazilian left little question that she was, at worst, the second-best female fighter at 115 pounds in the world. And that’s saying something.
Gadelha did everything she needed to against Karolina Kowalkiewicz, taking the Polish fighter to the ground and securing a rear-naked choke that caused her opponent to tap at the 2:12 mark of the first round.
It’s worth remembering that Kowalkiewicz is widely believed to be in the top-3 of the strawweight division and had put up a spirited fight against Jedrzejczyk in November at UFC 206.
And yet, she couldn’t last a round with Gadelha.
When the Brazilian was asked what she wanted next, she easily could have called out the champion. Instead, she let out a big laugh.
“I’m moving to Albuquerque and buying a new car and a fancy dog,” Gadelha said in the octagon. “That’s all I want right now.”
The move to New Mexico was a reference to Gadelha’s decision to relocate her camp from Rio to Albuquerque, where she is training at Luttrell-Yee MMA.
Gadelha’s always been good, but she’s never looked better than she did Saturday night.
The UFC may just want to consider giving her a third shot at Jedrzejczyk, even if it breaks all of the promotion’s unwritten rules.
BELFORT GETS IT DONE
By no means was it a vintage Vitor Belfort performance, but a win is a win.
Fighting in front of an adoring Brazilian crowd at UFC 212, Belfort outlasted Nate Marquardt to earn a unanimous decision victory in what many believed would be his last fight.
Belfort wasn’t nearly as explosive as he once was, but the Brazilian hasn’t been that way in a long time. The main point — at least from Belfort’s perspective — is that he didn’t get finished in the first two rounds the way he has bee in four of his last five fights.
“I was excited and (Canadian coach Firas Zahabi) told me to calm own a little bit,” Belfort explained. “I wanted to get a knockout and I’m sorry I didn’t get a knockout.”
Much of the conversation about the fight will inevitably centre on whether or not it should have been Belfort’s last fight in the octagon.
The 40-year-old had hinted he would retire after this fight a couple months ago after he was beaten badly be Kelvin Gastelum.
That loss would eventually be turned into a no-contest after Gastelum tested positive for marijuana, but Belfort’s disappointing performance had proven for the umpteenth time that he was no longer an elite UFC middleweight.