The president of the United States tweeted his encouragement to Colby Covington on Saturday afternoon, leading up to Covington’s main event against Robbie Lawler at UFC on ESPN 5.
How you felt about that – and the fact that two of the president’s sons were in attendance at Prudential Center in Newark, N.J., to watch Covington work – likely says a lot about how you feel about the 31-year-old Californian’s methodic rise to the top of the UFC welterweight division during the Past three years.
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As it turned out, Covington didn’t need any extra motivation to defeat Lawler via lopsided unanimous decision. In the wake of his five-round sweep over the former champion on all three judges’ scorecards (50-44, 50-45, 50-45), it’s impossible to ignore that Covington is as good at fighting as he is irritatingly committed to being the most hated man in the 170-pound division.
Moments after dispatching Lawler, Covington (15-1) had numerous jumbled messages to send the UFC faithful while on the mic with play-by-play announcer Jon Anik. He thanked the Trumps for their support, perfunctorily shouted-out the troops for keeping us all safe, told the New Jersey crowd to shut up while he was talking, called out current titlist Kamaru Usman, and took a nonsensical swipe at former welterweight champ Matt Hughes, who was injured when his truck was hit by a train in June 2017.
“Hey, let’s talk about the lesson we learned tonight,” Covington said. “It’s a strong lesson that Robbie should have learned from his good buddy Matt Hughes. You stay off the tracks when the train is coming through, junior. Don’t matter if it’s the Trump train or the Colby train. Get out the way.”
Covington takes pains not to let us like him. Before this fight, he walked to the cage accompanied by Kurt Angle’s former WWE theme song, inviting fans to chant “you suck!” along with the music, just as they used to do for Angle. It was a little like a magician explaining how his tricks work before he does them — clearly Covington knows exactly what he’s doing here — but was no less effective because of it.
But if fans tuned in to this event’s unorthodox mid-afternoon start time on ESPN hoping to see Lawler (28-14) knock Covington’s block off, they left disappointed. That’s because so far, Covington has had the chops to back up most of his windbaggery.
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He was overall too busy for the 37-year-old slugger. Covington took Lawler down numerous times in the early going and, while never really putting him in danger of a stoppage, the effort and the pace ultimately declawed Lawler’s normally fearsome offense. By the end, Covington was even getting the best of the striking exchanges.
Lawler, meanwhile, appeared content to bob and weave without uncorking many of the power punches fans were hoping to see from him. Much of his performance was vintage Lawler — he appeared completely unconcerned with any and all of Covington’s offense throughout — just without the terrifying violence.
It was a masterful performance from Covington, who now might well run his red hat and sunglasses into a championship fight against Usman. He will once again play the heel in that bout — perhaps more so than ever — though he’ll approach it now with the begrudging respect of much of the MMA community firmly at his back.
Score one for the grown-ups.
On an undercard largely built around young up-and-comers and lesser-knowns, the co-main event pitting longtime fan favorites Jim Miller and Clay Guida felt pretty special. It might have been shorter than we expected, but it was in no way a disappointment.
This bout made 97 combined pro fights for the 35-year-old Miller (31-14) and 37-year-old Guida (35-19). While fans were hoping for a 15-minute war, Miller’s 58-second guillotine win was impressive enough to win our hearts.
Miller and Guida traded hard strikes as the bout began. It was Miller who scored last, stunning Guida with a counter left and then pulling him into a tight guillotine. After checking Guida’s right hand for any reaction a couple times, referee Herb Dean pulled off Miller, revealing that Guida had been choked unconscious.
“I’m just a guy from North Jersey that any time adversity shows its face, I don’t back down,” Miller told Anik in the cage after the bout.
Miller, who has more octagon appearances than anyone else in UFC history, is now 3-1 in his past four.
So, a lot of people got choked unconscious here, huh?
Whether it was merely the result of some hard-headed competitors refusing to tap or the fallout from a few high-profile recent premature stoppages, referees on this afternoon appeared to want to make doubly sure losing fighters were done before stopping the fights. That approach led to three different bouts ending via “technical submission” after athletes were choked out.
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Guida, Trevin Giles and Lucie Pudilova were all forcibly separated from their wits while locked in submission holds. Now, early stoppages – like the one we saw happen to Lawler in his bout with Ben Askren in March – are unfortunate. The opposite approach seems pretty bad, too.
Here’s hoping this is merely a passing phase and not a harbinger of the future.
Patience pays off for Haqparast.
For much of the first round, Nasrat Haqparast (11-2) seemed content to stand and watch Joaquim Silva (11-2) develop his offense. With former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre in his corner, the 23-year-old lightweight showed the kind of patience that had UFC color commentator Dominic Cruz making comparisons to all-time great Anderson Silva.
Early into Round 2, all that scouting paid off for Haqparast. The prospect from Tristar Gym threw a looping left hand over Silva’s prodding jab and knocked the 30-year-old Brazilian into the land of wind and ghosts.
If you want to get excited about a young prospect in the 155-pound division, it might as well be Haqparast, who has now won three in a row in the UFC and appears to have a very bright future.
“We are coming for everybody,” Haqparast told Anik after the KO. “I have the best team in the world.”
Speaking of wily veterans …
After getting caught early by a hard right hand, the much more experienced Gerald Meerschaert (29-11) did everything he possibly could to drag Trevin Giles (11-2) into a grappling match. For his part, Giles appeared content to play Meerschaert’s game for much of their middleweight bout. Turned out, maybe that wasn’t the best idea.
The two traded sweeps and submission attempts through much of the first two rounds, before Meerschaert latched a choke onto Giles roughly one minute, 40 seconds into the third. The younger man tried to tap, but referee Dean couldn’t see it, and after a few seconds Giles was unconscious.
The loss sent the 26-year-old prospect skittering to his second straight loss. For Meerschaert? That was the performance of a man who knows exactly who he is.
“Hot Sauce” has his way
Holy cow. Lightweights Scott Holtzman (13-3) and Dong Hyun Ma (16-10-3) threw heavy leather in the direction of each other’s faces and bodies from the word go in Saturday’s main-card opener. Gotta think this kind of fight was exactly what matchmakers had in mind when they slotted the two action fighters against each other.
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It was Holtzman who got the better of most exchanges, though Ma appeared unconcerned with the American’s barrage of power shots. Early in the first, however, Holtzman’s strikes caused a lump to begin forming under Ma’s right eye. By the end of the second, it had swelled up enough that doctors saw fit to stop the fight between rounds.
Disappointing end? Maybe, but folks got their money’s worth from these two for 10 wild minutes. Hard to be made about that.
“I’m going to ice my knuckles up, and I’m ready go again,” Holtzman said in the cage when it was over.
You hate to see it. Even worse to feel it.
A light heavyweight prelim fight between Darko Stosic (13-3) and Kennedy Nzechukwu (7-1) was marred by three — yes, three — unintentional low blows by Stosic. The 27-year-old Serbian lost two points at the discretion of referee Gary Copeland, ultimately suffering a unanimous decision loss to Nzechukwu on some of the more unorthodox scorecards you’ll see: 29-26, 28-27 and 28-27.
Keep ’em up, boys.
That was a close one.
Mickey Gall’s welterweight prelim bout against Salim Touahri shaped up as a must-win for the New Jersey native Gall, who was on the heels of a loss to Diego Sanchez in March.
Gall (6-2) got it done via unanimous decision win — but just barely. After a first round won by virtue of Gall’s positional superiority, Touahri (10-4) afforded himself well during the final 10 minutes. Despite the two competitive frames, Gall got the nod from the judges (29-28 on all cards). Still, not exactly the overwhelming performance Gall might have been hoping to pull off.
“This is the kind of fight I needed,” Gall said. “I got that cage experience from it. I’m not going to make a habit of it. I’m going to get back to finishing people.”
Shevchenko switches up
Give Antonina Shevchenko points for persistence.
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The sister of UFC women’s flyweight champion Valentina Schevchenko fought her way through a crackerjack first round against Lucie Pudilova in a women’s flyweight prelim fight. That frame saw Pudilova gut out a tight armbar attempt by Shevchenko (8-1) that left the impression Pudilova (8-5) might not have any actual bones in that limb.
With the arm an apparent no-go, Shevchenko tried a different strategy in the second, locking on a rear-naked choke that rendered Pudilova unconscious. It was a nice, gritty, varied effort from Shevchenko, who rebounded from her first career loss to score her first submission win.
Mach schnell, Matt Schnell
Matt Schnell (14-4) made short work of Jordan Espinosa (14-6) in their men’s flyweight prelim fight, transitioning from an arm-in guillotine attempt to a triangle choke to score victory 83 seconds into the first round.
Is it any wonder Schnell’s last name means “fast” in German? This was the second-quickest submission finish in UFC flyweight history. This also makes two consecutive first-round triangle finishes for the 29-year-old Mississippi native in the UFC. Schnell caught Louis Smolka with the same move in 3:18 back in March.
Happy birthday, Lauren Murphy
Lauren Murphy turned 36 last weekend. A week later she gave herself a nice present, upsetting Mara Romero Borella with a stunning third-round TKO.
The two women’s flyweights had an entertaining scrap going headed into the final stanza, when Murphy (11-4) landed a nice uppercut on Borella (12-6), stuffed the Italian fighter’s takedown attempt and floored her with a knee right to the dome.
Murphy followed with a series of elbows on the ground that forced referee Leon Roberts to stop the bout.
“I feel like I’m in a dream right now,” Murphy said. “I visualized this fight a million times. I didn’t know how I was going to win; I just knew I’d win.”
Claudio rising
Could be the only thing keeping Claudio “Hannibal” Silva from reaching his own lofty goals is inactivity.
Silva (14-1) came into his 176-pound catchweight prelim bout against short-notice foe Cole Williams riding a 13-fight tear and had won four straight in the UFC. That included a 2014 split-decision win over current top welterweight contender Leon Edwards. Trouble was, Silva had fought just twice since that victory, owing to a laundry list of injury woes and scheduled fights that didn’t come to fruition.
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By submitting Williams (11-2) with a rear naked choke just 2:35 into the first round, Silva ran those streaks to 14 wins overall and five inside the UFC octagon. He also left us wondering what he might make of himself if he can get into the cage with a bit more regularity.
“I want to fight a top-ranked opponent next,” Silva said. “I deserve someone in the top 10. I’ve beaten guys like Leon Edwards and Nordine Taleb. Everybody knows I’m the real deal.”
(Top photo: Josh Hedges / Zuffa)