UFC Vegas 22 – Ultimate Fighting Championship

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By: Julio Olmo

UFC Vegas 21 Recap:

UFC Vegas 21 got off to a fast start. Literally.

Saturday’s event headlined by Leon Edwards and Belal Muhammad opened with one of the shortest fights in UFC history, between Matt Semelsberger and Jason Witt. The bout was called after 16 seconds, in which Semelsberger landed a single counterpunch that sent Witt backward like he was doing a trust fall.

That knockout win is the fastest the UFC has seen since Walt Harris knocked out Aleksei Oleinik in 15 seconds in July 2019, per ESPN’s Marc Raimondi, and is the seventh-fastest knockout overall in the promotion’s history. The win improves Semelsberger’s MMA record to 8-2. Saturday was only his second fight with UFC, and that KO is certainly a way to gain notice. A former second-team all-conference defensive back at Marist College, Semelsberger opened his pro MMA career in April 2017. Semelsberger wasn’t the end of wild KOs on Saturday, as featherweight Dan Ige delivered another counterpunch that put Gavin Tucker flat on his back hours later. Ige needed a full 23 seconds to pull that off.

However, because of an accidental eye-poke, UFC Vegas 21’s main event was a no-decision.

“My heart is shattered my first main event ended like that but Gods the best of planners im sorry to the fans and the @ufc you deserved a full fight.. Alhamdillah the vision is coming back and no permanent damage to the eye I’ll be back and want to run it back.”, Leon ‘Rocky’ Edwards.

The broadcast team weighs in on the ending of #UFCVegas21. pic.twitter.com/1lEkLNXAjq

— UFC (@ufc) March 14, 2021

"I'm just heartbroken. I don't know what to say." #UFCVegas21 pic.twitter.com/zQyI8Qxxdu

— UFC (@ufc) March 14, 2021

Spanish Version Recap of UFC Vegas 21 by Hablemos MMA Host, Danny Segura.

PERFORMANCES OF THE NIGHT: RYAN SPANN, DAN IGE, DAVEY GRANT AND MATTHEW SEMELSBERGER.

UFC Vegas 22 Preview:

More on UFC Vegas 22 Preview:

Longtime UFC middleweight veteran Derek Brunson will look to quell the uprising of streaking 185-pound prospect Kevin Holland at the promotion’s upcoming ESPN event on March 20 at APEX in Las Vegas.
A highly-significant middleweight fight has been locked in for March 2021.

Kevin Holland will face Derek Brunson in the main event of a UFC Fight Night event at an undetermined location on March 20, ESPN reported.

Holland will return to the cage after a stellar 2020 campaign that saw him secure five victories from five fights. The 28-year-old defeated Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza, Charlie Ontiveros, Darren Stewart, Joaquin Buckley, and Anthony Hernandez in the last seven months of 2020.

Brunson enters on a three-fight win streak and has not experienced defeat since he faced current champion Israel Adesanya in November 2018. With wins against Edmen Shahbazyan, Ian Heinisch, and Elias Theodorou, Brunson is enjoying his best run since 2014-16.

In a video posted to The Body Lock’s YouTube channel, Patrick Auger and Matthew Wells discussed the Holland vs. Brunson announcement and shared their predictions for the fight.
Wells says that the timing is right for this one. He believes that if this was an earlier version of Brunson, he’d be picking Holland to win easily. But Brunson has improved and has a different approach now. Meanwhile, Holland is tearing through everybody and is coming off one of the craziest knockouts of the year. He’s leaning Holland in what should be a very competitive fight.

Auger agrees that this fight makes all the sense in the world. He comments on how Brunson has seemingly reinvented himself and the new version looks great. Auger says that Brunson looked so good against Edmen Shahbazyan that he’s going to be picking Brunson to get the win in March.