10 Things I Like at UFC Vegas 59
Saturday's fight card is designed for folks with an eye towards the future and interested in getting early answers to important questions, making it a quintessential Spencer Card
I understand the various versions of “this card sucks” that are making the rounds in regards to Saturday’s Fight Night event at the UFC APEX, as the main card features the finals from another TUF season that “nobody” watched (but made sure to tell everyone they weren’t watching) and a bunch of inexperienced fighters in the early stages of their UFC careers.
This isn’t a card for casuals.
It’s not even a card for moderates, really.
It’s a card for hardcores and people taking a long-range view at where some of these kids could go in the next three, four, five years.
It’s a quintessential “Spencer Card” and luckily for you, I’m here to highlight what I really like at Saturday’s lineup.
Spencer Card: (1) an event with a pair of ranked fighters in the main event and a hodgepodge of bouts between prospects, Contender Series graduates, Fighters I Can’t Quit, and like assembled on the undercard; (2) a card the most prominent voices covering the sport will either downplay or largely ignore; (3) a card where the names might not be familiar or formidable, but action will be entertaining nonetheless.
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Jamahal Hill’s Varsity Audition
Jamahal Hill has been killing it against the junior varsity as of late, but Saturday night, he gets the opportunity to show that he deserves to be on he varsity squad in the light heavyweight division.
The DWCS grad enters his matchup with Thiago Santos this weekend on a two-fight winning streak, with both victories coming in the first round, but knocking out Jimmy Crute (see above) and Johnny Walker aren’t the same as hanging with proven contenders and former title challengers. They’re tremendous victories, especially in response to his loss to Paul Craig, but all they tell me is that Hill is ready for another step up in competition, and now he gets it.
Santos may not be the marauding fighter he was on his way to challenging for the light heavyweight title, but he’s still someone everyone has approached with kid gloves because he has established power and is still to be treated with respect, despite his recent slide. No one wants to be the guy that didn’t get by the lesser version of “Marreta” and so they fight a little more cautiously, which has produced wins, but not the kind of statement victories we’ve hoped for from the likes of Aleksandar Rakic and Magomed Ankalaev.
If Hill can go out and put forth a dominant effort — another first-round finish, a stoppage midway through the fight, or even a one-sided drubbing over 25 minutes — he has the potential to not only show he deserves to run with he LHW varsity, but to also leapfrog Ankalaev and land himself one fight away from challenging for championship gold.
Vicente Luque is Fighting
Need I say more? Just in case I do, here’s what you need to know:
Luque is 14-4 in the UFC with 13 finishes, and he’s equally as capable of catching opponents on he feet as he is on the ground. He’s never shied away from a brawl, but can also get things done early, and although it appears he’s topped out at being a “middle third” guy in terms of the welterweight Top 15, that’s still outstanding and no one has ever come away from a Vicente Luque fight disappointed.
It doesn’t matter who he’s standing in against — if Luque is fighting, you should be tuning in, even if only for his fight.
Geoff Neal’s Next Hurdle
But Luque is fighting Geoff Neal, and it’s a helluva fight with some very interesting questions that hopefully will be answered on Saturday.
Maybe I’m a little higher on Neal than others, and perhaps my relationship with Sayif Saud and the team at Fortis MMA, whom I have covered extensively throughout its rise, makes me give the Dallas-based welterweight the benefit of the doubt that I may not afford someone else in the same position, but I can’t help but think there is still room for Neal to advance in the welterweight division.
I know that he came up short against “Wonderboy” and Neil Magny in consecutive outings before rebounding with a split decision win over Santiago Ponzinibbio last time out, but there was a lot going on heading into and during that fight with Stephen Thompson at the end of 2020 and beating Magny is by no means easy. I just see that run prior to his nearly dying from sepsis and think we might be asking too much for someone to recover and be all the way back within a handful of months or even a year.
The great thing about MMA is that we generally get answers to the questions we have, and Saturday’s fight with Luque will tell us whether Neal does, in fact, still have room to advance in the division or if “Hands of Steel” has also topped out in the 170-pound ranks.
Either way, it should be a helluva fight.
I Want to Know More About… Zac Pauga
Because he’s on TUF and in the finale and people just love to dump on the show, it feels like there isn’t enough talk about what an intriguing talent Pauga is heading into this weekend.
We talk all the time about “what if some of the best athletes in the world transitioned into this sport,” and yet here we have a former NFL running back, two years into his pro career, fighting out of a great gym (Elevation Fight Team) and because it’s The Ultimate Fighter 30 Finale, people can’t see passed their own biases to recognize Pauga is someone to pay close attention to this weekend and beyond.
Now, do I think he is going to become a UFC champion? Probably not because he’s already 34 and that means his competitive window at light heavyweight, where I assume he’ll return following his matchup with Mohammad Usman in the heavyweight finale this weekend, isn’t as wide as it would be if he were 28 or 30 or even 32.
But he moves well, has flashed some pop, and just might be one of those fellas that picks things up rapidly, which may allow him to make a little run here once he touches down in the UFC. I don’t see why Pauga is any different than say Matt Mitrione, who went from being on TUF 10 with zero professional MMA experience to having a solid career inside the Octagon and beyond.
I Want to Know More About… Juliana Miller
Miller is even more intriguing to me than her fellow Team Pena member Pauga as she’s just three fights into her career and 26 years old.
While she clearly needs more experience and further skill development, Miller showed things in advancing to the finale that feel like important pieces for an emerging fighter to possess. The resilience and grit she showed in avenging her previous loss to Claire Guthrie was impressive, and her understanding that she had a massive edge on the ground against Katlyin Neal and playing to that is a crucial piece that even seasoned fighters don’t always grasp and can’t always enact.
Is she still raw on the feet? Yep.
Is the fight with Brogan Walker this weekend her toughest test to date? Absolutely.
But her skills on the ground are solid and her drive is impressive, and I will be paying close attention to “Juju” this weekend and beyond to see if she can develop into the kind of fighter I think she might be one day.
There is Something About Serghei Spivac…
Just as I want to take a little time making reads on Pauga and Miller, it feels to me like folks might have been quick to judge Spivak, who returns to action in search of a second straight victory with a main card assignment opposite Augusto Sakai on Saturday.
Spivak started his UFC career with one win in three fights, and my sense is that folks haven’t ever really moved on from whatever assessments and judgments they made about him at that point. But he’s still only 27, that one win was a second-round submission victory over Tai Tuivasa, and he’s gone 4-1 since, including a unanimous decision victory over Aleksei Oleinik and a first-round stoppage win over Greg Hardy.
He lost to Tom Aspinall… plenty of people have lost and will continue to lose to Tom Aspinall.
I just think that in a division where we’ve seen so many competitors find their footing in their early to mid-30s, dismissing a 27-year-old with a win over the guy currently ranked No. 3 in the division and four wins in his last five starts as being nothing more than a fringe Top 15 guy is a little premature. Saturday’s fight with Sakai should show whether Spivac has the skills to advance beyond that already and might even give us a better understanding of the heights he may or may not reach in his career overall.
Middleweight Michal Oleksiejczuk
While he’s been inconsistent throughout his UFC career, Michal Oleksiejczuk delivered some quality performances while competing as a somewhat undersized light heavyweight. Saturday, the 27-year-old from Poland makes his middleweight debut opposite Sam Alvey and I have to say that I am intrigued.
If Oleksiejczuk can maintain the speed and fluidity that made him compelling at 205 with this move to ‘85, I think we might have a new name to watch in the middleweight division. Now, I know that’s not saying a lot and I promise not to put too much value on a victory over Alvey on Saturday if that should come to pass… however, I’ve always liked his boxing, especially the way he works the body, and if dropping down brings a little more finishing pop with that same approach, Oleksiejczuk might be able to make a little run.
Maybe this is just me, but Oleksiejczuk feels like another one of those guys who can’t escape his worst effort, which is when he got put to sleep by Ovince Saint Preux with his patented Von Preux choke, but that was nearly three years ago. As I said off the top, he’s been inconsistent since then and throughout his UFC run, but there have been some solid moments along with those suspect ones, and I would rather give a 27-year-old changing divisions a little more time to show me who he is than write him off too soon.
McKinney Makes His Return
There’s not much more for me to say about Terrance McKinney beyond what I wrote about him in Tuesday’s Fighter to Watch series.
I think he’s a remarkably intriguing prospect with clear upside, but some things to keep working on, and I eagerly await seeing him step into the Octagon this weekend against Erick Gonzalez.
DWCS Question Marks
Josh Quinlan and Cory McKenna are a pair of Dana White’s Contender Series alums with something to prove on Saturday.
Quinlan earned a contract last fall with a first-round stoppage win, but that victory was later overturned when he tested positive for banned steroids. Now he’s making his UFC debut against veteran Jason Witt and it’s a massive “prove it moment” for the undefeated fighter.
McKenna punched her ticket to the UFC a couple summers back with a victory over Vanessa Demopoulos and then edged out Kay Hansen in her promotional debut. She returns here off a split decision loss to Elise Reed earlier this year in London where she showed a poor approach, and although she’s still extremely young (she just turned 23), her bout with Miranda Granger on Saturday comes with a bunch of questions attached.
Each of these two showed long-term upside in their respective DWCS showings, but are now under the gun a little to validate and justify those initial impressions, and it will be interesting to see if one or both can do so this weekend.
Bantamweight Crossroads Contest
Mayra Bueno Silva and Stephanie Egger are each currently in the “Second 15” in the bantamweight division and while the winner of their matchup on Saturday may not break into the rankings (though they probably should), the victor will certain make it clear that they’re someone to keep tabs on going forward.
Bueno Silva went 2-2-1 in five flyweight appearances, battling to a draw with Montana De La Rosa and losing to Manon Fiorot in her final two outings in the 125-pound weight class. She moved up to bantamweight and earned a unanimous decision win over Wu Yanan in a fight that, if I’m being honest, wasn’t as dominant or impressive as I was expecting given that she was facing someone that was 1-3 in the UFC and hadn’t fought in well over a year.
Egger, on the other hand, lost her promotional debut on short notice to Tracy Cortez, but has earned a pair of finishes since, smashing out Shanna Young in the second before tossing and arm-barring Jessica Rose-Clark earlier this year. The Swiss judoka is now 7-2 in her career and feels (to me at least) like someone that has found her footing and is ready to make a little push forward in the division.
The winner might have a number next to their name come next week and should absolutely face someone in that situation next time out, which makes this an opening fight I want to pay attention to on Saturday.