The latest UFC Fight Night will take place in about 24 hours in Nashville, Tennessee. Two seasoned, highly ranked fighters in the men's bantamweight division are set to clash in #4 Corey Sandhagen and #7 Rob Font.
Before I give more of my thoughts on the main event, let's look at some of the other matchups. There's a few interesting names floating about this card.
The gigantic featherweight Sean Woodson is set to fight against promotional newcomer Dennis Buzukja. Buzukja actually has fought on Dana's contender series twice, but this is his first official UFC bout.
Sean is an interesting fighter I've watched a few times, he's a great striker, and a decent athlete but I'm concerned he's like, way too big for the weight class. He's 6'2" and fighting at 145 pounds! I don't know but I just find that weird. He looks like an alien when he fights at such a low weight class. I wonder if he can actually successfully fight at the weight class long term. Still, he is a very entertaining striker and always brings a fight. I imagine that Sean gets the win.
American Kyler Philips and Brazilian Raoni Barcelos are set to face off in the men's bantamweight division.
Kyler Philips is a well rounded, younger fighter with perhaps some championship potential. He's still only 28 and is 4-1 in the UFC so far. Important to mention though Kyler hasn't fought in six months due to getting popped for a PED. I wonder how that time off will impact his performance.
Barcelos on the other hand is starting to age a bit, and has lost 3 out of his last four fights. But his back is against the wall, another loss could spell doom for his career going forward, so I expect him to really give it his all.
I'm gonna go with Barcelos in this one.
Two scrappy Americans in Billy Quarantillo and Damon Jackson are set to face off in the featherweight division. These guys are two middle of the road, but very game fighters. This could be a war.
Damon is a very strong powerful dude, but Billy is comparably powerful. Billy also brings a wicked pace and I think it will help him get the win.
Aleksa Camur and Tanner Boser are set to fight in a light heavyweight bout.
Boser often fights at heavyweight, but he takes this particular fight at light heavyweight. Boser is a wild unpredictable type of striker and always entertains. While that's great for us fans, this strategy has not produced wins lately. Boser has lost 4 of his last 5 fights and is only 4-5 overall in the UFC. He is desperate for a win at this point.
Aleksa Camur on the other hand, has also had a bit of a hard time in his short time in the UFC. He's just 1-2 with the promotion and his last fight came over two years ago in June of 2021.
Weird matchup no doubt. I won't even try to predict this one, Boser has been more active, yet Camur is four years younger. Boser is naturally probably slightly bigger and Camur seems a bit faster.
I'm just super curious about how that one unfolds.
#5 Jessica Andrade is set to have her 25th fight in the UFC! She's such a beast. She's been in the UFC since 2013 and has been elite the entire time including becoming** UFC Strawweight Champion in 2019.**
Jessica faces intriguing and still undefeated top tier grappler in #10 Tatiana Suarez. I've always been a fan of Tatiana's and after nearly four years away she returned in February and got a submission victory.
This is easily the biggest fight of Suarez's career, she must assert her dominance in grappling but that won't be easy. Jessica is super strong and has a low center of gravity being as short as she is. Plus, Jessica is a great grappler too.
This feels like a striker versus grappler matchup even though they're both fairly well rounded. Jessica should probably stay striking on the outside. Tatiana should try to grapple as usual.
I think Tatiana gets it done and surprises some people. Tatiana is elite in grappling and I think she's got a lot of pride and will protect her undefeated record.
In the main event as I mentioned earlier is Cory Sandhagen vs Rob Font.
Sandhagen and Font are two elite bantamweights in the prime of their careers. I think most assume Sandhagen is going to just dominate, but I don't know if it will be that simple.
Sandhagen has been in title contention for about three years now, he once fought for the Interim Bantamweight Championship but fell short against Petr Yan.
Sandhagen is obviously really good, and he's super confident, but I'm starting to wonder if he's really elite like many in the MMA world figures he is? Many of his wins have not aged all that well.
Sandhagen's best win is perhaps Chito Vera, maybe Song Yadong. Sandhagen beat Raphael Assunção and Frankie Edgar past their prime. He beat Marlon Moraes who himself turned out to be a fraud. Plus, the way I see it Marlon was on a two fight losing streak at the time he faced Sandhagen. Aldo for sure beat Moraes, the judging in that fight was insane.
Sandhagen has lost to several top tier guys like Aljamain Sterling, T.J. Dillashaw, and Petr Yan. I'm not saying Sandhagen is bad, but maybe he's slightly overrated.
I'm not sure Font has a better fight history, but it's not far off of Corey's and the guys he beat, he beat in their prime like Adrian Yanez and Ricky Simon.
I do think Sandhagen is probably better at the end of the day, but I guess I'm just saying this fight could be a lot closer than people think. Also, Sandhagen is five years younger, which is often an advantage for obvious reasons.
Eh, maybe I'm just hoping for a good fight. I like Rob's style. When he's on, he is fun to watch.
Corey probably wins, but it might be a split decision! Neither fighter has ever been knocked out, so it will be wild to see if either of them does!
