Fight Facts is a breakdown of all of the interesting information
and Octagon oddities on every card, with some puns, references and
portmanteaus to keep things fun. These deep stat dives delve into
the numbers, providing historical context and telling the stories
behind those numbers.
* * *
TOTAL NUMBER OF UFC FIGHTS: 6,932
TOTAL NUMBER OF UFC EVENTS: 630
The
Ultimate Fighting Championship staged its final pay-per-view
offering of the year, which built up to a crescendo that it could
not sustain in the co-main and headlining attractions. The momentum
of the eventful fight card came to a crashing halt in the end,
bringing with it high drama and bizarre scorecards.
UFC 282 featured a championship belt that still lay dormant at
night’s end, a pair of irregular crank submissions and a wunderkind
who passed his first UFC test with flying colors.
Making It Rain: A whopping 11 post-fight bonus checks totaling
$550,000 went out to various fighters at the event, with nine
finishers earning awards as well as “Fight of the Night”
participants
Dricus Du
Plessis and
Darren Till.
This dollar amount ties UFC on ESPN 37 in June for the most at a
single UFC card, which also dished out money to every stoppage
procurer.
Lazy Rear-Naked Chokes: Throughout the fight card, both du Plessis
and
Raul Rosas
Jr. picked up submission wins by face or neck crank. UFC 282 is
now the first event in organization history to see two head
crank-related finishes take place in one night.
Bring on Sudden Victory Rounds: In the final fight of the card,
Jan
Blachowicz and
Magomed
Ankalaev fought to a split draw. Their draw is just the fifth
in a UFC championship bout, joining
B.J.
Penn-
Caol
Uno,
Frankie
Edgar-
Gray
Maynard 2,
Tyron
Woodley-
Stephen
Thompson and
Deiveson
Figueiredo-
Brandon
Moreno 1.
Collecting Dust: Of those five draws in title fights, only two of
those have taken place for vacant belts. Penn vs. Uno, which
concluded the promotion’s lightweight tourney, ended with no man
claiming the strap. The UFC had no 155-pound champion from early
2002 to late 2006.
Like Kissing Your Sister: In the history of the UFC, five main
events have now concluded with draw results. The first came between
Edgar and Maynard in 2011, then Penn vs.
Jon Fitch a
month later,
Mark Hunt vs.
Antonio
Silva in 2013 and Figueiredo vs. Moreno in 2020.
Unclaimed Freight: By stepping in the cage to vie for the vacant
championship strap, Blachowicz became the third fighter in
organizational history to fight twice for a throne with no owner,
as he competed for the belt
Jon Jones
abandoned in 2020. Lightweights Penn and
Charles
Oliveira had done this prior to Blachowicz.
Polish Power, Not Polish Power Getup: Across his UFC tenure,
Blachowicz has encountered
five
adversaries that took him down more than once. He has not won
any of those matches when suffering multiple takedowns. Ankalaev
officially grounded the Polish ex-champ twice.
Face Frozen: Due to the short-notice nature of their pairing,
Santiago
Ponzinibbio and
Alex Morono
competed at 180 pounds. The “Argentinian Dagger” put Morono away in
the third round, the 10th of 13 intentionally booked catchweight
contests in the UFC this year to have ended by stoppage.
Stillchokes: Recording the tap in the third round, du Plessis
forced Till to surrender with a face crank. As a professional,
“Stillknocks” posts a 94% finish rate, with three stoppages in his
four UFC outings thus far.
Drilled Mitchell: Still undefeated at 13-0,
Ilia
Topuria blew through fellow unbeaten
Bryce
Mitchell in two rounds, tapping the submission specialist with
an arm-triangle choke. With finishes in his last four walks to the
cage, “The Matador” posts a stellar stoppage rate of 92% as a
pro.
You Still Have Spots: At 18 years and two months of age, Rosas Jr.
is officially the youngest fighter to ever compete in the Octagon.
He comes in greener than karateka
Sean
Daugherty, who fought at UFC 2 in 1994 at 18 years and three
months and lost by quick submission. As a result, Rosas is also the
most youthful to pick up a win, doing so by submitting
Jay
Perrin.
Some Kid: Rosas Jr. kept his perfect young record intact by putting
Perrin away in the first round. Winner of all seven pro contests,
Rosas Jr. has finished six of those foes inside the distance, with
five coming in the opening frame.
Bigi Boy, Biggier Knockouts: In only 23 seconds,
Jairzinho
Rozenstruik leveled
Chris
Daukaus. The Suriname native has earned 92% of his wins by
knockout, while recording his third UFC knockout in less than 30
seconds. He is the first fighter in UFC history to achieve this
three-peat feat, surpassing the likes of
Anthony
Johnson,
Francis
Ngannou and Penn.
Vegas Edmen: Getting back in the win column for the first time
since 2019,
Edmen
Shahbazyan stopped
Dalcha
Lungiambula in Round 2. “The Golden Boy” has finishes in 11 of
his 12 pro wins, with his lone decision coming against
Darren
Stewart in 2018.
Unwelcome Return to 145: Late into the second round,
Billy
Quarantillo melted
Alexander
Hernandez with offense to secure the stoppage. While his finish
rate sits at 76%, he has excluded the judges in eight of his last
nine victories.
We’re Going Downtown: “Downtown”
T.J. Brown
throttled newcomer
Erik Silva
in the third frame to earn his first stoppage as a UFC fighter. The
tapout was his 10th as a pro, with seven of those coming via
arm-triangle choke.
Saaiman Says: Bleed: To open the event,
Cameron
Saaiman pummeled
Steven
Koslow to force the late finish with less than a minute left in
the match. The South African UFC debutant has recorded stoppages in
six of his seven pro wins, while still never tasting defeat.
Never Say Never Again: Coming into UFC 282,
Jared
Gordon had never lost on the scorecards (24 fights), Mitchell
(15 fights) and Koslow (six fights) had never been defeated and
Perrin had never suffered a loss earlier than the third round (16
fights).
Fus Ro Draw: Rarely picking the same track twice, Blachowicz made a
splash with his walkout to
“The Song of the
Dragonborn” composed by Jeremy Soule for the “Skyrim” game
soundtrack. This unique song selection did not accompany a
win.
Well He Seemed Broken-Hearted: For the second bout in a row, Gordon
picked
“Edge
of Seventeen” by Stevie Nicks as a walkout tune. Unlike his
triumphant August appearance against
Leonardo
Santos, “Flash” was not so lucky this time out. Gordon and
Emily
Whitmire are still the only two fighters to select Stevie Nicks
songs.
He Didn’t Give a F: Tempting fate, Hernandez went with
“Just Don’t Give a
F---” by Eminem, and he succumbed to strikes in the second
round. Dating back the last five months, every UFC fighter to walk
out to an Eminem track has lost.