The march toward contention in the
Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight division has begun
in earnest for
Alexander
Romanov
.
“King Kong” will carry a 15-0 record into his
UFC Fight Night 205 co-main event opposite
Chase
Sherman on Saturday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. Romanov has
won all four of his fights inside the Octagon, three of them
finishes. He last appeared at UFC Fight Night 194, where he brought
down
Jared
Vanderaa with punches in the second round of their Oct. 9
pairing. Sherman, meanwhile, enters the cage on a three-fight
losing streak. He last fought on Jan. 15, when he submitted to a
rear-naked choke from
Jake
Collier at UFC on ESPN 32.
As Romanov and Sherman make final preparations ahead of their
three-round showdown, a look at some of the numbers that have
accompanied them to this point:
31: Years of age for Romanov, who was born in Comrat, Moldova, on
Dec. 11, 1990.
8: Romanov wins by submission, accounting for 53% of his career
total (15). His methods of choice: three forearm chokes, two
rear-naked chokes, two neck cranks and one arm-triangle choke.
Romanov holds six other wins by knockout or technical knockout and
one more by decision.
3: Sub-minute stoppages on the Romanov resume. He dispatched
Yuriy
Protsenko with a rear-naked choke in 50 seconds at Eagles
Fighting Championship 3 on Nov. 19, 2016, buried
Evgeniy
Golub with punches in 48 seconds at Eagles Fighting
Championship 5 on May 20, 2017 and struck down
Alexander
Stolyarov with punches in 36 seconds at Eagles Fighting
Championship 8 on Feb. 10, 2018.
4: Countries in which Romanov has competed as a mixed martial
artist. He has gone 9-0 in his native Moldova, 4-0 in the United
States, 1-0 in Russia and 1-0 in Ukraine.
56: Combined victories between the four opponents—Vanderaa,
Juan
Espino,
Marcos
Rogerio de Lima and
Roque
Martinez—Romanov has defeated since he joined the UFC roster in
2020. They sport a .667 cumulative winning percentage
(56-25-3).
32: Years of age for Sherman, who was born on Nov. 6, 1989 in
D’Iberville, Mississippi.
14: Sherman victories by knockout or technical knockout, accounting
for 93% of his career total (15). His list of victims includes
Isaac
Villanueva,
Jeremy May,
Rashad
Coulter and
Jack May.
Sherman owns one other victory by decision.
11: Seconds needed for Sherman to punch out
Chris
Jensen under the Atlas Fights banner on April 12, 2014. Having
occurred more than eight years ago, it remains his fastest finish
to date.
710: Days since Sherman found himself in the win column. “The
Vanilla Gorilla” has followed his May 13, 2020 technical knockout
of
Isaac
Villanueva with three consecutive losses.
.668: Cumulative winning percentage between the nine men—Collier,
Parker
Porter,
Andrei
Arlovski,
Augusto
Sakai,
Justin
Willis,
Shamil
Abdurakhimov,
Walt Harris,
Justin
Ledet and
Alex
Nicholson—who have beaten Sherman. They boast a combined record
of 139-68-1.