Following last night’s end-of-year UFC 296 event in Las Vegas the recipients of the evening’s $50,000 bonus awards were announced.
Earning ‘Fight Of The Night’ was a bloody back-and-forth war between Irene Aldana and Karol Rosa on the prelims of the stacked show, which Joe Rogan later boldly declared was one of the best fights he’d ever seen.
Rosa’s punishing leg kicks quickly became a factor in the fight and alongside visible damage were clearly taking a toll on Aldana’s mobility. However, though Aldana would reveal afterwards that she was actually dealing with a knee injury prior to the fight, she still managed to work her way back into the fight in the second round as her boxing began to pay off, leaving some swelling on Rosa’s eye. By the final round Rosa’s face would gradually become a crimson mask as Aldana continued to land clean blows, though Rosa in turn also had her bleeding too and was still landing leg kicks. In the end it wasn’t to be enough for her though, with Aldana emerging with a hard-earned unanimous decision victory.
Meanwhile, Josh Emmett earned a ‘Performance Of The Night’ bonus while simultaneously registering a late contender for knockout of the year with his brutal one-punch finish of Bryce Mitchell in the main card opener. Emmett’s overhand right just 1.57mins into the fight knocked his opponent out cold, and the aftermath was scary as Mitchell lay twitching on the canvas for several seconds. Thankfully he then came too and was later being discharged from hospital after getting the all-clear from doctors.
Ariane Lipski also claimed a performance bonus after she got the better of Casey o’Neill in a hard-fought prelim battle. Early in the second round Lipski was able to rock O’Neill in the feet and then turned the tables on her opponent when she tried to work the fight to the mat, getting on top and finding her way to an armbar submission finish.
Earlier, Shamil Gaziev also secured a performance award after he beat down and cut up Martin Buday with aggressive striking, leading to a 2nd round TKO finish while they were still standing after the referee decided he’d taken too much punishment.
