Following last night’s UFC On ESPN 19 event in Las Vegas the recipients of the evening’s $50,000 bonus awards were announced.
Earning ‘Fight Of The Night’ honors was the main event war between Marvin Vettori and Jack Hermansson, which was fought at an exceptionally high tempo as they slugged it out for the full five rounds.
Really the two fighters were often trading blow-for-blow, though Vettori started the brighter of the two and was doing well when he had Hermansson on the back foot, while his opponent adapted to that and by the third round it he was he who was leading the dance and landing at a higher clip.
By this stage you’d have expected the pace to start to slow, but Vettori found his second wind in the fourth and was demonstrating sharp striking, while Hermansson met him half-way, leading to ten more very competitive minutes of action before Vettori was handed a unanimous decision victory (49-46 x2, 49-45).
Earlier on the main card Gabriel Benitez impressed with his clinical striking against Justin Jaynes in the opening round, leading him to land a big knee to the body that sent his opponent falling backwards onto the mat in pain, with a few ground and pound blows sealing the TKO stoppage and performance bonus.
Also earning a performance award was Jordan Leavitt, who wasted no time in hoisting Matt Wiman into the air in the opening round and proceed to carry him across the Octagon before slamming him to the mat, with the thunderous impact of the veteran’s head hitting the canvas rendering him unconscious for a 22 second KO victory.
