Following last night’s UFC On ESPN 35 event in Las Vegas the recipients of the evening’s $50,000 bonus awards were announced.
Earning ‘Fight of The Night’ honors was an intense main event war between Marlon Vera and Rob Font that delivered five action-packed rounds.
From the outset Font was pushing a fast pace with his slick, high-volume boxing to the head and body. That was a trend that would continue throughout the fight, but while his work-rate and technique was crisper, he struggled to really hurt Vera, who demonstrated a strong chin and made the most of his high-guard.
On the other hand, though he wasn’t keeping up with Font’s strike count, when Vera was going on the attack it was delivering big results for him, and he’d go on to rock his opponent multiple times, including flooring him with a hook in the second round, a flying knee in the third and a head kick in the fourth. Font showed great resolve to survive those moments and continue to make a fight of it, but by the fifth round his face was a swollen mess and he’d be rocked again by another head kick, but stayed on his feet on that occasion to make it to the final bell, where Vera would emerge a unanimous decision winner (48-47, 49-46 x2).
A tough loss for Font then, especially after doing so much right offensively, but to add insult to injury his $50,000 share of the bonus money was taken Vera due to the fact that he had missed weight for the bout by 2.5lbs.
Joanderson Brito claimed one of two ‘Performance Of The Night’ awards after he made short work of Andre Fili, dropping him with a heavy right hook, with follow-up blows on the mat sealing a TKO victory after just 41 seconds.
Also earning a performance bonus was Francisco Figueiredo, who wasted no time getting Daniel da Silva to the mat and seizing upon a fight-ending kneebar submission at the 78 second mark.
