Fight Facts: UFC Fight Night 141
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.
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TOTAL NUMBER OF UFC EVENTS: 458
The Ultimate Fighting Championship on Saturday held an event in the Chinese capital of Beijing for the first time, bringing a thriller of a card with finishes from beginning to end. UFC Fight Night 141 featured a demolishing heavyweight with a staggering number of first-round stoppages, a strawweight with a finish rate higher than most heavyweights and a terrific trifecta of armbars.
YOU CAN TAKE THIS ARMBAR, AND YOU CAN SHOVEL IT:
Three fights ended by armbar at UFC Fight Night 141, tying the
record for the most at an event in modern history with UFC on Fuel
10 in 2010. Also of note, “The Ultimate Fighter 26” Finale in 2017
featured two armbars and a reverse triangle armbar.
HURTING PEOPLE IS NOT A GOOD THING! WELL, SOMETIMES IT IS …: After finishing Curtis Blaydes with punches in 45 seconds, all 12 of Francis Ngannou’s victories have ended by stoppage. Ngannou has never won a fight that went beyond the second round.
THE DEMOLITION MAN: By stopping Sergei Pavlovich in the first round, Alistair Overeem recorded his 39th stoppage and his 32nd inside one round. “The Demolition Man” holds more first-round finishes than any other fighter on the card has total wins.
SEND A MANIAC TO CATCH ONE: In losing by first-round knockout to Overeem, Pavlovich suffered his first career defeat in his 13th fight. Unbeaten prior to that bout, Pavlovich had stopped nine of his 12 opponents by first-round knockout.
BLAST FROM THE PAST: With 17 losses in his 19-year career, Overeem had almost as many losses on his record as all of the other fighters on the main card combined (19).
NOT TRAINED TO HANDLE THIS KIND OF VIOLENCE: When he finished David Zawada with a body kick, Jingliang Li became only the eighth fighter in UFC history to record a clean knockout with a body kick.
NEW SHEPHERD IN TOWN: After knocking out Zawada in the third round, Li picked up a “Performance of the Night” bonus for his efforts. In his last five fights, Li has earned four post-fight bonuses.
SOMEBODY PUT ME BACK IN THE FRIDGE: Coming into their bout, neither Rashad Coulter nor Yaozong Hu had ever gone the distance in their combined 16-fight careers. Prior to his decision win over Hu, Coulter had knocked out his opponent in all eight of his wins.
WHAT SEEMS TO BE YOUR BOGGLE?: By missing weight by two pounds, Coulter became the first UFC fighter above middleweight to miss weight since Marcos Rogerio de Lima came in four pounds heavy against Ovince St. Preux at UFC Fight Night 107 in 2017.
SOMETHING NEW AND IMPROVED: By submitting Jessica Aguilar in the first round with an armbar, Weili Zhang improved her career finish rate to 89 percent, which is the same finish rate as Overeem. After 19 fights, “Magnum” has only gone the distance three times, including her lone loss by decision. All of her stoppages have come within the first two rounds.
MELLOW GREETINGS: John Phillips has only gone the distance once in his 30-fight career after losing by third-round submission to Kevin Holland. His bout with Holland marked only the second time he had fought beyond the second round. All of Phillips’ 21 victories have come by stoppage within two rounds.
PUT HIM IN A HURT LOCKER: After losing by submission to Louis Smolka, Su Mudaerji has never gone the distance in any of his 12 verified bouts, with all of his losses coming by submission.
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN: Coming into UFC Fight Night 141, Lauren Mueller had never been defeated (five fights), Phillips had never lost back-to-back bouts (29 fights) and Vince Morales had never lost on the scorecards (10 fights).
LET’S JUST SAY HE’S HISTORY: In six recorded uses of “All Eyez on Me” by 2Pac, no fighter had won while using the track until Ngannou walked out to it and knocked out Blaydes.
EVEN BETTER LIVE THAN ON LASERDISC: For the fourth time, Alex Morono walked out to a different song by Viking metal band Amon Amarth, this time selecting “Live for the Kill” before facing Kenan Song. He is still the only recorded fighter to ever walk out to this band. He holds a 3-1 record when accompanied by it.
Jay Pettry is an attorney and a statistician. Writing about MMA since he started studying the “Eminem Curse” in 2012, and writing for Vice Sports and Combat Docket along the way, he put together many fight result and entrance music databases to better study the sport. You can find him on Twitter at @jaypettry.
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