Stock Report: UFC on ESPN 16

As is often the case immediately after a major Ultimate Fighting Championship pay-per-view, the promotion’s next offering seemed to represent a bit of a lull, at least on paper. Nonetheless, UFC on ESPN 16, also known as UFC Fight Island 4, featured several promising newcomers and a quartet of ranked bantamweight women in fights that figure to help plot the course of their division for the next year. As always, some fighters’ stocks rose on Saturday while others took a hit.

STOCK UP

Germaine de Randamie: 36-year-old fighters aren’t supposed to add new dimensions to their game—especially 36-year-olds who came to MMA as world-class competitors from another combat sport and have made it explicit that they are part-time fighters. However, in choking Julianna Pena to sleep with a third-round guillotine on Saturday for the first submission win of her career, Dutch police officer and former kickboxing champion De Randamie showed that she is doing exactly that. “The Iron Lady” finds herself 7-2 in the Octagon, with both losses coming to pound-for-pound queen Amanda Nunes. While she may have a long road back to a title shot, given the criticism leveled at her for choosing to vacate her featherweight title rather than defend against Cristiane Justino three years ago, De Randamie is fighting better than she ever has, and remains a serious problem for just about anyone at 135 or 145.

Carlos Condit: Riding a five-fight losing streak and with rumors of retirement swirling around him for well over a year, Condit’s stock was at an all-time low ahead of his fight on Saturday. Yes, his opponent was Court McGee, who is similarly in the final act of his career, but Condit was a slight underdog for a reason, and even more damning, found himself fighting on the prelims for the first time in his Octagon career. Condit impressed, leveling McGee with a right hook at the end of the first round to turn around the momentum, then staying a step ahead of McGee the rest of the way. The well-deserved unanimous decision win snapped the streak that had accounted for more than half of Condit’s UFC losses, but just as importantly, looked like the work of someone nicknamed “The Natural Born Killer.” It might be overstating things to say that Condit is back to prime form, but whether he fights on or chooses to retire on a win, he looked more alive in the Octagon than he has in quite a while.

Casey Kenney: It takes more than just winning for a 4-to-1 favorite to raise his stock in victory, but Kenney managed to do so, laying one of the most one-sided beatdowns of the year on Heili Alateng in their bantamweight preliminary bout. Kenney brought a diverse arsenal of strikes to the Octagon, but the weapon of choice was his left leg, which he delivered to Alateng’s head and body with equally devastating results. Within three minutes, Alateng’s right ear was busted open and his entire right side painfully bruised. By the end of the fight, the Mongolian’s right arm was battered as well, from his attempts to block the dozens of incoming kicks. After a unanimous decision that included 30-26 and 30-25 scorecards, the 29-year-old Arizona native will almost certainly merit a Top 15 opponent next.

STOCK DOWN

Yorgan De Castro: Five months ago, heading into his main card matchup with Greg Hardy at UFC 249, de Castro was a man on the rise, having leveled Justin Tafa in his Octagon debut after winning a roster spot through Dana White's Contender Series. In the wake of the Hardy fight, and now de Castro’s loss to Carlos Felipe in Saturday’s co-main event, things have cooled off considerably. Both times, the Cape Verdean by way of Fall River, Massachusetts dropped unanimous decisions in fights where his aggression and output disappeared after a round. Disturbingly, the problem both times appears to be not fatigue but adversity. Moreover, both fights have been dreadful viewing, meaning that even if de Castro’s roster spot is safe for the moment—and it probably is—his streak of main card appearances is likely over. We can only hope.

Julianna Pena: There is no shame in losing to de Randamie, who came into the bout as Sherdog’s No. 2 bantamweight while Pena was No. 13. However, there is a good reason why de Randamie was -170 to win, but +2300 to win by submission. After two back-and-forth rounds, it was still very much anyone’s fight when Pena blundered—there can be no other word—into a guillotine. While de Randamie applied the choke expertly, as mentioned above, Pena never really appeared to give the technique the respect it deserved, or try and counter or escape until all of a sudden she was asleep. For a fighter who was a sneaky-hot underdog pick going in, and figured to have the advantage on the ground if the fight went there, it was a bad look for the “Venezuelan Vixen,” who now takes a step back in the competitive 135-pound division.

Jinh Yu Frey: Frey is in a tough spot, as the former Invicta FC atomweight champion, drafted by the UFC into a roster that does not currently feature her weight class, is forced to fight 115-pounders. However, where fellow former Invicta 105er Michelle Waterson has carved out a decent résumé at strawweight, Frey is now 0-2 in the Octagon after her unanimous decision loss to Konklak Suphisara on Saturday. There are two problems beyond the simple “L.” One, while the eyeball test is far from infallible, Frey is an absolute physical specimen, yet seemed to be overpowered in the clinch, this time by a visibly smaller “Loma Lookboonmee.” Two, Frey seemed nearly inert, willing to stand by and watch herself lose the first two rounds before even making an earnest attempt to bring the fight to the floor, which she was able to do once she tried. Waterson has experienced success in the UFC by retooling her game, becoming much more of a grinder than her “Karate Hottie” nickname might suggest. Frey probably needs to undergo a similar reinvention if she wants to stick around.