UFC on Fox 4 Prelim Recap

The star of the prelims, John Moraga finishes Ulysses Gomez.
Photo by MMAWeekly.com

The fourth event that the UFC has held was the most underwhelming on paper leading up to it. It ended up as one of the better events the sport has had in some time. With all of the main card fights being finished and two of them being absolute wars, the card was an absolute success. Not only is this the type of event that you would show to nonbelievers of the sport, but also it just happened to be shown on one of the most watched channels in the world. Joe Silva and Sean Shelby knew what they were doing with the matchups on this card.

Ulysses Gomez vs. John Moraga: Moraga came into this fight as a decent underdog. Gomez was ranked in the top 10 at 125 and has some great BJJ, but Moraga seemed much faster and much more powerful as he stuffed all of Gomez’ takedowns and eventually finished him with a beautiful combo of uppercuts and elbows. Moraga is the real deal.

Possible matchups for Moraga: His original opponent for this fight was Ian McCall, which confused a lot of people at the time. Now, after this performance, I would absolutely love to see that fight, because I believe that Moraga will be challenging for the title sooner rather than later.

Possible matchups for Gomez: When the flyweight division was originally added, people wanted Gomez in as soon as possible. His debut was a huge disappointment but he still is a top-15 flyweight. Josh Ferguson still hasn’t been officially released by the UFC and I’m sure that Gomez is itching for a rebound fight.

Manny Gamburyan vs. Michihiro Omigawa: This fight was great. Omigawa came out very strong in the first and even rocked Manny with some of his powerful short punches. Gamburyan came back, though, and almost finished Omigawa himself. The fight was very back and forth and Gamburyan ultimately took the unanimous decision, leading to the very likely release of Michihiro Omigawa.

Possible matchups for Gamburyan: Manny is still a very solid fighter with some of the best Judo at 145 pounds. Him and both Darren Elkins have wins over Omigawa and the winner would certainly get a solid step up in competition.

Phil De Fries vs. Oli Thompson: This fight’s first round was horribly sloppy and terribly boring as it was reminiscent of the infamous Cheick Kongo/Shawn Jordan fight. De Fries eventually rocked Thompson badly and finished the fight with a face crank in the 2nd round. With Thompson now 0-2 in the UFC, he will most likely be cut, as both his losses were finishes as well.

Possible matchups for De Fries: Shawn Jordan is coming off of a loss and they are both two of the bigger prospects in the heavyweight division. A win for either man would be huge.

Rani Yahya vs. Josh Grispi: Never, have I ever seen a bizarre nickname more apt to a fighter. Josh Grispi was once considered to be the next big thing, he even had a title fight lined up against Jose Aldo in what was going to be the first ever featherweight title fight. Once Aldo hurt his neck, Grispi has never been the same. He lost to both Dustin Poirier (UD) and George Roop (TKO). People were scratching their heads at just how quickly his career disintegrated right in front of our eyes. His nickname is “The fluke”, have you ever heard of such a perfect nickname? Anyway, Rani Yahya proved to us why he has one of the best ground games in all of MMA. He choked out the former number 1 contender with a north/south choke that wasn’t even fully locked in. It was slick, and beautiful. Grispi is most likely gone after losing 3 in a row.

Possible matchups for Yahya: Rani Yahya is one of the more underrated fighters in the UFC. A lot of people were picking Grispi, and I personally thought that was just plain crazy. Grispi has some of the worst fight IQ in the UFC and it was shown as he threw a kick at Yahya when he should have just boxed with him. Hacran Dias is one of the more hyped fighters presently in the UFC and Yahya would show us just how good Dias truly is.

Phil Davis vs. Wagner Prado: Prado was looking very good against a top 10 light heavyweight. He was backing Davis up when Phil accidently scraped Prado’s eye with his finger. The ref then stopped the fight when Prado said he was seeing double, even though Prado can’t really speak English. It was really disappointing because Prado was looking solid and it was absolutely heartbreaking as he was screaming “WHY?!” at the top of his lungs as he watched his months of work and his dream get flushed down the toilet in a no contest.

Possible matchups for Prado and Davis: Looks like that toilet is giving it back to Prado. The rematch is already being set up for UFC on FX 5.

Cole Miller vs. Nam Phan: This fight would have been FOTN on most other cards, and yet it came in 3^rd. These guys put on a war for 3 rounds with some beautiful boxing, mainly on the part of Phan. He showed some of the best boxing combinations that I have seen in a really long time in the UFC. I was shocked by the split decision. I thought that it was a very clear 29-28 for Phan.

Possible matchups for Phan: Nam Phan is highly underrated, his performance Saturday further proved just how good Jimy Hettes is. Jonathan Brookins is coming off a tough loss to Charles Oliviera and these guys would certainly put on an awesome fight wherever that it goes.

Possible matchups for Miller: Cole Miller has a ton of potential, but he still has yet to find it. The only time that we had a sneak peak in what was to come was in his win over Ross Pearson when he dominated the standup, rocked him, and submitted him. Miller is close to being released. Him and Cody McKenzie are both close to being released and are very tall, lanky featherweights.

Click here for the main card recap.