Well. That happened. If nothing else, we got to hear Derrick Lewis somehow top his already impressive post-fight speech levels of awesomeness, and gave us "my balls was hot."That early shot on Conor, I felt like he defended, then opted to stay on top a bit, instead of completing the scramble, and despite not taking punishment in round 1, allowed Khabib to begin to get comfortable and key his mind and body to the type of fight he wanted/expected. I knew in round 4 when I saw Conor leaning against the cage and Khabib lock his hands that the end might be near. Conor had kept Khabib's hands separated in the earlier rounds, and controlled Khabib's head positioning as a defense to how Khabib triangle the legs. The 2 year MMA layoff did Conor no favors, but TBH, not as a Conor fan, but as an assessment of skills and gameplanning, Conor fared far better on the ground than expected. Save the flurry of punches from a standing Khabib (most of which I think were deflected/blocked), Conor fared far better against Khabib having the fight where he wanted than virtually any of Khabib's other opponents. At any rate, Volkov let a faded, hurt, battered Derrick Lewis off the hook and paid for it. Waterson beat Herrig (Thank God). I hate watching Herrig's fights because I've never figured out what exactly she does even when she gets to where she's supposed to be good: namely the guard and in the clinch against the fence. She put her forehead on Waterson's tummy and landed ineffectual punches, got tossed for stepping around to do an outside trip and loading herself up, and was basically just ineffective from almost everywhere.
OSP has fought almost anyone in LHW it seems like and Reyes utilized amazing movement to avoid prolonged takedown/wrestling battles, and really showed off some crisp striking and movement in his bout. He definitely coasted in the 3rd round, playing matador to an increasingly desperate OSP, but got the biggest win of his career and now can really look for a top tier opponent at LHW.
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