UFC 278 is coming together with all sorts of exciting match ups, as the Ultimate Fighting Championship touches down in Salt Lake City, Utah for the first time at the Vivint Arena on August 20, 2022.
UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman aims to defend his title for the sixth-straight time opposing a former foe in no. 2 ranked Leon Edwards in the main event of the evening.
We also have a stellar bantamweight matchup between former multi-time WEC & UFC featherweight champion, no. 3 ranked Jose Aldo, who faces no. 6 ranked Merab Dvalishvili. Man, that’s going to be a good one!
Another exciting bout expected to take place at this event comes in the lightweight division between Leonardo Santos and Jared Gordon.
Leo Santos came to the UFC in June of 2013 with a record of 11-3, laying claim to The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil II championship with a second-round submission (arm-triangle choke) over fellow castmate William Macario.
He’d follow this up with a draw against fellow TUF champion Norman Parke, before winning his next six-straight over the likes of another fellow TUF champion in Efrain Escudero (UD), Anthony Martin (rear naked choke), Kevin Lee (TKO), Adriano Martins (SD), Stevie Ray (KO), and Roman Bogatov (UD).
There were a couple times in this streak however that he’d have to sit out for years on end due to injuries and cancelled fight bookings, and he’d run into back-to-back defeats after this initial eight-fight undefeated run as well, losing to Grant Dawson (KO) and Clay Guida (rear naked choke).
Santos was absolutely dominating Guida early on, and nearly got the first round TKO stoppage a number of times in this fight. However, the fight wasn’t stopped, though perhaps it should’ve been, and he blew his wad in search of the finish, being submitted in round two, making the outcome one of the biggest upsets of 2021 considering.
Santos is one of the most decorated BJJ fighters in the entire sport of mixed martial arts, but that just goes to show you, once you’re tired, everything you know goes out the window.
Jared Gordon on the other hand came to the UFC in June of 2017 with a record of 12-1 as the CFFC featherweight champion. Following back-to-back victories inside the octagon in his freshman and sophomore efforts, he’d lose back-to-back outings in his next two fights, both via knockout.
Gordon followed this up with a victory over Dan Moret (UD), before being knocked out by future, now current UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira.
Since then, however, Gordon has gone 3-1, defeating the likes of former multi-time Cage Warriors lightweight champion Chris Fishgold (UD), Danny Chavez (UD), and Joe Solecki (SD), losing his last bout to Grant Dawson (rear naked choke), a fight he was looking very good in.
Both of these men have lost to Dawson, and both at the very end of the fight; Santos being finished at 4:59 of the third round, and Gordon being finished at 4:11 of the third round, just an interesting fact.
How do you see this stellar lightweight match up going down?
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I became a fan of combat sports when I was 12 years old. I was scrolling through the channels and landed upon versus, where WEC was televised. Urijah Faber fought Jens Pulver for the second time that night. That’s the first fight I saw, and the fight that got me hooked on the sport. Since then, the sport has grown so rapidly, and my goal is to enlighten everyone on what’s going on in the sport today.
