UFC Vegas 60 turned out to be a pretty fun event with a lot of fights that were competitive and entertaining. It all culminated with a pretty important fight in this sort of bantamweight grand prix that the UFC has set up. This title eliminator fight saw Cory Sandhagen fend off the young up and comer Song Yadong after the doctor stopped the fight in between the 4th and 5th rounds due to a cut in the eyebrow of Song. The fight was pretty competitive for the most part, but I thought Sandhagen was consistently just getting the better of Song. The judges were seeing it a bit differently as two of the three had it 38-38 going into the final round even though most people had it 39-37 in favor of Sandhagen at that point. The doctor finally had seen the cut get bad enough and close enough to the eye to put a stop to the fight though and Sandhagen moves on to the next round of the tournament so to speak. This was a pretty interesting fight to watch and I feel like I have a fair amount to say about it.
I liked a lot of what Cory Sandhagen was doing and was glad to see that he is continuing to evolve. He did his normal Cory Sandhagen thing where he moves his feet, fights behind his jab, and throws a ton of volume. He goes to the jump knees a little too often in my opinion, but he did land one at least partially, so I guess there is some merit to it. He looked, at least to me, like he was backing off of his power a bit though, which could be a concern in different matchups. The big take away though for Cory is that he seems to have worked on and has confidence in his wrestling. That has always been the best way to beat Sandhagen and will probably always be that way. However, the fact that he at least feels good enough to actively pursue takedowns not only adds an additional layer to his game, but shows that he is really serious in his pursuit of another title shot. He has a long way to go if he wants to be able to compete with the likes of Merab Dvalishvili, Aljamain Sterling, or Henry Cejudo in the grappling aspect, but if he can continue to narrow the gap, that will be huge for him. I think his added perspective of needing to do things to win the optics of a fight will help him as well. After losing to Dillashaw the way he did, I think he has a further understanding of how to get on the good side of the judges. Being more willing to go forward and being on the outside of clinch situations will do a lot and we saw him do a lot more of that here. If he's going to be in these close fights at the top of the division, all those little things will make a difference. Knowing that he's aware of those factors and is working to be on the right side of them can only help going forward. He still exposes himself at times defensively, but I think he is really primed to make another run towards the title.
Sandhagen has put himself in a position to fight one of the other "tournament winners". We have Merab Dvalishvili and Chito Vera who have already collected wins. There is also the Sean O'Malley vs Petr Yan fight and Aljamain Sterling vs TJ Dillashaw that will also provide options. For Sandhagen, he's already fought Dillashaw and Yan somewhat recently, so I don't think they'll be heavily considered for his next opponent regardless of outcome. His fight with Aljamain Sterling also wasn't that long ago, so I don't think it will be him either (regardless of if Aljo retains or loses to TJ). If O'Malley wins, I would be pretty surprised if he didn't get the title shot off of that. If O'Malley loses, I think he gets a lower opponent (probably Rob Font or maybe Dominick Cruz). That leaves us with Merab and Chito. I don't think either is more likely than other on the surface, but Dana didn't seem very happy with Merab after he defeated Jose Aldo in his last fight. Given that the UFC seems to consider Sandhagen as a guy who they can rely on to headline Fight Nights, it makes sense that they would prefer to match him with Chito. Chito has a huge fanbase of his own and could certainly headline a Fight Night again as we just saw him do against Dominick Cruz. I just kind of get the feeling that Sandhagen vs Chito is the direction they'll go as they seem to be talking about each other a bit in the last few days since the fight. Merab could find himself as the odd man out despite being ranked number three in the division right now. It will be interesting to watch all of this play out as there are so many options for everyone. How everyone gets matched up will be something to keep an eye on over the next few months.
Despite losing the fight, I thought Song represented himself very well. I thought there was a possibility that this could be a levels fight and Song would just be over matched, but that was not the case at all. Song was hanging in there for the most part and had a fair amount of success as well. His power was very clear and whenever he was able to land a clean shot, he made it known just how large the power difference was. He was able to stop a lot of the takedown attempts as well. Stopping Sandhagen's shots isn't like a feather in the cap or anything, but everyone he fights is going to try to take him down at this point, so stopping takedowns is something he will have to do for the foreseeable future. Where Song fell behind is in the pace after the first round. Once Sandhagen really turned up his volume a bit, Song just really didn't have an answer for it. Song is so young and has so much room left for growth that I'm not worried about his title prospects just yet. He will have to improve in some smaller areas and has to do a better job of cutting off the cage. He was pressuring Sandhagen some, but Cory was somewhat easily using footwork to avoid anything too damaging. Song would land a power shot here and there, but it was really just an isolated right hand every so often. Song's cardio also didn't hold up against Sandhagen's pace, which is something he'll have to improve. Everyone above Song other than Chito will push a high pace one way or another and Song will have to find a way to match them over 25 minutes. All things considered, I thought Song proved that he could hang within the top 5 of the division and that was my biggest takeaway. He has improvements to make, but he has the time to make them and I trust that he will put in the work to do so.
After the loss and removal of Jose Aldo from the rankings following his retirement, Song sits at the number nine spot in the rankings and should have plenty of options going forward. It isn't really clear exactly when Rob Font will fight next, but I assume he would want to get something sometime soon. I'm not really sure that those timelines align as cleanly as some others, so I wouldn't say that one is too likely right now. Dominick Cruz doesn't fight very often these days, but Song will have to take some time away to let that cut heal up, so maybe that matchup would make some sense for everyone involved. I like the matchup as well and think that fight would be a really good one. The Pedro Munhoz fight is there and while I think that is a reasonable fight to make, it doesn't really feel like that would be as big of a matchup. Sean O'Malley vs Song with an O'Malley loss to Petr Yan would make quite a bit of sense as well. Frankie Edgar and Ricky Simon just don't really seem like likely opponents to me and I'm not sure they would have him fight any lower in the rankings against someone like Umar Nurmagomedov, Adrian Yanez, or Jack Shore. I have a feeling that Umar is going to end up fighting Frankie Edgar even though I really don't want to see it. If O'Malley loses in a few weeks, I think that is the fight to make. If O'Malley wins or they just don't want to go in that direction, I think Song vs Cruz is the matchup that intrigues me the most.
What do you guys think? What is your takeaway from both performances? Who do you want to see each fight next? Leave any and all thoughts and opinions in the comments. Thanks for reading and have a good one.
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