MMA - UFC - Bellator

Last night’s UFC 136 was an awesome night of action and one of the fights that I had my eyes most closely glued to was the match-up between Melvin Guillard and Joe Lauzon. The Lightweight division in the UFC has slowed to a dead stop over the past year as a result of the trilogy of fights that evolved out of the seemingly never-ending war between UFC Lightweight champion Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard. After Edgar and Maynard’s last fight ended in a draw and both fighters suffered post fight injuries the entire 155 lb. division seemed to freeze in time.

All sorts of names were thrown into the hat as to who would most likely get a shot at the winner of Edgar/Maynard 3 when they would finally conclude their odyssey at UFC 136. First there was former WEC Lightweight champion Anthony Pettis who launched himself into fame much like he did when he landed that wonderful Jackie Chan style kick to Ben Henderson’s head when he won the WEC title. Pettis hit a brick wall named Clay Guida in his octagon debut and has since been pushed down the ladder. And speaking of Ben Henderson, he thoroughly beat down Dana White’s number one choice for a shot at the belt next, Jim Miller so it keeps getting even more interesting.

Guida and Henderson are now seemingly at the forefront for the race to get a title shot but flying not so discretely under the radar were the two competitors that fought on the nights under card, Melvin Guillard and Joe Lauzon. The red-hot Guillard was riding a five fight win streak heading into his bout with Lauzon and fans could argue that most people thought Guillard was going to knock Joe out because of his tremendous hand speed and power.

Lauzon played it cool and did exactly what he needed to do to sway the odds in his favor, he exploited Guillard’s ultimate weakness, submission defense. Surprisingly Lauzon setup the submission with his striking and it took  just 47 seconds for Lauzon to make one heck of a case for himself as someone to consider for immediate top-tier competition match-ups. Lauzon’s fantastic finish of Melvin not only gained him further attention in the Lightweight division but it also earned him the “Submission of the Night” award bonus for his efforts.

Article first appeared on JBStaredownMMA, to read more articles from James Begley check out http://jbstaredownmma.com