UFC Vegas: Dern vs Ribas 2 - Jan 11 ??

[wandshogun09]

Dern vs Ribas 2 was better than I expected, to be fair. I was gonna try and squeeze a rewatch of their first fight in and review it in here before the rematch on Saturday but I just couldn’t be bothered. I didn’t hate this matchup but I wasn’t exactly feeling it either. Especially as a headliner and especially at the Apex. It was pretty enjoyable in the end though.

Dern’s evened the score then. 1-1 now, so no doubt we’ll be getting the trilogy decider whenever Dern next gets derailed. I know that sounds harsh but it’s the way it goes with her, isn’t it? I keep seeing talk of Dern challenging for the title now, and I wouldn’t be that shocked if they try to shoehorn her into the title picture. They’ve been desperate to get her there for ages. But while this was a good performance, submitting Amanda Ribas doesn’t exactly scream #1 contender to me. If Zhang beats Suarez next month, they might throw Dern at Zhang next. I could see it. But I’m not sure what this win told us that we didn’t already know before. Everyone knows she’s a handful in the grappling. This was a nice little bit of redemption for Dern, avenging her first defeat, but aside from that I don’t think there was much to take from the win itself. I would like to see Dern vs Tatiana Suarez though, just to see how the BJJ vs wrestling battle would play out.

Ponzinibbio vs Harris was alright but didn’t do much for me, to be honest. Nice win for Ponzinibbio but he’s seemed to be on borrowed time for a while now. I had this on in the background while I was doing other shit and, while it didn’t look bad, it just never grabbed me for whatever reason.

Cesar Almeida KOing the KO artist Alhassan was brutal. Certainly an early Knockout Of The Year contender for sure.

Fuck me! Just completely flatlined him. Even with his Kickboxing experience, Almeida standing and trading with Alhassan was a risky game to play and it rarely ends well for guys who do that. And he did get a taste of Alhassan’s power and found himself getting dropped in an earlier exchange. He came back in style though and it obviously paid off big time for him. Nasty KO.

Enjoyed Kopylov vs Curtis and was pleased to see a bit of a return to form for Kopylov here. I’ve made no secret that I think the Middleweight division is mostly arse these days but Kopylov was becoming a bit of a favourite of mine before Fluffy Hernandez stopped him in his tracks last year. He won that dull decision over Cesar Almeida but I think that was just a case of him just needing to get back in the win column and taking the path of least resistance. This was more like the Kopylov I like though.

One second left in the fight! Like the Apex version of Holloway vs Gaethje ? Seen a lot of criticism of the stoppage and of course Curtis threw a bit of a tantrum after. I get it from his point of view, of course he’s gonna think he was fine. And if the ref didn’t stop it, I’m sure he’d have been OK in the next one second before the fight ended. I can definitely see why the ref did stop it though. I keep seeing fans going ‘Bullshit, there was one second to go!’ But the ref’s primary focus isn’t on the clock. He obviously saw something he didn’t like, and Curtis did look fucked, so he called it. It’s unfortunate but I don’t think it was a bad stoppage. If it happened 30 seconds earlier I don’t think there’d have been half the moaning about it. It’s all about the ‘one second left’ factor. The scorecards had them 1-1 going into that last round but the third was Kopylov’s even before the headkick at the end. Obviously a stoppage loss looks worse for Curtis but the truth is he was on his way to losing anyway.

Christian Rodriguez did it again! I touched on it in the opening post but he’s really gaining a reputation as a prospect killer now. We’re at the point where, if the matchmakers wanna build up a young prospect, they should probably just keep them away from C-Rod. That’s Raul Rosas Jr, Cameron Saaiman, Isaac Dulgarian and now Austin Bashi he’s derailed. Handed the lot of them their first loss. It was a good fight actually and Bashi showed some promise in spells. Rodriguez just keeps finding ways to beat these guys.

Was happy to see Punahele Soriano not only get the win but the quick KO in the main card opener. He needed something like this. I wasn’t convinced by his last win over Baeza, this was obviously much better from him.

On 1/14/2025 at 6:36 AM, Dai said:

- Soriano with a great KO, which reminded me of the Jonny Hendricks KO of Fitch from back in the day. I wonder if @wandshogun09's powers of gif making can go back that far and show us how similar it was to this one.

I thought exactly the same myself watching it. Opposite stance but definite similarities to Hendricks vs Fitch. Since you asked…

All that was missing was the matchmaker running into the Octagon to gleefully hug Soriano, like Joe Silva did to Hendricks when Fitch got flattened. Soriano seems a good guy. Can’t see him going on some big streak now but hopefully he can put a little run together and bank some bonuses at least with the baby on the way.

Can’t be arsed to go into everything but a couple of bits of note from the prelims…

Felipe Bunes vs Jose Johnson was fun for the short time it lasted but as soon as it hit the floor it seemed like a matter of time before Bunes caught him in a submission. Johnson seemed to be in danger all the time on the mat and Bunes got the armbar and that was a wrap. Short and sweet.

Tulio vs Potieria felt like the longest 3 minute fight ever with the fouls and time-outs and stuff. Then Potieria got chinned. Poor prick can’t catch a break. He might be a goner now.

Jacobe Smith absolutely delivered in his UFC debut. Who knows how good he actually is but, as an introduction, you couldn’t have asked for much better than this.

Got the KO just over a minute into the fight and it was a beauty. Proper highlight reel finish. I guess we’ll find out soon enough if he’s all he’s being cracked up to be but he’s definitely gonna be one to keep an eye on this year. Standout wrestler + KO power is usually a winning formula and good recipe for success in MMA so we’ll see.

Thought Fatima Kline looked good. Even though she lost her UFC debut, it was on short notice and up a weight class. I had a feeling there’d be better to come and here we got to see her off a full camp and back in her division at Strawweight and she battered Viktoriia Dudakova to a TKO. Not like we see a lot of stoppages at 115lbs so it was refreshing to see Kline get the finish. Looking forward to seeing more of her.

Nurullo Aliev got the win in his return. Wasn’t great to watch but it was a clear decision win and coming off a lengthy injury layoff and dealing with a late replacement opponent here, all things considered this was a good night for him. Hopefully he can stay healthy and active this year and we’ll see what he’s got. 



Yeah, considering it was an Apex card and not a very good one on paper, this surpassed my low expectations and was a decent first card of the year in the end. Roll on 311 this weekend though.