UFC Apex: Dolidze vs Hernandez - Aug 9 ??

[wandshogun09]

Back to the UFC’s glorified shed we go…

ESPN MAIN CARD
Roman Dolidze vs Anthony Hernandez 

Steve Erceg vs Ode Osbourne 

Iasmin Lucindo vs Angela Hill

Andre Fili vs Christian Rodriguez

Miles Johns vs Jean Matsumoto

Eryk Anders vs Christian Leroy Duncan  

ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS
Julius Walker vs Rafael Cerqueira

Elijah Smith vs Toshiomi Kazama 

Joselyne Edwards vs Priscila Cachoeira

Uros Medic vs Gilbert Urbina

Gabriella Fernandes vs Julija Stoliarenko

Cody Brundage vs Eric McConico

 

First thing, is it just me or do they put more effort into a lot of the posters for these Apex cards than they do for the PPVs? This one and the poster for the Albazi vs Taira card the week before are some of the better recent ones, in my opinion. Just an observation.

• Bout order’s probably all to cock. Take no notice of it. I’m just going off how Marcel Dorff’s got it currently but I’ll update this post whenever the card shuffling starts.

• Once again, gotta say I like the main event. Solid offering for Middleweight. And I’m a fan of Fluffy Hernandez so I hope he pulls it off.

• No idea if Steve Erceg is even staying on the card. He was supposed to fight Alex Perez here but Perez pulled out this week. Not sure if they’re gonna get a replacement in on a couple of weeks notice or just move Erceg to another card. Feels like Perez has spent half his career withdrawing from fights.

• Fili vs C-Rod is probably your pick of the bunch from the undercard.

 

Not much else to say…it’s the Apex.

Edited August 7, 2025 by wandshogun09

[Bruce85]

Wasn’t sure if there was ufc this weekend so came on here to check. Had to do some scrolling to find this thread lol. It’s not the best card is it…. Fluffy and Erceg are doing a lot of heavy lifting on this one. 
 

Erceg is a funny one, he was so close to beating Pantoja but it just hasn’t clicked since that fight. I thought we’d of had a rematch between them, and possibly a trilogy fight by now. Feels bit like when Reyes lost to Jon John’s in an incredibly close fight then just fell off a cliff. 
 

Anyway, no plans tomorrow so I’ll give this a watch! 

Edited August 9, 2025 by Bruce85

[wandshogun09]

Yeah not much to this. I do like the main event though. That should be worth a watch. Fili vs C-Rod should be good as well, that’s probably the likely FOTN. But yeah, not sure what to expect from Erceg. He really should be beating a guy like Osbourne but the pressure is on now. It’s one thing losing to Pantoja, Kara-France and Moreno, if you take a significant step down and still lose to a lower level guy like Osbourne, it’s gonna be hard to come back from that. 

[Kfogg1991]

Well I actually enjoyed this card overall, never intended to watch live but we got back from Gulliver's and it was just about to start so I ended up watching it all.

Good God in hell what can you say about fluffy that man absolutely whooped Roman to a point of it being embarrassing how much fighters like fluffy are levels above and really are the new wave of elite players coming through at the moment.

When khamzat wins his belt this coming weekend sign me up for khamzat Vs fluffy because that absolutely excites me and I want it all.

Personally I hated the decision for the co-main the first two went to ode with the third going to Steve, at most maybe a draw but absolutely no way did Steve win two rounds in that fight and it's a shame because the decision ruins the fight which I really enjoyed personally.

Rest of the card had good moments scattered throughout with a terrifying rampage style powerbomb slam knockout resulting in the recipient going straight to the hospital was very impressive and quite scary at the same time.

Overall it was a fun card with ones to check out but obviously not one we'll rewatch or remember like most apex shows 

[Bruce85]

Another low key decent showing from the UFC!

As Kfogg said, Fluffy just destroyed Dolidze to the point it looked like a total mismatch. Obviously Dolidze isn’t world class but he’s no bum and Fluffy just went through him. I don’t think it’s enough for a title shot, I think there are a couple ahead of him but I’d like to see him either against Bobby Knuckles or maybe against RDR in a number one contenders match. 
 

I wasn’t scoring it closely and throught the second was close but felt like Erceg should have lost that one. 
 

If you haven’t seen the Kazama powebomb KO do yourselves a favour and skip it, it’s brutal. I know it’s a combat sport and knock outs are part of it but that was sickening! 

[Kfogg1991]

Apparently straight after the fight Roman went straight to management and retired from the sport and has hung it up.

Absolutely the right thing if he didn't do that I would have expected the UFC to release him, he's not a exciting fighter who can have good/exciting fights to play out his contract so this is exactly what the outcome should have been 

[wandshogun09]

A week late but finally got around to this. Caught little bits and pieces on social media and wasn’t able to go in spoiler free, but whatever.

Fluffy strikes again. Strong performance from Hernandez in the main event. Absolute dominance and then put the cherry on top with the submission in the fourth round. A return to form. He looked a little bit lacklustre in his win over Brendan Allen back in February from what I remember but he dragged Michel Pereira into deep water and subbed him in his fight before that. And the way he dealt with Dolidze here was definitely more like the Pereira fight than the Allen one.

He looked like an absolute handful again here. I’m still not convinced he’ll be able to hang with the tippy top guys at Middleweight but, who knows, maybe he can? He’s clearly too good for this level of opposition. That’s became clear over the course of Fluffy’s last few fights. Dolidze had nothing for him. Fluffy’s moved up to #7 in the rankings now. Not sure what will be next. I’m seeing people talking about him fighting DDP or Khamzat but I think Fluffy needs another win myself. A title shot off a win over Dolidze doesn’t sound right. Plus I think the Imavov vs Borralho fight in Paris in a few weeks is gonna determine the next in line. I wouldn’t be at all against Fluffy vs De Ridder though. Outside chance of Fluffy vs Strickland or Adesanya maybe? Whittaker? The De Ridder fight would be great though.

Yeah, not sure what to make of that Steve Erceg fight. Seen cries that Osbourne was ‘robbed’, not having that. I think he might’ve edged it, definitely wouldn’t have a problem with anyone saying they had him winning. But this wasn’t a robbery. It was very close but no robbery. Not every close fight is a robbery! The thing is though, Erceg even having such a close fight against Osbourne isn’t a good look. He ultimately came out with the win so he’s stopped the rot for now and can hopefully build himself back up from here. But he just looked like a fighter who’d lost all confidence in himself here to me. That run of losses might’ve really done a number on him mentally. Like I say, maybe this win can be a fresh start for him and he can rebuild that confidence but it’s hard to look at him here and even believe this is the same guy who came within a cunt hair of taking the title off Pantoja as recently as last year. Mad how quick things can change.

Enjoyed Andre Fili vs Christian Rodriguez as I expected to. Good stuff. C-Rod’s such a weird one though. He’ll continuously derail all these young undefeated prospects but then he’ll lose these fights. Not sure why the one judge scored it for Rodriguez either. I thought Fili won quite clearly myself. I got a chuckle out of C-Rod doing the old Max Holloway point down at the canvas bit and Fili basically telling him to piss off. Good man. So sick of everyone doing that now. Fili talked about it to the media after and I thought he was spot on with this…

Matsumoto vs Johns looked like a pretty good fight from what I saw but I only had that fight on in the background while I was making the kids some breakfast. Seen a lot of debate about the scoring, no idea myself wasn’t watching closely enough. From what I did see though, seems like Matsumoto mightn’t have as bright a future as I initially thought. Going to the wire against a decent at best guy like Johns and only scraping a decision win doesn’t fill me with optimism.

Christian Leroy Duncan looked pretty good beating up Eryk Anders. Don’t know how impressive it was really though because Anders has never been great and he’s looked like he’s been just plodding along on his last legs for a while now to me. Nice performance from CLD regardless. Loved the spinning elbow that led into the finish.

The absolute highlight of the prelims, well probably the whole card in general, was Elijah Smith’s powerbomb KO. I’m sure you’ve all seen it by now but we can’t let this thread fade off without having it gif’d in here, can we?

Just brutal. Proper Rampage Jackson vs Ricardo Arona throwback. Smith even shouted out Rampage after the fight and Rampage commented on the KO himself and seemed quite impressed. Crazy finish. Definitely gonna be up there in the Knockout Of The Year list when December rolls around. Hopefully Kazama’s alright, he was down for ages. Early days for Smith and he’s in a shark tank division at Bantamweight but he’s gonna be worth keeping an eye on. Only 22 as well so he’s got time on his side.

Joselyne Edwards vs Priscila Cachoeira is a fight I had zero intention of watching until I read that Cachoeira got knocked the fuck out. I skimmed through to the KO and, yeah, she got waffled right on the chin.

Now can we please get Cachoeira off the roster? I don’t know why they’ve kept her around this long but she’s awful, unprofessional and a dirty fighter. There’s no upside to keeping her. Not even particularly a fan of Edwards but she’s gone up in my estimation with this. Thank you!

Uros Medic made short work of Gilbert Urbina as well. Not a lot to say about it but it was a nice KO.

Never watched the Cody Brundage fight because why would I? Saw he lost a split decision to some ham and egger called Eric though. Smashing.


Had its moments. Roll on 319 tonight though. 

[weevil]

11 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

Now can we please get Cachoeira off the roster? I don’t know why they’ve kept her around this long but she’s awful, unprofessional and a dirty fighter. There’s no upside to keeping her.  

She has only gone to a decision once in her last nine fights, which won fight of the night. and she won five of those nine fights, so her win/loss record is adequate. Dirty tactics aside it doesn't make much sense to cut her.