The TUF 24 Finale main event certainly didn’t play out the way most expected it to.
Demetrious Johnson is still the UFC flyweight champion; no surprises there. But his opponent, Tim Elliott, who won TUF 24 earlier this year to earn a crack at the title, surprised the majority of the card’s viewers. He was a game opponent and gave “Mighty Mouse” one of the toughest fights of the champ’s title reign.
Elliott survived five rounds. He didn’t get finished in the first. In fact, he nearly got the finish in the first. Yes, you read that correctly — Elliott almost defeated Johnson in the first five minutes. After scoring a takedown, he had a guillotine locked up pretty tight, but Johnson, the spectacular fighter he is, was able to escape. But Johnson also had to overcome adversity early on on the feet. Elliott landed a left punch while Johnson was going in for a takedown and wobbled the champion momentarily, and also landed quite a number of body shots. Johnson survived, and took over from there.
After getting Elliott down to the ground for the first time, the 125-pound champ realized that he would be able to dominate in side control, so that’s the position he continuously went to in the final 20 minutes of the headliner and it worked. Johnson took Elliott down frequently throughout the bout, and, other than the opening-round scare, it was a dominant outing for the pound-for-pound king, who extended his amount of consecutive title defenses to nine in a row, tying ex-welterweight titleholder Georges St-Pierre. Johnson is one title defense away from tying the UFC record, which is held by former middleweight champion Anderson Silva.
What was the highlight of the fight?
The fact that Elliott found any success at all against the greatest fighter on the planet was shocking, spectacular, and the highlight of the whole thing. Elliott had Johnson in multiple bad situations in the opening round of their title bout, and the guillotine attempt really stood out to me. Elliott used his size and funky style to his advantage in the fight — it took Johnson longer to figure out Elliott’s game than it does for him to figure out his other opponents’ games — but it wasn’t enough. Johnson bullied him on the ground and the belt was put around his waist at the end of the night, but Elliott made it fun early, and make it look like fans were about to witness the flyweight title changing hands for the first time and the biggest upset in the organization’s history.
Where do these two go from here?
It’s interesting, because I think Johnson looked human for the first time in a long time on Saturday. His win over Elliott was clear-cut, but it wasn’t 100 percent picture-perfect like most of his fights. That said, he has certainly cleared out the 125-pound division and it won’t be long until Johnson returning to bantamweight becomes reality or is at least in talks to become reality. He’ll probably fight Joseph Benavidez, who was also victorious at TUF 24 Finale, next, despite the fact that he’s already beaten the Team Elevation product twice. Benavidez is No. 1 in the flyweight division and has earned the right to fight the champion once again.
Elliott’s stock went through the roof on Saturday night, and he should be considered a UFC flyweight contender, as crazy as that may sound, considering the fact that he went from Titan FC champ to almost-successful UFC title challenger in a matter of months. Elliott also gained a heck of a lot of new fans. He didn’t win, but this fight was massive for his career in the long run. Elliott should be ranked in the top 10, for sure, and I think he’s going to get a top contender fight next.
Watch now, later, or never?
This was a crazy, back-and-forth bout that nearly saw Elliott pull off the unimaginable. Of course, Johnson ended up doing what Johnson does — win — but it’s still worth a watch immediately.