We’ve had some impressive performances in recent weeks but the Octagon has been lacking a real barnburner that gets people out of their seats.
The UFC returned to the Apex this past Saturday night where Lerone Murphy defeated Josh Emmett in an underwhelming main event.
UFC Vegas 105 as a whole wasn’t a card that produced many highlights with several performances receiving a significant amount of criticism.
A welterweight clash between Rhys McKee and Daniel Frunza was exciting whilst it lasted but fans have quickly turned their attention towards next weekend’s action already.
After four performance of the night bonuses were handed out on April 5, UFC 314 needs to produce a fight of the night in order to avoid the equalling of a record.
UFC Vegas 105 is the fourth event in a row to have no fight of the night bonus, one behind the record
Rhys McKee, Ode Osbourne, Changho Lee and Dione Barbosa all earned performance of the night bonuses at UFC Vegas 105.
This way of handing out the bonuses has been consistent throughout the past four events with no fight of the night worthy contest taking place since Justin Gaethje vs Rafael Fiziev at UFC 313.
The likes of Sean Brady, Kevin Holland and Manuel Torres have all deservingly cashed additional checks but if the same thing happens at UFC 314, it will tie a record.
There has only ever been one other time since the UFC integrated its bonus system that there has been five consecutive events without a fight of the night.
From February 22 to April 4 in 2015, five events took place, including two PPV cards, without a fight of the night bonus being given out.
Major names like Ronda Rousey, Tony Ferguson, Joanna Jedrzejczyk and Dustin Poirier all received bonuses but the likes of UFC 184 and 185 didn’t have one bout in particular that was worth highlighting.
The three other events in this run saw main events where Frank Mir stopped ‘Bigfoot’ Silva in Brazil, Demian Maia recorded a decision win on home turf over Ryan LaFlare and Chad Mendes stopped Ricardo Lamas in the first round.
With Ronda Rousey submitting Cat Zingano in just 14 seconds in the main event of UFC 184 whilst Rafael dos Anjos shut Anthony Pettis out over five rounds to win the lightweight title at UFC 185, not even the headliners could produce a back-and-forth clash.
UFC 314 will now look to end this run of not having a fight of the night bonus as the Octagon heads to the Kaseya Center in Miami.
Which matchup at UFC 314 could produce a fight of the night
There’s always a chance that we might end up getting four performances that are worthy of a bonus but given the matchups that are set to take place at UFC 314, you’d expect at least one of them to deliver a fight of the night worthy contest.
The prelims alone have got some bouts that could easily catch fire but when you look at the exciting styles that will collide on the main card, it seems impossible that one of them won’t be an edge-of-your-seat style viewing experience.
Both the main and co-main event have the potential to be wild for as long as they last but outside of the two marquee matchups, Yair Rodriguez vs Patricio Pitbull is another solid prediction for fight of the night.
Fight fans have waited a while to see a contest that really explodes into life but fingers are crossed that at UFC 314, it will end up being difficult to pick one winner rather than there being no contenders whatsoever.