‘Mr. VanZant’ suffered his first UFC loss on the UFC 320 prelims.
The former Bellator title challenger is one of the UFC’s oldest signings in recent memory, joining the premier MMA promotion at 34 years old.
Austin Vanderford won his UFC debut earlier this year at UFC Seattle where he submitted fellow UFC 320 fighter Nikolay Veretennikov in the second round.
On Saturday, the 35-year-old entered UFC 320 as a sizable 3-to-1 betting favorite against Ramiz Brahimaj, who pulled off quite the upset in front of Vanderford’s wife, former UFC star Paige VanZant.
Ramiz Brahimaj scores bloody submission over Austin Vanderford at UFC 320
In the second round of their welterweight bout, Brahimaj landed a massive head kick on Vanderford.
Vanderford kept fighting after getting rocked, wearing a nasty cut on his face.
Vanderford tried to take down Brahimaj to the ground, but to no avail as his opponent attempted a guillotine, getting Vanderford to tap out within seconds.
That’s three straight wins for Brahimaj, who improves to 5-3 in the UFC Octagon.
Ramiz Brahimaj shouts out Joe Rogan in post-fight interview
After the fact, Brahimaj had a memorable chat with UFC commentator Joe Rogan.
Brahimaj put a hat on Rogan’s bald head, giving a shoutout to the podcaster’s show, ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’.
“Joe Rogan podcast by night, training by day,” Brahimaj said in his post-fight interview.
“That’s all I was doing this camp,” Brahimaj added.
“You obviously did a lot more training and a lot less listening,” Rogan hilariously replied.