At UFC 213 on Saturday in Las Vegas, Nevada, a trio of heavyweight fights filled out the card, with two featuring on the PPV portion of the event. Prior to Alistair Overeem taking on former UFC heavyweight champ Fabricio Werdum, a couple of up-and-comers in the division went to war when Daniel Omielańczuk battled Curtis Blaydes.
With a touch of the gloves, the action got underway. Blaydes looked to shoot early and wound up pressing his opponent against the cage. A couple of unintentional low blows caused the ref to break up the action and restart it in the center, eliminating the dominant position for Blaydes rather than taking a point. Omielańczuk looked for the neck as Blaydes pushed him back up the cage wall once more. Blaydes would try to take his opponent down, but Omielańczuk employed a whizzer and was able to defend.
They broke, and worked back to the center. Omielańczuk landed a body kick, and Blaydes looked to land an uppercut but whiffed. Blaydes continued to look for the takedown, but remained unable to finish. A lot of wall and stall followed, much to the displeasure of the crowd. Towards the end of the round, Omielańczuk connected in a final exchange. That took us to the second.
In round two, more work alongside the cage opened the round. Omielańczuk continued to show strong takedown defense, but it became a question of why the ref didn’t break them up. They finally moved back to the center on their own, with Blaydes working in a good leg kick, and Omielańczuk looking to land shots from the southpaw stance. Omielańczuk landed a knee following an exchange of punches, which led Blaydes to push the Polish fighter against the cage again momentarily. Though bobbing and weaving well in the round, Blaydes wasn’t able to do much, and was again warned for a low blow. From that point, it was more of the same to end the round.
The third saw Omielańczuk tagged, then catch Blaydes with a solid shot of his own, but neither men was really in danger of being finished. Omielańczuk showed some flashy striking ability at the end of the round, but it was likely too little, too late. The bout went to the judges scorecards, with all three judges seeing it for Blaydes.
Curtis Blaydes def. Daniel Omielańczuk by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
