The Sugar Show would come to a screeching halt at UFC 252, with Marlon Vera getting a big TKO win over the rising star Sean O’Malley in the co-main event.
A curious choice for a UFC co-main event, perhaps. Or a sign that rising star Sean O’Malley has hit the big time. Either way, the penultimate fight of UFC 252 featured O’Malley taking on Marlon Vera, in a fight that could seriously propel the “Sugar Show” fighter up the bantamweight rankings.
Vera, meanwhile, had a chance to steal O’Malley’s shine, and derail one of the biggest hype trains in years.
What happened wound up being a little bit of both. O’Malley opened up fast and free-flowing as always, switching stances he started targeting the legs and body of Vera. Landing a variety of teep kicks and low kicks, O’Malley was very diverse in his movement early on. However, Vera started walking O’Malley down after O’Malley hurt something in his leg and began limping. It wasn’t clear initially as to exactly what happened with his leg or foot, but O’Malley began stumbling over his feet. “Sugar” pushed forward to try and land a combination, but he ended up tripping over his legs while walking backwards and went down. Vera jumped in the guard of O’Malley and landed a few elbows and punches and that was it! A relatively quick stoppage by Herb Dean, but not a bad one given O’Malley’s injury.
CHITO HAS DONE IT! 🇪🇨@ChitoVeraUFC finishes O'Malley in RD 1! #UFC252 pic.twitter.com/Jve8QQ83nR
— UFC (@ufc) August 16, 2020
Vera hopped on the cage and yelled “welcome to the Chito show!” To some degree he was right, for the story following UFC 252 is going to be all Marlon Vera. Quick as the stoppage was, disappointing as the injury is, a win is a win. Heading into the bout all the hype was about Sean O’Malley, and instead, it was the proven Vera coming out of the bout with the W. A great win for Vera in the end, even if it’s one we’d like to see run back some day.
Official Result: Marlon Vera def. Sean O’Malley via TKO, Round 1, 4:40
