Lightweight standouts A.J. McKee and Sidney Outlaw faced off on the Bellator 301 main card on Friday night — a battle of two fighters who would have been in the Lightweight Grand Prix, had fate not had other plans for them.
Outlaw was pulled from the tournament shortly after his quarterfinal fight had been announced, having failed a drug test. As for McKee, the former featherweight champ saw injury pull him from a fight with Patricky Pitbull.
The lightweight pair got right to work on Friday, with Outlaw landing an early takedown, which McKee defended with a guillotine. When the guillotine wasn’t there, however, McKee spent a good stretch of time on his back, seconds ticking away without Outlaw getting much damage in, or really improving position much, though he did try.
McKee would make it to the fence basically, looking to wall-walk up to no avail as Outlaw turned him away from the cage. McKee then fired elbows off his back, while Outlaw worked the body.
By virtue of spending the entire round on top, Outlaw no doubt won the round. But he did very little damage despite sitting in a dominant position throughout almost the entirety of the round.
Round two opened with Outlaw catching an A.J. kick, which nearly had him get the fight down. Instead, McKee managed to fight off the attempt with elbows, getting to his feet and cutting Outlaw with at least one of those blows. Outlaw, bloodied, would get the fight down, only to eat more McKee elbows, who was firing them off his back again.
Again, Sidney Outlaw would ride out the round on top. But there would be a better argument for A.J. McKee winning round two, given the damage he had done early on, and off his back.
A.J. opened round three with a 1-2, and this time it was McKee landing a takedown along the fence. Outlaw would later reverse the position, pulling McKee’s legs out from under him and getting him flat on his back. With roughly two minutes to go, McKee began elbowing the body off his back, while Outlaw looked to pass guard. He couldn’t, and for a third straight round A.J. McKee appeared to have the striking advantage despite being on his back. How the judges would see things was another matter, given Sidney Outlaw had dominated in the grappling department.
In something of a surprise result, all three judges scored all three rounds for A.J. McKee despite “The Mercenary” working off his back almost the entire fight. Not exactly a controversial result, given the damage A.J. inflicted — but still a rarity given the reluctance of judges to score rounds for fighters on bottom.
Official Result: A.J. McKee def. Sidney Outlaw by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
