Flyweights Daniel Barez and Andre Lima were the lone 125’ers on the men’s side at UFC Vegas 104 on Saturday.
Both men were coming off victories, but it was Lima who was an undefeated 10-0 to start the night, with three straight wins under the UFC banner. That of course included the infamous DQ victory over Igor Severino, after Severino was caught biting in the octagon. As for the Spaniard, he was coming off his first UFC victory after dropping his debut to Jafel Filho.
Lima opened with a heavy leg kick right away that Barez answered with a combination. Lima wasted no time finding his rhythm with multiple leg kicks, a stiff jab, then a right hand. He then landed a big right hand that stunned Barez. As Lima was calmly hunting down Barez, the Spaniard perfectly timed a takedown and hopped on Lima’s back. Lima immediately fought the hands and dragged Barez off his back.
The Brazilian then started targeting the body with his lead hand. Barez swung with power, trying to dissuade Lima’s constant forward movement, but to no avail. Lima kept plodding forward and was beautifully mixing his weapons and targets. Barez seemed out of answers. An eye poke with 30 seconds left in the round put a stop to the action, but it resumed less than a minute later. Barez attempted a takedown late in the round, but this time Lima easily stuffed it.
As the bell sounded again, Lima was right back at it with punishing leg and body kicks. He stuffed a takedown and then threw a leg kick that stumbled Barez. With a bloodied Barez focused on protecting his head and his legs, Lima feinted high and then dug to the body with his hands. You could hear the thud from those body shots in the empty Apex. Lima, who had clearly found his groove, started to extend his combinations as Barez could do nothing but cover up.
With Barez keeping his high guard, Lima advanced into the pocket and started landing knees and elbows. As the Brazilian was firing elbows to the head, he took a look at referee Kerry Haltey, wondering if he was going to stop the fight. Barez, who had never been finished via strikes in his professional career, used his surviving instincts and kept moving just enough along the fence to keep the referee out of it. Lima used an outside trip from the clinch to get the fight to the ground and landed in side control. Barez worked his way to a full guard and tied up Lima to limit the amount of damage he could inflict. A bullying round from Lima, that should be scored 10-8.
Round three opened with a takedown from Lima in the first 30 seconds. After landing some body shots from full guard, Lima temporarily got up on his feet for a couple seconds, but went back to the ground. This time, Lima wasn’t satisfied with landing strikes from full guard and started playing a little more jiu-jitsu. He took Barez’s back and after working for it, he eventually got the rear-naked choke and forced a tap.
After systematically breaking him down over the first two rounds, Lima secured his first career submission win. The undefeated 26-year-old now moves to 4-0 inside the promotion and could be looking at ranked opposition next.
Official Result: Andre Lima def. Daniel Barez by submission (rear-naked choke), Round 3, 3:05
