The Prelim Breakout Star is a once per event article that helps fans get to know those who will be entertaining them from the undercard. The intention of the article is not to bring attention to the most talented guy on the preliminary card, but rather one that the common fan may have overlooked or underestimated.
That’s right, for the first time in the history of Prelim Breakout Star we bring you a triple breakout article. And you thought that this week couldn’t get any better than it already was. Silly you!
UFN 80
Santiago Ponzinibbio (#323 in our Complete UFC Roster Rankings)
Nickname – Gente Boa
Affiliation – American Top Team
From – La Plata, Argentina
Height – 6’0″
Weight – 170 lbs (Welterweight)
Record – 20-3 (2-2 UFC)
TUF Finale
Ryan Hall
Nickname – Mr. 50/50
Affiliation – 50/50 BJJ
From – Arlington, Virginia
Height – 5’10”
Weight – 155 lbs (Lightweight)
Record – 4-1 (0-0 UFC)
UFC 194
Tecia Torres (#85 in our Complete UFC Roster Rankings)
Nickname – The Tiny Tornado
Affiliation – American Top Team
From – La Plata, Argentina
Height – 5‘1″
Weight – 115 lbs (Strawweight)
Record – 6-0 (2-0 UFC)
What makes them impressive
We perhaps could not find three less alike fighters if we tried. Okay, we tried, but these were the least alike we could find. For starters, on Thursday, Ponzinibbio is a knockout artist with intense forward pressure. His length mixed with this pressure makes him dangerous at pretty much all times.
Hall, on the other hand, could not have less forward pressure. While he is certainly competent on his feet, he likes to fall to his back and look for the leg lock. Despite only having five career fights, he’s shown he can do this with regularity.
Finally, Torres has some of the same pressure as Ponzinibbio, but is much more of an output fighter. She looks to land as many shots as she can and wins lots of decisions on volume alone. While being known for decisions is hardly ever a compliment, her style is very fan friendly. Not to mention it has gained her wins over both main event fighters from Thursday’s card, Rose Namajunas and Paige VanZant.
Why they have been overlooked
As with the styles, the reasons that they are getting overlooked are completely different. Ponzinibbio has had a couple of rough match-ups and as a result is only 2-2 in the UFC. The most recent loss took a lot of wind out of his sails.
Hall is coming off of The Ultimate Fighter. He’s never fought on the big stage and is actually far more famous for his jiu jitsu than he is for his MMA skills.
Torres has probably the most unique reason. Since coming to the UFC, Torres has taken a huge step down in competition. That’s right… step down in the UFC. As mentioned before, before joining, she beat both VanZant and Namajunas. Since then she’s been given Angela Magana and Angela Hill. No exactly wins to put on the resume.
What makes these are good match-ups
Ponzinibbio’s opponent, Andreas Stahl, fights a lot on the feet. In addition, his last time out, he had trouble with Gilbert Burns’s forward pressure. Since Ponzinibbio has that same kind of pressure, one would assume that this is just the type of fighter that Stahl is going to hate.
Ryan Hall… well, we don’t actually know who he’s fighting…. or if he’s fighting. That’s right, we went out on a limb and said that the UFC is going to give him a finale fight before it was even announced. How bold is that?
Torres gets UFC newcomer Jocelyn Jones-Lybarger on short notice. Lybarger is a tough stand-up fighter who recently won the RFA title. However, she has never faced the type of physical power that Torres has. She also has never dealt with that kind of striker. Torres could likely win this by making it a grappling match or by striking.
Record: 75 Wins, 39 Losses, 1 NC, 2 Did Not Fight (DNF)
- Francisco Trinaldo – UFC on FX: Belfort vs Bisping (W)
- Simeon Thoresen – UFC on Fox: Johnson vs Dodson (L)
- Tyron Woodley – UFC 156 (W)
- Vaughan Lee – UFC on Fuel: Barao vs McDonald (W)
- Dennis Bermudez – UFC 157 (W)
- Cristiano Marcello – UFC on Fuel: Stann vs Silva (L)
- Daron Cruickshank – UFC 158 (L)
- Ryan LaFlare – UFC on Fuel: Mousasi vs Latifi (W)
- Bart Palaszewski – TUF Finale (L)
- Yoel Romero – UFC on Fox: Henderson vs Melendez (W)
- Rustam Khabilov – UFC 159 (W)
- Fabio Maldonado – UFC on FX: Belfort vs Rockhold (W)
- Khabib Nurmagomedov – UFC 160 (W)
- Antonio Braga Neto – UFC on Fuel: Nogueira vs Werdum (W)
- Roland Delorme – UFC 161 (W)
- Seth Baczynski – UFC 162 (L)
- Jorge Masvidal – UFC on Fox: Johnson vs Moraga (W)
- Ednaldo Oliveira – UFC 163 (L)
- Mike Brown – UFC Fight Night: Shogun vs Sonnen (L)
- Dylan Andrews – UFC Fight Night: Condit vs Kampmann (W)
- Soa Palelei – UFC 164 (W)
- Elias Silverio – UFC Fight Night: Teixeira vs Bader (W)
- John Makdessi – UFC 165 (W)
- Alan Patrick – UFC Fight Night: Maia vs Shields (W)
- Andre Fili – UFC 166 (W)
- Jimy Hettes – UFC Fight Night: Machida vs Munoz (W)
- Germaine de Randamie – UFC Fight for the Troops 3 (L)
- Omari Akhmedov – UFC Fight Night: Belfort vs Henderson (W)
- Sergio Pettis – UFC 167 (W)
- Roxanne Modafferi – TUF Finale (L)
- Takeya Mizugaki – UFC Fight Night: Hunt vs Bigfoot (W)
- Alptekin Ozkilic – UFC on Fox: Johnson vs Benavidez (W)
- Siyar Bahadurzada – UFC 168 (L)
- Mairbek Taisumov – UFC Fight Night: Saffiedine vs Lim (W)
- Charlie Brenneman – UFC Fight Night: Rockhold vs Philippou (L)
- Walt Harris – UFC on Fox: Henderson vs Thomson (L)
- Clint Hester – UFC 169 (W)
- Joe Proctor – UFC Fight Night: Machida vs Mousasi (W)
- Aljamain Sterling – UFC 170 (W)
- Zak Cummings – TUF China Finale (DNF)
- Cyrille Diabate – UFC Fight Night: Gustafsson vs Manuwa (L)
- Mats Nilsson – UFC Fight Night: Gustafsson vs Manuwa (L)
- Alex Garcia – UFC 171 (W)
- Hans Stringer – UFC Fight Night: Shogun vs Henderson (W)
- Jim Alers – UFC Fight Night: Nogueira vs Nelson (W)
- Ryan Jimmo – TUF Finale (W)
- Caio Magalhaes – UFC on Fox: Werdum vs Browne (W)
- Joe Ellenberger – UFC 172 (DNF)
- Kyoji Horiguchi – UFC Fight Night: Brown vs Silva (W)
- Francisco Trinaldo – UFC 173 (L)
- Iuri Alcantara – UFC FIght Night: Mousasi vs Munoz (W)
- Paulo Thiago – TUF Brazil Finale (L)
- Jon Tuck – UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs Khabilov (W)
- Mike Easton – UFC 174 (L)
- Ian Entwistle – UFC Fight Night: Marquardt vs Te Huna (L)
- Ray Borg – UFC Fight Night: Swanson vs Stevens (W)
- Rob Font – UFC 175 (W)
- Derrick Lewis – TUF Finale (W)
- Jessamyn Duke – UFC Fight Night: Cerrone vs Miller (L)
- Nikita Krylov – UFC Fight Night: McGregor vs Brandao (W)
- Patrick Cummins – UFC on Fox: Lawler vs Brown (W)
- Sam Alvey – UFC Fight Night: Bader vs Saint Preux (L)
- Yuta Sasaki – UFC Fight Night: Bisping vs Le (W)
- Ben Saunders – UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs dos Anjos (W)
- Damon Jackson – UFC 177 (L)
- Chas Skelly – UFC Fight Night: Jacare vs Mousasi (W)
- Godofredo ‘Pepey’ Castro – UFC Fight Night: Bigfoot vs Arlovski (W)
- Alex Caceres – UFC Fight Night: Hunt vs Nelson (L)
- Cody Gibson – UFC 178 (L)
- Marcin Bandel – UFC Fight Night: Nelson vs Story (L)
- Jason Saggo -UFC Fight Night: MacDonald vs Saffiedine (L)
- Yan Cabral – UFC 179 (W)
- Jake Mathews – UFC Fight Night: Rockhold vs Bisping (W)
- Thomas Almeida – UFC Fight Night: Shogun vs Saint Preux (W)
- Gabriel Benitez – UFC 180 (W)
- Paige VanZant – UFC Fight Night: Edgar vs Swanson (W)
- Clay Collard – UFC 181 (W)
- Aisling Daly – TUF Finale (W)
- Jamie Varner – UFC on Fox 13 (L)
- Jake Collier – UFC Fight Night: Machida vs Dollaway (L)
- Alexis Dufresne – UFC 182 (L)
- Charles Rosa – UFC Fight Night: McGregor vs Siver (W)
- Konstantin Erokhin – UFC on Fox: Gustafsson vs Johnson (L)
- Sara McMann – UFC 183 (L)
- James Moontasri – UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs Thatch (W)
- William ‘Patolino’ Macario – UFC Fight Night: Bigfoot vs Mir (L)
- Norifumi ‘Kid’ Yamamoto – UFC 184 – (NC)
- Joseph Duffy – UFC 185 (W)
- Christos Giagos – UFC Fight Night: Maia vs LaFlare (W)
- Ron Stallings – UFC Fight Night: Lamas vs Mendes (W)
- Stevie Ray – UFC Fight Night: Gonzaga vs Cro Cop 2 (W)
- Beneil Dariush – UFC Fight Night: Rockhold vs Machida (W)
- Olivier Aubin-Mercier – UFC 186 (W)
- Lisa Ellis – UFC Fight Night: Hunt vs Miocic (L)
- Dhiego Lima – UFC Fight Night: Edgar vs Faber (L)
- Islam Makhachev – UFC 187 (W)
- Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos – UFC Fight Night: Condit vs Alves (L)
- Ricardo Abreu – UFC Fight Night: Boetsch vs Hendeson (L)
- Henry Cejudo – UFC 188 (W)
- Makwan Amirkhani – UFC Fight Night: Jedrzejczyk (W)
- Steve Mongtomery – UFC Fight Night: Machida vs Romero (L)
- Cody Garbrandt – UFC 189 (W)
- George Sullivan – UFC Fight Night: Ellenberger vs Thompson (W)
- Kevin Casey – UFC Fight Night: Mir vs Duffee (W)
- Jimmie Rivera – UFC Fight Night: Bisping vs Leites (W)
- Andrew Holbrook – UFC on Fox 16 (W)
- Warlley Alves – UFC 190 (W)
- Frankie Saenz – UFC Fight Night: St. Preux vs Teixeira (W)
- Misha Cirkunov – UFC Fight Night: Oliveira vs Holloway (W)
- Nazareno Malegarie – UFC 191 (L)
- Shinsho Anzai – UFC Fight Night: Barnett vs Nelson (W)
- Sage Northcutt – UFC 192 (W)
- Tom Breese – UFC Fight Night: Holohan vs Smolka (W)
- Johnny Case – UFC Fight Night: Belfort vs Henderson (W)
- Kyle Noke – UFC 193 (W)
- Taylor Lapilus – UFC Fight Night: Gastelum vs Magny (L)
- Yui Chul Nam – UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs Masvidal (L)
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