UFC 285 Post Fight Bonuses

UFC 285 will go down as one of the greatest PPV events in UFC history. We had not one but two championship titles change hands in this past weekend, but one was a lot more shocking than the other.

The biggest surprise of the night was when title challenger Alexa Grasso took it to the champion Valentina Shevchenko and submitted her via rear-naked choke in round 4. A lot of people knew this was going to be a very tough fight for the champion but no one saw that result happening.

Then we had the return of the GOAT Jon “Bones” Jones looks like he never left. A lot of people were questioning whether or not we would see vintage Jones in there, but he answered those questions rather quickly against one of his toughest adversaries to date in Ciryl Gane.

Jones said he was going to make it look surprisingly easy and that is exactly what he was able to accomplish. He honestly made Gane look like an absolute amateur as he gave him no respect, just marched forward, took him down, and submitted him in just under three minutes.

Performance Of The Night Bonuses

The UFC gave out three performance of the night bonuses and it went to the most deserving fighters on the night. Those who got a performance of the night bonus are Jon Jones, Alexa Grasso and Bo Nickal.

Nickal came into his UFC debut as just a 3-0 professional fighter and the way he was able to manhandle and finish Jamie Pickett the way that he did, he made it look like he’s been doing this for a long time. He has aspirations to be a world champion and if he fights the way that he did at UFC 285 then that is definitely in his future.

Then you have Grasso shocking the world and beating someone they called the women’s GOAT in Valentina Shevchenko. Shevchenko was winning two rounds to one coming into that fourth round, but Grasso turned up and capitalized on a mistake by Shevchenko and ultimately got the submission victory. Mexico now has three UFC champions with the other two being undisputed flyweight champion Brandon Moreno and interim featherweight champion Yair Rodriguez.

Of course, you can’t forget the most dominant performance in heavyweight history when Jones absolutely steamrolled who some believed to be the best heavyweight on the roster. He made it look effortlessly which is extremely hard to do and he looked like vintage Jon Jones out. Next, he gets the former heavyweight champion and some who called him the heavyweight GOAT in Stipe Miocic at International Fight Week in July.

Fight Of The Night Bonus

The fight of the night bonus had to go to the best fight on the card which was Geoff Neal vs. Shavkat Rakhomonov. Dana White even gave Neal his $50,000 bonus even though he missed weight because it was that great of a fight.

Most people thought Rakhmonov was just going to walk right through Neal which wasn’t the case at all. Neal fought tooth and nail, back and forth against what some people call the boogeyman of the welterweight division.

Ultimately, the undefeated fighter was Kazakhstan was just too much for the American Neal. His pace, pressure, and volume ultimately broke and wore down Neal until Rakhomonov was able to finish him via a standing rear-naked choke late in the third and final round. Rakhomonov is on an upward trajectory and could be just one more fight away from a potential title shot.