High Fives: Angel of Death Victorious

Guy PortmanMay 29, 2018
UFC Fight Night 130 and Bellator 200 were not the only shows taking place May 25-27. Legacy Fighting Alliance 40 on Friday in Dallas played host to a number of highly anticipated fights, as did Fight Exclusive Night 21 in Wroclaw, Poland. Here are five of the highlights:



TITLE FIGHT … The LFA 40 main event saw Kevin Aguilar retain his featherweight championship with a first-round knockout of Thanh Le. The challenger threw a couple of flashy kicks early on, but the champion responded by utilizing crisp boxing combinations. A right hook to the head felled Le, the referee stepping in to prevent further punishment. The end came at the 2:44 mark. With the victory, “The Angel of Death” improved to 14-1. His opponent slipped to 8-2.



FEAR ‘THE LEECH’ … In other action at LFA 40, Ultimate Fighting Championship castaway Damon Jackson dispensed with Jeremy Spoon via rear-naked choke at 3:59 of the second round. Jackson initially applied the fight-ending choke on his standing opponent. When the action hit the mat, “The Leech” continued to squeeze, forcing Spoon to tap. Jackson moved to 15-2. Spoon dropped to 20-4.



HOT PROSPECT … The LFA 40 card also featured featherweight prospect Levi Mowles, who submitted Rey Trujillo with a rear-naked choke. The end came 2:52 into the second round, where, after eating some sustained ground-and-pound from mount, “The Chosen One” gave up his back and Mowles transitioned to a rear-naked choke. With the victory, the 22-year-old Mowles rose to 8-2. At 21-21, Trujillo has lost four straight.



SLUGFEST … The FEN 21 main event saw middleweights Thiago Viera and Andrzej Grzebyk collide. This entertaining back-and-forth affair was contested mostly on the feet. Late in the third round, a flurry of punches from Grzebyk had his opponent reeling. The referee saw enough and waved off the fight at the 4:56 mark. Now 13-3, Grzebyk is on a five-fight winning streak. “Monstro” dropped to 10-3.

GROUND POUNDING … In other FEN 21 action, two Polish middleweights went head-to-head, as Bartosz Lesko took on Kevin Wiwatowski (watch video here). When the fight hit the canvas, Lesko threatened with a kimura from side control before transitioning to mount and raining ground-and-pound. Having taken the back, he applied the fight-ending rear-naked choke at 2:53 of Round 1. Lesko moved to 7-1. Wiwatowski slipped to 4-6.

STANDUP AFFAIRMarcin Zontek and Toni Valtonen were content to slug it out on the feet in their light heavyweight showdown at FEN 21 (watch video here). The doctor deemed that Valtonen was unable to continue due to a badly swollen left eye 2:15 into Round 3. The 38-year-old Zontek improved to 17-11. His Finnish opponent fell to 27-17.