3/29/24: Felipe Lima vs. Jonas Magard 2 Announced For OKTAGON 59
Also: A preview of Friday's top events
Welcome to a Friday edition of the Knockdown Daily. Today is a light issue to kick off your weekend. We have a quick update on OKTAGON, a preview of tonight’s top events, and a few notes from around the MMA world. We’ll have a really busy issue for you tomorrow, publishing reports on Friday’s card and previewing a pair of notable Saturday shows. Let’s get started.
Felipe Lima vs. Jonas Magard Bantamweight Title Rematch Set For OKTAGON 59
Felipe Lima has the chance to defend his OKTAGON Bantamweight Championship for the first time later this year, rematching the man he took the belt off.
Lima will face off against Jonas Magard at OKTAGON 59 on July 20th, per a recent announcement. The fight will take place at the Peugeot Arena in Bratislava, Slovakia.
Lima became the newest OKTAGON Bantamweight Champion last year, going five rounds against Magard to earn the title. This extended his record to an impressive 11 consecutive wins, including a 2020 Brave CF appearance and victories in the Brazilian regional scene.
Magard reign with the bantamweight title started back in 2021 with a decision over veteran Filip Macek. He defended it once, stopping UFC alum Gustavo Lopez with strikes in 2023.
Magard has picked up a win ahead of his title rematch, beating former Cage Warriors Bantamweight Champion Jack Cartwright in the main event of a card in January.
Also announced for OKTAGON 59 was a big fight in the second round of the Tipsport Gamechanger Lightweight Grand Prix. Current OKTAGON Lightweight Champion Ronald Paradeiser will face former KSW titleholder Daniel Torres in a quarter-final bout.
Paradeiser won his opening round bout earlier this month, beating Attila Korkmaz in a split decision. This victory came just three months after the biggest of his career in the promotion thus far, stopping Ivan Buchinger to earn the vacant OKTAGON 155-pound belt.
Torres won his promotional debut in the first round of the tournament, overcoming Vladimir Lengal in the first round. The former Salahdine Parnasse rival will try to move into the semi-finals of a tournament that has a combined prize pool of 1 million euros.
Previews
Featherweights Look To Shine In Last-Minute LFA Main Event Call-Up
Lance Lawrence and Landry Ward will have an unexpected main event opportunity on Friday night. Just yesterday, LFA announced that the featherweight prospects would appear in the headlining spot of this weekend’s card, bringing them up from the mid-card placement that they were previously in.
The original plan for LFA 180 was for flyweights Kevin Fernandez and Igor Siqueira to meet in a non-title bout. Fernandez was a veteran of the promotion looking for his fifth win, and Siqueira was returning after losing a title fight last year. However, due to an injury that Fernandez sustained, the bout was removed from the card.
Instead, it will be Lawrence and Ward sitting atop a 13-bout card from the Broadbent Arena in Louisville, Kentucky, USA.
Lawrence will be looking to string together a pair of wins for the first time in years. He has struggled on the regional scene since 2019, having won just two of his last six fights. Prior to that stretch of time, he was an undefeated prospect who came close to a UFC career. Starting his career with five consecutive submission wins, he earned an opportunity on the live reality TV show “Dana White’s Contender Series.” But a loss to Kevin Syler on that program shut down his UFC dreams and kicked off a multi-year struggle. After earning a win last November, Lawrence can prove that he is truly back with a successful showing on Friday night.
Ward is also in a position with something to prove. He took just the second loss of his career last October, dropping a split decision to Alfred Walker in the main event of LFA 169. The fightcould have set Ward up for a title shot, as Walker then challenged current featherweight champ Elijah Johns in his next appearance.
Ward had an impressive prospect record before that defeat last Fall. He made numerous appearances in Combate Global, and overcame Matheus Pereira in his LFA debut earlier that year. The 27-year-old prospect can add another strong win to his record with a successful performance on Friday.
Lightweight prospects Kegan Agnew and Richie Miranda are set to compete in the co-main event spot. Agnew has fought as a pro since 2018, with his sole defeat coming against UFC alum Austin Hubbard. Miranda is a five-fight LFA vet who has earned a finish win in most of his pro appearances. He bounced back from his first loss—a split decision defeat against Kegan Gennrich—with a mismatch win over Derion Chapman last October. He’ll certainly have a tougher assignment this weekend.
LFA 180 is a busy lineup with many notable names throughout. Undefeated flyweight finisher Joshua Perreira will return to LFA against Jesse Martinelli. Lower in the lineup, two-fight Bellator alum Ben Parrish will try to hand Alik Lorenz his second pro defeat.
Here’s a full look at the card:
Main Card (9:00PM EDT) (UFC Fight Pass)
Bout 13: Lance Lawrence (7-4) vs. Landry Ward (8-2) (Featherweight)
Bout 12: Kegan Agnew (6-1) vs. Richie Miranda (7-1) (Lightweight)
Bout 11: Dustin Parrish (10-4-1) vs. Victor Valenzuela (10-3) (Welterweight)
Bout 10: Angelo Robles (3-0) vs. Kibedy Gordon (5-1) (Bantamweight)
Bout 9: Ben Parrish (6-4) vs. Alik Lorenz (3-1) (Light Heavyweight)
Bout 8: Joshua Perreira (3-0) vs. Jesse Martinelli (3-1) (Flyweight)
Preliminary Card (LFA Youtube)
Bout 7: Chelsea Conner (2-3) vs. Alandria Rosales (3-2) (Strawweight)
Bout 6: Justin Thompson (3-1) vs. Ethan Burmingham (2-0) (Featherweight)
Bout 5: Whittany Pyles (4-6) vs. Nejra Repp (2-1) (Flyweight)
Bout 4: Ben Fowler (2-2) vs. Trae Cusac (0-0) (Middleweight)
Bout 3: Emilio Vallecillo (1-0) vs. Taylor Meister (1-0) (Light Heavyweight)
Bout 2: Blake Alvey (4-2) vs. Hayden Russell (2-0) (Amatuer Featherweight)
Bout 1: Alexander Collett (1-1) vs. Charlie Cleveland (1-0) (Amateur Heavyweight)
UFC Vet John Dodson Aims To Defend Bare-Knuckle Belt
Long-time UFC fighter John Dodson has found success in bare-knuckle boxing recently, and will try to continue his run on top of a division this weekend.
Dodson started competing for BKFC in 2022 and has amassed three first-round stoppage wins in the combat sport since then. His last outing earned him a flyweight title in the promotion, putting away JR Ridge in just under two minutes to become the inaugural champ in the weight class.
Dodson, who also currently fights in Japanese promotion RIZIN on the side, will try to defend his belt for the first time when he faces Dagoberto Aguero at BKFC 59 from Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA on Friday night.
Aguero switched to bare-knuckle boxing last year after a 17-fight career in traditional gloved boxing. He won his BKFC debut last November, stopping Chance Wilson with strikes.
The incredibly confident Dodson recently spoke to me for a story on LowKickMMA.com. During the interview, he didn’t seem worried about the years of experience that Aguero had in boxing.
“I mean, he can have as many experiences all he wants,” he said. “15-2 doesn’t mean anything to me when it comes to being the more dynamic striker. I’ve solidified myself being one of the most dangerous strikers and one of the most decorated ones out of all of them.”
Along with the opportunity to defend his flyweight belt for the first time, Dodson has the chance to return to the win column after a close loss from late last year. The two-time challenger to Demetrious Johnson dropped a decision to Hiromasa Ougikubo on RIZIN’s 2023 New Year’s Eve show, ending a six-fight winning streak that he attained through MMA and bare-knuckle fights.
BKFC 59 is scheduled to air at 9 p.m. ET on TrillerTV.
Notes On: UFC, PFL & Cage Warriors
UFC
UFC is exploring potentially matching UFC Middleweight Champion Dricus Du Plessis (21-2) against Israel Adesanya (24-3) for an August 18th pay-per-view in Perth, Australia, per Christopher Reive of the New Zealand Herald. It’s worth noting that the fight, while reportedly in consideration, has not been agreed upon in any form yet.
A pair of fights have been announced for the UFC 301 undercard. The pay-per-view will take place on May 4th from the Rio Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil:
Mauricio Ruffy (9-1) will make his UFC debut against Jamie Mullarkey (17-7). Ruffy earned a late finish win against Raimond Magomedaliev on “Dana White’s Contender Series” last October, earning him a UFC contract. He had a three-fight winning streak before then, including a pair of wins from a one-night tournament. Mullarkey suffered a first-round finish loss to Nasrat Haqparast late last year.
Vinc Pichel (14-3) will return against Ismael Bonfim (19-4). Pichel’s last fight was a decision loss to Mark Madsen back at UFC 273 nearly two years back. He has struggled to get a new fight since then, with three different bookings falling through. Bonfim took his first UFC loss last July, getting submitted by Benoit Saint-Denis.
A pair of fights have been booked for UFC’s June 8th card, per posts from MMA management team Iridium Sports Agency.
Brad Katona (13-3) will face off against Jesse Butler (12-5) in a bantamweight bout. Katona won Season 31 of “The Ultimate Fighter” last year, defeating Cody Gibson in a competitive grand final result. He is now coming off a loss, dropping a decision to Garrett Armfield earlier this year. Butler lost his short-notice UFC debut, getting stopped in just 23 seconds by veteran Jim Miller.
Taylor Lapilus (19-4) and Cody Stamann (21-6-1) will try to get back in the win column. Stamann had a two-fight streak of wins broken last year with a decision defeat to Douglas Silva de Andrade. Lapilus dropped a decision to undefeated contender Farid Basharat in January. He had six consecutive wins before then, including his return to the UFC roster in 2023.
My Throwback Thursday series has returned, continuing our look at 2002 MMA. This week’s article reflects on UFC 39: The Warriors Return. The card saw Ricco Rodriguez become the new UFC Heavyweight Champion, included the promotional debut of soon-to-be champion Tim Sylvia, had stand-out performances from lightweights BJ Penn and Caol Uno, plus more. You can read the full story here.
PFL
A recent comment by Alexnader Shabliy (24-3) has called into question whether he will challenge Bellator Lightweight Champion Usman Nurmagomedov (17-0) on May 17th. Shabliy recently told MMA Fighting that he has yet to be given a contract for the fight: “The only problem right now is I’m not fully sure the fight is actually going to happen. Because the fight was announced, it’s been on the official [homepage] of Bellator, but they still haven’t sent me the contract.”
Cage Warriors
Eperaim Ginting (7-1) has been withdrawn from his April 20th fight against Iain Postlethwaite (6-6) at Cage Warriors 171 from Glasgow, Scotland. Replacing him will be Pav Sahota (5-2), who is trying for his first Cage Warriors win. He lost his promotional debut last year to Sam Kelly, who stopped him in 11 seconds. Sahota has picked up a victory since then, beating James Willaims on a regional card late last year.