Welcome to the UFC’s first event on ESPN! UFC on ESPN+1 is coming to us from Brooklyn, NY, and the main event will see bantamweight champ TJ Dillashaw attempt to destroy the flyweight division by taking out its champ, Henry Cejudo.
But first, the prelims.
We first met Dennis Bermudez on TUF 14, where he made it all the way to the end but in the finals tapped out to Diego Brandao. Since then, he had a decent winning streak for a while, stumbled, and most recently notched four losses in the row. His opponent for this, his seventeenth in the UFC? Some scrub named Te Edwards.
Edwards manages to land a few solid punches and an elbow on the feet, but he has no answer for Bermudez’s takedowns, and spends all three rounds getting worked over on the ground.
Nasty elbows landed from top position by @MenaceBermudez to close the round! #UFCBrooklyn pic.twitter.com/kld7c1Ba32
— UFC (@ufc) January 20, 2019
At one point, Bermudez nearly tears his arm off with a kimura attempts, and at another point Bermudez almost gets the guillotine choke. However, to his credit, Edwards toughs them all out and survives to the final bell.
All the judges give it to Bermudez, and when Jon Anik sticks a mic in his face, the TUF runner-up announces his retirement amidst tears.
What an amazing career, @MenaceBermudez.
What better place than to end it in his home state of New York? Thank you, Dennis! #UFCBrooklyn pic.twitter.com/xzCD5GVPst
— UFC (@ufc) January 20, 2019
Well, that was surprising.