A number of new UFC bouts were announced over the weekend, and for today’s MMA Odds and Ends I’ll give my quick thoughts on them. Leonardo Santos vs. Efrain Escudero/Francisco Trinaldo vs. Leandro Silva, UFC Fight Night 51 Some matchup juggling took place at UFC Fight Night 51, and two fights that were previously announced were switched around, according to MMAFighting.com. The event takes place Sept. 13 at Ginasio Nilson Nelson in Brasilia, Brazil. For undisclosed reasons, Lukasz Sajewski is out of his fight against Leonardo Santos, and now the UFC has taken Efrain Escudero off of the prelims and pitted him against Santos. Francisco Trinaldo, who was originally set to fight Escudero, will now take on Leandro Silva, who is returning to the UFC after a nice win streak on the Brazilian regional circuit. As far as Santos vs. Escudero goes, it should be a pretty back-and-forth fight between former TUF winners but I believe Santos is the right side here and I have a feeling the UFC wanted to get him back on track by matching him up with Escudero, who has been up-and-down his whole career. As for Trinaldo vs. Santos, this is a very good matchup and should be fun to watch, and I think I might have to lean towards Santos here to get the win after his impressive performances and Trinaldo’s seemingly rapid decline. Anthony Perosh vs. Guto Inocente, UFC Fight Night 55 A light heavyweight bout between Anthony Perosh and Guto Inocente will take place at UFC Fight Night 54, which is set for November 8 at Allphones Arena in Sydney, Australia. Inocente himself announced the bout on his Facebook account. The fight makes sense as it pits two fighters coming off of losses who need a win to stay on the UFC roster. Perosh was absolutely destroyed by Ryan Bader in his last outing at UFC Fight Night 33, while Inocente was knocked out by Derrick Lewis in his UFC debut at the TUF 19 Finale. This is essentially a striker vs. grappler matchup, with Perosh being the grappler and Inocente being the striker, but based on how he’s fought in the UFC as of late I expect Perosh to keep this fight standing and try to use his improved boxing to knock Inocente out. That will likely be a bad idea, though, because Perosh’s chin is not good, and Inocente hits hard. Look for Inocente to open as a moderate favorite here and pick up his first UFC win with a victory over the elder statesman Perosh. Soa Palelei vs. Daniel Omielanczuk, UFC Fight Night 55 And finally, a heavyweight bout between Soa Palelei and Daniel Omielanczuk was added to UFC Fight Night 55, according to a report from Fight24.pl. This is a fight pitting two of the lowest-ranked heavyweights in the division against one another, and both fighters are coming off a loss to Jared Rosholt, so the fight does make sense. Unless there is a highlight-reel first-round knockout, I don’t expect it to be very exciting though, and if the fight goes three rounds it could be epically bad as both men have poor cardio. It’s a competitive fight on paper but based on the hometown factor and also the size factor Palelei should be a slight favorite here to pick up the win and save his UFC career.
