The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) was in Las Vegas, NV last Friday night (December 30, 2016) with UFC 207: Nunes vs. Rousey. It was a less than stellar night of action, but now that the scraps are in our rear-view, let’s take a look at which of the competitors we may no longer see going to work inside the Octagon… ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK Johny Hendricks Hendricks dropped a controversial unanimous decision to Neil Magny and has now lost three straight bouts inside the Octagon. The former UFC welterweight champion is 2-5 in his last seven fights and has been on a decline since losing his title and leaving his long-time camp, Team Takedown. Following the three consecutive defeats, I think there’s a good chance we have seen the last of Hendricks in the organization, especially considering the fact that he said he would retire if he came up short. There’s an asterisk with that, however, because Hendricks felt he defeated Magny. It is also worth noting that he has missed weight for his last two bouts. If we do see Hendricks back inside the Octagon, I think it will be at middleweight. Mike Pyle Pyle suffered a first-round knockout at the hands of TriStar Gym’s Alex Garcia and has now dropped back-to-back fights by knockout. He is 1-4 in his last five and 2-5 in his past seven, so following the consecutive knockout losses, I could see the UFC finally parting ways with the 41-year-old veteran. It would be better to see him opt to hang up the gloves himself, but if not, I think there’s a good chance the organization sends him his walking papers and we see “Quicksand” in the World Series of Fighting promotion. Bellator could be an option too, but for some reason I see him in the WSOF cage instead. Brandon Thatch Thatch has now lost four straight bouts by submission and will most certainly receiving his walking papers from the UFC following a first-round arm-triangle choke loss to undefeated short notice promotional newcomer Niko Price. He started his UFC career off hot with back-to-back first-round knockout victories but has since failed to live up to his hype, and in my opinion, proven to be one of the biggest busts in UFC history.
