Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) yesterday announced four new bouts for the upcoming UFC 180 card in Mexico, and all of the newly-announced fights are very exciting on paper. Here they are: Jake Ellenberger vs. Kelvin Gastelum The best fight announced is a welterweight bout between Jake Ellenberger and Kelvin Gastelum. Ellenberger has lost two in a row but he is still an extremely dangerous striker with heavy hands and can knock out anyone at 170 lbs. As for Gastelum, he’s looked great overall since winning The Ultimate Fighter, and deserves to be the favorite heading into this fight coming off of big wins over Rick Story and Nico Musoke. Norman Parke vs. Diego Sanchez For the third straight fight, Diego Sanchez will compete against an Alliance MMA fighter, this time Norman Parke. I see the fight playing out very much like Sanchez vs. Myles Jury and Sanchez vs. Ross Pearson, with Parke picking him apart from the outside and taking home a decision win (well, we’ll see with the judges). Sanchez is the veteran but Parke should absolutely be the favorite heading into this one. Dennis Bermudez vs. Ricardo Lamas After winning seven fights in a row, Dennis Bermudez has earned a top five opponent and he’ll take on Ricardo Lamas in a bid to possibly earn a tittle shot. If Bermudez wins this fight and picks up his eighth straight win, it will be hard for the promotion to deny him fighting for the belt. As for Lamas, he already lost to UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo, but if he can take out Bermudez he’ll be right back there in regards to the title picture. Erik Perez vs. Marcus Brimage Also on tap, a bantamweight match-up between two fighters coming off of a loss, Erik Perez and Marcus Brimage, was booked. Perez is from Mexico and one would think the UFC would want him to win in front of his home country, but Brimage is no easy out and this should be a competitive fight. I believe Perez should be the slight lean in this one, but he is far from a lock to take home the W. In addition to the new bouts added to UFC 180, the promotion also announced two other new bouts. The first is a flyweight bout featuring Joseph Benavidez vs. Dustin Ortiz, which will take place at UFC Fight Night 57 in Austin, Texas. This is an excellent flyweight contest and the winner will be the third-ranked fighter in the division. Benavidez will surely be a big favorite in this fight, but don’t sleep on Ortiz, who has a knack of pulling off the upset. And finally, Andre Fili is injured and out of UFC Fight Night 50 and so the UFC announced a replacement match-up of Sean Soriano vs. Chas Skelly. Skelly is coming off of a quick submission win over Tom Niinimaki at UFC Fight Night 49 and will hope to make it two in a row against Soriano, who dropped his UFC debut to Tatsuya Kawajiri earlier this year. This is a good fight and should be close in the betting lines, but with Skelly’s momentum and skillset I slightly lean towards him in this one.
