Surprises and Disappointments is a column featured on MMAOddsbreaker.com after every UFC event, highlighting three fighters who had surprising performances and three fighters who disappointed. Here were the three biggest surprises and the three biggest disappointments from UFC on FOX 13. Surprises Stipe Miocic — Not many people were giving Stipe Miocic much of a chance to defeat Junior dos Santos, but even though he lost a close decision his stock actually rose in the loss, at least in my eyes. Miocic looked tremendous in this fight, giving JDS all he could handle for five rounds, coming up just a bit short on the cards at the end of 25 minutes. But even in defeat Miocic shone, and he proved by going toe-to-toe to the distance with JDS that he’s one of the best heavyweights in the UFC. Bryan Barberena — The betting public favored Joe Ellenberger by a decent margin heading into his fight with Bryan Barberena, but Barberena showed he isn’t to be taken lightly as he thrashed Ellenberger in the later stages of the fight to pick up a third-round TKO victory. Ellenberger is a tough dude but Barberena looked great in this fight and the fact he could finish a durable guy like Ellenberger was very impressive. Ian Entwistle — I wasn’t giving Ian Entwistle much of a chance against Anthony Birchak, but he looked tremendous in securing the first-round submission with his patented heel hook. Entwistle looked a lot stronger physically at 135lbs and while he is a one-trick pony, he’s certainly an extremely dangerous opponent for anyone in the bantamweight division because his ground game is so lethal. Disappointments Nate Diaz –– Nate Diaz didn’t go to the open workouts, he missed weight by over four pounds, and then he was thoroughly dominated by Rafael dos Anjos en route to a lopsided decision loss. Diaz is still a good fighter, but this was a horrendous performance and his stock dropped big time at 155lbs. He’s arguably not even a top 15 fighter at this point. Jamie Varner — For the fourth-straight fight, Jamie Varner was defeated, this time succumbing to a first-round rear-naked choke from Drew Dober. It appeared that Varner hit his head and knocked himself out prior to the submission, but whatever the scenario was, he looked absolutely terrible and with four losses in a row, he decided to retire after the card, and it’s probably the right decision. Claudia Gadelha — It was a close fight for sure, but Claudia Gadelha wasn’t able to do enough on the judges’ cards to beat Joanna Jedrzejczyk, falling by way of split decision. Gadelha was touted as the best 115lber heading into the fight, but with the narrow defeat, she has some work to do before she gets back into title contention.
