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LAS VEGAS – Aljamain Sterling unhooked the UFC belt around his waist and dropped it on the Octagon mat with a thud. Sterling then knelt down and rested his head on the canvas.
It was not the behavior of someone who had just fulfilled a long-held dream of becoming a UFC champion. But those are the extremely bizarre circumstances of the UFC bantamweight title fight on Saturday at UFC 259.
Sterling won the title by disqualification at 4 minutes, 29 seconds into the fourth round after Yan landed an illegal knee to Sterling’s head. The ring doctor determined that Sterling, who was visibly shaken by the knee, couldn’t fight. Referee Mark Smith deemed the foul to be intentional, making the result a disqualification.
What made the streak even stranger was that Yan was in total control of the fight. He was starting to separate Sterling in the third and fourth rounds with technical boxing. Sterling, who worked hard to pick up the pace and make Yan uncomfortable, seemed to be running out of steam with Yan arriving in the final laps.
Sterling got off to a good start. He landed two hard jumping knees at Yan’s head in the first round. Yan rallied at the end of the first game by abandoning Sterling with a left hand.
Sterling continued to put the pressure on in the second, but Yan was generally bewildered. He stuffed pretty much all of Sterling’s takedown attempts and was proficient in the clinch.
Yan landed hard left and right hands in the fourth round, leading to a strange finish.
The judges had Yan ahead 29-28, 29-28, 28-29 before the fourth, a round that Yan convincingly won before the illegal knee.
Yan and Sterling finished # 1 and # 2 in ESPN’s MMA bantamweight rankings, respectively. UFC 259 took place under the coronavirus protocols in effect at UFC Apex, a facility across from the UFC corporate campus.
Sterling (20-3) has now won six straight wins. The New York native, who did his training camp at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas, had just picked up a first-round victory over Cory Sandhagen at UFC 250 last June. Sterling, 31, has a UFC record of 12-3.
Yan (15-2) won the vacant UFC bantamweight title by defeating Jose Aldo at UFC 251 last July. The Russian native had won 10 in a row, including his first seven in the UFC. Yan, 28, usually trains from Tiger Muay Thai in Thailand, but has transferred his camp to American Top Team in Coconut Creek, Fla., This time due to travel issues related to COVID-19.
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