Fight Night Fallout: Guillard vs Diaz

In what appeared to be a less than stellar night of fights, the participants in tonight's UFC offering exceeded expectations. From the opening bell of the first bout contested between Tim Credeur and Nate Quarry, we saw a back and forth brawl that saw the "Rock" win a tough unanimous decision. With the win, it looks like Nate moves toward the next up and comer as the resident gatekeeper for the UFC middleweight division, and Credeur goes back to the drawing board.

In a fight most thought would be a convincing win for the former WEC champ Condit, Jake Ellenberger decided to contest that thought by corking The Natural Born Killer with a couple of steaming right hands. Fortunately for Condit, Ellenberger was not on the same level when the fight hit the floor. Condit recovered his wits to end the first round and scored with several sub attempts and ground and pound through rounds 2 and 3 to manage a split decision win to nab his first win in the Octagon. Condit showed he has the gusto to keep on trucking in the UFC welterweight division, while Ellenberger remains a developing prospect.

In farewell match for Roger Huerta, The Bully Gray Maynard managed to utilize improved boxing and his bread and butter wrestling to manage a hard fought if not uber exciting win. Maynard started the first by catching Huerta with a couple of glancing shots, then got rocked by a flurried combination by El Matador. Maynard managed to recover, but without much else occurring in the round, Huerta stole the first by a score of 10-9. Round 2 found a faster paced exchange, with Maynard earning the round with more accurate punching and a jab induce knock down. The final stanza saw Maynard finally use his D1 wrestling ability and take Huerta down. Once the fight hit the ground, it was only a matter of time as Huerta showed his inability to get off the ground and his lack of a submission game. Maynard managed a nasty kimura that saw Huerta's shoulder get twisted like a Rob Zombie film. The round ended with both fighters standing in a weak clinch as the buzzer sounded. Maynard takes the fight by split decision, moving himself one step closer to a title fight, while Roger "El Model" Huerta moves on to greener pastures.

The make-no-sense main event of the evening saw Smokey the Bandits 'lil brother Nate Diaz face off against controversial lightweight, Melvin Guillard. Guillard managed a knock down in the opening seconds of the first round, landing a ginormic right hand on Diaz. Diaz managed to recover, but ended up losing the remainder of the first round to the elusive Young Assassin. The end came just after 2 minutes in round 2 when Guillard decided to get lazy and stick his neck out giraffe style on a takedown, thusly getting put in a modified guillotine that ended the fight. With the expected win, Diaz gets to keep his job. Guillard experiences his first loss in 2 years, and shows some maturity as a fighter in a loss that will likely land him in the vicinity of Dana White's cut list.