In his initial appearance against Ante Delija, the bout was paused midway through the opening round, with many, including Delija, believing referee Mark Smith was stopping the fight. Instead, a review was initiated to discern that the Croatian UFC sophomore had poked Cortes Acosta in the eye. The bout was eventually restarted, and the Dominican big man detonated a right hand on Delija’s jawline, crashing him to the canvas and pounding out the finish.
A few weeks later, and just a few days before the UFC’s debut event in Doha, Qatar, Cortes Acosta agreed to step in for Serghei Spivac opposite Shamil Gaziev. He landed in the host city, rolled to the hotel, made weight, then knocked out Gaziev in 82 seconds on Saturday, registering his second victory of the month.
Cortes Acosta has now bookended his loss to Sergei Pavlovich in Shanghai with a pair of wins, and he lobbied for the chance to log one more appearance before the year is out, too. He’s leaning into the fact he was poked in the eye by Delija by wearing an eye patch, clearly has concussive power, and is now 9-2 in the UFC, and 16-2 overall.
While he still needs to show he can hang with the elite of the division, he’s already done enough to merit another chance to prove it with his twin November victories, though he may have to wait a piece for that to happen, which honestly wouldn’t be the end of the world. A couple more fights against ranked opponents to garner a little more seasoning, and we might see further development from the 34-year-old ascending heavyweight.
Honorable Mentions: Steve Garcia, Christian Leroy Duncan, Chris Padilla, Uros Medic, Joseph Morales, Fatima Kline, Kyle Daukaus, Ethan Ewing, Michael Morales, Abdul Rakhman Yakhyaev, Luke Riley, Myktybek Orolbai
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