The Real Winners and Losers from UFC Fight Night 201

There are high-profile cards. And then there are hardcore fan cards.

The Fight Night show from the UFC Apex facility in Las Vegas on Saturday night was surely the latter.

Only two of the 24 fighters on the show—and none outside the light heavyweight main event—had a ranking number next to their name heading into the fight, ratcheting down the octagonal star power just a week after the promotion played before a full house for a pay-per-view show in Texas.

Tenth-ranked 205-pounder Johnny Walker and No. 12 Jamahal Hill took the five-round marquee position on this show, which went head-to-head with the final Saturday of the Winter Olympics as well as NBA All-Star festivities and a full slate of NHL hockey and college basketball.

Jon Anik, Dominick Cruz and Paul Felder held down the broadcast table for ESPN, while Laura Sanko worked the room for breaking news and features and Din Thomas was in the studio for technical analysis.

B/R's combat sports team handled its business in the form of a definitive list of winners and losers, which we encourage you to click through and peruse before leaving a viewpoint of your own in the comments section.

Jamahal Hill strutted menacingly around the cage.

He flexed his chest muscles and screamed into every camera he could find.

But given what he'd done a moment or two before, you really couldn't blame him.

The 30-year-old light heavyweight delivered the single most effective punch of a 12-bout card, landing a right hand high on the head of opponent Johnny Walker and laying him out for a first-round KO in the battle of ranked 205-pound contenders.

"Stop doubting me, bro," he told Felder. "I'm feeling great. I just wanted to come out here and start changing the conversation. It's time to start having a different conversation about me.

"How good is this guy? How high can he go?"

Matched with a taller, longer opponent, Hill took about half a round to come up with the proper exit strategy and implemented with the punch that looped over a lazy Walker jab.

It struck the Brazil-born Walker around the left temple and rendered him stiff-legged and defenseless as he collapsed backward to the floor alongside the cage. Hill jumped in and landed one more shot, a flush right hand, against his unguarded jaw before referee Jason Herzog intervened at 2:55.

"I decided I'd switch it up and go forward," Hill said. "I had a hard time hitting him from the southpaw stance. I timed it out. It landed and it landed clean. If that didn't land, I had another one coming."

It was Hill's 10th win against a loss and a no-contest in a career stretching back to 2017.

He's 4-1 with the no-contest in six UFC contests, recording KOs in the last three wins.

"Sweet dreams, Johnny Walker," Anik said. "There's a new light heavyweight contender, and it's Jamahal 'Sweet Dreams' Hill."

It's nice to call out your own nickname.

Philadelphia-based tough guy Kyle Daukaus did just that in the aftermath of a co-main event finish of catchweight foe Jamie Pickett, telling Felder in the post-fight interview that he'd assumed a new identity. 

"I want to call out Tony Ferguson," he said.

"I have more D'Arce chokes so I'm going to go for the 'D'Arce Knight!'"

And why not?

The 28-year-old punished Pickett with grappling throughout the first round of their scheduled three-rounder, ultimately locking in the choke and prompting a tap out with one second remaining.

Daukaus landed 19 strikes and had better than four minutes of control time and began the decisive sequence when he isolated a prone Pickett left arm and squeezed with his right until the end came.

The win was Daukaus' second in five UFC appearances against two losses and a no-contest, and it was his first finish since a submission victory in the Cage Fury promotion two years ago.

He's submitted nine opponents in his 11 career victories, all by chokes.

Ferguson, incidentally, has seven choke finishes in 25 career wins.

"It feels great to get my feet back in here and get comfortable and enjoy the victory." he said.   

Each time he goes out, Jim Miller adds to the legend.

The 38-year-old New Jersey resident has been steadily climbing the UFC's all-time ranks for several years, and he added another bullet point Saturday night when a second-round TKO of Nikolas Motta made him the promotion's winningest active fighter.

The finish was the 23rd UFC victory for Miller, evening him atop the historic list with Donald Cerrone. Cerrone hasn't fought in nine months and is 0-5 with a no-contest since his last victory in 2019.

Miller, meanwhile, has won two straight and four of his last seven since Cerrone's last triumph.

"Who else at the later end of their career is knocking guys out?" he said. "My goal has been to fight as hard as I can fight for as long as I can. I'll be excited making that last walk, but it won't be next time."

Indeed, Miller looked nowhere near the end against his 29-year-old opponent, who was making his UFC debut after a winning appearance on Dana White's Contender Series in 2020.

The fighters were competitive across the opening five minutes while combining to attempt 90 strikes, but Miller took charge in the second when he discarded his countering style to leap in with a right hand that landed flush on Motta and sent him sprawling to the floor.

"It's your 39th fight, you come in against an up-and-comer and you do that?" Felder said. "Come on, man!"

Miller instantly pounced and landed 22 ground shots of varying impact before Keith Peterson intervened at 1:58. 

"I hadn't really thrown it. I knew I'd be able to land some leg kicks on him and I was chipping away," Miller said. "I needed to press him at that point so I just went in. If there's time on the clock, I'm gonna keep going."

Chas Skelly may ultimately find himself back in a cage.

But if he's true to his Saturday night word and actually calls it a career after 22 fights in 13 years, it'd be hard to imagine he could have exited any more memorably than he did against Mark Striegl.

The 36-year-old featherweight controlled the initial five minutes with high-intensity grappling, logging nearly three minutes of control time alongside 34 landed strikes and a successful takedown.

Still, he switched gears to striking as the second round began and decisively rocked Striegl with an elbow before flooring him with a hard right knee up the middle. A series of six ground shots followed, ultimately prompting an intervention from referee Keith Peterson at 2:01.

It was the first appearance in better than two years for Skelly, who improved to 8-3-1 in the UFC but suggested he'd be looking for more time to concentrate on grappling as well as a roofing company he unabashedly pumped during a post-fight chat with Felder.

"It felt amazing. There's no better feeling than putting in hard work and coming out here and having it pay off," Skelly said. "I felt completely at peace. I had no emotion. I just wanted to win for all the people who have supported me. I had really, really, really good inner peace. I'm not retiring, I'm just switching careers.

"The grind never stops. I'm not gonna stop. I'm just gonna continue to grind."

If you were looking for big long-shot cash-outs, Saturday wasn't your night.

No fewer than nine of 12 betting favorites had their hands raised across the board, and even the biggest off-chalk payouts came in the form of +150 (bet $100 to win $150) and +140 (bet $100 to win $140) propositions Stephanie Egger and Jim Miller.

Not exactly the stuff of exotic vacations.

Co-main-eventer Kyle Daukaus was the biggest favorite to come through on the main card, taking out Jamie Pickett after entering as a -305 (bet $305 to win $100) favorite.

Meanwhile, featherweight Jonathan Pearce was the biggest favorite (-435) on the preliminary show and rewarded the confidence with a unanimous decision over Christian Rodriguez. Just behind at -425 was bantamweight Mario Bautista, who beat opponent Jay Perrin by a unanimous decision of his own in the night's first fight.

Bets of $100 on all five main card favorites would have yielded a $240 profit, while outlays on all five underdogs would have incurred a loss of $260.

Cashing tickets on all five winners, meanwhile, would have resulted in a $540 profit.

Overall, $100 bets on 12 favorites would have wound up with a $440 profit compared to bets on 12 underdogs that would have incurred a loss of $500. Bets on all 12 winners would have earned a cool $1,300.

Main Card

Jamahal Hill def. Johnny Walker by KO (punch), 2:55, Round 1

Kyle Daukaus def. Jamie Pickett by submission (D'Arce choke), 4:59, Round 1

Parker Porter def. Alan Baudot by unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)

Jim Miller def. Nikolas Motta by TKO (punches), 1:58, Round 2

Joaquin Buckley def. Abdul Razak Alhassan by split decision (29-28, 29-28, 28-29)

Preliminary Card

David Onama def. Gabriel Benitez by TKO (punches), 4:24, Round 1 

Stephanie Egger def. Jessica-Rose Clark by submission (armbar), 3:44, Round 1 

Chas Skelly def. Mark Striegl by TKO (knee), 2:01, Round 2

Gloria de Paula def. Diana Belbita by unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)

Chad Anheliger def. Jesse Strader by TKO (punch), 3:33, Round 3

Jonathan Pearce def. Christian Rodriguez by unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)

Mario Bautista def. Jay Perrin by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-26)