Missed Fists: Slicing knee knockout opens gruesome gash on fighter’s forehead

Welcome to the latest edition of Missed Fists where we shine a light on fights from across the globe that may have been overlooked in these hectic times where it seems like there’s an MMA show every other day.

After a lovely two-week break, I am back in action and judging by the excellent work done by my pal, Jed Meshew, it looks like the MMA world continued to churn out the hits.

Did you see that sweet Contender Series KO?

Have you ever seen the rain… make a complete mess of a cagefighting show?

While nothing quite so wacky happened this week, to say we weren’t blessed with a menagerie of memorable images would be false, starting with maybe the most gruesome knee knockout of 2024 from Anthony Pettis’ latest event.

(Big thanks as always to @Barrelelapierna for their weekly lists of the best KOs and submissions, and to @Grabaka_Hitman for uploading many of the clips you see here. Give them a follow and chip in on Patreon if you can.)

Elvin Romero vs. Todd Welle

Elvin Romero hit the switch 90 seconds into his fight with Todd Welle, sizing him up against the cage and delivering a knee to the head that not only knocked Welle for a loop, but immediately opened a bloody cut on his head.

GROSS. Who wants to watch this kind of thing?

Oh, here’s another angle, courtesy of Pettis himself.

I don’t know what Romero has been doing to prepare his knees for these situations, but if you’ve got some 2x4s that need to be broken, I now know a guy who can do it for cheap.

Anthony Pettis FC 12 is available for replay on UFC Fight Pass.

Alexis Pacheco vs. Gerardo Xango Ochoa
Paulina Vargas vs. Rosselyn Chavira

Check out this beautiful setup at Supreme Fight Night 6 in Guadalajara, Mexico.

Alexis Pacheco didn’t just have opponent Gerardo Xango Ochoa biting on this takedown fake, he downright chomped down on it before being served the real entree: A jumping knee knockout. Unsurprisingly, Ochoa looked dazed after the stoppage, probably because he’s still waiting to stuff that takedown attempt.

No tricky stuff needed for Paulina Vargas, who wrapped up a third-round knockout by walking down Rosselyn Chavira.

SFN 6 is available for free replay on YouTube.

Kameron Shamsi vs. Josh Gomez
Rogerio Matias vs. Martin Farley
Anderson Ferreira vs. Rogerio Matias
Lucas Barros vs. Bruno Dantas

How about some more free MMA?

At a Melee Combat Championship event (watch here) in Leander, Texas, amateur featherweight Kameron Shamsi planted Josh Gomez with this spinning backfist.

One could argue that the referee stepped in a tad early, but I saw at as him rewarding Shamsi for a stylish strike. Sorry Mr. Gomez, sometimes you just get cracked and it’s better to live to fight another day.

Over in Sao Paulo at Centurion FC 22 (watch here), Rogerio Matias was somehow both the hammer and the nail in the same night.

In his first fight of the night, Matias scored a massive KO of Martin Farley to advance in a one-night tournament.

All good, right?

Wrong. Very wrong.

Matias ran into Anderson Ferreira in the final and despite his unwavering confidence, he discovered that swagger alone isn’t the best defense when your opponent is lobbing haymakers at you. Let’s hope Matias remembers the good times more than the bad (assuming he remembers anything from that night at all).

Elsewhere in non-tournament action, Lucas Barros added to the pile of knockout knees this week, launching one right up the middle to end Bruno Dantas.

Henerson Duarte vs. Jeferson Costa
Andre Miranda vs. Raimundo Costa

There’s no good place to get knocked out, but Sao Paulo was apparently particularly bad this past weekend as Jungle Fight 129 also saw its fair share of nasty finishes.

Henerson Duarte unleashed the HELLbow to cause Jeferson Costa to sink sleepily to the canvas.

And Andre Miranda shined in the main event, annihilating Raimundo Costa’s liver to claim a vacant heavyweight title.

Vinicios Santana vs. Wanderlly Lino

Heading north to Soldado Combat 3 in Brasilia, we find one more spectacular KO as Vinicios Santana appeared to juuuuuuuuuust catch Wanderlly Lino with the tips of his knuckles.

More than enough to flatten Lino, that’s for sure.

Lerryan Douglas vs. Javier Reyes
Luis Francischinelli vs. Victor Kuiks
Eduardo Chapolin vs. Igor Siqueira
Xie Bin vs. Masuto Kawana

Hope you kept that Fight Pass handy, because we’ve got two more stops to make, first at LFA 190 in Commerce, Calif.

Lerryan Douglas continued to make his case for a UFC callup, rattling off a third-straight knockout victory with this power left hook against Javier Reyes.

The win made Douglas the interim LFA featherweight champion and if he can’t at least get a Contender Series nod, it feels like we’re doing this wrong.

Luis Francischinelli showed off a heavy left hand as well, but not before rocking Victor Kuiks with a knee first.

He put a serious exclamation point on that one.

In the main event, Eduardo Chapolin secured his first defense of his flyweight title, needing less than 90 seconds to put Igor Siqueira down.

That’s three straight wins and eight in the past nine for Chapolin, who could also step into even brighter lights soon.

One man we know will see octagon action soon is Road to UFC hopeful Xie Bin, who punched his way to a featherweight tournament final this past weekend at UFC APEX in Las Vegas.

Two monster right hands, one win away from officially joining the UFC. Xie fights for a contract on Nov. 23 at UFC Macau, where he faces Zhu Kangjie.

If you know of a recent fight or event that you think may have been overlooked, or a promotion that could use some attention, please let us know on X — @AlexanderKLee — using the hashtag #MissedFists.