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Morning Report: Aljamain Sterling believes Herb Dean made ‘perfect stoppage’ in Alexander Volkov vs. Jairzinho Rozenstruik

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Aljamain Sterling believes that Herb Dean got it right.

In the main event of UFC Vegas 56, Alexander Volkov scored an early TKO victory over Jairzinho Rozenstruik, knocking him out in 2:12 seconds; however, the outcome was not without controversy. Though Rozenstruik was clearly hurt from the strikes of Volkov early, when referee Herb Dean waived the bout off, “Bigi Boy” was on his feet and immediately protesting the stoppage. But bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling believes Dean make the correct call.

“As long as this fight lasted, it was fun,” Sterling said on his YouTube channel. “Rozenstruik had his moments, tried to go for the kill, got caught with a right hand and then got caught with a nasty uppercut against the cage. It felt like, from what I was watching, he went limp twice, and when you do that, even if you’re standing up, if you go limp, it looks like the fight is over because it looks like there’s a big disconnect between the brain and the body and you just buckled and you’re not there to respond. So it looks like you’re about to be in even more trouble. Rozenstruik recovered really quickly, but when you go back and watch the stoppage, I do not think it was a bad stoppage. I think it was only going to get worse because Volkov — that split second where [Rozenstruik] got to recover when the ref stopped the fight, if the ref doesn’t do that, Volkov stays on him, lands a couple more shots, and that’s probably even a worse finish than what it actually was.”

Unsurprisingly, Volkov agrees with Sterling, saying in his post-fight press conference that he was “ready to throw him down and continue my work” but Dean saved Rozenstruik from further damage. And for Sterling, that gets to the heart of the stoppage: Rozenstruik was tough and recovered quickly, but it’s the referee’s job to save him from himself, and Sterling believes Dean did that.

“Good thing for Rozenstruik to be able to recover quickly,” Sterling said. “That says something, that he was in good shape I would like to believe, because when you recover quickly from a hard shot, it shows that you’re in good shape… But I just think there’s a very fine line between the ref letting you live to fight another day and letting you get punished to the point where you probably won’t be able to fight for another day, because the shots and the damage you’re going to take are going to be a lot worse when it’s accumulated. So I think the ref made a good judgmental move, jumped in when he saw him go limp twice, gave him an opportunity and it was just one of those things where he got caught against the cage against a much bigger guy.

“Volkov is 6’7”. He’s an animal. Rozenstruik is 6’2”, these are big, big boys, but when they stood next to each other it was like, ‘Damn, this looks like big brother and little brother right now.’ Volkov is just a big human being, so when that guy hits you, I can only imagine what that feels like. I don’t want to imagine what that feels like… But yeah, I think that was a perfect stoppage.”

TOP STORIES

Results. Alexander Volkov makes quick work of Jairzinho Rozenstruik at UFC Vegas 56.

Results. Fabricio Andrade calls out ‘John Chicken Lineker’ after liver kick KO at ONE 158.

Fair. Alexander Volkov defends Herb Dean’s stoppage against Jairzinho Rozenstruik but adds ‘it’s not my fault anyway’.

Savage. Alonzo Menifield rips ‘chump’ Askar Mozharov after UFC Vegas 56 record controversy: ‘It fluctuated like the damn stock market’.

Haters. Jeff Molina on backlash for wearing UFC’s Pride Month shorts: ‘I just thought people would be a little more open-minded’

VIDEO STEW

UFC Vegas 56 Post Show.

UFC Vegas 56 Post-Fight Press Conference.

UFC 275 Countdown.

KSW 70 slow motion highlights.

LISTEN UP

On To The Next One. Matches to make following UFC Vegas 56.

SOCIAL MEDIA BOUILLABAISSE

Statements.

Support.

Call outs.

Israel Adesanya does not want to move to boxing.

That’s a pretty big win.

Thanks, Jon.

FIGHT ANNOUNCEMENTS

Adriano Moraes (20-3) vs. Demetrious Johnson (23-4-1); ONE Championship, Aug. 26.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Thanks for reading! See y’all tomorrow.

EXIT POLL

If you find something you’d like to see in the Morning Report, hit up @JedKMeshew on Twitter and let him know about it. Also follow MMAFighting on Instagram and like us on Facebook.

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