The UFC’s second pay-per-view and first title fight of the year are both in the books as, as UFC 258 went down on Saturday night.
As with every UFC event, four fighters were awarded $50,000 bonuses for outstanding work in the octagon on the evening. This time around, the promotion didn’t give out a “Fight of the Night” bonus, but rather went with four “Performance of the Night” awards.
UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman, Polyana Viana, Anthony Hernandez, and Julian Marquez all earned post-fight honors.
UFC 258 took place at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. The main card aired on pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and early prelims on ESPN+.
Here’s a look at each of the competitors who earned post-fight bonuses.
‘Performance of the Night’: Kamaru Usman
Gilbert Burns gave Usman (18-1 MMA, 13-0 UFC) his best, and it wasn’t close to good enough to unseat a fighter who seems well on his way to becoming the UFC’s next dominant champ.
Usman shook off an early knockdown, roared back, picked Burns apart, and finished him at the 34-second mark of the third round.
That’s three successful title defenses for Usman, and his fourth career post-fight bonus.
‘Performance of the Night:’ Anthony Hernandez
The middleweight bout between Hernandez (8-2 MMA, 2-2 UFC) and Rodolfo Vieira wasn’t just exciting, but it had an incredible finish: Hernandez used a guillotine to submit Vieira, marking the first time in history a former ADCC gold medalist was ever submitted in the octagon.
If that’s not worth an extra $50K, nothing is. It marked the first post-fight bonus of Hernandez’s UFC career.
‘Performance of the Night:’ Polyana Viana
Brazilian submission ace Viana (12-4 MMA, 3-3 UFC) was at it again on Saturday night.
Viana went for the finish early in her flyweight preliminary bout against Mallory Martin as she held a triangle tight. When the tough Martin wouldn’t surrender, Viana transitioned into a fantastic armbar and that was all she wrote.
That’s two straight submission wins for Viana and her second career post-fight bonus.
‘Performance of the Night’: Julian Marquez
Marquez (8-2 MMA, 2-1 UFC) and Maki Pitolo got the pay-per-view portion of the card off with a bang, but it was Marquez who got the job done in the end.
Fighting for the first time in 31 months, Marquez used a nifty anaconda choke to end things at the 4:13 mark of the third round.
That’s the middleweight competitor’s second career post-fight bonus.
Article source: https://mmajunkie.usatoday.com/lists/ufc-258-bonuses-kamaru-usman-four-performance-of-the-night-honors