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#4 Robert Whittaker vs. Yoel Romero – interim UFC middleweight title, UFC 213
In 2017, with UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping controversially on the shelf while waiting for a potential fight with Georges St. Pierre, the UFC set up an interim middleweight title clash between top contenders Yoel Romero and Robert Whittaker at UFC 213.
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Romero came into the clash as the favored fighter, as he’d never lost in the UFC and held wins over the likes of Jacare Souza, Chris Weidman and Lyoto Machida.
But Whittaker was on a good run of his own, coming off a win over Jacare, and walked into UFC 213 confident of getting his hands on some UFC gold.
The fight turned out to be a war for the ages. The early rounds belonged to Romero, who managed to take Whittaker down on multiple occasions – even if he couldn’t do a lot on the ground – and also landed the better strikes.
But by the third round, it was clear that the Cuban had begun to tire. Despite Whittaker seemingly carrying a knee injury, he began to push a hectic pace, forcing Romero back with heavy combinations.
In the fourth and fifth rounds, the Reaper really opened up, hurting Romero badly and leaving him on rubber legs on more than one occasion. The fight ended with Whittaker landing some nasty elbows to Romero’s head. When the judges delivered their scorecards, the Aussie was crowned the new interim UFC middleweight champion.
It was a tremendous fight by anyone’s standards, with enough back-and-forth action to keep fans guessing as to who was going to win. Incredibly, the two men topped it with an even better fight a year later at UFC 225.
#3 Tony Ferguson vs. Justin Gaethje – interim UFC lightweight title, UFC 249
2020 was supposed to be the year that we’d finally see Tony Ferguson challenge Khabib Nurmagomedov for the UFC lightweight title. But as per usual, it wasn’t to be.
The COVID-19 pandemic meant that Khabib couldn’t enter the US for his scheduled fight with Ferguson at UFC 249. Instead, the UFC set up an interim title bout between El Cucuy and Justin Gaethje.
Ferguson was no stranger to interim titles – after all, he’d submitted Kevin Lee for the interim UFC lightweight title in 2017 before being stripped of it due to injury.
But UFC 249 wasn’t to be his night. Ferguson had always been able to take a shot and survive in his previous UFC outings, but it quickly became clear that Gaethje hit much harder than anyone he’d faced before.
The Highlight nailed Ferguson with some brutal jabs and right hands throughout the fight. Even a huge uppercut from El Cucuy in the third round couldn’t slow down Gaethje’s onslaught.
Ferguson managed to survive into the fifth round, but by that point his face was a mess and he was clearly in a bad way. As Gaethje continued to unleash shots on him, he began to turn away and shake his head in an odd way – forcing referee Herb Dean to mercifully step in.
The fight was somewhat one-sided, but it was also incredibly entertaining and a seriously impressive performance from Gaethje – making it easily one of the most memorable interim UFC title fights.
