UFC on FX: Alves vs. Kampmann Bonuses

Demetrious Johnson vs. Ian McCall (Josh Hedges/UFC)

Kampmann, Benavidez, Johnson, McCall win $50,000 bonuses

There may not be resolution yet in the UFC’s flyweight tournament, but three of its four fighters are $50,000 richer after Friday night.

Joseph Benavidez, Demetrious Johnson and Ian McCall, all competing for the first time in the UFC’s new 125-pound division, took home fight night bonuses after their bouts at UFC on FX: Alves vs. Kampmann on Friday night. UFC president Dana White announced the winners and totals at the post-fight news conference. Main event welterweight Martin Kampmann was the fourth bonus winner.

UFC on FX: Alves vs. Kampmann was the promotion’s second event on the FX cable network. The card took place at the Allphones Arena in Sydney, Australia, and the event set Fight Night records for attendance with 14,537 fans and a live gate of $2.3 million, White said.

Johnson and McCall were given the show’s Fight of the Night bonus for their main-card flyweight fight. McCall, widely considered the top 125-pound fighter in the world, was announced as a split decision loser to Johnson, a former title challenger in the UFC’s bantamweight division dropping down to flyweight.

But at the post-fight press conference, White announced the commission in Sydney made an error while tallying the scorecards in the fight. Rather than a split decision win for Johnson, the fight should have been announced as a split draw. The judges’ cards actually were one 29-28 for Johnson, one 29-28 for McCall and one 28-28 draw when Sal D’Amato scored the first two rounds for Johnson, but a 10-8 third for McCall.

The fight was supposed to go to a “sudden victory” fourth round in the case of a draw. But since the score-tallying error wasn’t noticed until it was too late, Johnson and McCall will have to rematch – which puts Benavidez on hold while he waits after winning in the other semifinal bout. White said in addition to Johnson and McCall getting Fight of the Night bonuses, they both also will receive their win bonuses.

Benavidez’s second-round knockout of Yasuhiro Urushitani just 11 seconds into the frame not only advanced him to the UFC’s first flyweight title fight, it won him $50,000 for Knockout of the Night. Benavidez, like Johnson, was competing for the first time at 125 pounds and, like Johnson, was a former title challenger at bantamweight.

And in the main event, Martin Kampmann was dominated for the majority of the fight against Thiago Alves and was on his way to a decision loss. But when Alves shot for a takedown with under a minute left trying to seal the deal, Kampmann latched onto a guillotine choke that forced Alves to tap.

Along with putting him in early contention for Comeback of the Year (along with Tim Boetsch over Yushin Okami just last week in Japan), Kampmann won Submission of the Night. His win fended off two preliminary card fights that were in contention, including TJ Waldburger’s 55-second armbar win over Jake Hecht.