August’s Top Five UFC Knockouts

August delivered some awe-inspiring finishes inside the Octagon, writes Quintin van Jaarsveld as he selects the top five UFC knockouts of the month.

From a dream debut and a new Ultimate Fighter being crowned to a top contender staking his claim for a championship opportunity and a living nightmare, August had plenty of violent highlights.

These were the month’s five best knockouts:

5: No Judges Kneeded

A finisher of note, Joel Alvarez force-fed Elves Brener a devastating diet of knees at UFC Abu Dhabi to score his 21st stoppage in 21 wins.

4: Don’t Blink

Kai Kara-France spoiled Steve Erceg’s homecoming and lived up to his “Don’t Blink” nickname when he landed a step-through left hook and stopped the Australian with a right hand in UFC 305’s co-main event to score his 13th first-round knockout and make a strong case for a flyweight title shot.

3: Red Alert

You only get one chance to make a good first impression and Wang Cong killed it by crushing Victoria Leonardo with a brutal one-two at UFC Vegas 96 to earn the fastest debut finish in women’s flyweight history at just 62 seconds.

2: Santos Is The Ultimate Fighter

Mairon Santos seized The Ultimate Fighter 32 featherweight crown in vicious fashion at UFC Vegas 96 with a wicked counter left hand that switched Kaan Ofli’s lights off, with the 24-year-old instinctively landing a few follow-up blows on his sitting duck of an opponent.

1: Living Nightmare

Carlos “The Nightmare” Prates put himself on the map in the UFC 305 main card opener as he became the first man to knockout Li Jingliang, starching the Chinese veteran with one brutal left after another and leaving “The Leech” unconscious for a scary amount of time.

Quintin van Jaarsveld

Quintin Van Jaarsveld is a former MDDA-Sanlam SA Local Sports Journalist of the Year and a former three-time Vodacom KwaZulu-Natal Sports Journalist of the Year. Formerly the sports editor and Outstanding Journalist of the Year award winner at The Fever Media Group, deputy editor at eHowzit, editor at SARugby.com and senior staff writer at Rugby365.com, he boasts over 15 years’ experience and is currently a freelance sports writer.