At UFC 238, Marlon Moraes (23-8-1) entered the cage as the betting favorite to capture the vacant bantamweight championship. Standing in his way was the promotion’s flyweight champion of the world, Henry Cejudo.
Entering UFC 238, Moraes had gone 17-1 in his previous eighteen fights. The lone loss was a split decision to Raphael Assuncao which Moraes emphatically avenged when he stopped Assuncao in the first round of their rematch.
Moraes had finished his previous three UFC fights in the first round and many believed he would be too much for Cejudo. In the first round, Moraes was really dominating the fight on the feet. He brutalized Cejudo with low kicks and kicks to the body.
Cejudo looked like he was going to be overwhelmed by Moraes. However, he wasn’t going to go away easily. The first half of the second round looked the same with Moraes dominating the striking. However, momentum started to switch.
You could almost see Moraes starting to break at UFC 238 after Cejudo refused to fall to his attacks. In the third round, Moraes looked like a broken fighter and Cejudo went on to finish him in the third.
Since that loss, Moraes has not looked like the same fighter in the UFC. He defeated Jose Aldo last December by split decision, but the vast majority of people believe that Moraes lost the fight.
Rough 2020 for the UFC’s Magic Man
Entering 2020, Moraes had a lot to prove inside the octagon. Cejudo completely broke him at UFC 238 and many thought Aldo won their fight. Aldo was actually awarded the title shot over Moraes despite Moraes technically winning their fight.
After being out the first part of the year, Moraes got his first UFC contest of 2020 in October against Cory Sandhagen. Sandhagen was coming off of an embarrassing loss and many believed that this was a good fight for Moraes to get back on track with.
However, that didn’t happen at all. Sandhagen went on to finish Moraes in the second round of their fight. Frustrated with another loss, Moraes wanted a quick turnaround. The UFC game him Rob Font at UFC Vegas 17.
Font has really good boxing, but the grappling and kicking advantage would go to Moraes. For those reasons, I believed Moraes would win the fight. However, what transpired was another loss for Moraes.
Moraes started out strong, however, it was clear that he didn’t want to stand with Font. After taking him down early in the first round, Moraes was forced to stand after Font worked his way back up. It didn’t take long for Font to knock him out once on the feet.
In the eyes of many, Moraes has lost four fights in a row starting with the Cejudo loss. I personally think that Moraes needs to take some time to really evaluate where he’s at in his career and how can proceed forward.
He’s gone from being the UFC‘s magic man to truly everyone knowing his tricks. I still believe he has a lot of talent, but if he suffers another loss, he could be on the chopping block.