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Thad Jean overcomes late replacement Ernesto Rodriguez after
Shamil Musaev withdraws to capture the PFL welterweight
championship

Carefirst Arena in Washington, D.C., was the venue for
Professional Fighters League’s latest “Summer Series” fight
night on Saturday, July 25.

In the main event, two of the top welterweights in the world were
due to battle it out as 2025 tournament champion Thad Jean was
set to fight 2024 tourney king Shamil
Musaev, but the latter had complications with his weight cut
and was replaced by Ernesto
Rodriguez.

We were initially scheduled to an incredible fight on paper, but
what we got in practice was somehow even more special as Jean and
Rodriguez went to war from the bell. Jean was rattled by Rodriguez
right hands multiple times in the opening frame, but gave as good
as he got with some blistering kicks and a couple of guillotine
attempts. The second stanza, though, was all Rodriguez as he
dropped Jean with a combination and had him in bad trouble on
several occasions as Jean amazingly fought through a number of
rear-naked choke attempts. Jean’s conditioning heldin the end and
was the difference in the third period as he ended up on top from a
scramble before forcing referee Mario Yamasaki to stop the fight
with ground-and-pound. With the win, Jean was crowned PFL
welterweight champ.

The two fights directly preceding that were a duo of
light-heavyweight clashes with possible contender implications as
Rasul
Magomedov took on Sullivan
Cauley before former
Ultimate Fighting Championship 205er Tyson Pedro
locked horns with Rafael
Xavier. The former was an absolute scrap for the ages as
Magomedov and Cauley traded takedowns, knockdowns and cuts in a
brawl of the year contender which Magomedov ended up winning on the
cards. Xavier then got a first-round TKO stoppage of Pedro after a
prolonged attack of calf kicks left the Australian barely able to
stand. Xavier was able to overwhelm Pedro late in the stage and
finish him with grounded elbows against the cage in a
picture-perfect performance.



The opening main card match-up saw Eliezer
Kubanza’s coming out fighting against Chris Mixan
as the DR Congo man landed some heavy strikes before a second round
brabo choke put away Mixan.

On the undercard, former PFL Africa champion Nkosi
Ndebele produced the standout performance. The South African
left Brandon
Davis bloodied and battered after a unanimous 30-26 victory
following a kick-heavy domination where Ndebele almost finished
Davis twice with, secondly, late ground-and-pound in the third and
with an Anderson
Silva-esque front kick to the face midway through the second
frame.

Four-time All-American wrestler Bryce
Meredith headlined the prelims against Michael Cyr
in a fantastic fight which could be best described as a grappler’s
delight as Meredith took home a unanimous decision win after 15
minutes of Cyr’s jiu-jitsu just falling short against the heavy
wrestling and ground striking of Meredith.

A lightweight
title fight headlines PFL NY: Tune on Friday, July 31 at 7 p.m. ET
on ESPN.

There were also mixed results for debuting pros as highly-touted
Chad
Yard started well but was choked out by experienced 10-fight
veteran Coby
Bradford with a rear-naked choke in Round 2. While opening the
card, D2 national champion wrestler Noah
Hermosillo made a more successful professional debut against
Jacob
Pais as he eased his way to a decision win with a takedown
inside the opening minute of each round which led to prolonged
segments of ground-and-pound to claim his maiden victory.

IMAK ADMIN

By IMAK ADMIN

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