As much as Anthony Figueroa wanted it to be, and felt like it would be, it just wasn't his night Friday in HP Pavilion in San Jose.
Taking on Chris Cariaso in the third bout of the Strikeforce mixed martial arts main card, Figueroa suffered his second straight defeat by submission, losing in the middle of the second round on a rear naked choke. In his previous bout, Figueroa, also known as "Antdawg," lost to Darren Uyenoyama.
"I really trained hard on the ground, but it shows you can never stop learning," Figueroa said. "I really felt like this was going to be my night."
The stage was set for a breakout performance, as the pairing was moved from a preliminary bout to the main card after other fights were canceled. Unfortunately for Figueroa, Cariaso proved to be proficient in his ability to take Figueroa to the mat and gain top position.
"He was good, man. I got to give it to him," Figueroa said.
The first round went by quickly, as the two fighters spent most of the five minutes rolling around the mat. Figueroa's best shot came at the end of the round when he delivered a solid knee to the face of Cariaso who was caught leaning forward.
The second round was similar to the first. After breaking out of several attempts by Cariaso to apply a key-lock hold, which bends the forearm back while stabilizing the bicep, Figueroa rolled to his left to escape a barrage of punches. In the process, he allowed Cariaso to latch onto his back and apply the choke.
"He was really well positioned on me," Figueroa said about the decision to tap out. "I was going to hold out and it started to get cloudy."
Cariaso improved to 7-1 overall, with two of those wins coming against Figueroa.
Despite the disappointment of defeat, Figueroa, who dropped to 4-3, was still confident following the fight.
"In this game you can bounce back with one win," Figueroa said, adding that he would take a week off before getting back to training.
Other main card bouts included Bryan Caraway choking out Alvin Cacdac, Jeremiah Metcalf, using an ambiguous form of fighting called "Voodoo", defeating Raymond Daniels in a 185-pound bout (no dolls or needles were seen in the cage), Bobby Stack topping previously undefeated Jose Palacios by decision in a matchup of 155-pounders, Elaina Maxwell winning a decision over Miesha Tate in the lone female fight of the night, Bobby Southworth managing to defend his light heavyweight title against Anthony Ruiz in by far the dullest bout of the evening, and Billy Evangelista taking a controversial split-decision over Nam Phan.
The fight 7,488 people came to see, though, was Josh "The Punk" Thomson challenging Strikeforce Lightweight champion Gilbert "El Nino" Melendez. Trading combinations in each round, Melendez took a steady, serious approach while Thomson played to the crowd, smiling at fans while in a clinch or laughing at one point in the third round when he slipped and had to scramble to his feet.
Melendez didn't take a round, though, as Thomson showed more consistency with his strikes and had far more takedowns, winning a unanimous decision in five rounds, 50-45 on all judges' scorecards.
Josh Koehn Josh Koehn is the sports editor of the Gilroy Dispatch.
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