UFC Fight Island 3 bonuses: 6 finishers get rewarded

UFC Fight Island 3, which went down Saturday night on Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, was packed to the edges with finishes.

In fact, the card was so rife with finishes that the promotion opted to give out six performance of the night bonus checks instead of the traditional two performance of the night bonus checks and two fight of the night bonus checks.

Here’s who received $50,000 post-fight bonuses at UFC Fight Island 3:

• Tanner Boser: Boser, a Canadian heavyweight, scored a second-round TKO victory over Raphael Pessoa on the undercard. It was his second stoppage win in a month, as he also knocked out Philipe Lins in late June.
• Tom Aspinall: Aspinall, a former Cage Warriors standout and training partner of Darren Till, picked up a first-round knockout win over Jake Collier in his UFC debut on the UFC Fight Island 3 undercard.
• Jesse Ronson: After six years away from the UFC, Canadian lightweight Jesse Ronson picked up a huge, submission victory over Nicolas Dalby. It was his first UFC win after losing a trio of split decisions in his first three UFC fights.
• Paul Craig: Craig, a Scottish light heavyweight, submitted Gadzhimurad Antigulov in the first round, reestablishing himself as one of the division’s best submission specialists on the process.
• Khamzat Chimaev: Chimaev defeated England’s Rhys McKee via first-round TKO on the UFC Fight Island 3 main card. This win came just 10 days after a submission win over John Phillips, which also earned him a bonus.
• Fabricio Werdum: Werdum, the former UFC heavyweight champion, tapped out former UFC light heavyweight title challenger Fabricio Werdum in the first round on the main card. This victory marked the end of Werdum’s UFC career, as he intends to take his services elsewhere.

UFC Fight Island 3 marked the UFC’s final event on Yas Island for the time being. While the promotion’s next few events will occur inside its APEX facility in Las Vegas, UFC President Dana White has said that there could be many more events on Yas Island in the near future, particularly if events in Las Vegas become impossible due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Do you think the UFC got the bonuses right for UFC Fight Island 3?