Time certainly appears to be of the essence for
Marlon
Moraes in the unsparing
Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight division.
The
American Top Team-trained Brazilian will attempt to nail down
his first win in more than two years when he confronts
Yadong Song
in the
UFC Fight Night 203 co-main event on March 12 at the UFC Apex
in Las Vegas. Moraes enters the cage on a career-worst three-fight
losing streak. He last appeared at UFC 266, where he succumbed to
punches from
Merab
Dvalishvili in the second round of their Sept. 25 encounter.
Song, meanwhile, carries some momentum after back-to-back
victories. He last competed on Nov. 13, when he brought down
Julio
Arce with a head kick and follow-up punches in the second round
of their UFC Fight Night 197 pairing.
As Moraes and Song move ever closer to their pivotal battle at 135
pounds, a look at some of the numbers that have accompanied them to
this point:
33: Years of age for Moraes, who was born on April 26, 1988 in Nova
Friburgo, Brazil.
10: Moraes victories by knockout or technical knockout, accounting
for 43% of his career total (23). His list of victims includes
Jimmie
Rivera,
Aljamain
Sterling,
Josh Hill,
Carson
Beebe and
Tyson Nam.
Moraes owns six other victories by decision and seven more by
decision.
1,011: Days spent by Moraes as undisputed
World Series of Fighting bantamweight champion. He captured the
title with a five-round unanimous decision over
Josh
Rettinghouse in the WSOF 9 co-feature on March 29, 2014,
successfully defended it on five different occasions and vacated
his throne to sign with the UFC on Jan. 3, 2017.
32: Seconds needed for Moraes to wipe out Beebe with punches at
WSOF 6 in October 2013. Having occurred more than eight years ago,
it remains the fastest finish of his 33-fight career.
.735: Cumulative winning percentage between the nine
men—Dvalishvili,
Rob Font,
Cory
Sandhagen,
Henry
Cejudo,
Raphael
Assuncao,
Deividas
Taurosevicius,
Ralph
Acosta,
Zeilton
Rodrigues and
Alexandre
Pinheiro—who have defeated Moraes. They sport a combined record
of 144-52.
24: Years of age for Song, who was born in Heilongjiang, China, on
Dec. 2, 1997.
7: Song wins by knockout or technical knockout, accounting for 39%
of his career total (18). In addition to Arce, his list of victims
includes
Alejandro
Perez,
Felipe
Arantes and
Rae Yoon
Ok. Song holds three other wins by submission and eight more by
decision.
6: First-round finishes on the Song resume, with two of them having
taken place inside the Octagon. He submitted
Bharat
Khandare with a guillotine choke in 4:16 at UFC Fight Night 122
on Nov. 25, 2017 and punched out the aforementioned Perez in 2:04
at UFC 239 on July 6, 2019.
55: Significant strikes by which Song has outlanded the opposition
during his current two-fight winning streak. He has connected on
146 such strikes against Arce and
Casey
Kenney while absorbing only 91 of them in return.
80: Combined victories between the five men—
Kyler
Phillips,
Renat
Ondar,
Alexey
Polpudnikov,
Giovanni
Moljo and
Xian Ji—who have
beaten Song. They boast a cumulative .667 winning percentage
(80-38-2).