Medic stops Rodriguez in 30 seconds at UFC Belgrade
Uros Medic needed half a minute to finish Daniel Rodriguez in the main event at Belgrade Arena, then told the crowd he had missed home for nine years.
The first thing anyone heard was Vidovdan. Uros Medic walked out of the tunnel at Belgrade Arena to that song, the stands picked up a “Kosovo, Serbia” chant, and the fight that followed lasted half a minute.
He did not throw the first strike either. Daniel Rodriguez opened low with a calf kick that put Medic briefly on one knee. Medic was up instantly, no pause, no step back. What came next went into the books as a TKO by strikes, round one, 0:30.
What actually happened in those thirty seconds?
The accounts differ on the finishing blow. The UFC’s official report credits a left hand that met Rodriguez as he came in. CBS Sports describes a four-strike burst in which a lead left hook hurt the American and a knee to the body put him down. Bloody Elbow mentions both knees and a kick to the body of a downed opponent. Even the clock is not unanimous: the official time is 0:30, while Telegraf and several Serbian outlets timed it at 29 seconds.
Nobody disputes the rest. Rodriguez went down, Medic followed him with ground strikes, and referee Jason Herzog waved it off. This was a welterweight main event at 77 kilograms, booked for five rounds. One tenth of the first was enough.
The numbers behind the knockout
Medic leaves Belgrade at 14-3, with every one of those wins coming by finish. Rodriguez drops to 20-6 and loses a three-fight winning run, having walked in after eight months in a Tijuana jail cell. Medic arrived on a three-fight streak of his own.
The line that says most about how he closes:
- the UFC counts this as his fourth straight first-round stoppage
- FightMag logs a second consecutive first-round knockout, after he beat Jeff Neal in Houston in February
- with five first-round knockouts he is now tied for the most in UFC welterweight history
That is no longer a hot streak explained away by one good night. That is a pattern.
Straight out of the cage
Medic got the microphone before his breathing settled.
I just want to cry, man. I just want to cry. I missed home so much. Nine years, it’s a long time.
Nine years is the exact measure of his absence. He left for the United States as a student, 22 years old, and came back to Belgrade as the man closing a UFC card. Then he added a line that sounded less like a thank-you and more like a warning.
I have so many words, I don’t think we enough time tonight. With that being said, I’m going to cook the rest of this division.
Bonuses and the rest of the card
The UFC handed out four Performance of the Night awards worth 100,000 dollars each, to Medic, Navajo Stirling, Gilbert Urbina and Nina Nikolija Milosevic. Stirling stopped Jan Blachowicz by TKO in the first round at 2:56 in the co-main event. Aleksandar Rakic took a unanimous decision over Marcin Tybura, 30-27 on all three cards.
The other Serbian fighters, from Jovan Leka and Borislav Nikolic to Milos Janicic, Dusko Todorovic, Vlasto Cepo and Marina Spasic, the first Serbian woman to fight in the UFC, each have their own report in today’s edition.
Why this night entered the UFC record book
When we published the running order on Friday, in “UFC Belgrade: first bell at 4 p.m., Medic closes the night”, the open question was whether a card stacked with strikers could hold that pace. It did, and it rewrote a table while doing it. Of 14 fights in Belgrade, 12 ended by knockout or submission, a new promotional record, and the ten first-round finishes beat the previous eight set at UFC 329.
Medic is 33 and has no reason left to take unranked opponents. The next step is a name from the welterweight top 15, and the UFC has yet to announce either the opponent or the date.
