#3 Jake Hecht vs. Rich Attonito – UFC 140: Jones vs. Machida – 12/10/11
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The UFC’s second show in Toronto, UFC 140 was another loaded card with a triple main event of Jon Jones vs. Lyoto Machida, Frank Mir vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and Tito Ortiz vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira. Like with the previously mentioned Garza/Jabouin fight, nobody was really anticipating the prelim fight between TUF veteran Rich Attonito and newcomer Jake Hecht.
In fact, the fight was never originally booked on the card. Attonito was supposed to fight Claude Patrick, but when Rory MacDonald dropped out of his scheduled fight with Brian Ebersole, Patrick moved up the card and Hecht stepped in on late notice.
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Coming out of Matt Hughes’s old camp in Illinois, Hecht had a record of 7-2 but was largely unknown. He was a firm underdog against Attonito, who had won three of four fights in the UFC.
Evidently, Hecht didn’t care about the odds. A takedown and some ground control – albeit not with too much damage – won the first round for Attonito and things seemed to be going according to plan for him. In the second round, though, Hecht changed things up. Big time.
Attonito again went for the takedown but this time Hecht was able to defend, getting his back to the cage and jockeying for under hooks. As Attonito dropped even lower to attempt a double leg, Hecht made his move, landing a vicious series of elbows to the side of Attonito’s head that caused his legs to buckle.
The TUF veteran went down and Hecht quickly sealed the deal with some punches. The announcers marvelled as it was the first time they’d ever seen such a finish, although Hecht mentioned a past opponent – fellow UFCer Che Mills – had tried the same tactic on him when they’d fought.
At the time, after such a unique finish, it was expected that Hecht might go on to big things in the UFC, but it never happened. He lost his next two fights and was released from the promotion.
Just under two years later, Travis Browne used the same series of elbows in two fights, knocking out both Gabriel Gonzaga and Josh Barnett. A bigger stage and against better opponents, admittedly, but I find it unfair that such a cool finish has since been attributed to Browne when in fact, Jake Hecht was the man to innovate it inside the UFC Octagon!
