Tamdan McCrory vs. Dustin Hazelett
With Amir Sadollah’s withdrawal from the event due to a leg infection, the main card sees the addition of Tamdan “The Barn Cat” McCrory vs. Dustin “McLovin” Hazelett in a battle for bad nickname supremacy. Both men are largely lost in the shuffle of UFC’s crowded 170 pound division, so a win here could go a long way toward advancing their position and possibly moving them into title contention.
Tamdan McCrory has been impressive in his short UFC stint thusfar, sandwiching his lone loss to Akihiro Gono between quality wins over Pete Spratt and versatile grappler Luke Cummo. A quality wrestler with decent striking and submission skills, McCrory is the proverbial jack of all trades, but master of none. He’s not world class at anything, but he’s also not going to get overwhelmed in any aspect of the game. This well-roundedness is undoubtedly his best weapon heading into a fight where he is largely overmatched.
His opponent, Dustin Hazelett, is an accomplished grappler from Jorge Gurgel’s gym who has carved out a niche for himself with slick submissions. Coming off a win over quality opponent Josh Burkman, Hazelett has only tasted defeat once since 2006, being overwhelmed with strikes by top Welterweight contender Josh Koscheck. Hazelett is definitely the worse striker in this contest, but he is far and away the better grappler. Coupled with his advantage in the experience department, he should be able to corral the fight to the ground and use his superior technique to largely neutralize McCrory’s ground and pound attack.
After a few rounds of frustrating and tiring out his opponent, look for Hazelett to wrap the fight up, literally, with a third round rear naked choke.
