Welcome to the upper echelon of the UFC's welterweight division, Stephen Thompson. An upset, first-round knockout of former champion Johny Hendricks on Saturday places Thompson among the top 170-pounders in the world.
The UFC Fight Night event in Las Vegas also saw the official crowning of 24-year-old Mickey Gall as winner of the CM Punk sweepstakes.
Here's what really mattered most from the weekend:
Stephen Thompson: 'Wonderboy,' kickboxer extraordinaire and ... title challenger?
A myriad of injuries in the often-plagued heavyweight division saw Thompson's bout against Hendricks elevated to the main event on Saturday. That said, though, he was forced to share the spotlight with the CM Punk love triangle, plus the official announcement of Daniel Cormier-Jon Jones II, which was guaranteed to hog the news cycle a bit.
But Thompson's performance is what mattered most this weekend. Until this win, Thompson was basically just a well-liked, entertaining addition to any UFC card -- but not someone you'd include in a conversation about title contention. He's a fun, unorthodox striker who (sadly) didn't start training in grappling until his late 20s. That last part felt like a deal-breaker when it came to Thompson ever holding a UFC title.
Then Saturday happened. Thompson dwarfed Hendricks, a guy who has had well-documented trouble making 170 pounds, in size. He completely befuddled the former champion on his feet (Hendricks had no idea whether Thompson was coming or going) and he passed his biggest test of all in defending a deep single-leg takedown against the fence while Hendricks was still very fresh.
Will Thompson get a title shot off this? My guess is probably not. A rematch between champion Robbie Lawler and Carlos Condit, an early favorite for fight of the year, is more marketable. The constant tease of a Georges St-Pierre return still looms. Tyron Woodley is floating around, although once again we see the potential downside of waiting for a title shot as Woodley did. Thompson is coming off a career win against the No. 2 guy in the division. Meanwhile, it's difficult to even recall T-Wood's last fight (hint: it was January 2015). Right now, if it came down to those two, I'd rather see Thompson get the shot.
Given the circumstances, Mickey Gall looks as legit as any of us could have hoped for
The WWE couldn't have written that one up any better. A first-round submission for Gall in his UFC debut? That's what the script called for, right? CM Punk is getting a fight and, although Gall only has a 2-0 record, you can't call the kid a bum. No sir.
It has to be noted that Michael Jackson was not a huge hurdle for Gall to leap over. None of the six strikes he managed to throw (before Gall choked him out) seemed to have real bad intentions. When the bout was over, Jackson went to press row (he's a budding MMA journalist) and, later, asked a self-deprecating question to Gall at the post-fight press conference.
Basically, he looked like he was content just to be there. Had there been a gift shop selling "I fought in the UFC and all I got was this lousy T-shirt" memorabilia, I believe Jackson would have picked some up.
And that's not a knock on him. His goal was never to stick in the UFC. I only point out his shoulder-shrug reaction to the loss to illustrate that, yes, Gall wasn't fighting a UFC-caliber opponent on Saturday. But he looked comfortable under the spotlight and performed as well as anyone could have asked for.
Now, at the very least, we won't go into CM Punk's first pro fight thinking the UFC just found him someone to kick around. The fact that Punk, whose birth name is Phil Brooks, will face someone who has started to prove himself in the way Gall has makes the whole "CM Punk experience" more interesting.