The Ultimate Fighter 33, Episode 3: Coach Colby Covington gets involved

The third episode of The Ultimate Fighter: Team Cormier vs. Team Sonnen began with a notorious UFC star injecting some chaos into the house.

Colby "Chaos" Covington is one of Chael Sonnen’s assistant coaches this season and the polarizing former interim welterweight was shown having a heart-to-heart with Team Sonnen’s Diego Bianchini during a training session and then gave him some friendly advice about the business side of the sport.

Believe it or not, Covington was not always outspoken and mostly flew under the radar early in his career before he made a drastic change to his public persona.

Back in 2017, Covington had a 7-1 UFC record but wasn’t really close to a title shot and wasn’t in the best standing with the organization despite being a top-10-ranked contender – that’s to say he didn’t have a reputation for being an entertaining fighter.

That all changed thanks to his matchup with Demian Maia.

Covington took on Maia in Maia’s native Brazil and he put on a dominant performance against a respected two-time UFC title challenger before giving a memorable post-fight speech (ironically or fittingly, Sonnen's TUF 33 head coaching counterpart Daniel Cormier was holding the mic) during which Covington insulted the Brazilian crowd, who booed him mercilessly, and called out then-champion Tyron Woodley.

Covington was shown talking about that fight with Bianchini, a 9-1 welterweight fighter on Team Sonnen who’s from Brazil and recalled that moment.

The business of mixed martial arts for fighters, unfortunately, is about more than merely wins and losses, and Covington gave Bianchini some pointers on how to market himself. 

Following his interaction with Covington, Bianchini could be seen with some increased bravado inside the TUF house and a budding rivalry with fellow welterweight competitor Rodrigo Sezinando of Team Sonnen began to form.

Bianchini trains with the Fighting Nerds team – known for being home to Caio Borralho, Jean Silva, Carlos Prates and Mauricio Ruffy among others – while Sezinando is a fellow Brazilian who has been competing in Canada the past couple years. As of the third episode of TUF 33, neither Bianchini nor Sezinando had fought in the 170-pound tournament.

Carla Esparza was this week’s special guest coach. The recently retired Esparza was a two-time UFC strawweight champion and a past winner of TUF. She became the inaugural 115-pound champion thanks to her undefeated run on Season 20 that she capped off with a championship win over future two-time champ Rose Namajunas. Esparza was seen giving some wrestling tips to Team Sonnen.

Spoilers below for TUF 33, Episode 3:

THE MATCHUP

This week’s bout was the second contest in the flyweight tournament and a meeting of unbeaten fighters. Daniel Cormier selected Imanol Rodriguez from his team to face Team Sonnen’s Arshiyan Memon.

Mexico’s Rodriguez, 25 with a 5-0 pro record, occasionally trains with the Brazilian Warriors team alongside recent featherweight title challenger Diego Lopes.

Memon, 29 from Mumbai, is making history this season as the first Indian competitor in TUF history. He has a 7-0 pro record with seven finishes. Memon quickly endeared himself to his TUF housemates with his friendly, humorous personality and became a favourite among Team Sonnen members.

THE FIGHT

This was an opposite stance matchup with Rodriguez an orthodox fighter and Memon a southpaw, which contributed to an early foul from Memon who attempted an inside low leg kick but landed directly to Rodriguez’s cup in the opening minute of Round 1. 

Within a minute of the action resuming, Rodriguez connected on a hard body kick that hurt Memon who went down to the canvas. Memon eventually recovered and fired back aggressively with body kicks of his own and looping left hooks with his head held high as he backed up on a straight line.

Memon shot for a takedown midway through the round, but Rodriguez was able to defend and spin to take Memon’s back. Rodriguez flattened Memon out on the canvas then briefly spun him into mount position before being bucked off.

Once back to their feet it was Memon who pressed forward aggressively.

UFC president Dana White said during the action while watching from cageside: “Damn this fight’s got me on the edge of my seat.”

In the final minute of the opening round, Memon stood in front of Rodriguez with his hands at his sides and Rodriguez capitalized by landing a hard straight right hand. Memon stayed on his feet but proceeded to eat an additional dozen unanswered punches before the referee called off the fight.

Rodriguez won via technical knockout and now joins Team Sonnen’s Joseph Morales in the semifinals of the 125-pound tourney.

“Damn, that was a badass fight,” White added. “Great fight. That’s one of the best fights I’ve seen in a minute. … I was impressed. Imanol looks like the kind of fighter we want in the flyweight division.”

NEXT UP

Team Cormier had control of the next matchup selection and Cormier went with Jeff Creighton from his team and Andreeas Binder of Team Sonnen.

Creighton is an 11-2 pro from the United States; Binder is10-2 fighting out of Ireland.