UFC Vegas 118 results: Sooo … About last night | Belal vs. Bonfim

Yesterday (Sat., June 6, 2026), Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) returned home to Meta Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada, for UFC Vegas 118. In the main event, former Welterweight champion Belal Muhammad hoped to avoid a three-fight losing streak by turning away rising contender Gabriel Bonfim. The rest of the card was unusually stacked with good talent, as Brendan Allen, Fares Ziam, and Bryce Mitchell are all fairly accomplished ranked fighters who could genuinely make an impact in their division — not bad for the Apex!

Let’s take a look back over the best performances and techniques of the evening:

Gabriel Bonfim proved himself a genuine threat to the UFC Welterweight title.

It wasn’t terribly long ago that Belal Muhammad was a UFC champion. A year prior to Muhammad’s title win, Bonfim was gassing out terribly and getting knocked out by Nicholas Dalby, a respected veteran but somebody who never came anywhere close to title contention. For Bonfim to develop to the point that he’s capable of putting on a five-round masterclass is very impressive, and it makes you wonder about the 28-year-old Brazilian’s overall potential.

This bout was dominated by range. Bonfim stranded Muhammad at the jab and kick distance, but he wasn’t afraid to sit down on his counter shots. When Muhammad tried to “Bully” his way back into the fight, Bonfim would fire counter combinations with both volume and ill intentions. In the process, he bloodied up Muhammad and convinced him to spend more time at range getting kicked to pieces.

It was a whole lot more dominant than Ian Garry’s win eight months ago. The Welterweight title mix is a logjam right now, so hopefully Islam Makhachev books a fight soon and these contenders can start squaring off with clear consequences on the line.

Brendan Allen took a major risk in facing unranked Edmen Shahbazyan rather than waiting for a more appropriate matchup.

Fortunately, he won pretty clearly. Shahbazyan’s jab was sharp from the first bell, but otherwise, he struggled to answer Allen’s more diverse offense. “All In” attacked with kicks, right hand leads, lots of elbows, knees from the clinch, and more! He continued to attack as the range shifted from distance to the pocket to the clinch and vice versa. Though the takedowns never really materialized, Allen landed the heavier shots and consistently kept Shahbazyan on the defensive.

So … does this win matter much? It’s great that Allen extended his win streak to three, but this was a reasonable competitive fight. It didn’t look like No. 4 mopping the floor with some unranked random. Allen was calling for a title shot in his post-fight interview, but I don’t know that this victory generated any momentum towards that goal.

Santiago Luna has a lot of the technical tools and physical gifts you would look for in a fighter hoping to defeat Bryce Mitchell. A physically dynamic athlete and accomplished wrestler, Luna has natural knockout power in a way that “Thug Nasty” simply cannot match. Unfortunately, he’s also 21 years old and took this fight on less than two weeks notice.

Subsequently, Luna fell into many traps, which moved this fight from competitive matchup to one-sided domination. Early on, he willingly tried to take down Mitchell for no real reason, and he wound up on his back for four minutes as result. Why wrestle the jiu-jitsu ace? Luna is accustomed to finishing his boxing combinations by shooting or clinching, because that’s his typical strategy.

Against Mitchell, it backfired badly.

Both men ended up on bottom at some point, and the different levels of comfort were clear. Luna could do little more than hold on, as he wasn’t confident enough to risk his neck scrambling. Mitchell, conversely, was throwing up triangle attempts and trying to wrestle into top position, keeping Luna defensive even from bad positions. Late in the fight, Luna tried for a Hail Mary d’arce choke attempt, a display of pure inexperience that landed him on bottom and saw him submitted at the bell.

Luna is still a great prospect, but hopefully, some lessons are learned here for “Border Boy.” As for Mitchell, the notable improvement was his gas tank, which looked much healthier in his second cut down to Bantamweight compared to his divisional debut a few months ago.

Poland’s Next Champion?

I generally don’t put much weight into beating Ibo Aslan, Austen Lane, or Junior Tafa — that’s pretty much the bottom of the Light Heavyweight ranks, a division in dire shape. Still, I have to give Iwo Baraniewski his due. He’s running through this class of competition like a superheated knife through room temperature butter!

Opposite Tafa, Baraniewski was unusually patient, which meant the fight lasted nearly 90 full seconds. Rather than charge forward and trade with the power puncher, Baraniewski slammed home a couple ripping calf kicks at distance. It didn’t take many to cripple Tafa and send him to the canvas, where a hail of ground strikes officially sealed the deal.

Now 9-0 with nine first-round finishes, Baraniewski is still a mystery but has obvious talent. Maybe it’s time for a gritty, ranked veteran like Alonzo Menifield?

An Unlikely Flyweight Contender

Edgar Chairez punched his ticket into the Top 15 by clubbing-and-subbing Flyweight veteran Bruno Silva.

In the opening exchanges, Silva seemed to have a small edge, timing Chairez’s jab and countering with his right hand. 30 seconds later, however, that jab was finding the mark like a piston. His jab has never looked better, and Silva’s nose was soon bloodied from just a handful of snapping shots.

Chairez didn’t just jab, quickly building on that rangefinder with a cracking right hand that sat his opponent down. Silva, living up to his “Bulldog” moniker, popped back up and tried to press the action even harder. As a result, Chairez continued to crack him with jabs then timed a nasty uppercut counter. The second knockdown left Silva dazed and confused, highly vulnerable to the rear naked choke finish.

After seven UFC fights, Chairez has established himself as a dangerous finisher and is clearly improving at 30 years of age. He’s only lost to Joshua Van and Tatsuro Taira — arguably the best two fighters in the division! — in that span. If he can continue to grow at this rate, perhaps he earns a rematch with one of those two young talents in the not-too-distant future.