UFC on FOX 3 Results: Breaking Down the Winners and Losers

UFC on FOX 3 was structured differently than the previous two network television installments. 

The two prior cards were heavy on superstars, but light on memorable action. With the third broadcast, Joe Silva and the UFC took a different approach: book four fights with stars that might not be household names, but were almost guaranteed to put on action-packed fights.

And it delivered in spades.

From the Facebook fights all the way to the big Fox card, the entire card was chock-full of excitement. Let's take a look at the biggest winners and losers from the entire night.

Winner: Nathan Diaz

Whatever happened to the Nate Diaz that struggled to win fights just over a year ago? Because that guy is certainly gone now.

Forget having Diaz face Anthony Pettis to determine a new No. 1 contender. After Diaz' dominant win over Jim Miller at UFC on FOX 3, there's no doubt who the new top lightweight contender is. 

Diaz took some time to figure things out in the first round. But just as soon as the second round started, you could see the Stockton native's complexion change. The swagger came back. He started letting loose, both with his hands and with his mouth. Miller was visibly perplexed, like so many of Diaz' other opponents have been over the course of his career.

And then he finished Miller—a lightweight contender who had never been finished before—with a rolling guillotine choke.

We don't need to see Diaz and Pettis square off. We already know who the rightful top contender is.

Winner: Johny Hendricks

Man, this was a close fight.

I can't, in good conscience, call Josh Koscheck a loser. Truth be told, I scored the fight 29-28 for Koscheck, but I also realize it was an incredibly close fight. Either guy winning would've made perfect sense.

The story of Hendricks winning the fight was told perfectly in the instant replay: Hendricks running forward, snapping Koscheck's head left, right and back with monster hooks and uppercuts. Koscheck's eye, swollen shut by the end of the fight, was the only true damage sustained by either fighter in the fight. 

Hendricks moves on to bigger and better things, while Koscheck flies directly into non-title purgatory, likely for the remainder of his career.

Winner: Alan Belcher

Alan Belcher's been working on his leglock defense. Obviously.

Belcher patiently defended several major leg submissions from Rousimar Palhares. He waited for his moment to strike, and found it after Palhares exhausted his leglock attempts and found himself on his back. Belcher struck with poise from the guard, landing two nasty elbows that sent Palhares spiraling into defensive mode. 

Belcher attacked and forced the stoppage. A great performance from a real talent in the middleweight division.

Loser: Rousimar Palhares

Look, I know that Palhares wants to submit dudes with leglocks. It's kind of his thing.

But when it's not working, it's not working. And it was evident from the start that Alan Belcher had trained diligently on defending leg submissions. Which means Palhares should have stopped continually trying for them and changed up the game plan a little bit.

His lack of reaction of Belcher's superb submission defense put him in a bad position, and Belcher capitalized on that bad position. Was it the kind of mental lapse Palhares has suffered in the past? Maybe. 

Or maybe it was just a bad decision made in the heat of the moment. Whatever the cause, it cost Palhares dearly.

Winner: Lavar Johnson

Lavar Johnson is one scary dude. He's never going to be UFC heavyweight champion, but he doesn't have to be. He is a giant, hard-hitting dude with the kind of power to knock dudes out in violent fashion.

Johnson's one-round steamrolling of Pat Barry wasn't without its problems. Barry isn't the best ground artist in the world, but the New Orleans native was able to control Johnson and nearly submit him. Johnson endured, however, and got back to his feet before finishing Barry against the cage with what seemed to be 500 giant punches to the face.

Loser: Pat Barry

Pat Barry's been saying for a long time that he wants to submit someone. He even says he's going to let his hair grow until he earns his first submission in the cage.

He'll be waiting a little bit longer after tonight. Barry utterly failed to capitalize on the ground against an opponent that had even less idea what to do on the mat than he did. Instead, he let Johnson get back to his feet, and that ultimately led to the end of the fight.

Winners: John Dodson and Tim Elliott

I think we can firmly establish that the flyweights are going to be the most exciting division in the UFC.

Sure, they might be forced to ply their trade in front of merely dozens of fans on the preliminary cards. But that'll change as more and more people are exposed to fights such as the one between Ultimate Fighter 14 winner John Dodson and Tim Elliott, because it was an awesome fight. 

Dodson showed all of the poise and quickness that aided him to the TUF championship, but it was Elliott who made the biggest impression, even in losing the decision to "The Magician." Despite being poked in the eye in the first round—and his eye nearly swelling completely shut—Elliot still managed to fire off all kinds of crazy kicks that we rarely see in the Octagon. He tried a Ebersole-style cartwheel kick, for God's sake.

Elliott may have lost the fight, but he gained some new fans tonight.

And future UFC flyweight champion Joseph Benavidez may have gained a new contender for late 2012 in Dodson.

Loser: Tony Ferguson's Back Tattoo

I know that a tattoo is not a real, animate object. But I'm still being subjected to seeing it on my television, so I'm allowed to write about it.

I guess it's fitting that Tony Ferguson was once under the gentle wing of Brock Lesnar at the DeathClutch camp in Minnesota, because both men have just about the worst tattoos you can possibly think of.

For Lesnar, it's the ink on his chest. For Ferguson, it's a pair of giant angel's wings emblazoned across his back. Neither were good life choices, and both are easy for me to mock. At this rate, I'm fully expecting Pat Barry to show up with ink straight out of the Affliction playbook in the near future.

Winner: Louis Gaudinot

The diminutive green-haired Gaudinot was one of the more forgettable characters from last season's Ultimate Fighter. Sure, he had the hair, but he also had the...hair. Yep, that's just about it.

But in his flyweight debut, Gaudinot looks quicker and crisper than he ever did at bantamweight, proving that he's a natural flyweight. He and John Lineker engaged in one of those punching battles where neither guy has enough power to knock the other one out, so they just stand there trading punches the whole time.

That's pretty much exactly what happened until Gaudinot locked in a nasty guillotine in the third round and put Lineker to sleep. He may never be a champion, but Gaudinot can at least hang with the lower tier of UFC flyweights. That's good enough for now.