Grading the Latest Episode of the Ultimate Fighter

Season 29 of The Ultimate Fighter—billed as The Return of The Ultimate Fighter: Team Volkanovski vs. Team Ortega—is now well underway, with episode four airing on Tuesday night. 

As the season's official name suggests, it's coached by UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski and the division's No. 2-ranked contender Brian Ortega. The two featherweights and their chosen coaching staff are mentoring a group of eight middleweights and eight bantamweight hopefuls, who are battling through a six-week tournament in hopes of earning a UFC contract.

In episode four, we witnessed the lead-up to a bantamweight quarterfinal fight between Sanford MMA product "Scrappy" Dustin Lampros and Team Alpha Male staple Vince Murdock, as well as the fight itself.

The episode also featured plenty of the other things that have kept TUF around for 29 seasons—namely some sizzling drama involving the coaches and the contestants.

But how did episode four stack up overall?

Keep scrolling for our official grading. 

The Coaching: B+

The coaches are a big part of the reason fans tune in for any season The Ultimate Fighter. And while Volkanovski and Ortega don't really stack up to previous coaches like Conor McGregor and Michael Bisping when it comes to name value, they're both putting forth excellent efforts. 

Contrary to his 0-4 skid to start the season, Volkanovski seems like the objectively better coach—though it's possible that's just because of the way the show's been edited. One way or another, the featherweight champ's coaching skill was on full display on this week's episode.

Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC

Early on, he gave his team a rousing pep talk after their previous three losses. He then brought in UFC welterweight contender Michael Chiesa—a former TUF winner—to get his team fired up about their futures. He even helped his fighter, Dustin Lampros, through a tough 12-pound weight cut.

"It didn't seem like it bothered him—I was talking up his time," Lampros said after the fact. "I'm pretty blessed to have him as a coach."

Ortega also made some solid efforts for his team this week, notably showing up at the fighter house to cook dinner—though it's worth noting that Volkanovski did just that on episode three.

The Drama: B-

The fist-fighting makes it easy to forget that The Ultimate Fighter is, at its roots, a reality television show—and no reality television program is complete without drama. 

Surprisingly, however, episodes one through three of this season featured little drama. No brawls outside the cage, nobody kicking down doors, nobody urinating on beds.

Thankfully, that changed a bit in episode four. While it was hardly an episode of The Real World, it concluded with a pretty heated exchange between coaches Volkanovski and Ortega.

The trouble began when Volkanovski accused Ortega of being late for next week's fight announcement. Ortega then fired back by noting that his team has a commanding 4-0 lead to start this season.

"Your boys did well, you didn't do s--t," Volkanovski responded.

UFC welterweight contender Michael Chiesa, who Volkanovski brought in as a special guest coach for this week's episode, even got involved, urging one of Ortega's coaches to stay out of the feud.

"Let these guys do their talking and shut up," he said.

Again, it's not the kind of drama you're going to read about in the tabloids tomorrow, but hey, it was something.

The Fight: A

Episode four's fight—a bantamweight scrap between Vince Murdock and Dustin Lampros—was probably the best of the season so far.

The two bantamweights made things fun right away, exchanging chopping low kicks and big punches mere seconds after the opening bell. Somewhere in the early going, Lampros managed to sting Murdock, but the experienced Team Alpha Male product kept calm under fire. From there, Lampros continued to push forward, but ultimately let his guard down and paid the price.

A Murdock right hook sent him crashing to the mat. Lampros managed to hang in there for a few seconds thereafter, but he ultimately ate a skull-rattling knee for his efforts. The ref promptly intervened, handing Murdock a first-round TKO victory and Team Ortega its fourth straight victory.

The Rest: A+

One of the best things about The Ultimate Fighter is the way the show gives us an in-depth look at the fighters we're watching—not just as athletes, but as people.

It's something UFC President Dana White himself noted in a recent exclusive interview with B/R.

"I just think that The Ultimate Fighter is a deeper dive into who these guys are—their personalities, where they come from, what they're all about, how they train," the UFC boss said.

Episode four certainly had plenty of that.

Early on, we were given a peek into Lampros' life, as the bantamweight opened up on the death of his mother, his father's struggles with alcoholism and his relationship with his little brother.

Not long thereafter, Murdock shed some light on his backstory, explaining how a previous UFC run was derailed by a serious brain issue that was only detected in a pre-fight medical.

In terms of that sort of stuff, this episode absolutely overdelivered. It was at once both heart-wrenching and heartwarming. A+!