UFC Fight Night 159 featured a featherweight booking with the potential for fireworks, but it ended in just 15 anticlimactic seconds.
To make matters worse, the end wasn’t because of a brutal knockout or wicked submission. Rather, it concluded because of an accidental Yair Rodriguez eye rake, which left foe Jeremy Stephens unable to continue.
Rodriguez (11-2) landed a leg kick and then a glancing front kick to the chest in the early going. But when the two featherweights threw punches simultaneously, “El Pantera” had his left hand open and one of his fingers raked Stephens’ left eye.