UFC 284: How did Josh Emmett do in his last fight?

UFC veteran Josh Emmett will get his first shot at a championship in the promotion when he takes on Yair Rodriguez for the interim featherweight title at UFC 284 on Saturday, Feb. 11. The event will take place at the RAC Arena in Perth, Western Australia at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+ PPV. Emmett's bout against Rodriguez will be the co-feature on the main card.

Emmett (18-2) is a +160 underdog at DraftKings Sportsbook, but he is on a five-fight win streak that includes victories over Michael Johnson, Dan Ige and Shane Burgos. The 37-year-old from Phoenix, Arizona was last in the octagon on June 18 against Calvin Kattar in the headline bout of a “UFC on ESPN” card.

In the fight against Kattar, it was expected to be a tight, hard-hitting contest and the first round played out in that form with both fighters connecting over the final three minutes of the round. Emmett was cut late in the round off a 1-2 from Kattar, but a final flurry of strikes in closing seconds gave Emmett a chance to steal the round.

In the second round, Emmett staggered Kattar early, but the latter did a good job of creating space with his jab and controlled Emmett for much of the round to win on all three cards. With Kattar starting to sit down on his jab, Emmett got aggressive in the third round and began to swing with bad intentions. He landed some massive right hands in the round that caused Kattar's face to swell up and earned Emmett a 10-9 on all the scorecards.

The fourth round saw Kattar go back to his jab with more success, snapping Emmett's head back on a couple of connects. Emmett wants to brawl and is throwing major power shots, but the ones that miss are leaving him open for Kattar's attack. With his haymakers failing, Emmett goes to low kick while Kattar continues to connect upstairs to bloody Emmett's face.

In the final round, Kattar continued his sound gameplan of working the jab and busting up Emmett's face. Meanwhile, Emmett, sensing he was behind on the cards, began to pick up the pace and come forward with big swings. He connects at times but seems to be victimized by Kattar's jab more.

As the fight finished, Kattar seemed to be the favorite to win based on the action, but Emmett's aggressive won two of the judges over for a split-decision win.

  
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