Elijah Smith knocked out Davey Grant in 60 seconds Saturday night at UFC Vegas 124. Nobody had ever done that to Grant. The UFC paid him $100,000 for it with a Performance of the Night bonus, and Johnny Walker and Waldo Cortes-Acosta each took home $100,000 for Fight of the Night after their main event at Meta Apex in Las Vegas.
The UFC announced the bonus winners on X after the Paramount+ card wrapped.
Smith (11-1 MMA, 4-0 UFC) didn’t waste time on a feeling-out process. MMA Junkie described the two bantamweights trading punches less than a minute in, with Smith’s landing harder. A follow-up shot dropped Grant (16-9 MMA, 9-8 UFC), and two more punches on the canvas ended it. Heavy called it the biggest win of Smith’s career and reported that he is now a free agent. That’s an awkward position for the UFC. A 4-0 bantamweight with two career bonuses, per a bonus tally posted to r/MMA, just finished the first fight on his deal by ending a stoppage streak that had stood for Grant’s whole career.
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The headliner earned its check. Walker (24-10 MMA, 10-7 UFC) won the first round with leg kicks, then spent much of the second in trouble and on his back against Cortes-Acosta (17-5 MMA, 10-5 UFC). Heavy had Cortes-Acosta ahead early. In the third, Walker landed a glancing head kick and a spinning strike, dropped Cortes-Acosta, and finished him for the TKO. The win moves Walker to 2-0 at heavyweight, and the bonus is the seventh of his UFC run according to the r/MMA count. Cortes-Acosta leaves with a loss and his third bonus.
The second Performance of the Night went to heavyweight Thomas Petersen (12-5 MMA, 4-4 UFC), who by MMA Junkie’s account could have been stopped twice in the first round by Gabriel Lorenco (6-2 MMA, 0-1 UFC). Petersen survived, took over the second against a gassed Lorenco, and got the TKO with 13 seconds left in the third. That’s his first post-fight bonus.
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Four more fighters picked up $25,000 finish bonuses:
- Nina Milosevic (10-1) stopped Priscila Cachoeira in the second round for her second straight UFC knockout.
- Austin Bashi (15-2) choked out short-notice opponent Carlos Calderon in 67 seconds. Calderon stepped in during fight week after Lucas Brennan withdrew.
- Andre Petroski (14-6) snapped a three-fight skid with a second-round TKO of Mantas Kondratavicius, who was a 3-1 favorite.
- Jose Souza (10-1) opened the card by knocking out Jonny Parsons with an uppercut and left hook with 44 seconds left in Round 1.
My take: Walker getting paid is fine, and Cortes-Acosta earned his share by nearly winning the thing. The real story is Smith. A guy who walks into a contract year, or in this case out of one, and becomes the first to put Grant to sleep has every bit of leverage a bantamweight can have. If the UFC lets a 4-0 fighter with a 60-second knockout of a 17-fight Octagon veteran test the market, somebody in matchmaking should be answering for it.
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