Augusto Sakai suffered the first knockout loss of his mixed martial arts career last Saturday night (Sept. 5) at UFC Vegas 9. He fell short to the veteran Alistair Overeem.
The Brazilian big man told Ag.fight that the injuries happened early in round two of their five-round Heavyweight tilt inside UFC APEX in Las Vegas, Nevada.
“In the second round, I was hit with a knee that dislocated two of my ribs,” Sakai said, speaking to AG Fight. “When he took me down, he hit me with an elbow that broke two more. So I was without four ribs, so to speak. That got in the way a lot. I could not defend takedowns. I could not show my jiu-jitsu. I could not defend myself very well. Kudos to him.”
“I’m sure he used his experience in his favor, but I was expecting that. What made things difficult for me, and I’m not trying to come up with an excuse here, was the pain in my ribs. Even then, I tried to endure it as much as I could.”