Waldo Cortes-Acosta delivered a brutal first-round knockout to finish Ante Delija after it looked like his night might end after he suffered a gruesome eye poke just moments earlier.
It was a wild turn of events for Cortes-Acosta after he took an eye gouge followed by a flurry of punches from Delija that forced referee Mark Smith to intervene. The fight was stopped momentarily but replays showed that Delija’s finger clearly poked Cortes-Acosta in the eye prior to the barrage of punches he unloaded
in an attempt to get the finish.
Cortes-Acosta was pretty clearly hurt from the eye poke but he was given time to recover and due to the foul, he was allowed to continue if he wanted. He ultimately decided to restart the fight and Cortes-Acosta came out like a man possessed.
Just seconds later, Cortes-Acosta uncorked a perfectly timed counter right hand that flattened Delija and sent him crashing to the canvas. “Salsa Boy” followed up with a few more shots on the ground as Smith swooped in to rescue Delija from further harm.
The stoppage came at 3:59 in a crazy first round.
“I feel a finger go deep inside my eye,” Cortes-Acosta said after his win. “The referee said stop, I stopped. I don’t know the referee or something didn’t poke me in the eyes. I decided to continue because I feel I can continue, my eye is at like 20 percent vision. [Tom] Aspinall, I go for you, I’ll be ready.
“I’m mad. I’m Dominican. That’s in my blood. I’m excited. I want to come back. I want to be champion of the world.”
It was a remarkable turnaround for Cortes-Acosta, especially considering he ate numerous punches while covering up his face after the eye poke that the referee didn’t see until the replay. He obviously recovered enough to restart the fight and score the knockout, although Cortes-Acosta was still putting a towel over his eye even as he conducted his post-fight interview.
It’s a huge win for Cortes-Acosta as he gets back on track following a loss to Sergei Pavlovich in his previous outing while Delija suffers his first loss in the UFC after a successful debut.
