Kai Kara-France made a real statement with his performance in the co-main event this past Saturday night in Perth.
It was a battle of top flyweight contenders at UFC 305 and "Don't Blink" showed why he still belongs in title contention following consecutive defeats.
He was able to stop Perth's own Steve Erceg in the opening round, after dropping him with a huge overhand shot that caught the former title challenger clean.
Some follow-up strikes led to him earning a performance bonus for his third knockout or TKO win in the UFC's 125-pound weight class.
While it was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the night, a former champion did have a point to address after seeing the stoppage.
Aljamain Sterling Says Steve Erceg Was Still Intelligently Defending Himself At The Time Of UFC 305 Stoppage
In his post-UFC 305 breakdown on his YouTube channel, former bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling discussed the stoppage in this fight.
"Funk Master" has spoken before about his loss to Sean O'Malley at UFC 292, where he believes the referee jumped in too early when he was still intelligently defending himself despite taking some follow-up strikes after being dropped.
Sterling made the same case for Erceg in this fight after seeing how, in his opinion, "Astro Boy" was still in the fight even though his opponent was putting strikes together to get the finish.
Now, the stoppage was a little odd for me. Like yeah he was hurt beforehand but then he's starting to recover. My only gripe with the stoppage is you see the guy turn and you see him cover and then you see him trying to get up, he gets hit once, like let him eat a couple because it's not like it's catching him clean on the chin right? That would be clear, you're not intelligently defending yourself but if you at least are smart enough to put an arm up, it's like, 'Hey, this is better here. It might rattle my head a little bit but it's better here than just taking clean shots to the dome.'
If you can be conscious enough to do that, I think the refs should pay attention to those scenarios. Yes, the whole sequence, I'm not a ref. I'm not a ref but from a fighter's standpoint, we think about these things and I don't even think Erceg even like really was protesting or anything but I'm sure he was still in the back of his mind like, 'I don't want to be that guy but I'm still kinda annoyed because I could have maybe fought through that and weathered the storm.' Who knows, we would never know now.