SportsJOE’s Monday Morning Awards: Who was expecting UFC Seoul to be that exciting?

Fights at 10 A.M. Irish time? We likey.

MMA fans on this side of the Atlantic got the rare treat of watching some UFC action at a reasonable hour as the octagon set up shop in South Korea for the first time. Nobody was expecting much from the Fight Pass event but boy did it deliver as we saw five wars that required split decision victories and five stellar finishes. Here are the warriors who earned our appreciation from Seoul.

Knockout of the Night - Dominique Steele

With a nickname like Non-Stop Action-Packed, the pressure was piled on to impress and Dominique Steele did just that. Steele went into enemy territory to take on Dong Hyun Kim (not that one) and earned himself a stunning knockout victory with a slam that would make Rampage proud. Steele got hold of a double-leg at the very beginning of the third and final round and hoisted Kim into the air before dropping him on the back of his head and stole robbed his consciousness. A few elbows for good measure forced Leon Roberts to jump in and Steele got his first UFC victory.

Submission of Night - N/A

Performance of the Night - Seo Hee Ham

The strawweights may not hit like heavyweights but Seo Hee Ham and Cortney Casey engaged in an absolute war on the undercard of UFC Seoul. Ham had her work cut out against the much bigger, much stronger and much more athletic Casey but the crowd favourite bit down on her mouthpiece and continued to come forward à la Wanderlei Silva. After being rocked early from a Casey headkick, Ham finally got inside her opponent's range and started punishing with knees and step-in left hands with her zombie-like forward pressure earning her a unanimous decision win.

One to Watch - Doo Ho Choi

Korean Superboy indeed. Doo Ho Choi put the featherweight division on high alert with his stoppage over the heavy handed, concrete-chinned wrestler Sam Sicilia on Saturday morning. Sicilia came out looking for a knockout, cocking his right hand and waiting to uncork. But it was Choi who uncorked first as he let rip with a right hook-left hook combination that dropped Sicilia and the Korean finished the job with three swift strikes on the ground to move to 13-1.