Combat NightTallahassee

Combat Night spent August 1 back where it began. The Moon has been on this promotion’s calendar since the beginning, and the broadcast booth said so on the way out: "It’s been another live event here in Tallahassee, Florida, at The Moon, right here where it all started." Nineteen bouts were announced and sixteen were contested, all of them amateur, and ten of the sixteen went to the scorecards.

Ernesto Lavayen took the main event at 125 pounds, beating Dayvion Huttoe on all three cards. Lavayen fights out of Fusion Xcel Performance, by way of Guayaquil, Ecuador, and walks out as Dovahkiin, a nickname the ring announcer cheerfully admitted he could not pronounce.

Six fights ended early, and the quickest of them barely started. Cameron Brunelle needed twenty six seconds to put Trey Bates away. Rajohn Chambers took the first round too, a rear naked choke at 1:43. Three more finished in the second: Micah Perdue by rear naked choke at 46 seconds, Ean Williams by armbar at 1:22, and Javarius Shields by triangle at 1:48. Brett Saylor was the only man to end one with strikes.

The hardest story of the night belonged to two brothers who do not have a gym. Christian Elam and Shilo Elam train in their own backyard. Christian fought first and lost to Saylor in the second round. He was back at the fence later the same night with a mouse already under his eye, telling his younger brother to keep his hands up. Shilo went the full distance with Elijah Pantophlet in a 155 pound kickboxing bout and lost a unanimous decision. Neither brother got his hand raised. Both of them turned up.

Sean McCleary won the heavyweight combat jiu jitsu bout by unanimous decision and then spent his interview on somebody else. "This is going to be pretty short. I don’t talk a lot unless I’m in a combat jujitsu match," he said. "But I want to dedicate this win. I know probably it wasn’t as exciting as a submission or TKO. I want this win to go in honor of him." The man he named had joined his team recently and died unexpectedly that week. "I wish I could have told him more beforehand."

Reggan Northrup took a unanimous decision at 170 and kept a familiar name in the win column, his older brother Reggie having fought on Combat Night cards for years. Isabella Dabage de la Espriella won the closest fight of the night, a split decision in a 115 pound kickboxing bout, and told the broadcast she starts graduate school this fall for a counseling degree she wants to use on professional fighters. It was her first fight. The night opened with a youth kickboxing bout, and Brody Ellrich took it on all three cards.

"Tallahassee, they did not disappoint," the booth said on the way out. "Not even a bit." Combat Night is back August 8 in Kissimmee, amateurs and pros on the same card.