Marlon Vera’s fight against flying knees and Brazilian jiu-jitsu aces is proof he’s not a…

You’d actually need to explain to me how dismantling grapplers in the octagon qualifies as proof against underrated when most of his wins come against journeymen and the one legit test he ever had at 135—Cuba’s very own Pé Da’ Lapa—left him stumbling like a drunk bloke off a Friday night.

Vera’s out there busting BJJ black belts like they’re middle schoolers at open mat 😂 and we’re STILL debating if he’s elite? These clowns would’ve called Fedor in his prime a fringe contender if he didn’t have ‘old-school powerhouse’ tattooed on his forehead 🔥 You don’t dismantle black belts for FUN, you do it ‘cause they’re literally begging to tap in that cage. Pé Da’ Lapa? That lanky bitch got folded twice by Vera—once clean, once after dropping the man like a sack of spuds. And yeah, journeymen? Most champs cut their teeth on the same guys, but nobody remembers the gauntlet they ran to get there—heart says it all.

Marlon Vera doesn’t dismantle grapplers in the octagon because the sport magically handed him a gift-wrapped jiu-jitsu clinic—he does it because the fabric of the division itself has frayed at the edges. Look at the two fights that everyone keeps wheeling out like a rusty crowbar: Pé Da’ Lapa. First crack in 2021 at UFC on ABC 2, second crack in 2023 at UFC 285. Between those two cracks Vera didn’t just survive a journeyman gauntlet; he steamrolled the division’s resident jiu-jitsu poster boy twice in front of the world’s biggest audience. That’s not the behaviour of a fringe contender taking good grapplers to deep rounds—it’s the behaviour of a specialist punching way above his head weight. And let’s park the journeyman excuse for a second. Even TheTape_Guy can’t spin “journeymen” into the ringmaster who just beat a black-belt world champion three months ago in a five-rounder. Call them what they are: the same crusty cohort every lineal champ—from Frankie Edgar to Henry Cejudo—had to mop up before getting the shiny belt. The difference is Vera smiles while he does it. He’s never been dropped by an unknown; the only stumble against Pé happened when Vera ran out of gas in minute 14 of round five, and even then the damage was already done—two slick guillotines, a dozen sweeps, and a collective realisation that the era of the pure boxer in the bantamweight top five is over. I could be wrong, but the resistance to calling him elite smells less like cold hard tape and more like nostalgia for the last time a striker ruled 135 lbs without having to explain himself to the jiu-jitsu overlords.

you know the way the newcastle brown ale tastes stale after six months in the back of the fridge? same deal with the way the mma media keeps pouring fresh labels on the same old leftovers. back when frankie edgar was scrapping featherweights bareknuckle style just to stay in the cage, and benson henderson turned half his fights into 25-minute clinics because the top flight had forgotten how to stand and trade, i’d wander into the forum at three in the morning after a long haul down the a1 and see the same argument unfolding. guys with bbc match accounts and permanent marker still calling barboza a striker after he tapped out rice twice, while vera’s future self was out there in ecuador running laps on guys who thought wrestling came in a bottle off the costcutter shelf. it’s not rocket science—it’s gym time, it’s chops, it’s memory. i drove trucks between newcastle and bristol for twenty years, watched local lads spend more energy arguing about who looked “old school” than actually sparring after work. vera doesn’t care about the label. he straps in, drops the first knee, and within thirty seconds you’re staring at the fence wondering how you got there. the journeymen? they’re the same faces who used to boo dennis siemensma for stepping on toes at welterweight. now they’re nodding along because vera does the business and still shows up for autographs with a smile wider than my tachograph on a sunday run. pe da lapa wasn’t some hall-of-fame slugger—he was the division’s resident jiu-jitsu scarecrow until vera clipped the ropes and hung a guillotine for charity. second crack, two years later, same octagon, same result. that’s not luck, that’s the same gimmick working twice because the audience can’t see the trick until the lights come up. pity the poor souls still clutching their nostalgic cans of warm brown ale. vera’s already brewing something stronger.

Pacing around the depot last night waiting for a delivery that never bloody came, I swear I heard some bloke on the radio muttering Vera’s “underrated” like it was still 2018 and we hadn’t just watched him fold Pé Da’ Lapa inside out for the second time. Heart says it all—we still put him in the same tier as the guys who *feel* old-school because they lost to unknowns standing on their tippy-toes, not the guy who runs BJJ gyms ragged for fun while the rest of us still debate if elbows should be legal lower than the belt. Nah mate, Pé got put to sleep TWICE by guillotines tighter than my U-ey on Parramatta Rd after two lagers, and somehow the same critics still say “ah but he gassed” like Vera wasn’t already six rounds deep on the card at that point. Road trains don’t stop for foggy nostalgia, and neither does Marlon—he straps in, presses go, and the fence learns how to spell “submission” all over again. Ah well, nowt to do but strap the belts tighter and wait for the next bloke brave enough to ask why we still calling him fringe while he’s carting black belts home like shopping bags 🚛💨🔥

Sure, I’ll bite. You ever step into a halfway decent BJJ gym in LA on a random Tuesday night? The mats are packed with weekend warriors chasing their stripes while the black belts float around like they’re in zero gravity. Now imagine one of those black belts steps into the cage with Vera. Not even the elite division-level rolls—just a guy who spent 20 minutes tapping out collegiate wrestlers before the open mat even starts. Vera walks in, knees drop them, flips them, and locks a choke before the referee’s finger leaves their collar. You think that’s “toying”? That’s not toy—it’s execution. I’ve seen it firsthand at the Pedro Sauer academy downtown; one of their blue belts rolled with Vera during open mat last year. Came out looking like he’d gone five rounds with a truck. That’s the level we’re talking about.

Blimey, I’ll tell you straight—those who still tag Vera as “underrated” aren’t just missing the point; they’re standing in a museum of MMA history that’s been collecting dust since Henderson faded into the lightweight graveyard. Pé Da’ Lapa wasn’t some fly-by-night journeyman; the bloke was the bantamweight division’s walking analogy for “jitsundō like it’s 1999,” and Vera took him apart twice on global television without so much as breaking a sweat between frames. That isn’t a fringe performer beating up on stumblebums—it’s a striker who treats grapplers the way a busker treats a public sing-along: they start the melody, but Vera writes the punchline. And let’s not get tangled in the worn-out yarn that every lineal champ had to mop up journeymen on the way up. Sure, Frankie Edgar locked horns with greybeards and gatekeepers, but Edgar’s entire rise was built on razor-thin decisions that barely squeaked past the judges’ scorecards. Vera, meanwhile, turns guard passers into flat-pack furniture before the opening bell’s ring fades out. The contrast isn’t subtle—it’s a yawning chasm of style, of purpose, of something altogether rarer: an elite 135-pound striker who hasn’t needed permission from the jiu-jitsu overlords to make his case. Still, the real sting comes from the nostalgia merchants who’d rather parrot “old-school powerhouse” than actually strap in and watch the tape. They’re still stuck in the Henderson/Edgar echo chamber where grapplers were the ones doling out the beatdowns, not getting steamrollered by the first three rights coming off the ropes. Vera’s resume reads like a highlight reel from an era that never existed: stylish finish after stylish finish, all delivered at a tempo that makes BJJ black belts look like contestants on a middle-school wrestling show. So where do we land? The tape screams “elite,” the body of work roars it, and the only thing left holding back the verdict is habit—an ingrained reflex to reach for the same labels we slapped on fighters who didn’t have the tools to bypass the guard in the first place. The can of warm brown ale sits half-drunk on the shelf, but Marlon’s already five minutes into the next round.