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History · 2018 · UFC Fight Night: Alvarez vs. Poirier 2 · John Makdessi vs Ross Pearson
From the tape · 28 Jul 2018

John Makdessi vs Ross Pearson

UFC Fight Night: Alvarez vs. Poirier 2 · Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Result

John Makdessi beat Ross Pearson

Method
Decision - Unanimous
Round
3 of 3
Clock
5:00
LightweightMain cardReferee · Yves Lavigne

We published no prediction for this bout. Everything on this page is the official record and the tape it was fought on — the result, the round-by-round counts, the judges’ cards where they exist and the sportsbook line where one was published. Our graded calls start in 2026 and live on the public record.

JM
Red corner JohnMakdessi“The Bull”Tristar Gym · Halifax, Nova Scotia
VSOn the tape
RP
Blue corner RossPearson“The Real Deal”Central Coast MMA · Sunderland, Tyne and Wear
Lightweight3 rounds28 Jul 2018
The story going in
  • Has finished 3 of 8 UFC wins.
  • Has finished 5 of 12 UFC wins.
  • Lands 1.8 more significant strikes a minute than Pearson.
  • 24 UFC bouts deep — 10 more than Makdessi.
18-9
Record
20-16
33
Age
33
5' 8"
Height
5' 8"
68″
Reach
+1″69″
Orthodox
Stance
Orthodox
14
UFC bouts
+1024
3/838% of wins
Finishes
+4%5/1242% of wins
Tristar Gym
Gym
Central Coast MMA
Halifax, Nova Scotia
From
Sunderland, Tyne and Wear
Vitals, record, nickname and camp come from the public UFC fighter register and are current, not a snapshot of fight night. UFC bouts, finish rate and every storyline line are counted off the official UFC fight record. A tick marks the side holding the raw edge in that row — longer reach, taller, younger, more bouts, a higher finish rate. It is a fact about the tape, not a prediction, and rows with no clean comparison (record, stance, gym, hometown) carry no tick at all. Any row we cannot fill on both sides is left out rather than half-drawn. Streaks, bout counts and finish rates are as they stood going into this fight — this bout and everything after it is excluded from the count.

Round by round

Every round the fight went, shaded by where the significant strikes actually landed — the takedowns, control time and knockdowns beside them, and how the three judges scored that round.

UFCStats · per round

3 rounds of tape

Round 15:00 of action
John Makdessi30 sig landed
HEAD57%17 of 44BODY3%1 of 4LEGS40%12 of 16
Ross Pearson27 sig landed
HEAD52%14 of 48BODY4%1 of 4LEGS44%12 of 13
30 of 64
Sig.
strikes
27 of 65
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 30Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 27Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Makdessi firstDerek Cleary10–9Dr. Greg Jackson9–10Chris Lee9–10
Round 25:00 of action
John Makdessi41 sig landed
HEAD66%27 of 65BODY24%10 of 14LEGS10%4 of 4
Ross Pearson30 sig landed
HEAD70%21 of 74BODY20%6 of 6LEGS10%3 of 9
41 of 83
Sig.
strikes
30 of 89
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 39Clinch 2Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 30Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Makdessi firstDerek Cleary10–9Dr. Greg Jackson10–9Chris Lee10–9
Round 35:00 of actionEnded 5:00
John Makdessi60 sig landed
HEAD92%55 of 102BODY3%2 of 7LEGS5%3 of 5
Ross Pearson22 sig landed
HEAD73%16 of 60BODY9%2 of 5LEGS18%4 of 5
60 of 114
Sig.
strikes
22 of 70
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 2
0:00
Control
0:18
Distance 51Clinch 9Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 22Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Makdessi firstDerek Cleary10–8Dr. Greg Jackson10–9Chris Lee10–8

Significant strikes, takedowns, control time, knockdowns and submission attempts exactly as UFCStats recorded them for this bout, round by round. Zone percentages are that round’s landed head, body and leg counts over their own total — raw arithmetic, nothing modelled or smoothed. A round in which a fighter landed nothing shades empty and reads zero; it is never filled in from the round before.

The cards, totalled

The judges’ final totals, the media’s cards beside them, and how these judges usually score. Their round-by-round 10–9s are with the rounds above.

Official card

Unanimous Decision

Referee · Yves Lavigne
John MakdessiRoss Pearson
Official totals — John Makdessi first
JudgeTotal
Derek Cleary2.0 avg spread · 42% wide30–26
Dr. Greg Jackson29–28
Chris Lee2.0 avg spread · 44% wide29–27

Each judge’s round-by-round scores sit with the round they belong to, in the round-by-round section above — switch a round there and the three cards for it change with the stats.

Media cards — 17 scored, John Makdessi first · unofficial

Youngs FanSided.com30–26
Danny Segura MMAFighting.com30–26
Chris Nelson Sherdog.com30–26
Keith Shillan TheMMATakeover.com30–27
Ryan Frederick WrestlingObserver.com30–27
Drake Riggs BJPenn.com30–27
Rob Tatum CombatPress.com30–27
Gustavo Lima mmabrasil.com.br30–27
MM AJunkie.com30–27
Tristen Critchfield Sherdog.com30–27
Brian Knapp Sherdog.com30–27
Dayne Fox BloodyElbow.com30–27
Mookie Alexander BloodyElbow.com30–27
Ryan Pike WrestlingObserver.com29–28
Dominik Durniat Polsat Sport29–28
Nolan King MMA- Today.com29–28
Mike Straus MMAJA29–28

Fan vote · unofficial

30-27 Makdessi · 33%30-26 Makdessi · 33%29-28 Makdessi · 17%30-29 Makdessi · 6%30-24 Makdessi · 6%

18 fan cards submitted to MMA Decisions.

Official cards come from the UFCStats fight record and MMA Decisions. Media cards and the fan vote are MMA Decisions’ own collection and are not official. Judge tendency figures are that judge’s whole recorded history, not this bout — they are context for how a card was scored, never a claim that it was scored wrongly.

Takedowns

Takedowns

The level change — head to head

Career UFC takedown rates. Red corner left, blue corner right.

John Makdessi

0.00takedowns / 15 min
0.00 / 15m
TAKEDOWNS
0.74 / 15m
n/a
ATTEMPTS
2.11 / 15m
n/a
ACCURACY
35%
0.00 / 15m
SUB ATT
0.00 / 15m

Ross Pearson

0.74takedowns / 15 min

Career UFC takedown rates exactly as UFCStats publishes them: takedowns landed per 15 minutes, completion rate, submission attempts per 15 minutes, and the share of takedowns tried on them that they stuffed. Attempts per 15 is the one derived figure — landed ÷ completion rate — and it is omitted wherever either input is missing. UFCStats writes 0% where no attempt was recorded at all, so a percentage of exactly zero reads “n/a” here rather than as a measured rate. “Field” is the average fighter in that weight class, or across every division where a class is too small to average. Rate bars run to the population’s 95th percentile (5.22 takedowns / 15m); a fighter above it pins the bar. Percentages are drawn on their own axis.

Ranked in Lightweight

The market story

Where the price started and where it finished — the sportsbook consensus, with the vig removed. We captured no price series for this bout, so there is no chart to draw.

John Makdessi↑ +3.0pp
open 63.8%close 66.8%
Ross Pearson↓ −3.0pp
open 36.2%close 33.2%
0%50%100%
OpenClosing consensus (BFO, vig removed)

John Makdessi opened at 63.8% and closed at 66.8% (+3.0pp), with Ross Pearson moving the other way by the same amount — the two are one de-vigged pair, so they always sum to 100%. There is no line between those two points because nobody recorded one: we hold the open and the close for this bout, not the days in between.

Show the numbers
CornerOpen (US)Close (US)Open %Close %Move
John Makdessi-210-22763.8%66.8%+3.0pp
Ross Pearson16019036.2%33.2%−3.0pp
Opening and closing moneylines from BestFightOdds (data/refs/bfo_fighter_moneylines.csv), one row per fighter per bout, de-vigged pairwise so the two corners sum to 100% · scraped 2026-06-10. No price series was captured for this bout, so no line is drawn between the two points.
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