UFC Fight Night: Ankalaev vs. Guskov rolls on July 25, and buried lower on the card is a flyweight pairing with more juice than its slot suggests. Ramazan Temirov and Steve Erceg represent two very different theories of how to win a 125-pound fight, and the gap between those theories is exactly what makes this one worth a second look before the line moves.
Ramazan Temirov
Temirov built his reputation as a finisher long before he got here, and nothing about his recent form suggests that identity has changed. His most recent outing ended live, in the first round, with Emil Vergara on the deck — the latest entry in a finishing resume that already runs to thirteen knockout or TKO stoppages. That is not a fighter who is content to bank rounds on the feet or the mat; it is a fighter who is actively hunting the finish from the opening bell, and his path to victory runs through imposing that pace before the fight has a chance to settle into a rhythm.
What makes him dangerous is not just volume but conviction — he closes distance with purpose, and once he is in his range, he is looking to end things rather than out-point his way to a decision. Against a flyweight field that increasingly rewards patience, that kind of front-foot pressure is its own kind of stylistic statement.
Steve Erceg
Erceg is a different animal — a rangy, technical operator who prefers to make opponents miss before making them pay. He works behind a jab, manages distance well, and has shown he can hang with elite competition in extended, technical fights. His path to victory is built on those tools: keep the fight at the end of his punches, pick his volume, and drag things into deeper rounds where craft tends to win out over aggression.
The one real question mark on his resume is what happened the last time he ran into a live puncher early — a first-round knockout loss to Kai Kara-France, finished by a clean punch before he could settle into that preferred rhythm. It does not erase everything else in his profile, but it is the one data point that matters most when the man across the cage built his whole career around finishing people early.
How the fight plays out
Strip away everything else and this fight comes down to a straightforward tension: can Temirov find the finish before Erceg finds his range, or can Erceg survive the first storm long enough to turn this into the kind of technical, distance-driven fight he wants? Round one is doing a lot of the work here. If Temirov gets to his spots early and forces messy exchanges, this looks like a short night. If Erceg navigates the opening minutes clean, uses his jab to keep the fight honest, and gets Temirov chasing, the whole complexion changes and the later rounds start to favor the man with the better footwork.
That is the swing factor that makes this fight genuinely live rather than a formality — not a name or a ranking, but whether a proven finisher can operate before a technician's feet get set.
The verdict
This is exactly the kind of matchup that separates handicapping from guessing — a live stylistic clash where the first round can decide the outcome of the whole fight, and where the line may not fully account for that variance. Bones has this one graded as an official play, with a rated pick already locked in before the line closes.
The full breakdown, including which side of this stylistic puzzle Bones is backing, is available now for members.