The first round began. Faber landed a probing leg kick. First fight of his after Kampmann took over as coach I believe. Faber jabbed the body, testing the range. 4:00. Nice exchange, neither landed. Rivera needs to throw combos though. Faber landed a right and ate a right uppercut. Rivera landed a knee. Faber landed an inside kick. Rivera landed a leg kick, Faber nearly caught it for a single, Rivera avoided, 3:00. Faber kneed the body. Nice exchange, neither landed. Rivera landed a leg kick and ate an overhand right. Rivera landed a body kick. 2:00. Lot of feints exchanged. Faber landed a right to the body and ate a leg kick, Rivera stuffed a single. Rivera landed a counter right with 1:00. Rivera landed a hard leg kick. Same left leg Faber had problems with against Aldo. 30 as Rivera landed a counter right. And another hard counter right. 15 left, Rivera landed a leg kick and a pair of body kicks after sprawling a double after the first kick, R1 ends, 10-9 Rivera IMO but close.
R2 began. Rivera landed a counter right. Faber landed a body shot ducking another counter. Rivera landed a glancing right. 4:00. Rivera stuffed a telegraphed single, Faber dropped him with something, landed a knee, lefts under, working for an awkward choke with one hook, more of a bulldog choke really, Rivera tapped, wow. That uhh.. that looked fixed as shit. Rivera was complaining about an eyepoke actually, didn't really get dropped legitimately, just covered up and went down. Hmm... Bad left eyepoke. Yeah wow. Faber comforted Rivera. Boos during Faber's classy post-fight interview. Apparently that was another bulldog choke too. Not an RNC officially.