Justin Wilcox Wins Strikeforce Challengers Main Event

Justin Wilcox put on a show at Saturday night's Strikeforce Challengers event in Stockton, California, dominating Rodrigo Damm for five minutes and opening up a cut over Damm's left eye that caused the fight to be stopped before the start of the second round.

It was Wilcox's fifth consecutive win in Strikeforce, and his most impressive yet. Wilcox benefited from Strikeforce legalizing elbows to the head on the ground in brutalizing Damm on the ground, and prior to that he chased Damm around the cage, as Damm didn't really look like he wanted any part of Wilcox.

Wilcox, who had Josh Koscheck in his corner, praised his camp afterward.

"I train with the best camp, American Kickboxing Academy," Wilcox said.

The fight got off to a strange start, as Damm and Wilcox met in the center of the cage and touched gloves, only to be told they had to wait a couple minutes for California State Athletic Commission officials to get into place. But once the fight started, Wilcox did everything he wanted to do.

In other Challengers fights:

-- Caros Fodor dominated David Douglas for two and a half rounds before the referee had finally seen enough and stepped in midway through the third, handing Fodor a third-round TKO victory. The stoppage was questionable, as Douglas was on his feet and trying to defend himself when the fight ended. But Fodor had Douglas against the cage and was battering him with knees and punches, and Douglas simply wasn't fighting back.

-- Lorenz Larkin displayed a beautiful array of striking in defeating Scott Lighty by second-round TKO. Larkin, who took the fight on short notice, improved his record to 9-0 and showed that he deserves a place on the Strikeforce roster. This guy is a legitimate talent, and a lot of fun to watch.

-- James Terry unleashed a vicious right hand to knock out Josh Thornburg in the first round. Terry is a student of Cung Le, and he displayed some of Le's trademark crisp, effective striking. It was an impressive showing from Terry.

-- The show got off to a sloppy start when Damion Douglas won an ugly split decision over Wayne Phillips. Both Douglas and Phillips were totally gassed by the end of the first round, and the two of them engaged in 10 minutes of bad MMA after that. The decision left the fans in Stockton, California, booing, and Douglas then had the audacity to grab the microphone and lecture the fans about what a good fight they had just seen. He was wrong, and the fans were right to boo. Fortunately, the rest of the night was much better.