Palmer steps up against Paixao at RFA 4

Fredson Paixao

Resurrection Fighting Alliance have had a great year so far, first with the building of the cards starting with RFA 2 followed by distribution on HDNet and as announced two weeks ago acquisition of Titan FC.  Now Titan’s rescheduled show for this weekend is again postponed replaced by RFA 4.  RFA 4 takes place at the Texas Station in Las Vegas, NV November 2nd with a main card broadcast live on AXSTV.

In their first fights since leaving the UFC Tyson Griffin takes on Efrain Escudero in the main event.  Griffin was a hot name back in 2007-09 when he racked up five “Fight of the Night” awards (including one “Fight of the Year”) and one “Submission of the Night”.  Griffin’s spotlight started to fade in 2010 when he went on a three-fight losing streak, the third at UFC 123 also picking up a positive test for marijuana.  After a win over Manny Gamburyan at featherweight Griffin failed to make weight against Bart Palaszewski with the resulting KO loss being the end of Griffin’s run in the Octagon for now anyway.  Escudero has had two runs in the UFC, from December 2008-September 2010 and again from December 2011-April of this year.  Escudero had a high-profile win in Bellator against Cesar Avila at BFC 55 but his two recent losses in the UFC against Jacob Volkmann and Mac Danzig will be hard to get over.  Escudero is known for his submissions and Griffin his striking leaving this fight difficult to predict but it should be worthy of main event status.

In the co-main event Chidi Njokuani gets the respect he has earned as he takes on Phil Dace.  Njokuani’s last three fights have been in LFC (broadcast on ASXTV), TPF (webstreamed on Sherdog), and RFA so fans from all over are becoming familiar with him.  Riding three wins in a row Njokuani so far has mainly shown his striking with one guillotine choke his only submission victory to date.  Dace’s experience has been in smaller shows but he holds five wins in a row most recently defeating Dave Terrel for the second time in one year, the downside being Dace hasn’t fought in a year.

Lance PalmerOne of the most interesting fights on the card is Lance Palmer vs. Fredson Paixao.  Palmer was impressive in his UVC 20 fight against Jon Washington but so far in his 4-0 career the up-and-comer from Urijah Faber’s Team Alpha Male hasn’t had a “name” to fight.  UFC vet Paixao is much more experienced at 10-4 but is coming off a loss in his UFC debut.  Both fighters need this win and both have been impressive so keep an eye on this fight to be the one to look back on.

RFA 4 card:

Cory Galloway vs.Jerry Shapiro
Steve Mocco vs.Tyler Perry
Jordan Isordia vs.Joey Angelo
Chris Holdsworth vs.Tyler Shinn
Sergio Pettis vs.Jimmy Jones
Derrick Burnsed vs.Dakota Cochrane
James Kraus vs.Guilherme Trindade
Fredson Paixao vs.Lance Palmer
Joe Yager vs.Marcio Cruz
Chidi Njokuani vs.Phil Dace
Tyson Griffin vs.Efrain Escudero