WEC 36 was originally scheduled to take place on September 10th in Hollywood, Florida but was postponed due to Hurricane Ike. The event featured two championship bouts: Urijah Faber defended his featherweight title against Mike Thomas Brown, and middleweight challenger Chael Sonnen was set to rematch champion Paulo Filho for the belt. However Filho was not able to make weight, and so the bout was changed to three-round affair with no title on the line. Not that it made any difference in the big picture, as Zuffa (the parent company of WEC and UFC) decided to fold WEC’s 185-lbs & 205-lbs divisions, rendering the middleweight championship belt meaningless after this event. Also on the card, two former UFC lightweights Jens Pulver and Leonard Garcia met in a featherweight bout that would likely produce the #1 contender for the winner of Faber-Brown.
Jake Rosholt vs. Nissen Osterneck (185 lbs)
In a middleweight bout with a potential shot at a future UFC contract on the line, Osterneck came out swinging from the opening bell, and was dominating Rosholt in the standup. However Rosholt was able to reverse the course of the round by taking Osterneck down and controlling him on the ground, winning the round despite not doing much damage. In the second round, Nissen once again attempted to work his standup, and had Rosholt reeling at one point, but lost his balance after throwing a head kick and ended up on his back. Rosholt capitalized and mounted his opponent; Osterneck had nothing left in the gas tank at this point and was not able to escape or offer any defense to Rosholt’s strikes as the referee Troy Waugh stepped in to stop the bout.
Fair performance from both fighters, though it’s not clear whether either one is ready for a move up to the UFC at this point.
Fight grade: 4/5
[#9 W125] 
[#1 W105] 
[#26 W105] 
[#8 FW] 
[#26 FW] 
