30 of the best MMA knockouts of all time [UPDATED AUGUST 2023]
By Amy Kaplan
25. Thiago Santos turns Steve Bosse into jelly
From UFC Hollywood – 2015
It was a display of beautiful Muay Thai techniques and strategies from Thiago Santos. He sets the head kick up throughout the entire fight, which lasted all of 29 seconds. In the fight’s first exchange, Santos throws a leg kick to Bosse’s inner thigh, causing Bosse’s hands to drop.
Later, Santos retreats and allows Bosse to charge, then hits Bosse with a quick kick to the body. Once he notices that Bosse is dropping his hands to defend the lower kicks, Santos throws a beautiful switch kick right to the temple of Bosse which hits the Canadian like a Louisville slugger.
If there were ever a point in which you would need to show someone what ‘alligator arms’ looks like, show them this clip. Bosse’s legs turn into my grandmother’s peach jam and his arms coil up like a tyrannosaurus rex. No need for ground and pound on that one, game over.
Anyone who has ever trained in Muay Thai knows how awkward throwing a switch kick with your weight going backwards is. Not to mention, the ability for Santos to generate devastating knockout power from an awkward angle like that is nothing short of spectacular.
Santos has a 63 percent finish rate in professional MMA, and it’s because of kicks like this that he is a tough matchup for many in the middleweight division.