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Everybody loves a good knockout. The UFC’s first half of 2007 has provided us with some great ones. In part two of the Highly Unofficial Half-Year UFC Awards, we look at the best knockouts of the first six months and one week of 2007.

First-Half Knockouts of The Year
5 – UFC 71 - May 26 – Houston Alexander TKO1 (0:4 Keith Jardine
At around 4:30am on Sunday, May 27, the morning after he took out Keith Jardine in just 48 seconds, Houston Alexander was getting the rock star treatment, signing autographs, taking pictures and shaking hands with well-wishers while waiting for his ride to the airport. It’s what you get when you enter the Octagon for the first time and knock out a contender who was a couple wins away from a likely title shot. And that’s what Nebraska’s Alexander did, actually stunning Jardine with repeated right hands at close range and then unleashing the finisher with a couple vicious right uppercuts that put ‘The Dean of Mean’ down and out in under a minute. It was a spectacular debut to say the least, one of the most memorable in some time.

4 – UFC Fight Night – January 25 – Rashad Evans KO2 Sean Salmon
In the lead-up to his main event bout with Sean Salmon, Rashad Evans started going by the moniker ‘Sugar’. Well, the former MSU Spartan showed a little spice in this fight, battling through a sluggish first round to put an emphatic end to Salmon’s UFC debut in the second with a picture perfect right kick to the head. Salmon was out on impact, and he hit the head with a thud as the fans in attendance gasped. Thankfully, Salmon was all right, but if you needed any reminders that this is a contact sport, Evans’ spectacular knockout win provided all the proof you needed.

3 – UFC 69 – April 7 – Matt Serra TKO1 (3:25) Georges St-Pierre
As far as aesthetically pleasing knockouts go, the three high-impact honorable mention candidates listed below belong somewhere in the top five, but sometimes, you have to give a nod to a knockout that belongs strictly for its historic and shock value, and Matt Serra’s upset of the seemingly unstoppable GSP definitely applies. A hard right hand that clipped a ducking St-Pierre took the champion’s equilibrium, and as he tried to get his legs under him, Serra was calm, cool, collected, and sending bombs down the pipe that
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were keeping the Canadian from getting back into the fight. Finally, a series of unanswered shots on the ground forced a halt to the bout, and the MMA world had a new champion in the charismatic New Yorker, Matt ‘The Terror’ Serra.

2 – UFC 71 – May 26 – Quinton Jackson TKO1 (1:53) Chuck Liddell
Back when I was young and stupid and thought I could win the New York Golden Gloves, I tried throwing a shot to the body from three feet away and wound up getting knocked out in 63 seconds. UFC light heavyweight champion Chuck Liddell did the same thing at UFC 71 but lasted a little longer, getting stopped in 1:53 of the first round by Rampage Jackson, who made it 2-0 against ‘The Iceman’ in the biggest UFC event of the year. Jackson’s right to the jaw of Liddell was a thing of beauty, dropping the soon to be ex-champion hard to the mat. The follow-up barrage by Jackson was just a formality, and a new 205-pound king was crowned at the MGM Grand.

1 - UFC 70 – April 21 – Gabriel Gonzaga KO1 (4:51) Mirko Cro Cop
As I noted in the Upsets of The Half-Year section, there were many who felt that Gonzaga’s ground game was good enough that if he could take Cro Cop to the mat, he had a chance to win. Well, Gonzaga followed that plan and grounded and pounded Cro Cop for much of the opening round. Unfortunately for the Brazilian, his efforts seemed for naught when the fight was stood up with 35 seconds left in the round. Suddenly, Gonzaga was going to face the wrath of the most feared striker in the game. But then a funny thing happened, and Gonzaga whipped a right kick to Cro Cop’s head, and the Croatian

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UFC 73 was hardly over when "the Huntington Beach Bad Boy" and his opponent Rashad Evans managed to fight a fourth round in the post-fight press conference. Though this one was strictly of the verbal variety, Ortiz and Evans left no doubt that there should and will be a rematch following their three-round draw at Arco Arena.

After Ortiz and Evans traded pointed comments on the stage, a reporter asked UFC President Dana White if indeed, there would be a rematch.

"Hopefully not in the next three minutes," White said to laughter before confirming the two would fight again.