Battlefield Fight League will make its 2024 debut on February 8 in downtown Vancouver and the event looks to have fireworks from top to bottom. The featured bout between Maxime Soucy and Radley Da Silva will be a highly contested match-up.
Lets take a deeper look at the featherweight championship bout in this BFL 79 main event preview.
Maxime Soucy
The Quebec native is 5-1 in his professional career, with his lone blemish coming in his first pro outing. That fight was in 2017 under the TKO banner and was a first round head kick knockout against Matar Lo. Soucy right back on the saddle and stepped back inside the cage at TKO 43. At this event he started his current winning streak, earning a first round submission victory against Olivier Nadeau.
Over the course of the next two and a half years, Soucy had three bouts cancelled and this lead to his 2021 debut with BFL.
Stepping into enemy territory, the Nova Gym product wowed fans as he earned a unanimous decision victory against Makinde Adeyemi. This led him to fight one of the Province’s favorite fighters, “The Juggernaut”.
At BFL 73, Soucy took on the always dangerous and exciting Josh Kwiatkowski. Soucy showed his well rounded game and was able to earn another unanimous decision.
Those two decisions were impressive, but it was his next two fights that truly made the Quebec fighter stand out on the West Coast.
At BFL 77, Soucy faced a very tough test against Nic Ouellet. The first round went exactly as most expected, a grappling fans dream. Ouellet and Soucy battled it out on the ground and despite no submissions were secured, Soucy managed to get out of the round fairly unscathed. Ouellet on the other hand had an energy dump and in the second round Soucy pushed the pedal to the metal. With punches in bunches, Soucy finished the BJJ black belt with strikes late in the second stanza. This earned him the interim championship.
He took his skills back to the East Coast for his most recent fight, earning a second round TKO stoppage against Neftaly Martínez Burgos at Samourai MMA 8.
Radley Da Silva
The man known as “Snake Eyes” has grown up on the mats and with martial arts in his blood. His father an MMA champion, his uncles legends not only in the cage but in the Capoeira scene as well, have all shared their knowledge with Da Silva.
He made his professional debut all the way back in 2013 and while that may sound like a long time ago, he is still very young in the sport. Like Soucy, Da Silva lost his pro debut to Ben Jansen at AFC 19. His record shows that he is 3-1, however, don’t let that fool you. Being immersed in the game shows in his skills in the cage, and being able to put his professional fighting on the back burner let him grow up outside the cage as well.
He fought against in 2013 and earned his first pro victory against a touted prospect from Toshido MMA, Joe Pirrotta at BFL 25.
Following that fight came the aforementioned growth period in life.
After a six year hiatus, Da Silva made his long anticipated return to fighting, as he took on John Nguyen for the featherweight championship at Rise FC 5. He showcased his elusive striking, as well as his grappling game, as he was able to earn a second round victory and the belt around his waist.
After two fight cancellations, he returned to BFL for his second stint with the promotion in late 2023.
At BFL 78 the Pinnacle MMA product showed an even more mature game, with a ton of patience, was able to earn a decisive decision victory against Mike McAloon.
The Fight
These two step inside the Octagon as two lifelong martial artists and it will be very exciting to see what each bring to the table on Thursday, February 8.
Soucy has shown that he can pick people apart from the outside and close distance at will. He has won by every method in the books and is known to put on exciting fights.
Da Silva is also very well rounded. He has the Capoeira background, which can be very tricky to predict, especially depending on the range at which the fight takes place. His ground game is also very underrated as many think of him as a striker. However, he showcased the submission game in his Rise FC championship fight, and in his last outing it was a grappling clinic against McAloon.
So it will be interesting to see which fighter is able to implement their specific game plan into the BFL 79 main event and what that game plan is.
