AMARILLO, Texas -- Shark Fights 13 put on a good show at the Amarillo Civic Center last Saturday in a card that featured several former UFC fighters, including big names like Houston Alexander, Keith Jardine and Paul Daley. 

Trevor Prangely, also a former UFC fighter, is the promotions current Light Heavyweight champ and looked impressive through two rounds of the three round battle. 

Prangley (22-6-1) said he knew Jardine (15-8-1) was expecting takedowns and instead, chose to try and out-strike his opponent. 

He was successful in doing so and rocked Jardine early in the first round with a big knee in the clinch that sent the 37-year-old to the canvas.  Prangley  took Jardine down, which proved to be a mistake as it gave just enough time for Jardine to recover. 

Prangley landed an uppercut that floored Jardine again in the second round and followed it up with a flurry of punches but wasn't able to finish the fight. 

Jardine came out on fire in round three, seemingly coming to the realization that he was about to lose his fifth consecutive fight and possibly have to look at a new career path, peppered Prangley with several dozen strikes but it was too little, too late as the judges gave the unanimous decision to Prangley. 

Jardine was visibly stunned at the reality of having just lost his fifth consecutive fight.  Commentator and former fighter Don Frye had many puzzling statements throughout Saturday's broadcast, but there was one thing he said that was a harsh but very true reality. 

"Five straight fights is a hell of a hole to dig your way out of," Frye said and UFC president Dana White is probably thinking the same thing. 

Houston Alexander (10-6) went into Saturday's fight as an underdog against Rameau Sokoudjou (9-6) and it was clear as to why he was the underdog in the first minute. 

Sokoudjou floored Alexander with a with left hook in the first two minutes and followed it up with over 25 more punches before taking the fight to the ground.  Alexander manages to get back to his feet but is dropped again with a big right hook.  Sokoudjou gets half mount and it looks like the fight is all but over with more than a minute left in the fight. 

Almost like a script out of a Rocky movie, Alexander is able to reverse and get into Sokoudjou's guard.  It looked as though Sokoudjou didn't have any gas left in the tank and Alexander stood in the wrong corner until his trainer walked over and brought him back. 

It was remarkable that the referee didn't stop the fight as Alexander's legs were very wobbly after getting caught by Sokoudjou.  Even though the 38-year-old Alexander was able to survive round one, one got the feeling that he would eventually be put away in the second round. 

But Alexander showed heart where most men would crumble, catching Sokoudjou with two stiff jabs and flooring the 26-year-old.  Alexander followed a crumbling Sokoudjou to the ground and threw 53 punches before the referee awoke from a nap and realized that he should have stopped the fight 30 punches ago or even when Sokoudjou clearly tapped to strikes as Alexander pummeled him with haymakers.

In an exclusive interview with The Final Point, Alexander was blunt about what was going through his head as he was trying to survive the first round.

"Grab on to anything," Alexander said smiling.  "Whatever you see in front of you grab it." 

Alexander was full of emotions at the press conference following the win, referring back to how much of an inspiration his children are in his life and how they helped him get through the Sokoudjou fight. 

"I always tell my kids to never give up," Alexander said.  "If I would have submitted or tapped out, I would have been telling them something wrong.  I didn't give up and that's the message I portray to them." 

In what was clearly a come-from-behind of the year candidate, the referee allowing Sokoudjou to take an unbelievable amount of punishment before finally stepping in to do his job, unfortunately, took away from this fights luster.  Sokoudjou laid on the canvas for several minutes before being helped to the locker room, where he was transported to the hospital on a stretcher. 

Paul "Semtex" Daley (24-9-2) made his U.S. return after a post-fight-punch to welterweight contender Josh Koscheck got the Brit his walking papers from the UFC. 

Daley's opponent was Jorge Masvidal (20-5) who was a game opponent and did a spectacular job of slipping Daley's punches.  Masvidal went backwards for most of the first round as Daley stalked his opponent down with a knockout on his mind and took round one. 

Masvidal scored three takedowns in round three and although he didn't do any significant damage to Daley, it scored enough points to win him the round. 

Both fighters seemed to realize that the winner of round three would take the fight and a late flurry and a surprising takedown by Daley followed by ground and pound helped eek him out a decision victory. 

WIth pay-per-view numbers not available for several days, the promotion will have to look at just the live-gate and speculate the cards potential success. 

Unfortunately, for Shark Fights, the Civic Center had several hundred empty seats, which doesn't add up for such a big name card and tickets being so reasonable.  The organization needs to put future events, especially ones like last Saturday's stacked card, in bigger markets like Dallas, Houston or even Austin. 

The fights were exciting and Shark Fights put on a solid event but the Texas Athletic Commission is going to have to get its act together and get some legitimate officials for MMA events. 

With the referee's complete disregard for fighter safety, in particular Sokoudjou taking an obscene amount of unnecessary blows the head, it's a miracle nobody was seriously injured.

Interviews with Houston Alexander, Paul Daley and Trever Prangley can be found by clicking here.