UFC Fight Night: Overeem vs Arlovski - May 8th

[Keith Houchen]

Loved that event! To my untrained eye I thought the 30-27 decisions in the birds fight was a bit rum. But Hunt though, fucking hell.

[jimufctna24]

I switched on during the 2nd round of the Danny Kelly fight. Anik and Florian really liked saying "Shoeface" didn't they.

 

Glad Hunt won. It was always going to be a decent style match-up for him. 

[Fox Piss]

Magny performance was epic. How high can he go?

[Chunk]

Holy shit at the refereeing in the Magny fight. I don't care if the strikes aren't bombs, how do you manage to flatten a man out, hit him with 40 unanswered strikes and not get the stoppage!? Mental.

[JNLister]

I can only assume I read this wrong, but supposedly none of the judges gave the second round in the Magny fight as a 10-8.

[Chunk]

I can only assume I read this wrong, but supposedly none of the judges gave the second round in the Magny fight as a 10-8.

 

I'm not the person to comment really but I guess you could (could!) argue that Lombard got some offense in during the first part of the round. Is that enough to justify it not being a 10-8? Probably not.

[ColinBollocks]

Hunt is just tremendous. Him getting kneed in the face by Werdum is still hard to take, really.

[Egg Shen]

 

 

I can only assume I read this wrong, but supposedly none of the judges gave the second round in the Magny fight as a 10-8.

I'm not the person to comment really but I guess you could (could!) argue that Lombard got some offense in during the first part of the round. Is that enough to justify it not being a 10-8? Probably not.

Nah, you cant get a more cut and dry 10-8 than that second round. Magny is the man.

 

There was dodgy judging decisions all night.

[SNRN10]

The Magny Scorecard - https://twitter.com/MMAFighting/status/711419534729588736

[Egg Shen]

that's madness.

 

the other strange decisions i thought came in Pearson/Laprise (no problem with the decision but Laprise clearly won round 3, one judge scored it 30-27 Pearson), i thought Rin Nakai did enought to beat Leslie Smith yet one judge scored it 30-27 Smith, thought Rawlings/Lam was off too.

 

Good show though. I've all but given up on Frank Mir at this point, i've had pops at him countless times over the years but he's just showing up and picking up a cheque at his point isn't he?

 

Nice to see Steve Bosse win, never gonna be anywhere near contention but he's the kind of guy that'll always peak interest on a card, matched up correctly he could have a fun little stint in the UFC. Canadian market is gonna be all over it.

 

Dan Kelly was the best moment on the card. Incredibly he's 5-1 in the UFC, he probably only got a second chance at the UFC due to his Olympic credentials but at 38 with destroyed knee's he's winning fights. He's got that Anthony Perosh going for him where he seems to fight guys with superior physicaly advantages but he's finding a way to get it done. I always root for a guy like that.

 

And as i said previously, Neil Magny is the man. Few guys would have survived that Lombard onslaught in round 1 (and he may be lucky Perceval was reffing), but great comeback. Magny's fought his way into contention the hard way and whilst i love the the bullshit of promotion and shit calling you have to respect guys who go about it the other way and make it work for them, props.

 

Oh, gotta mention Alan Jouban too, never a dull moment when that guy's in the cage.

[David]

I've got loads. Been ages since I read them but from what I remember BJ Penn's and Jens Pulver's were both really good reads. Forrest Griffin's first book (Got Fight?) is good as well, but the second one was shit. Randy Couture's is also worth a read. But I think I enjoyed Hunt's the most. The fact he's been everywhere (UFC, Pride, K-1, DREAM) makes the book so interesting to me, and his outside the cage/ring content is just as engrossing.

 

Wasn't a big fan of Chuck Liddell's, despite being a fan. Just felt a bit knuckleheady, even for an MMA book. Found Tito's pretty crap. And Brock's could've been so much better.

 

I've had Ronda Rousey's still to read since Christmas. I wish Big Nog would do a book.

 

Surprised you left out Enson Inoue's book. That's one of the best books on the sport that I've ever read.

[Egg Shen]

Ahhh shit, cheers for the reminder Dave, im yet to read Enson's book.

 

I highly recommend any of the Joe Rogan podcasts Enson did if you ain't seen them.

[David]

Enson's book is one of the few books of any kind that I've read more than once. It's fantastic.

[seanz25]

Started reading Hunt's book via Wand's request. 4 Chapters or so in - It's great stuff, easy read and that on daily commute. 

[wandshogun09]

The UFC hold their first show in Croatia on April 10th, with this heavyweight-heavy card...

 

 

FOX SPORTS 1 MAIN CARD

Junior Dos Santos vs Ben Rothwell

Gabriel Gonzaga vs Derrick Lewis

Francis Ngannou vs Curtis Blaydes

Timothy Johnson vs Marcin Tybura

Igor Pokrajac vs Jan Blachowicz

Maryna Moroz vs Cristina Stanciu

 

FOX SPORTS 1 PRELIMS

Zak Cummings vs Nicolas Dalby

Ian Entwistle vs Alejandro Perez

Mairbek Taisumov vs Damir Hadzovic

Filip Pejic vs Damian Stasiak

 

FIGHT PASS PRELIMS

Robert Whiteford vs Lucas Martins

Jared Cannonier vs Cyril Asker

Bojan Velickovic vs Alessio Di Chirico

 

Got to be honest, I've never heard of half the names here, nor can I be particularly arsed to dig up info on them. As always though, the European UFC cards usually turn out good, the crowds are usually lively and there's often a nice mix of styles despite the fact most of these guys won't go on to be world beaters or anything.

 

It's a shame Cro Cop's career ended on a whimper of injuries and drug test controversy a few months ago because this would've been the ideal show for his retirement fight. Oh well.

 

 

Dos Santos vs Rothwell is an interesting heavyweight clash. Not least because of the timing of it. Had this fight happened at any point over this last five years, no-one would be giving Rothwell a snowball's chance in hell. In 2016 though, JDS is looking pretty shot. A combination of nine rounds of attempted murder from Cain Velasquez, a five round brutal war with Stipe Miocic, and a list of injuries Dominick Cruz would wince at...poor old JDS hobbled through a slow round against Overeem in December, before getting dropped and TKO'd in the second. The once scarily explosive, fast combo punching beast with the durability of Michael Myers now looks to be on his last legs. Sad times. And it's coincided with Ben Rothwell coming into the absolute form of his career. Rothwell has always been dangerous but he's at a point now where he holds a KO over Overeem and a submission over Josh Barnett! Unbelievable. That's way more than anyone thought him capable of.

 

 

On pure skills I still think JDS is the superior fighter here. But I don't like how he looks at all these days. He moves slower, can't get out of the way of shots as well, his reaction times seemed to have slipped, he doesn't throw combos much these days (his combos were probably his biggest weapon at his peak) and he seems constantly hesitant to pull the trigger. It's sad to see but I think he's ripe for Rothwell to beat at the moment. And if Rothwell wins, I think I'd give him a title shot. Cain's probably going to get injured again after Werdum vs Miocic plays out anyway, isn't he? It's just the way it goes. Sure, Werdum vs Rothwell or Miocic vs Rothwell title fights aren't going to set the PPV world alight but there's no denying Big Ben would've earned a crack at the gold if he beats JDS. Maybe shove that one on FOX or something.

 

 

Gonzaga vs Lewis isn't likely seeing a round two. And I don't fancy Gonzaga's chances much. I like Derrick Lewis. Definitely become a fan of 'The Black Beast'. Nothing he does is pretty, nor do I expect him to trouble the top dogs in the division, but he's fun to watch and he's a terrifyingly imposing presence in there. I always find myself watching his fights through my fingers. When he's throwing haymakers, I'm always half expecting him to actually knock someone's face off. Who knows, if Gonzaga can take him down, he'll hold a huge advantage. Gonzaga is one of the best pure grapplers in the division. But, like JDS, Gonzaga just has that feel of a fighter from a dying era who's on the way out. And he's been put out a few times in his career, by lesser concussive punchers than the Beast.

 

 

Speaking of 'black beasts', Francis Ngannou returns to the octagon for his second UFC fight. He's a 29 year old, 6'4" French brick shithouse with a 6-1 record (all his wins were stoppages). He won his UFC debut by crushing KO...

 

 

Hasn't beat anyone of note yet but he certainly looks the part. For the heavyweight division's sake, I hope he goes from strength to strength. If there's one thing heavyweight MMA needs badly, it's an injection of new blood.

 

My interest in this show drops off a cliff from there really. I guess Pokrajac vs Blachowicz might be decent. Maryna Moroz is pretty good, strong boxing, solid submissions and she gave Valerie Letourneau a good fight not too long ago. Erm, Dalby vs Cummings could be the darkhorse show stealer actually.

 

Not a bad little card, nothing special really though and I'm not looking forward to seeing JDS take more abuse in there. Even if he wins, and he could, you just know the poor sod's going to take some punishment along the way.