On This Day in MMA History

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 20th)

Pancrase: 1997 Neo-Blood Tournament; Round 1 (July 20th 1997)
Pancrase: 1997 Neo-Blood Tournament; Round 2 (July 20th 1997)

Pancrase ran two shows, an afternoon and an evening show, for their Neo-Blood tournament, which was to showcase their younger and newer fighters. The Neo-Blood tournament was an eight-man single elimination affair; the only name people are likely to recognize is Ikuhisa Minowa, who made to the semi-final stage. The tournament ended up being won by Keiichiro Yamamiya, who defeated the late Satoshi Hasegawa in the final in 5:50 by TKO.

Dream 10: Welterweight Grand Prix 2009 Final Round (July 20th 2010)

This event from DREAM featured the semi-finals and final of their Welterweight Grand Prix, which would crown their first Welterweight Champion; in DREAM, the welterweight limit was 168lbs. The first semi-final saw Hayato Sakurai take on Marius Zaromskis; Zaromskis was lighting Sakurai up like a christmas tree in the stand-up, bloodying him up and resulting in a cut that took a while to be fixed. It only delayed the inevitable with Zaromskis levelling Sakurai with a high kick and finishing him off with punches. Michael Schiavello was going absolutely crazy on commentary putting this over as a major upset. Man, Schiavello would kill it in the UFC. The other semi-final, between Andre Galvao and Jason High was not so exciting, with High winning by split decision.

The final between High and Zaromskis wasn’t that exciting until Zaromskis delivered a one-two combination followed by a head kick that knocked High out cold. It was one of the most spectacular looking knockouts you’ll see. With the win, Zaromskis won the Welterweight Grand Prix and claimed the DREAM Welterweight Championship.

The non-tournament fight of note saw Paulo Filho facing Melvin Manhoef in the classic battle of grappler versus striker. Manhoef was dropping more bombs than an Avro Lancaster and doing a number on Filho, but the fight ended up on the ground, where Manhoef was predictably lost and he got submitted with an armbar in 2:35.

@: Tim Sylvia being a laughing stock.

Sylvia was something of a laughing stock at that time, but that was more to do with his behaviour. When he was UFC champion, Sylvia would always walk around with the belt around his waist. It didn’t matter if he wasn’t fighting; if Tim was at a UFC event, or most places, he would have that UFC belt around his waist. It made him come across as something of a geek, especially when he didn’t understand why people were laughing at him for it. Sylvia didn’t help that rep when he would constantly bitch and moan about people booing him for the boring fights. He genuinely did not understand why people were booing him; he blamed the booing on the fans not understanding fighting. I’m sure Sylvia was a decent guy underneath but he had no self awareness whatsoever.

The UFC 100 entry will be posted later this evening.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 11th) (The UFC 100 Edition)

UFC 100 (July 11th 2009)

The UFC had reached the milestone of its 100th numbered PPV and they were intent on loading the card up. And load it up they did, with two title fights, one of them involving one of the biggest and most notorious names to ever compete in the UFC, in what would be one of the biggest grudge matches in UFC history. There was also a second grudge match, and this one had been set up by a contentious season of The Ultimate Fighter.

Brock Lesnar vs. Frank Mir: The Rivalry

Brock Lesnar had entered the UFC in late 2007 to tremendous fanfare. The former WWE superstar had left that company and, after an unsuccessful attempt at becoming part of the Minnesota Vikings, the former NCAA Wrestling Champion announced his intentions to join K-1’s MMA promotion, Hero’s, in April of 2006. Lesnar began his training at the Minnesota Martial Arts Academy, and in August of 2006, Lesnar would join the K-1 promotion.

Lesnar’s first MMA fight was scheduled for June 2nd 2007 against Choi Hong-man, a 7ft2 330lbs South Korean kickboxer who was also competing in MMA. Just before the fight was to take place, Choi was replaced by South Korean judoka Kim Min-soo. Lesnar was taller, bigger and stronger than Kim, and overwhelmed him in just 1:09 of the first round, Lesnar gaining the submission victory after a series of punches. It was a successful MMA debut for Lesnar, albeit against physically inferior opposition.

Despite his lack of experience, Lesnar’s name value meant that there was tremendous completion in the race to sign him. And on October 20th, during the broadcast of UFC 77, it was revealed that Lesnar had signed with the UFC.

The signing of Lesnar was a controversial move. Lesnar had big name value and he did have a background in amateur wrestling; he was a two-time NCAA All American and a former NCAA Heavyweight Champion. There was no doubt that Lesnar had legitimate athletic credentials. The problem was that people only saw Lesnar as a former professional wrestler, a fake and phony athlete who shouldn’t be anywhere near a real sport. It was as if Lesnar’s amateur wrestling pedigree didn’t exist.

Lesnar’s highly publicized debut occurred at UFC 81, where he faced former UFC Heavyweight Champion, Frank Mir. The idea was that if Lesnar won, he could be put into a title fight, which would be highly marketable due to Brock’s name. But if he lost, then it wasn’t too great of a shame because he’d lost to a more experienced opponent, and Lesnar could survive the loss whilst retaining much if not all of his drawing power.

Lesnar came into the fight as a major heel to MMA fans. They hated the idea of a ‘fake’ pro wrestler coming into their legitimate sport. The fact that Lesnar had tremendous credentials as an amateur wrestler was completely ignored, if those people were even aware of them at all.

The fight itself saw Lesnar immediately get Mir down and destroy him with some brutal ground-and-pound; in the process, Lesnar landed some inadvertent punches to the back of Mir’s head. The referee, Steve Mazzagatti, immediately stepped in to halt the fight, deducting a point from Lesnar and restarting the fight from a standing position. This was a controversial move because the blows were accidental and Mazzagatti never warned Lesnar about his actions; if a fighter accidentally hits the back of the head, the referee warns the fighter and tells them to change their attack. I can’t recall a referee ever bypassing that warning and going straight for the immediate stand-up and the point deduction. Mazzagatti had somehow forgotten how things are meant to go as he made yet another of the many questionable calls that would litter his career.

The move gave Mir a huge break and when the fight restarted, he was ready for Lesnar’s attack, and Mir would tap Lesnar out with a kneebar in 1:30 of the first round. To many people, this was proof that Lesnar shouldn’t even be in the UFC. Their view of Lesnar as a fake athlete had been vindicated.

Lesnar rebounded from this loss with a decisive unanimous decision victory over Heath Herring at UFC 87 in August before getting a shot at UFC Heavyweight Champion Randy Couture at UFC 91 in November. This was another move that generated tremendous controversy, with many people viewing it as an undeserved title shot, one that Lesnar was getting only because of his name value. Whilst that argument could be made, the truth was that Lesnar was a big star, and the nature of his stardom, and his big money contract meant that he could only be in big fights. And there was no bigger fight to put Lesnar in than against the heavyweight champion.

There was also the fact that the two fighters one could argue should be ahead of Lesnar for a title shot were otherwise engaged, and we’ll get to that in a moment.

Lesnar and Couture’s battle at UFC 91 was one that divided opinion right down the middle in regards to how it would play out; either Lesnar would be too big and too strong for the much older Couture and he would steamroll right through him, or Couture was too experienced and too good for Lesnar to handle, and would strategically take him apart. The fight ended up being more competitive than either side of the debate expected. In the end, though, Lesnar landed a punch that dropped Couture, Lesnar finishing him off with measured forearm strikes to the head.

The former NCAA and WWE champion was now the UFC Heavyweight Champion.

And for his first title defence, he would end up facing a familiar face.

In late 2007, whilst still the UFC Heavyweight Champion, Randy Couture had become embroiled in a contract dispute with the UFC. The dispute was based around money that Randy believed he was owed. As a result, Randy announced he was leaving the UFC and he refused to see out the remaining fights on his contract. A long and protracted legal case played out, during which time, Randy remained the UFC Heavyweight Champion. The UFC didn’t strip Randy of the title because of the belief it would strengthen Randy’s legal position. Plus, they really did want Randy back, even if both sides disagreed on the terms which he should fight under.

Whilst the legal disputed played out, the UFC created an interim Heavyweight Championship, and in the main event of UFC 81, the same show Lesnar debuted at, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira tapped out former heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia to become the interim UFC Heavyweight Champion. Nogueira’s first title defence would be against Frank Mir at UFC 92, and the fight would be built to with Nogueira and Mir serving as opposing coaches on the eighth season of The Ultimate Fighter. Nogueira and Mir fought at UFC 92 and with Brock Lesnar at ringside, Mir TKO’d Nogueira became the first person to stop the Brazilian with strikes and claim the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship.

Lesnar and Mir were brought together in the middle of the octagon to set up a title unification fight, and with Lesnar mocking Mir for not having the real title, the return match was on, and Brock Lesnar and Frank Mir would fight one more time, and the winner would be the undisputed UFC Heavyweight Champion. The fight was set for UFC 98 but a knee injury to Mir forced it to be postponed, and it was rescheduled for UFC 100, the biggest and most important PPV ever, at that time, and the biggest rematch in company history now had the biggest stage possible.

Georges St. Pierre vs. Thiago Alves (the build)

Georges St. Pierre was the UFC Welterweight Champion. After tapping out Matt Hughes to claim the interim welterweight title, GPS then decimated Matt Serra to become the undisputed UFC Welterweight Champion and with it, avenge the shocking loss he suffered at the hands of Serra at UFC 69. St. Pierre followed that up with a one-sided unanimous decision win over Jon Fitch at UFC 87 and an equally one-sided TKO (corner stoppage) victory over BJ Penn at UFC 94.

Georges St. Pierre was not just the UFC Welterweight Champion; he was considered one of the best fighters of all time, with a well-rounded game and a remarkable ability to dominate fighters in areas where they were considered superior to Georges. This aspect of GSP was never more evident than at UFC 74 when GSP, with no amateur wrestling background, outwrestled Josh Koscheck, a former NCAA Wrestling Division I Champion and four-time All American. The belief was that GSP was so good and so fight savvy, that it would take a tremendous fighter to beat him and take the welterweight title away.

Thiago ‘Pitbull’ Alves had put together a string of KO/TKO victories, which had culminated in the biggest win of Alves’ career, a TKO victory over former champion and UFC legend Matt Hughes, albeit in a fight where Alves had missed weight. Alves followed that win over Hughes with a dominant and bruising unanimous decision win over Josh Koscheck, in a fight where Alves was picking Kosheck apart in the stand-up and where Koscheck was considered to have done well just to survive the fight, especially after he was essentially fighting on one leg by the third round.

Alves was a dangerous striker with powerful kicks and punches. In the light of GSP’s famous defeat at the hands of Matt Serra, Alves style was considered to make him a serious threat to GSP’s title and when their fight was formally announced for UFC 100, it was felt that GSP’s title reign was in genuine danger.

Michael Bisping vs. Dan Henderson (the build)

The ninth series of The Ultimate Fighter was built around a USA vs. UK theme. The coach for the UK team would be Michael Bisping, who won the third season of TUF as a light heavyweight. Opposing him would be Dan Henderson, who earned his role as coach with a unanimous decision win over Rich Franklin at UFC 93; the coaching role on TUF was going to be given to the winner of the fight between Henderson and Franklin.

TUF naturally inflamed the tension between Henderson and Bisping, especially when Bisping squirted water into the face of Damarques Johnson, a member of Team USA, due to erroneously believing Johnson had made racist remarks. Bisping made amends but the damage was done, and Henderson would end the season with a less then flattering opinion of Bisping. Henderson’s attitude was not helped by the fact that both tournaments on this season of TUF, in the lightweight and welterweight divisions, were won by Team UK fighters.

And if any more fuel needed to be added to the fire, it was announced in early June that the winner of the Bisping/Henderson fight would receive a shot at UFC Middleweight Champion, Anderson Silva.

The Rest of UFC 100

The other main card fights at UFC 100 would see former welterweight title challenger Jon Fitch take on Paulo Thiago, and former K-1 HERO'S Light Heavyweight Champion Yoshihiro Akiyama make his UFC debut against Alan Belcher.

On the preliminary card, the main fight would see UFC Hall of Famer Mark Coleman take on TUF 1 finalist Stephan Bonnar. We’d also see light heavyweight prospect Jon Jones face Jake O’Brien, as well as Jim Miller vs. Mac Danzig, Tom Lawlor vs. CB Dollaway, and several other fights as well.

Changes to the Card

Surprisingly for a UFC card, this one had almost no changes made to the originally announced fights. The only change was TJ Grant replacing Jonathan Goulet against Dong Hyun Kim.

UFC 100 (The Preliminary Fights)

The prelims opened up with Shannon Gugerty and Tom Lawlor choking out Matt Grice and CB Dollaway in 2:36 and 55-seconds respectively, both Grice and Dollaway being rendered unconscious. Dong Hyun Kim scored a comprehensive unanimous decision victory over TJ Grant, and Jim Miller was almost as dominant over Mac Danzig in his unanimous decision victory. In a similar vein, Jon Jones continued his rapid ascent to the top with a strong and convincing win over Jake O’Brien, Jones getting the tap in the second round with a guillotine choke.

Rounding out the prelims was Mark Coleman against Stephan Bonnar, in a fight where most people expected Coleman to be dominated by his younger and stronger opponent. Instead, Coleman used wrestling to control Bonnar and ground-and-pound to bloody him up on the mat for the second and third rounds. Coleman tired quickly, but he kept going and Bonnar just couldn’t defend against being taken down. It was an unexpected but very popular win for the UFC and MMA legend.

UFC 100 (The PPV) (“I am the UFC Heavyweight Champion; enough said”.)

The PPV kicked off with Yoshihiro Akiyama taking on Alan Belcher. Belcher was sporting his notoriously shitty tattoo. Akiyama’s walk-in music is overdubbed on Fight Pass and they do a really poor job; you can still hear his original walk-in music in the background. Joe Rogan pimps Akiyama’s popularity in Japan but greatly overstates it, making Akiyama sound more popular than he actually was. Belcher looked to have a good 10-15lb weight advantage on Akiyama. This was a really good, very competitive fight, with Akiyama and Belcher both looking good and having their share of moments. Akiyama got the split-decision victory. Joe Rogan outright says Belcher got robbed; Mike Goldberg agrees. The third round was clearly Belcher’s, but the first two were close enough that they could have gone either way. One judge scored it 30-27 for Akiyama, which is an inexcusable score, but 29-28 for Akiyama is perfectly reasonable, and Akiyama getting the nod is by no means a robbery.

Michael Bisping vs. Dan Henderson

It was the battle of the TUF coaches next. This event took place eight years ago, but Bisping looked almost 15-years younger. The first round of what was a good competitive stand-up battle saw Henderson moving forward almost the entire time, headhunting, looking to land a big punch. Bisping showed good footwork but he got clipped a few times and he kept circling left, which was towards Henderson’s right side and he was setting himself up to get hit by Henderson’s big right hand. And at 3:18 of the second round, that is exactly what happened as Henderson caught Bisping flush with the right hand and knocked him out cold.

Henderson followed up with a big diving right hand to an already unconscious Bisping before the referee could stop him. In the post-fight interview, Henderson said he knew Bisping was out cold when he landed that second punch and that he wanted to really shut him up. Later, after the UFC advised him it might not be a good idea to admit t delivering one of the most brutal cheapshots in MMA history, Henderson dialled back on his claims of intentionally landing a diving punch to an opponent he knew full well was unconscious.

With this victory, Henderson put himself in line for a shot at the UFC Middleweight Championship, but it was a fight that would never happen. This was the last fight of Henderson’s contract and when it came time to put a new deal together, Henderson didn’t like what the UFC offered him and he ended up making the move to Strikeforce.

Georges St. Pierre vs. Thiago Alves

The reigning UFC Welterweight Champion was making his latest title defence of his title against the next opponent who was intended to be his toughest challenger to date. Alves did have brutal stand-up and was a heavy kicker and puncher, so the threat posed by Alves was very genuine indeed. GSP was the firm crowd favourite, with the fans chanting his name as the fight started.

This was a good fight but a great performance by GSP who shut Alves down for virtually the entire duration. GSP was taking Alves down almost at will, and whilst Alves could get back up some of the time, GSP was always able to take him back down. The timing on GSP’s takedowns was impeccable, his movement and positioning on the ground to neutralize Alves was precise, and Alves only landed a few kicks and punches through the entire fight; this was a championship-calibre performance from one of the best fighters of all-time, and it wasn’t the biggest shock in the world that GSP won all five rounds on all three scorecards.

In the post-fight interview, Joe Rogan asked GSP if he had thought at all about moving up to middleweight and facing Anderson Silva. GSP said that he is a small welterweight and was about 185lbs for this fight, and that he’d have to take the time to gain weight and take care of business.

The simple fact is that GSP at middleweight would have been very undersized. He would have been giving up size, reach, speed, and just about everything against Anderson Silva, and most other middleweights, so the much talked about dream fight between GSP and Silva was never likely to happen. GSP would be giving up too much to make winning the fight a realistic prospect.

Brock Lesnar vs. Frank Mir II

The biggest rematch in UFC history, as it would be until UFC 202, is finally here. Mir looked the part of a complete douchebag as he came out Kanye West’s ‘Amazing’; you can almost smell the smugness oozing out of Mir’s body as he saunters to the cage. Being from Vegas, Mir is a solid crowd favourite. When the lights go down for Lesnar’s entrance, there is incredibly loud booing; the fans hate Lesnar so much, and we’ll find just how much they hate Lesnar later on.

To no surprise, Lesnar declined to touch gloves before the fight; Mir offered, but Lesnar simply turned and walked away, eliciting more booing.

The first round was all Lesnar, who quickly dragged Mir down to the mat and got on top of Mir, with the fighters staying in that position for the rest of the round. Lesnar had one arm behind Mir’s neck to prevent Mir from properly defending himself and he peppered Mir with punches to the body and face. Lesnar stayed busy doing this, maintaining his position, yet despite that, Herb Dean frequently warned Lesnar about staying busy. It’s a decisive round for the heavyweight champion and was probably 10-8.

The second round saw Lesnar get Mir down quickly but he got to his feet and backed up, wanting Mir to his feet as well, which had Mike Goldberg and Joe Rogan both confused. They tied up again and Mir landed a knee to Lesnar’s chest but when Mir went for it again, Lesnar caught the leg; for some reason, Mir tried a jumping knee, which was a huge mistake because he misses completely and Lesnar has him back down on the mat. The fans are booing and despite Lesnar remaining active, Herb Dean is constantly warning Lesnar that has to work or the fight will be stood up. The fans start chanting for the fight to be stood up, even though there is no reason for it to be, but the fans hate Lesnar so much they don’t want him to have the advantage.

Regardless, Lesnar has Mir trapped against the fence and starts landing massive punches; someone from Mir’s corner is repeatedly yelling ‘you ‘aint got nothing’ at Lesnar, presumably trying to tell the 280lb monster that has lunchbox-sized fists that his punches are doing no damage at all to Mir. And you can see this person’s face, and they certainly seem to believe what they’re saying, although Mir’s face tells another story. Lesnar has one of Mir’s arms pinned behind him and he just waylays Mir with punch after punch after punch, and if Herb Dean was quick on the draw earlier in the fight, he isn’t now because Mir takes several punches whilst unconscious before Herb steps in to stop the fight, and Brock Lesnar remains the undisputed UFC Heavyweight Champion.

“I love it; keep going, keep going”.

After Lesnar got to his feet and starts celebrating, Mir is helped to his feet and starts staggering around; Lesnar got in Mir’s face, telling him to ‘talk all the shit you want now’ before being herded away by officials, and fans are booing Lesnar yet again. Lesnar plays into it by flipping the double-bird and the booing gets even louder.

Lesnar is booed unmercifully when Joe Rogan tries to interview him. Watching a fan’s live video of this, and you get an idea of just how hated Brock was. If there was a stronger and more negative reaction to a fighter in UFC history, I don’t remember it off-hand. This was more than just a negative reaction to a bad fight or the simple booing of your typical unpopular fighter; this was a visceral hatred.

“That’s a Coors Light...”

Lesnar cuts a great promo, complete with one of the best lines ever, although it’s a line that’s cut out of the Fight Pass version of UFC 100;

“I’m gonna go home tonight. I’m gonna drink a Coors Light. That’s a Coors Light because Bud Light won’t pay me nothin’. I’m gonna sit down with my friends and family, and, hell; I might even get on top of my wife tonight. See y’all later”.

And Lesnar casually walks off like it was just another day at the office. Brock Lesnar is awesome.

Mir is interviewed and his face looks like a complete mess. Mir admits to making a dumb mistake, and that they wanted to keep the fight standing.

For some reason, the fight in the actual main event spot is Jon Fitch vs. Paulo Thiago. I don’t know who had the bright idea of holding that fight back and sending them out last.

The Numbers

The attendance was 10,871 with 9,793 paid. The gate was $5,128,490 and it drew the UFC record 1.6 million buys, a record that would stand until UFC 202, which just about edged this one, drawing 1.65 million.

UFC 100 was the biggest UFC of all time for six-years, and remains one of the biggest and most successful shows they’ve ever done. It had MMA’s biggest ‘monster heel’ avenging his prior loss in brutal fashion, the sports best all-round fighter once again showing why he’s considered one of the greatest of all-time, and a highlight-reel knockout that was one of the most famous knockouts in UFC history.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 21st)

DREAM 5: Lightweight Grand Prix 2008 Final Round (July 21st 2008)

DREAM 5 would play host to the semi-finals and finals of the Lightweight Grand Prix and in a similar vein to the welterweight GP, the winner of this tournament would become the DREAM Lightweight Champion. The two semi-finals would see Shinya Aoki face Caol Uno and Eddie Alvarez face Tatsuya Kawajiri. In the alternates bout for the tournament, Kultar Gill took on Joachim Hansen. In non-tournament matches of note, Mark Hunt fought Alistair Overeem and Yoshihiro Akiyama took on former NJPW wrestler Katsuyori Shibata.

In the first semi-final, Aoki dominated Uno for both rounds, Aoki constantly going for submission and Uno did well to survive them. At one point, Aoki threw up the fastest triangle choke I’ve ever seen. Aoki was untroubled in this unanimous decision victory. Eddie Alvarez and Tatsuya Kawajiri had a heck of a fight in what was a technical version of the recent Gaethje/Johnson brawl. Both Alvarez and Kawajiri hurt each other, both were rocked and went down, but it was Alvarez who prevailed with a TKO victory at 7:45. Unfortunately, Alvarez sustained a cut above his right eye and was ruled out of the tournament final. Taking his place would be Joachim Hansen, who won the alternates bout by submitting Kultar Gill in 2:33.

In the tournament final, Aoki and Hansen were having a nice enough fight, nothing too outstanding; Hansen accidentally landed an upkick to the family jewels and Aoki needed a timeout. Aoki had been dominating up to that point. After that, it was Hansen who had the advantage; Hansen was in Aoki’s guard and stood up before hitting a diving punch that stunned Aoki, and a series of punches finished the job to give Hansen the TKO victory. Both men, especially Aoki, were suitably emotional in the post-fight ceremonies.

The non-tournament matches of note were, well, notable. Alistair Overeem submitted Mark Hunt in 1:11. Hunt appeared to be doing well until he threw Overeem to the mat and followed him down; Overeem ended up grabbing one of arm Hunt before transitioning into an armbar on the other. Overeem was himself in transition, from lightly jacked to heavily jacked at this point, and Hunt was looking a lot slimmer than normal as well. The fight between Akiyama and Shibata went exactly as you think it would. Akiyama fought in a gi, which the commentators, Kenny Rice and Bas Rutten, seemed surprised by, as they didn’t know if it would be allowed. They acknowledged Shibata’s pro wrestling background, and Rutten praised the quality of wrestlers in New Japan. They also acknowledged Shibata’s lack of experience, this being just his seventh fight, and questioned putting him in against Akiyama. Akiyama dominated, obviously, and won with a mounted ezekial choke.

UFC 149: Faber vs. Barão (July 21st 2012)

This was a UFC show that seemed to be cursed from the start, with the main event undergoing several changes, not all for reasons having to do with either fighter involved. Numerous undercard fights were changed as well, and a vaunted bantamweight was announced as debuting at this show before getting pulled from card and ending up never actually fighting in the UFC.

The Times (and the UFC 149 main event) They Are a-Changin

The original main event for UFC 149 was going to be Jose Aldo defending the UFC Featherweight Championship against Eric Koch. However, three weeks out, Aldo was removed from the fight due to injury, and with a new main event needed for UFC 149, the UFC went looking for a new one and they didn’t have to look far.

The trilogy fight between Dominick Cruz and Urijah Faber, with Cruz defending the UFC Bantamweight Championship, was originally set as the co-main event for UFC 148. However, two months before the fight, Cruz suffered a major ACL injury and was sidelined for an extended period. Cruz’s replacement was Renan Barão and, due to Cruz being out indefinitely, the Faber/Barão fight would be for the interim UFC Bantamweight Championship. It was still intended to be the co-main event of UFC 148, but when Aldo was pulled from UFC 149, they needed a new main event, and the decision was made to switch the Faber/Barão fight from the co-main event spot at UFC 148 to the main event spot at UFC 149.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

The original co-main event was another fight moved from UFC 148, and it was intended to pit Michael Bisping against Tim Boetsch. However, Bisping was forced out due to injury, and he was replaced by Hector Lombard, who was making his UFC debut. Lombard was regarded as the best middleweight in the world not in the UFC, having won 24 out of his last 25 fights (the other fight was a draw) and being unbeaten in six years, and his arrival in the UFC was much anticipated

Yoshihiro Akiyama was set to face Thiago Alves but Akiyama pulled out due to injury and was replaced by Siyar Bahadurzada. However, Alves then pulled out citing a injury and was replaced by Chris Clements. But Bahadurzada was then himself withdrawn due to injury and was replaced by Matt Riddle. Maurício Rua was to fight Thiago Silva but Silva was forced out of the fight due to injury and Rua was tabbed to face Brandon Vera at UFC’s fourth FOX network show. Daniel Pineda replaced George Roop against Antonio Carvalho.

Former Pride and Interim UFC Heavyweight Champion Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira was set to face Cheick Kongo but Nogueira pulled out of the bout claiming a previous arm injury had not healed enough and he was replaced by Shawn Jordan. Brian Ebersole replaced Claude Patrick against James Head.

Perhaps the most noted change came after it was announced that the UFC had signed former DREAM Bantamweight and Featherweight Champion, Bibiano Fernandes, to face Roland Delorme. Fernandes, like Hector Lombard, was considered one of the best fighters in the world in his division who was not in the UFC and his arrival was met with great fanfare. But a week after the announcement, it was then announced that Fernandes was out of the fight due to injury. However, this was then compounded by the revelation that Fernandes had not in fact with the UFC at all. Quite where the confusion arose and how his fight was announced without Fernandes having actually signed is not clear, but what is clear is that Fernandes spurned the UFC’s offer and decided to sign with ONE FC in Asia, Fernandes then re-signing with them when that original contract ended, and so, for reasons officially simply down to money, Fernandes seems set to be one of those fighters whose anticipated arrival in the UFC never happens. Francisco Rivera would replace Fernandes against Delorme.

UFC 149

This was a show where the undercard outperformed the main card, which wasn’t difficult as the PPV portion of UFC 149 was pretty dire. In fact, it was so bad that UFC 149 is almost unanimously considered the worst UFC show of 2012.

The highlight of the undercard was a record-setting performance by the late Ryan Jimmo. Jimmo was making his UFC debut against Anthony Perosh and he made it a debut to remember by scoring a 7-second knockout, with the first and only punch of the fight. Antonio Carvalho knocked out Daniel Pineda in 1:11. Francisco Rivera knocked out Roland Delorme in the first round, but the result was changed to a no-contest when Rivera failed his post-fight drug test for a stimulant.

The main card started out fine, with a good fight where Matt Riddle submitted Chris Clements in the third round. However, the result would later be changed to a no-contest when Riddle failed his post-fight drug test, Riddle failing for marijuana. But the next three fights prior to the main event were pretty poor, with nothing good about them. Cheick Kongo’s win over Shawn Jordan was especially bad, as most of it consisted of both fighters clinched up against fence and doing nothing. Hector Lombard looked completely flat as he lost his first fight in six-years, Lombard losing to Tim Boetsch by split-decision. To say Lombard failed to impress would be a major understatement, and Lombard’s rep took a serious hit.

The fight between Urijah Faber and Renan Barão was being counted on to save the show, to at least end things on a high note and send the fans home moderately happy. Instead, we had a fairly mudane fight, with Barão pretty much shutting Faber out, but with a performance that was neither exciting nor captivating, and with Faber the crowd favourite, it meant that Barão’s unanimous decision victory to claim the interim UFC Bantamweight Championship ended a pretty poor main card on a flat note and ensured UFC 149’s status as the worst UFC show of the year.

 

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 22nd)

Pancrase: 1995 Neo-Blood Tournament Opening Round (July 22nd 1995)

This was the first night of a two-might eight-man tournament, built around young or new talent. The only recognizable names, to most, in the tournament were Ryūshi Yanagisawa and Vernon White. Yanagisawa won his first round fight, submitting Christopher DeWeaver in 3:38 with an armlock, while White lost by decision to Gregory Smit.

Pancrase: 1996 Neo-Blood Tournament, Round 1 (July 22nd 1996)

As with all Neo-Blood tournaments, this was for young or new talent. There were few more recognizable names here, with Satoshi Hasegawa, Yuki Kondo, Semmy Schilt and Pete Williams all taking part. Kondo beat Schilt by split-decision, Hasegawa lost to Keiichiro Yamamiya by split-decision, and Williams beat Kiuma Kunioku by unanimous decision.

WFA: King of the Streets (July 22nd 2006)

This was the fourth and final event from the ill-fated WFA promotion. WFA had seemingly folded at the end of 2002, after a disastrous event where building security forced credentialed photographers out of their areas, forcing them to shoot from places where they couldn’t take good pictures. This in turn forced writers to have to track down their photographers, thereby missing their beat; as a result, some editors pulled their coverage of the event altogether. However, in 2005, with MMA (at least the UFC) surging in popularity, new owners took over, spent a ton of money on fighters and even lured Bas Rutten out of retirement. The result was another event that befitted a promotion as poorly run as the WFA.

Rutten was supposed to fight Kimo, but Kimo failed a pre-fight drug test days before the event and was replaced by Ruben Villareal. Rutten, even at this stage of his career, handled Villareal with no problems, but Rutten then went and failed his post-fight drug test. Martin Kampmann got the call to fight on two day’s notice, but Kampmann at least ended up winning his fight. Former UFC Heavyweight Champion Ricco Rodriguez, whose fall from grace and the ranks of the notable in MMA is almost breathtaking, overcame Ron Waterman by doctor stoppage at the end of the first round. Future UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Lyoto Machida beat Vernon White by unanimous decision.

The main event was Quinton Jackson taking on Matt Lindland. Lindland got a $70,000 payday for the fight, which was probably more than he was realistically worth at this stage of the game. Jackson would get a big money deal as well. Their fight was pretty good, very competitive, even with much of it fought with both men clinched against the cage. The first round was solidly for Lindland, despite a trademark Jackson slam, and Lindland almost had Jackson done with a rear naked choke at the end of the round. The second round was far more competitive but Jackson edged it. The third round was also competitive, but Lindland edged that one, mainly with his wrestling, despite Jackson opening up a cut on the bridge of his nose late on. However, it may have been that cut that got Jackson the win, because Jackson got the nod via split-decision. It was a controversial decision and the commentary alludes to the judges favouring the near-his-hometown favourite Jackson. Lindland was rather subdued in his post-fight interview, but after the event and in subsequent interviews, Lindland has outright called the result a fix.

Strikeforce Challengers: Voelker vs. Bowling III (July 22nd 2011)

This was part of Strikeforce’s ‘Challengers’ series, shows designed to showcase up-and-coming talent. The only names on the show, however, to achieve much of note were Sarah Kaufman and Liz Carmouche, who fought each other, with Kaufman winning by unanimous decision, and Ovince Saint Preux. Saint Preux beat Joe Cason by submission due to punches.

[Egg Shen]

the Voelker/Bowling trilogy is one of the most underrated and forgotten little triologies in MMA, they had some wars.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 23rd)

Pancrase: 1995 Neo-Blood Tournament Second Round (July 23rd 1995)

This was the second night of Pancrase’s tournament for young and new fighters, and it featured the semi-finals and finals. For some reason, there is just one camera and it’s above the ring, so you’re almost looking straight down; it’s quite the unique angle and it makes it hard to properly see what’s going on, so why they did this, I have no idea.

The semi-finals kicked off the evening and they saw Takafumi Ito beat Katsuomi Inagaki by unanimous decision after 20:00 and Ryushi Yanagisawa submit Gregory Smit in 7:30. Before the finals, we had three non-tournament fights, the most interesting of which saw Bas Rutten face Frank Shamrock. It was a grappling-heavy battle, classic Pancrase, really. In the finals, it proved to be a long night for Takafumi Ito as it went the full 30:00, but it wasn’t in vain as Ito won via majority decision. Again, as with most Pancrase fights, it’s almost entirely grappling, and it’s a testament to Ito’s stamina that he could do 50:00 of that in one night and still keep going and he was on the offensive for most of the tournament final.

Pancrase: 1996 Neo-Blood Tournament, Round 2 (July 23rd 1996)

This was the second of the 1996 version of Pancrase’s tournament for new and younger fights. As with the previous year, the semi-finals started the night off; Petey Williams beat Osami Shibuya via decision, through lost points, and Yuki Kondo TKO’d Keiichiro Yamamiya with palm strikes in 6:15. Vernon White scored a major win with his majority decision victory over Minoru Suzuki and Minoru Suzuki eased past former Neo-Blood tournament winner Takafumi Ito in 2:01.  The two beaten tournament semi-finalist faced each other before the final, and Osami Shibuya submitted Keiichiro Yamamiya with an ankle lock in 6:48. The final of the tournament saw Yuki Kondo outlast Petey Williams with a 20:00 unanimous decision victory.

Strikeforce Challengers: del Rosario vs. Mahe (July 23rd 2010)

This was another of Strikeforce’s ‘Challenger’ events, designed to build up the names of up-and-coming or otherwise relatively unknown fighters. The main event was a heavyweight fight with Shane del Rosario taking on the Tongan, Lolohea Mahe. The co-main event really should have been the main event, as it saw Sarah Kaufman defends the Strikeforce Women’s Bantamweight Championship (at this point in time it’s called the Welterweight Championship) against Roxanne Modafferi. The only other fighter on the card that most people will ever heard of is future Robbie Lawler victim, Bobby Voelker.

The fight between Kaufman and Modafferi was OK but nothing overly special, although it did have a fairly spectacular ending. Modafferi had pulled guard on Kaufman and was working for an armbar; Kaufman began to lift Modafferi up and Modafferi held on rather than let go, so she was hoisted into the air and Kaufman slammed her to the mat powerbomb-style to knock Modafferi silly and the referee was quick on the dive in and stop the fight.

In the main event, Shane del Rosario TKO’d Lolohea Mahe in 3:48.

UFC on Fox 20: Holm vs. Shevchenko (July 23rd 2016)

The UFC’s 20th show on the FOX network would be headlined by a women’s bantamweight clash, with one fighter looking to reclaim her spot atop the division, and the other, looking for a rematch with the recently crowned divisional champion.

Holly Holm vs. Valentina Shevchenko (the build)

Holly Holm had ended her 2015 by scoring one of the biggest upsets in UFC history when she shocked the MMA world by knocking out Ronda Rousey at UFC 193 in Australia to claim the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship. Rousey was the dominant champion who had dispatched foes with relative ease, sometimes in just a scant few seconds. She appeared to be unbeatable and felt like a genuine MMA powerhouse who would reign for a long time. Holm threw that all out the window at UFC 193 with a stunning and sensational second round knockout, Holm levelling Rousey with what is surely MMA’s most famous high-kick finish.

Yet despite the stunning high she had achieved, Holm crashed down to earth in decisive fashion in her very first title defence. Holm defended her title at UFC 196 in the co-main event to McGregor/Diaz I, and her opponent was perennial Rousey rival, Miesha Tate. Tate was unarguably the better all-round fighter, yet despite that, and despite Holm being underwhelming before her performance against Rousey, it was Holm who entered the fight as the favourite. In a turnaround, it was now Holm facing an opponent that most people were giving little chance to.

Instead, after a fight that saw Holm edging ahead and likely in a position to score the unanimous decision victory, one mistake saw Tate take the back of Holm and hold on tight with a rear naked choke; despite throwing Tate over her head, Holm couldn’t shift Tate off her back and Tate choked Holm into unconsciousness to score the second straight upset in a UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship fight and claim the title that had previously eluded her.

From being the woman who had defeated the seemingly unbeatable champion, Holm now found herself in the ranks of the defeated for the very first time, and the events of UFC 193 seemed like a distant memory. But Holm would have a chance to redeem herself, but to do so she would have to beat an opponent who, like herself, had a boxing and kickboxing background.

Valentina Shevchenko had entered the UFC as a short-notice replacement for Germaine de Randamie against Sarah Kaufman at UFC on Fox 17. Shevchenko came in without much fanfare, but she made her mark in her UFC debut with a split-decision win over Kaufman. Shevchenko followed up on that with a hard fought unanimous decision loss to Amanda at UFC 196, ironically as the PPV opener underneath the Holm/Tate title fight. Nunes dominated the early going and took the first two rounds, but Nunes began to tire and Shevchenko came on strong to win the third round. Shevchenko had lost but she had put up a fight and made herself a name in the women’s bantamweight division.

Consequently, when it came time for Holm to get her first fight after the title loss to Tate, it was Shevchenko that the UFC put her up against, and it would be on FOX network television. There was talk that if Holm won, which was the expected result, then Holm would get a rematch for the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship, but by the time the fight with Shevchenko took place, that title had changed hands yet again; it was now Tate who had lost the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship in her first defence, and the new champion was none other than Shevchenko’s most recent opponent, Amanda Nunes.

For Holm, victory would likely mean a title fight against Nunes. Yet for Shevchenko, victory would not assure her of anything other than of being one step closer to, not just a title fight but the chance of revenge, and it was a rematch that a lot of people felt Shevchenko might win, with the champion’s cardio considered somewhat suspect.

The Rest of the Main Card

The co-main event was set to a fight between two light heavyweight contenders, Anthony Johnson and Glover Teixeira. However, just five days before the event, Johnson was pulled from the fight due to personal reasons, and the fight was rescheduled for UFC 202. Moving up a slot to take its place would be Edson Barboza against Gilbert Melendez. Barboza was coming off a dominant unanimous decision win over Anthony Pettis, whilst Gilbert was looking to avoid a third straight defeat. Heavyweight prospect Francis Ngannou was taking on Bojan Mihajlović, and the main card was rounded out by Kailin Curran facing Felice Herrig.

Card Changes

TUF: American Top Team vs. Blackzilians winner Kamaru Usman replaced Ryan LaFlare against Alexander Yakovlev. J.C. Cottrell made his late replacement debut against Michel Prazeres, Cottrell replacing an injured Tony Martin. And George Sullivan was pulled from his fight against Héctor Urbina stemming as the result of a potential UFC's anti-doping policy violation; Sullivan admitted to inadvertently using a banned substance, and would eventually be given a one-year suspension.

UFC on Fox 20: Holm vs. Shevchenko (The Preliminary Fights)

There were no real action highlights from the preliminary fights, but there were some very dominant performances. The most dominant of which was Kamaru Usman against Alexander Yakovlev, with Usman getting 30-25 scores on all three scorecards. Granted, the new judging criteria allow for such a score to be achieved more readily, but to get three 30-25s is still a remarkable feat, and it remains the second most one-sided score given out in UFC history. There was another 30-25 as Alex Oliveira dominated James Moontasri, with Oliveira winning on two 30-26s and one 30-25.

UFC on FOX 20: Holm vs. Shevchenko (The Main Card)

The main card got off on a downer with Felice Herrig submitting Kailin Curran in just 1:59 with a rear naked choke. It wasn’t that the fight was bad, but Herrig is such an obnoxious attention whore, and Curran is very likeable, that anytime she wins is a major turn-off. Francis Ngannou got the explosive win over Bojan Mihajlović that the UFC were hoping for, Ngannou TKO’ing Mihajlović in 1:34.

Edson Barboza and Gilbert Melendez had a good fight that tapered off at the end. The first round was pretty even and could have gone either way, but the second was solidly for Barboza; even though Melendez seemed to rock him a little and had him backing up off of a punch, Barboza was lighting up Melendez’s left leg with kicks. As a result, things slowed in the third because Melendez just couldn’t move like he wanted to and Barboza just methodically picked him apart with more leg kicks. Barboza got the unanimous decision victory to gain back-to-back wins, whilst Melendez had now lost three straight. As of the time of writing, Melendez has yet to fight again, although he is scheduled to fight Jeremy Stephens at UFC 215.

Holly Holm vs. Valentina Shevchenko

Going into this fight, it felt like that a lot of people were sleeping on Shevchenko, as if it was almost a formality that Holm would win; all the talk was of a future Holm title fight, with the idea of Shevchenko win being completely secondary. It wasn’t like people were downplaying the skill of Shevchenko; it just seemed like nobody was considering the possibility that she could win.

This fight really wasn’t that good. It wasn’t necessarily bad, but it had nothing to make it exciting or engaging. Holm had her best success in the first round, which was fairly even but went to Holm because she dropped Shevchenko, albeit not for long. After that, Shevchenko was just too quick, had better movement and reaction times, and Holm was almost completely shut down. They were both fairly even for strikes thrown, but Shevchenko landed way more than Holm did. Shevchenko wasn’t landing any power shots but she was landing in volume, and that’s what did the damage to Holm whose left leg was heavily reddened by the end.

Shevchenko won the unanimous decision with 49-46s across the board which was the only score the fight could have.

It was a big win for Shevchenko and it made people start to really take notice of her. It put her in prime position for a contendership fight, leaving Holm to pick up the pieces and in danger of not just cooling off, but become ice cold.

I think this fight, more than any other, showcased the big flaw with Holm’s training by Greg Jackson. Holm was trained for years to beat Ronda Rousey. That was the big fight she and Jackson were looking at and they geared their training towards that goal. And it worked. But it left gaping holes in Holm’s game and she has ended up being a very limited and rather one-dimensional fighter. That was always the knock on Rousey, usually by people who, for whatever reason, were driven mad by the fact that she kept winning. And it was true to extent. But as much was it was true for Rousey, it’s been shown to be just as true for Holm. Outside of the Rousey fight, Holm’s performances have been listless and uninspired, and the fights have ranged from OK (this one) to beyond terrible (Bethe Correia). Holm was trained to beat one woman, but the others were forgotten, and it seems like Holm has no other gameplan than the one she used against Rousey, and we’re still seeing the results today.

As there is nothing meriting a discussion for tomorrow, there will be a ‘catch up’ entry, and this one will cover UFC 116.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 3rd) (The UFC 116 Edition)

UFC 116: Lesnar vs. Carwin (July 3rd 2010)

The main event to UFC 116 would be one of those fights that is surprisingly rare for a division built around size and power, as it would be a battle of the monsters, a fight between two powerhouse wrestlers as Brock Lesnar, the UFC Heavyweight Champion, faced the interim UFC Heavyweight Champion Shane Carwin, in a title unification fight.

Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin (the build)

Shane Carwin had entered the UFC with the reputation of being a destroyer of men; of his eight pro fights, four had lasted less than a minute, with no fight lasting longer than 2:11. That reputation was cemented on his UFC debut at UFC 84 when he destroyed Christian Wellisch in 44-seconds, Carwin following that up with a 1:31 beating of Neil Wain at UFC 89. Carwin’s next fight was thought to be his first real test as he would face former title challenger Gabriel Gozanga. Carwin suffered an early scare to nail Gonzaga with a short punch, and despite there being only a couple of inches of space, Gonzaga was left unconscious and slumped against the octagon fence in one of the nastiest looking knockouts in UFC history.

This run of destruction secured Carwin a shot at Brock Lesnar and the UFC Heavyweight Championship. The fight was scheduled for UFC 106 but postponed until UFC 108 before being postponed again due to Lesnar suffering from an ongoing illness (diverticulitis) that kept him from training. To keep the heavyweight scene going in the meantime, it was decided that Carwin would face Frank Mir for the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship at UFC 111, with the winner of that fight then facing Lesnar when he was able to return to action.

At UFC 111, Carwin massacred Mir in 3:48 to claim the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship, and after Lesnar was brought into the octagon to set up the fight, Lensar once again referred to the interim title as not a real title, and the title unification match between Lesnar and Carwin was set for UFC 116.

The co-main event

The original co-main event was going to be Wanderlei Silva against Yoshihiro Akiyama. But on June 22nd, Silva was forced to withdraw due to three broken ribs and an injured right knee. Tabbed as Silva’s replacement would be middleweight slugger Chris Leben, and Leben’s participation was a major surprise as he had literally only just fought, having faced Aaron Simpson at the TUF 11 finale on June 19th. This would mean there would be just two weeks between fights for Leben, making this the shortest turnaround time between fights in modern UFC history, a record that would stand for over your years.

The Rest of the Main Card

Stephan Bonnar would be in a rematch against Krzysztof Soszynski; the two had fought at UFC 110, with Soszynski winning due to a doctor stoppage after Bonnar sustained a cut, but the cut was caused by an accidental headbutt. Bonnar appealed the loss but was unsuccessful, however, this rematch was immediately booked. Matt Brown would face Chris Lytle, and the main card would be rounded out by facing George Sotiropoulos, with both fighters coming into the fight on winning streaks.

Card Changes

A fight between Cheick Kongo and Roy Nelson was scrapped when Kongo suffered a back injury; Nelson was removed from the card and booked against Junior Dos Santos at UFC 117. Alessio Sakara was pulled out of a fight against Nate Marquardt due to the death of his father. A fight between Paul Kelly and Jacob Volkmann had to be rescheduled due to apparent visa issues with Kelly. A fight between UFC newcomer Ricardo Romero and Steve Cantwell was cancelled for unknown reasons; taking Cantwell’s place would be the returning Seth Petruzelli. Forrest Petz replaced an injured Julio Paulino against Daniel Roberts. The fight between Kendall Grove and Goran Reljic was scheduled to air on Spike TV, but was moved down the card and replaced by the Ricardo Romero vs. Seth Petruzelli fight after Grove made critical comments about Spike and TUF.

UFC 116 (The Preliminary Fights)

The highlight of the preliminary fights was undoubtedly Gerald Harris and his slam knockout of David Branch. It was in the third round; Harris had Branch pressed against the fence in a clinch, so Branch jumped up to hook his legs around Harris to try and pull guard. Harris took a few steps before slamming Branch to the mat and with his forearm braced against the chin of Branch and knocked him out cold upon impact. Other results of note were Ricardo Romero tapping out Seth Petruzelli and Brendan Schaub knocking out Chris Tuchscherer in 1:07.

UFC 116 (The Main Card)

George Sotiropoulos mixed up good striking with ground work to pretty well dominate Kurt Pellegrino for the unanimous decision victory. Pellegrino dropped Sotiropoulos with a knee from the clinch at the end of the third round, and whilst it won him the round, it was as good as it got for Pellegrino who otherwise had no answer for what Sotiropoulos could do. Stephan Bonnar and Krzysztof Soszynski had a bloody, brutal brawl, just wall-to-wall excitement with both men throwing without regard to defence. There was plenty of punching and kicking, both men hurting but still coming forward, making this a fight definitely worth going out of your way to see.

Matt Brown and Chris Lytle had a hard time following that, and this fight probably didn’t get the kind of reaction it should have. It was a good fight, very scrappy, and both men showed the submission side of their game. Lytle got a verbal submission with a combination mounted triangle and americana.

The UFC do a better job in overdubbing Yoshihiro Akiyama’s walk-in music than they usually do, but their choice of generic music is pretty bad. And as before, the announcers oversell Akiyama’s popularity in Japan. Akiyama and Chris Leben had a hell of a fight; sloppy as heck, but just a tremendous effort by both men. Akiyama used his judo to throw Leben a few times, and Leben came back with the requisite brawling. Akiyama and Leben wobbled each other and it turned into a swing-for-the-fences affair for a bit. Akiyama kept taking Leben down, though, and he seemed set to ride out the third round for a likely unanimous decision victory, but Leben, who had threatened off his back before during the fight, managed to snag Akiyama in a triangle choke and Akiyama fell backwards into the wrong position and had to tap with just twenty seconds left. As with the Bonnar/Soszynski fight, this fight is worth going out of your way to see.

UFC 116: Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin

The battle of the monster wrestlers had arrived. Brock Lesnar was powerful, quick and explosive; he was, as Joe Rogan liked to say, a walking video game character. Meanwhile, Shane Carwin was 12-0 and more of a pure powerhouse; in his twelve fights, his average fight time was 68-seconds. These were two men who had lunchboxes for fists, were both built like a brick shithouse, and it really was the unstoppable force meeting the immovable object.

After managing to stuff an early Brock takedown, Carwin landed a short uppercut on Lesnar and started to blitz him. Lesnar was soon on his back and Carwin began to unload punches on Lesnar and it looked bad, and there were some people who thought the referee was giving Lesnar too much of a break and should have stepped in. However, if you watch closely, the majority of Carwin’s punches were not landing flush on Lesnar; a few were glancing off his head and to his shoulders, but most were being absorbed by Lesnar’s forearms. Lesnar was bloodied up somewhat, but he really wasn’t taking the kind of punishment you thought he was when watching it live. And Lesnar was making some attempt to escape or otherwise defend himself so it’s not like he was just laying there and taking the punches. With about a minute left, Lesnar got back to his feet and spent the rest of the round with his arms around Carwin and pressing him against the fence.

In between rounds, Lesnar’s corner is very relaxed and Lesnar himself doesn’t appear to be too phased as he listens to his cornermen. Carwin, on the other hand, looked shattered and was breathing heavily.

When the second round started, Carwin was moving slow, breathing heavy, and it was evident that he had completely gassed himself out in that first round onslaught. Just under a minute in, and Lesnar took Carwin down with complete ease; Carwin couldn’t even to begin to defend against it. Lesnar is quickly in side-control but soon works into the mount position and then transitions into an arm triangle in almost one fluid motion. Lesnar’s technique isn’t pretty but he’s got the hold on tight and is squeezing on Carwin’s neck and after a few moments, Carwin gently taps out and Brock Lesnar remains undisputed UFC Heavyweight Champion.

Unlike at UFC 100, Lesnar is cheered like a conquering hero. He even pretends to punch himself, as if to indicate he can take a punch and keep going. And Lesnar can take a punch and keep going, because his problem with punches isn’t that he can’t take them; it’s that he doesn’t like taking them and it gets him off track. Lesnar is very humble in his post-fight interview and admits to being in trouble with the punches but that he knew Carwin was tiring out, that each punch was hitting less dramatically and he just had to weather the storm. Carwin was still sucking wind during his post-fight interview, where he said he fell down a mountain but would climb back up.

The Numbers and the Aftermath

The attendance was 12,740 with 9,218 paid, for a gate of $4,053,990. UFC 116 drew 1,160,000 buys which, for the time, was the 2nd highest in company history behind UFC 100. As of the time of writing, UFC 116 is the 6th highest drawing PPV in UFC history.

UFC 116 was widely lauded as one of the best shows of the year and was voted Best Major Show in the 2010 Wrestling Observer Newsletter awards. It was an accolade that was probably deserved, at least based purely on the PPV portion; it had two great fights and a very dramatic come-from-behind win by Brock in the battle of the monsters main event, ensuring a memorable ending to a great night of action.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 25th)

UFC on FOX 16: Dillashaw vs. Barão II (July 25th 2015)

The main event to UFC’s 16th show on the FOX network was an eagerly awaited championship rematch, a rematch that had previously been scheduled twice before having to be scrapped. The third time was the charm, however, and there would be no postponement and one of the most anticipated UFC Bantamweight Championship fights of all time would finally take place.

TJ Dillashaw vs. Renan Barão II (the build)

Renan Barão had entered the UFC with a tremendous record; after losing his debut fight, Barão had gone on quite the streak, compiling a 25-1, 1 NC record before debuting in the UFC octagon. Barão’s record was such that when Dominic Cruz was injured and had to be pulled from his UFC Bantamweight Championship defence against Urijah Faber at UFC 148 (the fight later being moved to UFC 149), it was Barão who replaced Cruz in a fight that would be for the interim title, and Barão cruised to a unanimous decision victory to claim the title.

Barão looked sensational in interim title defences against Michael McDonald and Eddie Wineland, and when it was determined that Dominic Cruz would be sidelined for a considerable length of time, Barão was promoted to official champion status and was now the UFC Bantamweight Champion. Barão face Faber a second time at UFC 169 and scored a controversial first round TKO victory, with Faber seemingly fine when the referee stopped the fight. Regardless, Barão was still considered the best bantamweight in the world, and one of the pound-for-pound best.

So when Urijah Faber’s Team Alpha Male teammate TJ Dillashaw was set as Barão’s next challenger at UFC 173 (May 2014), it was felt that this would be another routine title defence before Barão faced a soon-to-be returning Dominic Cruz. The odds reflected this perception with Barão a -1000 favourite and Dillashaw a +650 underdog heading into their UFC 173 main event. Instead, Dillashaw pulled off one of the biggest upsets in UFC title fight history, as, after decking Barão early in the first round, Dillashaw totally dominated Barão en route to a fifth round TKO victory.

It was a stunning upset as Dillashaw put in one of the most complete performances of his career in completely dominating the seemingly unbeatable Renan Barão. The rematch was scheduled for UFC 177 in August of 2014, but Barão was pulled from the fight the day before, as just prior to the weigh-ins, he’d fainted and been admitted to hospital due to a poor weight cut. The rematch was then rescheduled for UFC 186 (April 2015), but this time, Dillashaw was pulled from the fight, due to a broken rib.

Eventually, the rematch was once again booked, for a FOX show, and this time there would be no last-minute cancellations, and the most anticipated UFC Bantamweight Championship fight of all time was on.

The Rest of the Card

The co-main event would be a women’s bantamweight fight between Jessica Eye and Miesha Tate. Coming off her second challenge to Ronda Rousey and the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship, Tate had won three fights in a row, including a majority decision win against Sara McMann, in a fight where Tate had to dig deep after being dominated in the first round. A victory over Eye may not put her in line for another shot at Rousey, as it would be her third chance at Rousey, the second in the UFC, but Tate had to win if she wanted to keep her name in that championship contender mix.

Jessica Eye had won her first fight in the UFC, a split-decision win over Sarah Kaufmann, but the result was overturned when Eye failed a post-fight drug test for marijuana. Eye then lost a split-decision to Alex Davis before scoring one of the most gruesome TKO victories in UFC history when her fight against Leslie Smith was stopped due to Smith’s cauliflower ear exploding, leaving the ear literally hanging on and flapping in the wind. However she got the win, she got it, and it was a win Eye desperately needed, and she’d need another win here tonight to fully establish herself in the women’s bantamweight division.

Elsewhere on the main card, former UFC Lightweight champion Anthony Pettis was set to face Myles Jury and Joe Lauzon would take on former PRIDE standout Takanori Gomi.

On the preliminary card, the main fight would be Tom Lawlor against Gian Villante, with other fights scheduled including Danny Castillo vs. Rustam Khabilov, Bryan Caraway vs. Eddie Wineland, and Jessamyn Duke vs. Elizabeth Phillips.

Card Changes

Anthony Pettis was pulled from his fight against Myles Jury due to injury and was replaced by Edson Barboza. Jury would then himself be pulled due to injury and he was replaced was replaced by Paul Felder. The lightweight bout between Danny Castillo and Rustam Khabilov, that had previously scheduled for UFC 182, had to be scrapped due to complications with Khabilov’s visa, and Jim Miller replaced Khabilov. Andrew Holbrook replaced Erik Koch against Ramsey Nijem. And Dominique Steele made his UFC debut, replacing Antônio Braga Neto against Zak Cummings.

UFC on FOX 16 (Fight Pass)

Zak Cummings gave Dominique Steele a short and unpleasant welcome to the UFC, TKO’ing him in 43-seconds. Cummings stunned Steele with a punch and ended up trapping him against the fence and just unloading, Phil Baroni-style. Elizabeth Phillips avenged a loss in the amateur ranks to Jessamyn Duke, with Phillips wining by unanimous decision. The loss would be Duke’s third in a row and she would subsequently be released by the UFC. Andrew Holbrook scored a minor upset with a split-decision win over Ramsey Nijem. This would be Nijem’s last official fight with the UFC, and Nijem would not fight again until taking part in the recent TUF: Redemption series. And James Krause submitted Daron Cruickshank in 1:37

UFC on FOX 16 (FOX prelims)

The FOX prelims saw three of the four fights go the distance; Bryan Caraway beat Eddie Wineland by unanimous decision, and Ben Saunders and Jim Miller beat Kenny Robertson and Danny Castllo respectively, by split-decision. The final prelim fight saw Tom Lawlor come back from a beating against the much bigger Gian Villante to score the knockout victory in 27-seconds of the second round. Villante moved in with his hands down and Lawlor caught him with a perfectly timed right hook. Villante protested the stoppage when he stood up but it was the right call as Villante was on very wobbly legs.

UFC on FOX 16 (FOX)

The main card opened up with Takanori Gomi facing Joe Lauzon. It started slow and not much happened until Lauzon went for a takedown; Lauzon ended up getting the back of Gomi and pounding him out, and he actually walked away as Gomi was unconscious before Herb Dean realized that Gomi was out. Not one of Gomi’s best days, or Herb’s, as he pulled a Mazzagatti. Edson Barboza and Paul Felder had a tidy little scrap with men willing to stand and trade. Felder drew first blood with an early bunch that had Barboza’s right eye swelling. Barboza returned the favour with interest when he hit a spin kick to Felder’s balls. Most of the fight was Barboza playing counter striker and he as lighting Felder up with leg kicks, body kicks, and some spinning shit was thrown in too. Felder was throwing the spinning shit as well, but he was taking more than he was receiving, as was made evident by some of the welts on his body. It was a good fight and whilst Felder was disappointed to lose by unanimous decision, 29-28 across the board, it was the right result.

Miesha Tate vs. Jessica Eye

This was a really good fight with Miesha Tate looking great. Eye looked good too, at least for the first few minutes; she was aggressive, moving forward, and seemed to be landing punches at will. Then Tate landed a power shot and dropped Eye; Eye recovered but Tate had control of her on the ground for the rest of the round, and from that point on, the fight was all Tate. It felt like Eye completely folded once she got hurt, because she had none of that initial spark of the rest of the fight.

Tate was landing kicks and punches, feigning takedowns and then going for them for real later on. It was a decisive and strong performance from Tate, just the thing she needed to stake her claim to one more crack at the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship.

TJ Dillashaw vs. Renan Barão II

The main event was up and it was the much anticipated UFC Bantamweight Championship rematch. Would TJ Dillashaw show that the events of UFC 173 were no fluke, that he was indeed the top bantamweight fighter in the world, or would Renan Barão retake as position as UFC Bantamweight Champion?

This wasn’t entirely one-sided but it was pretty damn close, with TJ Dillashaw putting in another complete performance and virtually shutting Barão out completely. Dillashaw was just too quick, too precise, and kept up on a constant stream of pressure. And Barão did himself no favours in that he was gassing by the second round, and part way into the third, he appeared to be done.  As Joe Rogan pointed out on commentary, Barão’s big weight cut to make 135lbs had seen him fade before, and never was this more evident than tonight because Barão tired quickly and had almost nothing to offer in the way of offence or defence.

It was a performance and victory that made it clear that TJ Dillashaw was here to stay as UFC Bantamweight Champion and that it would take a very special fighter to take that title away from him.

[Carbomb]

Oh, fucking Dillashaw. I hadn't been any kind of MMA fan until about a year before, and had become a big fan of Barao, so it pissed me off I pretty much caught him at what turned out to be his nadir. And losing to that Alpha Male scrote Dillashaw too. The first fight was a shock, but I had held out hope that it was just because Barao had underestimated him, or perhaps he'd been unlucky, or he was just unused to the guy's style; Barao had a reputation for having one of the best fight IQs in the business. That rematch broke my heart, because it pretty much confirmed Barao was now probably never going to get back on top again. That he's done not-so-well at 145, losing to that utter prick Jeremy Stephens, has only served to compound my disappointment.

I still can't get my head around fucking Vegas odds. I've had it explained to me, and I think I even understood them at one point, but they've completely slipped out of my head again.

EDIT: One of my favourite bits of trivia about Barao was supplied on here by wand: he hadn't lost since before YouTube was launched.

 

[Noah Southworth]

12 hours ago, Carbomb said:

I still can't get my head around fucking Vegas odds. I've had it explained to me, and I think I even understood them at one point, but they've completely slipped out of my head again.

If a fighter is -250, then you need to wager $250 to get $100 back. But if the fighter is +250, then you get $250 for every $100 you bet.

So for the first Barão/Dillashaw fight, you would have had to wager $1000 on Barão just to get back $100. Conversely, a $100 wager on Dillashaw would have won you $650.

They can be tricky to understand at first, but I think the American odds are a lot more straightforward than the decimal and fractional systems.

[Carbomb]

See, that makes a lot more sense than the explanation I saw on some bettors' website. I still prefer regular fractional odds, but I get it now.

Thanks for that!

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 26th)

Pancrase: Road to the Championship 3 (July 26th 1994)

The Road to the Championship series of events was designed to build towards Pancrase’s King of Pancrase tournament in December, a two-night tournament on back-to-back days that would crown the first Openweight King of Pancrase. This particular night had a big main event but the undercard fights were set up to be, and generally played out as one-sided. The main event was one of Pancrase’s big names and its top foreign star, Ken Shamrock, taking on Bas Rutten. Whilst they would go into this fight with similar records, 5-1 and 7-2 respectively, Shamrock was the better all-round fighter as Rutten was still learning the submission side of things, to go along with his striking background.

Four of the six undercard fights went less than 4:15, with the quickest one being Masakatsu Funaki’s 56-second submission win over Scott Sollivan. The longest undercard fight was Todd Bjornethun’s 15:00 unanimous decision win over Gregory Smit. The main event between Shamrock and Rutten saw Shamrock completely control and dominate Rutten. It was to be expected given Rutten’s experience with the ground and submission game. It’s interesting to note that if you watch closely, Shamrock really does have poor submission technique and a lot of his submission attempts are Shamrock trying to use brute force rather than technique. Shamrock is also considerably leaner than he was during his future UFC runs, so his steroid use was way down at this point, although he's still bulkier than in his early Pancrase days.

Pancrase: 1998 Neo-Blood Tournament Second Round (July 26th 1998)

This was the second night of Pancrase’s annual Neo-Blood tournament, built around new and upcoming talent. Unlike previous versions of this tournament, the second night featured just the tournament final, with the quarterfinals and semi-finals having both been held on the first night. There were only five fights on this card and the Neo-Blood tournament final was right in the middle of the card. The main event featured Pancrase’s top star, Masakatsu Funaki, taking on Osami Shibuya, a mid-level fighter. The tournament this year had come down to Justin McCully and Evan Tanner. In the co-main event spot, the 1996 Neo-Blood tournament winner Yuji Kondo faced Ryushi Yanagisawa. Tanner and McCully had a decent little grappling battle; it’s strange watching a fight where nobody actually throws punches, just open-handed slaps. There was a nice post-match ceremony as well.

EliteXC: Unfinished Business (July 26th 2008)

This was the second EliteXC show to be held on CBS; their first was EliteXC: Primetime and that was the first MMA event to be shown on primetime network television in the US. One of the fights that night saw Robbie Lawler defend the EliteXC Middleweight Championship against Scott Smith; the fight ended in a no-contest due to an inadvertent eye poke by Lawler. Because of the way the fight ended, a rematch was booked and it would serve as the main event for this second show on CBS, and would give the show its title.

Other fights on the main card for Unfinished Business would see Jake Shields taking on Nick Thompson for the vacant EliteXC Welterweight Championship, Nick Diaz face Thomas Denny and a catchweight (140lbs) fight between Cybog and Shayna Baszler.

The first fight of the main card is Cyborg/Baszler, and it should be mentioned that women’s fights still have rounds of only three-minutes. Cyborg was a lot younger here and when you combine that with her being fairly well jacked, Cyborg, once she avoided Baszler’s submission attempts, just hammered the crap out of Baszler. In the second round, Cyborg dropped Baszler and started celebrating, Cyborg even jumping the cage, but she had to be told the fight was actually still going. It didn’t last much longer and Baszler took more of a beating before getting dropped for the final time.

Prior to the fight between Jake Shields and Nick Thompson, there is a video piece with Frank Shamrock as he describes some of the terms and techniques used in MMA. It’s a good instructional piece and makes sense to have on just the second primetime network MMA show, because a lot of people will still not really know what is going on. Shields/Thompson is for the vacant EliteXC Welterweight Championship. The title isn’t vacant for too much longer because Shields quickly takes Thompson down, mounts him, and gets the submission with a mounted one-armed guillotine choke.

Nick Diaz got a great reaction coming out for his fight against Thomas Denny, primarily because this was in Stockton, which is literally Diaz’s backyard. The fight was intended to be a showcase for Diaz and it was exactly that, with Denny offering only the briefest of resistance. Diaz is good on this feet, obviously, but sometimes his punches looked a little weird, like they’re not being thrown with the ‘proper’ form, but they work for Diaz who had the Stockton fans going crazy with his victory.

The main event between Robbie Lawler and Scott Smith didn’t get exciting until near the end of the first round when Smith started to really find his range and he was giving Lawler problems. In the second round, Lawler came on strong; he clinched up with Smith and pressed him against the fence, Lawler then unleashing some dirty boxing and punching Smith all over the body. Smith couldn’t escape and ended up taking a knee to the chest that dropped him; Smith took some shots and managed to get back up, but another knee to the body dropped him again. Lawler delivered some knees and then a kick to the ribs of Smith and the referee stepped in to stop the fight and Lawler had retained the EliteXC Middleweight Championship.

UFC on Fox 12: Lawler vs. Brown (July 26th 2014)

The twelfth outing of UFC on the FOX network would be main evented by a highly anticipated welterweight showdown between two fighters known for their exciting fights, and it was a contest that would gain added significance when it was announced that it would serve as a welterweight championship eliminator, with the winner of the fight earning themselves a shot at UFC Welterweight Champion Johny Hendricks.

Robbie Lawler vs. Matt Brown (the build)

Robbie Lawler returned to the UFC in February of 2013 and made an immediate impact with a first round TKO victory over former welterweight title challenger Josh Koscheck. Lawler followed up on that with a head kick knockout win over Bobby Voelker on a FOX show, before scoring a hard fought split decision win over Rory MacDonald at UFC 167. MacDonald was considered the next in line for a shot at the welterweight title, but Lawler had spoiled those plans and in doing so, he put himself opposite the cage against Johny Hendricks in the fight to fill the title vacancy created when UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St. Pierre took a sabbatical.

Lawler and Hendricks had a tremendous fight, a fight considered to be the best of the year, but it would be Hendricks who walked away with the victory and the UFC Welterweight Championship after winning by unanimous decision. Not to be deterred, and mindful of the fact that the UFC would likely seek to book a rematch as soon as possible, Lawler rebounded with a TKO win over Jake Ellenberger at UFC 173. It was a strong win and just what Lawler needed to put himself back into title contention. Lawler was then chosen be the headliner on the UFC’s twelfth event on FOX, in a fight that would end up being a title eliminator. Facing Lawler, though, would be a fighter who had made a quiet and almost improbable rise up the welterweight ranks.

Matt Brown was a solid, tough-as-nails fighter, who entered 2012 with a 6-4 record in the UFC. Brown was considered to be one of those fighters who could have an exciting fight in the midcard, get the fans going, but would be unlikely to achieve more than that. To that end, Brown, after starting 2012 with a TKO win over Chris Cope, was matched against Stephen Thompson, a welterweight on the rise and who was considered a future title challenger. Brown surprised people with a very dominant showing en route to a unanimous decision victory, handing Thompson the first loss of his MMA career.

Brown followed up on that performance with five consecutive victories, all by KO or TKO, and with two of them earning Fight of the Night honours. To a slowly rising fanfare, Brown had put together a string of seven victories, something rarely seen in the always competitive welterweight division. It forced people to finally take notice of Brown and view him as more than a good hand, a reliable gatekeeper. Now, Brown was being talked about as a possible title contender, and when it was time to decide who to put against Robbie Lawler in the FOX 12 headliner, it was Matt Brown who got the call and whose addition to the fight triggered the decision to make it a welterweight title eliminator. Matt Brown had risen up the ranks almost unnoticed, but he now had the opportunity to put the whole division on notice, and with it, claim an almost improbable championship opportunity.

The Rest of the Card

Anthony Johnson was expected to be a force in the light heavyweight division when he returned to the UFC, and his first fight seemed to confirm that with a decisive unanimous decision victory over Phil Davis. However, Johnson was a banger, a heavy hitter, and to give the fans a chance to see Johnson do what he did best, he was matched up with Antônio Rogério Nogueira. Nogueira was an accomplished amateur boxer, even competing for Brazil in the Pan-American games. It was felt this would be a battle of power versus technique, and there was every chance of fireworks and excitement in the co-main event of the evening.

The two other fights on the main card included Dennis Bermudez facing Clay Guida, Bermudez, the runner-up in TUF 14, had won six-in-a-row since losing to Diego Brandão, whilst Guida had gone 1-2 since dropping down to bantamweight, and badly needed a win to establish himself in his new weight class. And the opener was scheduled to be Michel Johnson against former Strikeforce Lightweight Champion, Josh Thomson.

Changes to the Card

Gilbert Burns made his UFC debut as a replacement for Viscardi Andrade against Andreas Ståhl at the event. Michael Johnson was pulled from his fight against Josh Thomson and replaced by Bobby Green.

In the weigh-ins, Matt Brown missed weight for the main event. Brown initially weighed in at 172.5lbs and was going to try and cut weight, but for some reason, the CASC wouldn’t allow him to. There was a similar confusion over Juliana Lima and her attempts to make weight for her fight against Joanna Jędrzejczyk. As a result, neither Brown nor Lima was fined for their failure to make weight and they both remained eligible for post-fight bonuses.

Also, due to a programming situation, the televised preliminary fights also aired on FOX.

UFC on FOX 12 (The Preliminary Fights)

The preliminary fights were draining to watch live, because seven of the eight went the distance, but most of them were actually good fights. The major exception was Patrick Cummins’ unanimous decision win over Kyle Kingsbury, which was a tedious clinch and wrestling-heavy fight that saw Cummins completely dominate Kingsbury, Cummins even getting the very rare 30-24 score from one judge. The main result of interest saw Joanna Jędrzejczyk dominate Julian Lima for the unanimous decision (30–27, 29–28 and 30–27) victory.

The only preliminary fight to have a finish saw Brian Ortega submit Mike De La Torre in the first round, but that would end up being changed to a no-contest when Ortega failed a post-fight drug test for Drostanolone, which is a steroid.

UFC on FOX 12 (The Main Card)

The fight between Bobby Green and Josh Thomson was pretty disappointing and it had more action from Green’s mouth than from either fighter, with Green doing a lot of trash talking. Green won by split-decision but it was one of those wins that looks far better on paper than it did in reality. Dennis Bermudez completely dominated Clay Guida on his way to a second round submission victory. Now this was a win that looked just as good in reality as it did on paper, because Bermudez was just so great.

In the co-main event of the evening, Anthony Johnson completely obliterated Antônio Rogério Nogueira in 44-seconds. Johnson just overwhelmed Nogueira and sent him into the shadow realm with a series of brutal-as-heck uppercuts.

Robbie Lawler vs. Matt Brown

Rather than recap the fight again, I can repost what I originally wrote about the fight;

Quote

Matt Brown vs. Robbie Lawler was a very much a war in the first round with both fighters getting rocked but Lawler able to pick things up as the round went on and both fighters were lighting each other up. Brown got rocked in the later stages of the round so Lawler should take it. The second round was more competitive and virtually all standing; this one was a lot closer to call and I think Brown edged it, however, it could go either way, so it’s 19-19 or 20-18 in favour of Lawler. The third round saw Lawler really pour it on and pretty much dominate the whole round standing, apart from a brief flurry from Brown late on. Brown is taking some serious punishment and is down 29-28 or 30-27 going into the fourth and realistically needs to pull out a finish, somehow, to win this. The pace slowed in the fourth and whilst Brown pressed the action, he was constantly getting tagged and Lawler again dominated the round. 39-37 or 40-36 going into the fifth and final round, and Matt Brown needs to pull something incredible out of the bag if he wants to win this. The fifth round saw Brown try to pour it on and he somewhat did, but he was just too tired and he very clearly hurt his right hand part-way through the round. Lawler should take the round and win 49-46 or 50-45 but even if Brown somehow gets the round, Lawler has won the fight and possibly more decisively than the scorecards will suggest. Lawler takes it with scores of 49-46, 49-46 and 48-47.

It was good fight but not the fight that people expected it to be. A lot of people were expecting a real barnburner, a war, and it was anything but. It wasn’t a bad fight just one that didn’t live up to what were perhaps overly lofty expectations. Robbie Lawler was just too aggressive and hard-hitting and it was clear that Brown simply wasn’t on his level.

Tomorrow’s entry will talk about UFC 14, ShoXC: Elite Challenger Series, and UFC on FOX 8: Johnson vs. Moraga.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 27th)

UFC 14: The Showdown (July 27th 1997)

This UFC show would feature two four-man tournaments; a heavyweight tournament (200lbs and over) and a middleweight (formerly lightweight) tournament (under 200lbs). It would be the first UFC event where it was mandatory to wear padded gloves, weighing between four and six ounces. The main event would see Maurice Smith, the last EFC Heavyweight Champion, making his UFC debut to challenge Mark Coleman for the UFC Heavyweight Championship. Also making his UFC debut tonight, as part of the heavyweight tournament, would be Mark Kerr.

The fights tend to breeze by as, with two exceptions, they don’t last longer than 2:22.

The first fight is in the middleweight tournament and is one of the two fights of the night that go long, as it goes 15:00, and at this stage of the UFC, that means 12:00 plus one 3:00 period of overtime. Joe Moreira beat Yuri Vaulin in what was a terrible fight; virtually the entire fight was Moreira on top of Vauilin and controlling him but without doing anything offensive or going for a submission. The second semi-final fight in the middleweight tournament saw the UFC debut of former Olympic gold medal winner Kevin Jackson. Jackson also won gold in the World Championships and Pan-American Games, and he was someone that the UFC had very high hopes for as they were intending to build the middleweight division around Jackson. Jackson’s opponent was Todd Butler, a karate fighter who had a little amateur wrestling experience. This fight didn’t last long, just 1:27, as Jackson quickly took Butler down and pounded him out for the submission.

The first semi-final fight in the heavyweight tournament saw Mark Kerr taking on Moti Horenstein. Kerr is a wrestler, whilst Horenstein was another karate guy. Kerr mowed through Horenstein in 2:22, taking him down and pounding him out. You can tell we’re in the glory days of the ground-and-pound approach to fighting by wrestlers.

In between fights, it is announced that Joe Moreira cannot continue, officially due to concussion, and he will be replaced by Tony Fryklund, who won an alternates bout.

In the second heavyweight semi-final, the 310lbs Dan Bobbish took on Brian Johnston, who was a ‘mere’ 232lbs. They started out swinging before Bobbish took Johnston down and had him pressed against the fence; Johnston’s head was at a weird angle and with Bobbish pressing his own head against Johnston’s, it created tremendous pressure and Johnston tapped. This would be Johnston’s last MMA fight and he would retire with a record of 5-6.

There is time to kill so they show Tony Fryklund beating Donnie Chappell in the alternate’s bout. It’s not much of a fight, with Fryklund choking (two-handed style) Chappell for the submission in 1:31. It’s more notable for what Fryklund did after the stoppage, as he’d hit Chappell and step on him whilst walking off. Fryklund was completely unapologetic until John McCarthy talked to him, and whilst Fryklund apologized in his post-fight interview, it came off as completely false.

The middleweight final is first and it’s Kevin Jackson taking on Tony Fryklund. Fryklund is booed due to his earlier bullshit, and it’s highly satisfying when Jackson takes him down and chokes him out in 44-seconds. Next is the heavyweight tournament final between Mark Kerr and Daniel Bobbish. Kerr took Bobbish down, although it took a little effort; Kerr ended up on top of Bobbish and got the submission in unique fashion, by pressing his chin into Bobbish’s eye. Well, whatever works, right?

Mark Coleman vs. Maurice Smith

This is the main event and it’s the UFC Heavyweight Champion defending against the last EFC Heavyweight Champion. This was built up to with some great video pieces throughout the night. Smith said that Coleman punched like a girl, but he played it straight, like he was being serious and wasn’t just riling Coleman up. But Coleman took it personally and his pre-fight comments made that quite clear, so Smith had riled up Coleman something fierce. At this point in time, Coleman had appeared to be unbeatable; a monster that took you down and pounded you out, so Smith’s tactic of riling up the gorilla seemed to be virtually suicidal. And despite Smith’s combat experience, he didn’t have a big reputation; he was seen as just a kickboxer who would be easy prey for the world class wrestler, so Coleman was the heavy favourite going into this fight.

Coleman took Smith down quickly and started throwing headbutts, which were still legal in the UFC at the time. Coleman controlled Smith against the ground but Smith was making Coleman work to keep top position. Coleman transitioned into the side mount and got the back of Smith and went for a rear naked choke but he didn’t have good positioning and Smith turned to his back, although now Coleman was in the mount position. Coleman rained down punches but Smith took them well, although he did have to turn to avoid getting hit and Coleman got his back again; Coleman had back control but not good enough to stop Smith from once again turning to his back. Coleman stayed on top of Smith and took side control, but Smith managed to wriggle free and get to his feet.

We’re now nine-minute into the fight and Coleman is leaned over and breathing heavily. Smith starts kicking at Coleman, who goes for a takedown but gets nowhere near Smith, and as Coleman stands up, Smith launches a head kick but John McCarthy steps in as this is a foul. I’m not sure why, because Coleman is clearly stood on both feet when the kick is thrown. Coleman gets a brief respite but he’s completely gassed and is now doubled over, gasping for breath when the fight resumes.

Coleman is still dangerous, though, and he takes Smith down and Coleman mounts Smith and gets him in the grounded headlock, which has been Coleman’s finishing hold in the UFC so far, but Smith quickly forces Coleman to let go, delivering some big knees off his back. Coleman is so exhausted that Smith not only wriggles free but takes Coleman’s back. Smith backs off, though, because he wants the fight standing, and as regulation time ends, Mark Coleman is completely shattered.

In the first overtime, Smith starts picking Coleman apart with kicks. He’s careful not to go too crazy. Coleman goes for a takedown but to say it was half-hearted is being generous. Coleman is beyond spent and has absolutely nothing left. Coleman is so exhausted that he’s bent over gasping for air as Smith is just in front of him and ready to kick his head off. The second overtime period goes the same way; Smith picking Coleman apart and Coleman just too exhausted to do anything at all. Mark Coleman can barely stand as the fight ends and it certainly looks like the unbeatable monster just got beat.

Indeed, the announcement is made that we have a new UFC Heavyweight Champion; Maurice Smith. It was considered a major upset at the time because Coleman had mown through people and had looked unstoppable, and Smith just didn’t have the rep of being a top heavyweight fighter. Some of that might have been down to his working in RINGS, where, even though they were pushed and promoted as real fighting, the vast majority of their matches, at least in this timeframe, were works, but a lot of places who you think should know better either didn’t know or didn’t care to know the difference, so put more stock in some of Smith’s losses than they should have.

The weaknesses of Coleman were there from the beginning; in his first UFC, it was clear that Coleman had cardio issues. It was even mentioned on commentary at the time. But Coleman powered through them and his opponents and it never became an issue. Yet Maurice Smith had the perfect strategy for beating Coleman and executed it to perfection; he goaded Coleman into blowing his wad early, bided his time for Coleman to tire himself out, and then picked him apart at a distance. It was risky because Coleman is heavy handed, but it was the right strategy to beat Coleman, and it paid real dividends here.

ShoXC: Elite Challenger Series (July 27th 2007)

This was the first of EliteXC’s ShoXC cards, shows designed to showcase new and upcoming MMA talent. Of the fights on this card, there were a few who people would recognize; Shayna Baszler, Jan Finney, Scott Jorgensen, K.J. Noons, and Aaron Rosa. Other than that, you’d be hard pressed for any of the other fighters to generate even a glimmer of recognition. For the record, the main event was Brian Cobb submitting John Reedy in 4:09 of the first round. Cobb was in the UFC for a cup of coffee, a second round submission loss to Terry Etim at UFC 95, and it was a loss which snapped a seven fight winning streak.

UFC on FOX 8: Johnson vs. Moraga (July 27th 2013)

The main event to UFC’s eighth show on FOX would see Demetrious Johnson make the second defence of the UFC Flyweight Championship against John Moraga.

Demetrious Johnson vs. John Moraga (the build)

Demetrious Johnson had become the first ever UFC Flyweight Champion with a split-decision victory over Joseph Benavidez at UFC 152. It was the final of a four-man tournament that also involved Ian McCall and Yasuhiro Urushitani. Johnson’s first title defence had also been part of a FOX network event, with Johnson defending against John Dodson at UFC on FOX 6. The fight itself was keenly contested and fairly competitive, but Johnson retained his title with a unanimous decision victory. The next challenger would be a quality fighter, who had undoubtedly earned his way into the UFC. The problem was not that he would get a title shot after just two victories, but that those victories were on platforms that ensured his name wasn’t going to get out to the masses

John Moraga entered the UFC on a five-fight winning streak, with an overall record of 11-1. Moraga’s first fight in the UFC saw him gain a first round TKO victory over Ulysses Gomez, and he followed that up with a third round TKO win over Chris Cariaso. The victories meant that, with the flyweight division being relatively shallow at the time, they were enough to earn Moraga a shot at the champion, Demetrious Johnson. And this might not have been a problem except for one thing; those two wins were on Fuel TV and Facebook respectively. This meant that you were promoting a title fight where the challenger would be virtually unknown outside of the diehard fanbase.

The UFC seemed to get around this problem by putting Johnson vs. Moraga in the main event of the live finale to TUF 17, a program that would have 13-weeks of weekly television to promote it, thus ensuring a respectable viewing audience, even if it wasn’t primarily drawn by the main event. That idea hit the wayside when Johnson withdrew from the fight due to injury, so the fight was rescheduled, and the UFC made the bold move of putting the Johnson vs. Moraga title fight as the main event of their eighth FOX special, and it was a major gambit to have as their FOX headliner, a fight where one half of the main event was a fighter that was virtually unknown.

The Rest of the Card

The co-main event would see Rory MacDonald take on Jake Ellenberger. MacDonald was a Canadian welterweight who was 14-1 and who the UFC hoped would eventually become the Canadian face of MMA when Georges St. Pierre retired. To that end, his previous fight, which had taken place on FOX, saw him face the legend BJ Penn; it was a fight that MacDonald was expected to dominate, and he did, and it gave him a high-profile win over a fighter with a big name. The UFC wanted to put MacDonald in another high-profile fight, so they once again put him on FOX, and this time, they gave him an opponent who was expected to give him a sterner test.

Jake Ellenberger was 8-2 in the UFC; his two losses were a split-decision loss to divisional standout Carlos Condit, and a TKO loss to the hard-hitting Martin Kampmann. In his previous fight, Ellenberger had knocked out Nate Marquardt in just 3:00, so Ellenberger was no slouch, and whilst he was the underdog going into his fight against Rory MacDonald, Ellenberger was expected to test MacDonald and give us an indication of just how good MacDonald really was.

Set to round out the main card were Robbie Lawler against the debuting Tarec Saffiedine, and a women’s bantamweight fight between Jéssica Andrade and Liz Carmouche, with Andrade making her UFC debut. The pick of the preliminary fights would see undefeated TUF 15 tournament winner Michael Chiesa face Jorge Masvidal.

Card Changes

Jorge Masvidal replaced Reza Madadi against Michael Chiesa, with Madadi pulled due to alleged visa issues. Liz Carmouche replaced Miesha Tate against Jessica Andrade, with Tate removed from the fight so that she could be one of the coaches on TUF 18. Tarec Saffiedine was forced out of his UFC debut against Robbie Lawler due to injury; he was replaced by Siyar Bahadurzada, who was himself then replaced due to injury, and Lawler’s new opponent would be Bobby Voelker. A heavyweight fight between Matt Mitrione and Brendan Schaub was rescheduled for UFC 165 when Mitrione was injured. Tim Means replaced Bobby Green against Danny Castillo, with Green citing an injury as the reason for his pulling out. Daron Cruickshank replaced an injured Spencer Fisher against Yves Edwards.

Tim Means would miss weight for his fight, as would John Albert, and both men elected to forfeit 20% of their purse rather than attempt to cut the excess weight, and both of their fights were made catchweight contests.

UFC on FOX 8 (The preliminary fights)

The night opened up with a bantamweight fight between John Albert and Yaotzin Meza. This was a really good fight, very submission based, and both fighters had their chance to win. Unfortunately, not only would John Albert miss weight for this fight he would also lose it, with Meza submitting him in the second round with a rear naked choke. This would be Albert’s fourth straight loss and he would subsequently be released, and as of the time of writing, John Albert has yet to fight again.

The next four fights had quite the run as in what I believe is a first in the UFC we had four straight split-decisions. The previous record for consecutive split-decision was set at UFC 94 when there three in a row. In this run of split-decisions, future former UFC Women’s Featherweight Champion Germaine de Randamie made her UFC debut with a win over current Invicta FC matchmaker Julie Kedzie. The pick of the bunch, however, was the fight between Ed Herman and Trevor Smith.

Breaking the streak of split-decision was Melvin Guillard, who delivered a brutal knockout to Mac Danzig in what would end up being Guillard’s final win in the UFC. After Danny Castillo scored a unanimous decision win over Tim Means, the preliminary fights culminated with Jorge Masvidal ending the undefeated run of Michael Chiesa, with a last-gasp submission in the second round; Chiesa tapped to a D’arce choke with one second remaining.

UFC on FOX 8 (The Main Card)

The opener between Liz Carmouche and Jéssica Andrade was a decent fight and a real good showing from Carmouche. Andrade had her moments in the second half of the first round, but this was a virtual showcase for Carmouche who showed a very strong top game. Andrade did show potential and watching this fight makes it clear just how much she’s grown in four years, but Carmouche was just too much for her and she got the TKO win at 3:57 of the second round.

The fight between Robbie Lawler and Bobby Voelker was pretty uneventful until Lawler started to pick things up late in the first round, and it was clear that Lawler was too powerful and precise for Voelker, who ended the round with a bloody nose. It didn’t take long for Lawler to finally end things, Lawler landing a head kick 20-seconds into the second round, and the sound of Lawler’s shin connecting with Voelker’s forehead made for an almost sickening thud. The fight was over seconds later and Lawler had delivered the highlight reel finish in his second fight back in the UFC.

The action came to a screeching halt in the co-main event as Rory MacDonald and Jake Ellenberger produced a fight virtually bereft of excitement, as it seemed neither fighter was willing to commit to anything. MacDonald was content to completely neutralized Ellenberger, and in a manner that completely neutralized any chances of any sort of excitement. MacDonald won by unanimous decision but you’d be hard pressed to want to see him fight again after this.

The main event between Demetrious Johnson and John Moraga would follow the same pattern that most of Johnson’s fights would end up following; as technically proficient a performance as you will ever see, but with little in the way of excitement that would actually engage you and get you interested. The only moment of real excitement in the entire fight came late in the fourth round when Moraga caught Johnson with a perfectly timed right hand as Johnson was coming in. It seemed to wobble Johnson who backed up, but Moraga got taken down when he tried to follow up, although the punch did leave Johnson with a bloody nose. It was one of the few moments of advantage Moraga had in this fight, which ended at 3:43 of the fifth round when Johnson submitted Moraga with an armbar.

The Numbers

The highest paid fighter, as per their contract, on the card was Robbie Lawler, who got $156,000. Johnson got $108,000, but $50,000 of that was a bonus for being awarded the Submission of the Night, so Johnson’s contract only netted him $58,000. Melvin Guillard also got paid more than Johnson; Guillard’s contract earned him $84,000, plus he got another $50,000 for getting the Knockout of the Night. Had Jake Ellenberger won his fight, he would have earned more on his contract than Johnson. Also having a better paying contract than Johnson was Jorge Masvidal and Ed Herman. I know the numbers talk isn’t for everyone, but I find it a fascinating aspect of MMA, especially when the headline attraction, and a champion at that, on a FOX show has a lower paying contract that several guys he should, if things were fair, be getting paid more than. Not to mention it highlights that a lot of fighters were not getting paid what seems like a fair amount for their efforts. John Moraga only got $17,000, and a few fighters got less than $10,000. I’d like to think that they got extra that we don’t about, because it almost seems criminal that you’re fighting on FOX and you’re only contracted to get $8,000 (Jessica Andrade).

Tomorrow is a light load, with just Invicta FC 2 to talk about.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 28th)

Invicta FC 2: Baszler vs. McMann (July 28th 2014)

Invicta FC is the all women’s promotion and this was their second show, and it was during their peak period when Invicta were putting on consistently strong shows. The main event would see the experienced Shayna Baszler take on the Olympic silver medallist in freestyle wrestling, Sara McMann. It would be a big test for McMann as this was just her sixth fight.

Invicta FC also had an alliance with the Japanese promotion JEWELS, and the JEWELS Lightweight Queen Ayaka Hamasaki was coming in to face the undefeated Austrian fighter Jasminka Cive. However, Civa was unable to secure a visa in time and she was replaced by Lacey Shuckman. Vanessa Porto was set to fight Kelly Kobold but Kobold withdrew due to a shoulder injury and she was replaced by Sarah D'Alelio.

Future UFC Women’s Bantamweight Champion Amanda Nunes was set to fight Milana Dudieva, but Dudieva pulled out due an illness and was replaced by Leslie Smith, but Smith would end up injuring her hand and was forced out of the fight as well, and it would end up being Raquel Pa'aluhi who faced Nunes.

Invicta FC 2

This was another good show from Invicta, if a little off of their peak. The fights ranged from one-sided to very competitive, from decent to very good. The fight of the night was the main event between between Shayna Baszler and Sara McMann; they had a really entertaining fight and it’s interesting to see how much McMann has improved over the past three years. Kaitlin Young and Liz Carmouche had a really good fight as well and may have been just as good as the main event. Amanda Nunes (whose surname was pronounced ‘Noonies’, for some reason) had a short but competitive fight with Raquel Pa'aluhi, and Nunes is another fighter who has grown and changed over the last three years. Vanessa Porto vs. Sarah D’Alelio was short and scrappy but very entertaining while it lasted.

The opener saw future UFC Strawweight Champion Carla Esparza face Sarah Schneider, and they had a decent fight. Elina Nilsson and Julia Budd followed that with a battle of the strikers that didn’t go to type. Bethany Marshall and Barb Honchak was a pretty one-sided fight. Ayaka Hamasaki dominated Lacey Shuckman on her way to a late third round submission win. And Alexis Davis put in a very dominant performance en route to a submission win over Hitomi Akano.

As Invicta FC shows go, this wasn’t their best, but it was still entertaining, and it’s interesting to go back in time and see how far the likes of Nunes and McMann have come.

Just two shows to talk about tomorrow, with PRIDE 15: Raging Rumble and Invicta FC 18: Grasso vs. Esquibel getting looked at.

[Noah Southworth]

On This Day in MMA History (July 29th)

PRIDE 15: Raging Rumble (July 29th 2001)

This show took place at one of PRIDE’s main venues, the Saitama Super Arena, and it featured the debuts of two men who would go on to become legends of PRIDE; Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira and Quinton Jackson.

A theme for the fights at this event would be fighters seeking redemption. Kazushi Sakuraba was coming off a brutal knockout loss to Wanderlei Silva, and his attempt at redemption would see him face Quinton Jackson. At this stage of his career, Jackson was virtually unknown despite having had eleven fights, but he had a look and charisma, and PRIDE presented him as this wild streetfighter type.

Mark Kerr, once considered the best heavyweight in the world, had lost two fights in a row and was on a downward slide in more ways than one. Kerr would be looking to re-establish himself, looking for his redemption, against Heath Herring.

And the main event would see Tokimitsu Ishizawa looking to both redeem himself and reignite his professional wrestling career, when he was rematched against Ryan Gracie. Ishizawa wrestled for New Japan Pro Wrestling under a mask as Kendo Ka Shin, and he did a shooter gimmick based off of his amateur wrestling background. He had a pretty successful career, winning the Best of the Super Juniors tournament in 1999 and then winning the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship later that same year.

During this period of New Japan, the legendary Antonio Inoki was in control, and as part of his quest to make people believe that wrestlers could fight for real, and thus give credibility to New Japan and convince people that wrestling was real, he had the bright idea(!) of putting New Japan wrestlers in shoots. This would have almost exclusively end badly for the New Japan wrestlers and it ended very badly for Ishizawa.

Ishizawa fought Ryan Gracie at PRIDE 10 and was destroyed in 2:16. This was not a shock to anyone, because Gracie was a real fighter, and Ishizawa, despite having an amateur wrestling background, was over eight years removed from competition. As a result of this, Ishizawa’s pro wrestling career was dead in the water. He continued to wrestle, but he couldn’t heat with a blowtorch because he had absolutely no credibility. Therefore, to gain redemption, and reignite a wrestling career that was ice cold at best, Ishizawa was pretty much backed into a corner and had to fight Ryan Gracie again, and this time, he hoped for a better result because another loss would kill his wrestling career dead and there might be no coming back.

Other fights on the card would include Valentijn Overeem taking on Assuério Silva, Shungo Oyama face Wallid Ismail, Masaaki Satake would have the unenviable task of going against the hard-hitting Igor Vovchanchyn, and Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira would make his PRIDE debut against Gary Goodridge.

PRIDE 15: Raging Rumble

Valentijn Overeem and Assuério Silva had a decent fight; Overeem is a submission guy but showed no hesitation in standing and trading. Conversely, Silva, a striker not noted for his submission skills, was equally unhesitant to go to the ground. It ended up with Silva actually submitting Overeem, a leg lock specialist, with a heel hook. Overeem either didn’t respect Silva’s heel hook attempt or couldn’t be bothered to escape, and Overeem didn’t make any effort to escape before tapping out.

Shungo Oyama vs. Wallid Ismail was OK but fairly one-sided, with Oyama playing defence or counterfighter for most of the fight. Ismail was patient in the first round but picked things up in the second, Ismail eventually making Oyama pass out in a head arm triangle. Igor Vovchanchyn gave Masaaki Satake a serious beating in their fight but he couldn’t quite put him away. Satake showed a lot of heart and guts in being able to hang in there with a power striker like Vovchanchyn, but he was never in the fight at all.

Mark Kerr and Heath Herring was a boring fight with an exciting finish. Most of the fight saw Kerr in the guard of Herring but not doing much with it; Kerr would keep busy enough to stop from being stood up, he’d punch Herring around the body, but he made no attempt to pass the guard of Herring. The first round ended like that and the second round started off with Kerr quickly taking Herring down and ending up in his guard, but doing even less. The referee stood them up and gave Kerr a yellow card. Kerr moved in for a takedown but Herring landed a well timed knee that Kerr somehow withstood. Kerr went for a deep single leg but Herring stuffed it, punched Kerr and then landed a barrage of knees to get the TKO victory. The fight was very dull up until that finish.

Daijiro Matsui and Ebenezer Fontes Braga had a decent fight but a lot of it saw Matsui content to play defence and neutralize Braga rather than be aggressive and try and win. Not that he would have done so well had he tried, because Braga had the size and reach advantage, and was lighting Matsui up in the striking. It seemed like Matsui was content to stall things out just to go the distance, which is exactly what happened with Braga winning by unanimous decision.

Stephen Quadros interviewed Gary Goodridge before Goodridge’s fight with Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira. ‘Big Daddy’ was fun to listen to. Unfortunately, Goodridge didn’t fare so well in the fight, with Nogueira practically walking right through Goodridge without much trouble. Nogueira was slick on the ground, obviously, sweeping Goodridge with ease and controlling him on the mat, Nogueira transitioning from one submission to the next before submitting Goodridge with a triangle choke.

Kazushi Sakuraba and Quinton Jackson had a really entertaining fight. Jackson, who outweighed Sakuraba by a good 10lbs-15lbs, slammed Sakuraba several times; at one point, Sakuraba had an armbar on Jackson and Jackson lifted Sakuraba up and almost dumped him over the top rope. It was Jackson’s slams that provided much of his defence because as a fighter, he wasn’t in Sakuraba’s league, and it showed. The fans popped for every submission attempt Sakuraba came close to getting, and when Sakuraba eventually submitted Jackson, the fans went crazy.

What was interesting is that they greatly downplayed Jackson’s experience; in the post-fight discussion by the announcers, they talked as if Jackson had only just started fighting, when the reality was that this was his twelfth pro fight.

Ryan Gracie vs. Tokimitsu Ishizawa

In the pre-fight interview with Ryan Gracie, Stephen Quadros brings up the problems the Gracie’s have with Wallid Ismail, and Renzo Gracie, who is there as the translator for Ryan, says Ismail has a big mouth, that he talks too much, and has no loyalty. If Gracie said anything at all about Ishizawa, they edited that out, so quite why they bothered airing the interview when it had absolutely no relevance to anything on this show or any other is a mystery.

In case you’re wondering why the Gracie’s hate Ismail, some of it is because Ismail has beaten Ralph, Renzo and Royce Gracie in jiu-jitsu fights, with Ismail choking Royce out in just under five minutes. But there is a lot of bad blood between Ryan and Ismail because they had a shouting match in December of 1999 on a beach, and in October the following year, Ryan jumped Ismail from behind at a party and ended up getting choked unconscious for his troubles. They were supposed to fight at WEC event in 2000, but Ryan dropped out and the fight never happened. Ryan, who had a rep for being a hothead, passed away in 2007; he died in a jail cell in Sao Paulo, Brazil, having been arrested for stealing a car and then attempting to steal a motorcycle to try and run from police.

The fight with Ishizawa isn’t particularly good; most of the fight, for as long as it lasts, is either Ishizawa in side control or Gracie on his back, daring Ishizawa to come into his guard. The fight ends in strange fashion, with Gracie missing a kick and getting taken down; Gracie starts grabbing his rib and rolling around, in apparent agony, and the fights called off. Despite the nature of the victory, Ishizawa gets a great reaction for it, and it does end up kickstarting his wrestling career back into life, so it achieved the desired result. Still, it was a strange ending because there doesn’t appear to be any reason for Gracie to have been hurt.

Invicta FC 18: Grasso vs. Esquibel (July 29th 2016)

Over the previous year or more, the UFC has stripped Invicta FC of a lot of their more marketable or talented fighters to stock up their strawweight and bantamweight divisions. As a result, the bulk of Invicta FC shows are filled with fighters who are inexperienced or are otherwise not on the UFC’s radar for whatever reason. This means that the quality of Invicta FC shows is can be very hit-and-miss, because green fighters don’t always have the best of fights and it’s now a crapshoot as to whether the fighters they do use can produce the goods.

Luckily, this is one Invicta FC show that skews very much towards the more favourable end of the spectrum, with some fighters showing real potential. One of them, Megan Anderson, would have had the chance to become a UFC champion later tonight had she not had non-fighting issues to deal with.

Card Changes

The original co-main event of Irene Aldana facing the undefeated Brazilian Taila Santos, which was to decide the next challenger for Tony Evinger’s Invicta FC Bantamweight Championship, was scrapped due to Santos having visa issues. Likewise, the fight between Lynn Alvarez and the undefeated Indian fighter Manjit Kolekar was cancelled due to visa problems. Alvarez was instead matched up against Mizuki Inoue. And completing the trifecta of visa issues was the cancellation of the fight between Agnieszka Niedzwiedz and Claudia Rey, with Rey having the problems with her visa. Christine Stanley would replace Rey against Niedzwiedz.

Invicta FC 18

Sijara Eubanks showed some real potential in her fight against Amberlynn Orr. Eubanks has got some power in her hands, and has the makings of a vicious killer instinct, and she got TKO win in 4:41. Eubanks is like an earlier version of a Jessica Andrade or Amanda Nunes. It’s a shame she’s 32 because she’d otherwise be virtually assured of a bright future if she had the right training. And whilst it’s not out of the realm of possibility for Eubanks to still go places, time may not be on her side.

Aspen Ladd walked through Jessica Hoy in as basic a manner as possible. Ladd is young, just 21 at the time of this fight, so she’s obviously far from the finished article. Ladd has received rave reviews for her potential, but based on this fight, I wouldn’t be raving so much. Simona Soukupova vs. Tessa Simpson was rather mundane and unexciting, with Simpson dominating, until late in the third when Soukupova finally got into the fight and had Simpson in trouble. Unfortunately, she couldn’t get the finish, and Simpson got the win by unanimous decision.

Megan Anderson absolutely battered the shit out of Peggy Morgan. It really wasn’t much of a fight because Morgan isn’t much of a fighter; seriously, she is terrible, just woefully bad. Morgan ended up with a battered and bloody face, and the left side of her face was badly swollen as well.

Cindy Dandois walked right through Jessamyn Duke like she wasn’t even there. Dandois took Duke down right away, although Duke soon got back up. Dandois ended up taking Duke down with what was pretty much a side headlock; Dandois then hooked her legs over the left arm of Duke and secured a modified armbar to get the submission. Mizuki Inoue looked really good against Lynn Alvarez. Some of that may have been because this was Alvarez’s first fight in over two years, but it also could be because Alvarez just isn’t a top fighter. Mizuki looked polished and relaxed, stuck to her gameplan, and she was never in any trouble.

Christine Stanley vs. Agnieszka Niedzwiedz was a decent fight; Stanley was taking this fight on one week’s notice and it showed, because she didn’t press the action at all until the third round. Other than that, this fight was pretty much Niedzwiedz tagging Stanley at will and having very little to worry about.

The main event between Jodie Esquibel and Alexa Grasso was a decent fight but it was a great showing by Grasso, who was fighting for the first time in 18-months. Grasso had great timing on her punches, had strong takedown defence, and shut Esquibel down for most of the fight.

There are three shows to talk about tomorrow; Strikeforce: Fedor vs. Henderson, UFC 201: Lawler vs. Woodley, and WSoF 32: Moraes vs. Hill II.