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Cyborg vs Holly UFC 219


Baigg

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I did not enjoy much of that.

After sitting through the prelims, I just became numb to decisions and the grinding pace. By the time the audience were booing Diakese/Hooker I found myself siding with them, rather than Rogan when he called them meatheads.

There was just nothing to hang your hat on, on that card. Khabib being Khabib was the best thing on it, sure, but I found the whole thing a bit of an attritional watch.

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I read the results rather than watch it. Doing so is becoming increasingly regular. For whatever reason, I just don’t care about the UFC these days. Do they have anyone else on the roster to challenge Cyborg? Does that division even exist beyond her holding a belt?

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Apparently they only have 5 signed for the Cyborg division.

Anyway, I see I'm not alone with finding most of this show a bit of a slog. I found myself skipping through the middle portion to get to the two fights I was arsed about.

Khabib should never be taken for granted. What he consistently does in such a stacked division is terrifying. Barboza tried, but as the 1st finished he looked like Leo D after the bear mauled him. All forward pace and anything Barboza threw, Khabib no sold and just kept coming. Three rounds of that sort of abuse ruins sleep.

Cyborg v Holly was alright. It became pretty clear early doors that Cyborg's power is just too much and once Cyborg worked out Holly's game plan, it was inevitable.

Overall, pretty rubbish show to end a good year, but I don't think I'll ever tire of the violence Khabib brings. Just compelling to see someone that dominant and vicious.

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44 minutes ago, Supremo said:

Do they have anyone else on the roster to challenge Cyborg? Does that division even exist beyond her holding a belt?

In a word...no. 

I honestly don't know what you do with Cyborg. Great fighter but there's just nothing for her. People used to rag on Ronda for ruling over a weak division but it was nowhere near as shallow as 145. I always said that. There was enough depth at 135 to justify that division and with Ronda and Miesha at the top, and their rivalry with each other, it was something. 145 is so thin though. It's not Cyborg's fault but there's just not enough quality women fighters out there who fight at 145. That's why she's been bashing up 135ers who have basically had to just overeat to make the weight. Fuck, I don't even think there are any other featherweight fights booked currently on the schedule. It's that shallow. 

There's a fight between Cat Zingano and Ketlen Vieira booked for UFC 222 in March. But that's at 135. I can see them just giving the winner of that the next go at Cyborg just because there's nothing else. I hope not because I'm a big fan of Zingano and i think she'd be a much more interesting challenger for Nunes at 135, especially as she's beaten her before. I don't want to see her used as Cyborg fodder. But I can't think what else they can do. Where's Megan Anderson? She was meant to fight Cyborg at UFC 214. She's gone awfully quiet lately. Maybe she's tweeting but no-one's talking about her as a challenger now, they were in July. 

Fuck knows? 

Anyway, all that said, I actually enjoyed Cyborg vs Holm. It wasn't a crazy war or anything, nothing hugely dramatic happened but it was nice to see Cyborg in a competitive fight for a change. Again though, Holm just seems to lack something in these big fights. She never just gets battered or schooled out there. She makes it competitive and close, she wins rounds. She just never seems to be able to put the exclamation point on it and close the show. The Tate fight was close before she got choked, the Shevchenko fight was close, the De Randamie fight was razor close, she even left the Correia fight fairly close before landing that headkick. You can see the skills are there, she just seems to find a way to lose. Of course, Cyborg might well have beat her regardless though. 

Khabib once again looked like a monster. It's mad to think he's putting in performances like this after these massive spells of inactivity. Imagine what he could be if he fought every 4/5 months? This is him after all these stops and starts. I hope he can stay active and on weight now and really get things moving. If McGregor doesn't get his arse in gear soon I think they just need to go ahead with trying to book Khabib vs Ferguson again. 

Oh yeah, I had no idea Robert Follis died. That was a shock when the graphic popped up at the beginning of the PPV. I never knew too much about him but he was a face you'd always see around and he was linked with names like Randy Couture, Miesha Tate and more recently Kevin Lee. I read up on it just now and apparently he committed suicide by shooting himself. He was only 48. 

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Fell asleep just before the prelims and woke up at the start of the third fight, took about 10 minutes to finally open my eyes so the PPV was pretty good, Cyborg & especially Khabib looked really impressive and both had success on their feet than their higher level opponents and their opponents showed tremendous heart, especially Barbosa, although his corner should have stopped it before round 3.

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hold up a minute guys, Cyborg hasn't even fought a genuine 145lber yet. And she's one big fucking 145lber herself.  Cyborg is only untouchable until she isn't. We basically said all the same things about Ronda Rousey and then she fell, and she fell spectacularly.  Ronda raised the bar, then didn't realise that someone else could raise it further until she was brutally beaten up, particularly the second time vs Nunes. 

Look at other sports like tennis or even (at my peril) fucking darts. Phil Taylor was on a different stratosphere for years, then all of a sudden you've got guys like MVG who can arguably play better stuff than the Power ever could. Federer in tennis - played in a dinner suit until Djokovic and Nadal got fed up of finishing as runner up. 

It has to be Megan Anderson for Cyborg next. Lets give the division a chance! 

The card wasn't briliant but not bad either.  I follow both Diakiese and Hooker quite closely, so the crowd fucked me off by booing.  Granted Hooker is a defensive fighter, I thought he fought really well.   Condit-Magny sucked, but props to Magny.  Pretty glad Carla won as well, I've not bought into the hyperbole the UFC have tried to stuff down out throats with Cynthia Calvillo. 

Khabib is a fucking animal. Looking at his record - not many big names under his belt. You can see why, not many blokes are dumb enough to fight him.   

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Good post, Oz. Rousey did absolutely raise the game for women's MMA, but her weaknesses were very much exposed. Cyborg just seems to be on another level, though. I can't see anyone knocking her out. Rousey had her judo and her armbar, and everyone - Rogan included - marked out for her to a slightly silly extent. 

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I agree with a lot of what you're saying Oz. A lot of times people get carried away when someone's on a run like this, talking like they're unbeatable and stuff. We used to hear it with Anderson Silva before Weidman, Fedor Emelianenko before Werdum, Ronda Rousey before Holm and Conor McGregor before Diaz. Everybody can be beat. 

Where the Cyborg situation is different to the Rousey situation though, is there's literally nobody around to beat her. There's about 4 girls in the division for fuck's sake. And what 145ers are there even outside the UFC who they can bring in? At least with Ronda there were a line of challengers waiting for her. As much as you couldn't see any of them beating her at the time, there were girls waiting for a shot like Holm and Nunes, girls coming up like Shevchenko and Pena and the likes of Zingano who could get back in the mix. There's nothing at 145. Well, there's Megan Anderson. If Cyborg beats her then what? I'd love to give the division a chance, I've been one of the most positive on here about women's MMA. But women's 145 is and always has been a wasteland with a small handful of viable fighters at best. 

Cyborg is definitely beatable. It's not going to be easy but it can be done. We saw Jorina Baars beat her in kickboxing. And Holm landed a fair few shots on her over 5 rounds. She looked great against Holm but I also thought she looked human for once. If Holm had more power in her hands who knows?

Also, I don't think the size was such an issue in this fight either. In the staredown at the weigh in and in the cage itself Holm looked every bit the 145er and just as big if not bigger than Cyborg. 

Cyborg called out Megan Anderson for UFC 221 in Australia. That makes sense with Megan being Australian. After that, I don't have a clue. Like not one clue what they do next. There's nobody really on the roster who makes sense, there's nobody to bring in who makes sense. The female boxer Cecilia Braekhus has been talking about a fight with Cyborg recently. Maybe some crossover thing? Maybe they can try to bring Jorina Baars into the UFC for a rematch under MMA rules? I'm reaching though. 

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Amanda Nunes said she wanted to fight the winner but Cyborg isn't that interested as she's a fellow Brazilian but said would do it if asked.

I would prefer Nunes to stay at 135, they are going to lose top ranked Shevchenko to Flyweight soon, I think Cyborg has beaten her but Julia Budd & a few others are in Bellator and wished they co-promoted, so she would have more options.

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Every passing moment my anticipation for McGregor returning to the octagon diminishes further and further. Tweeting shite like that doesn't help that cause. There's times I think we'd be better off if he just retired from MMA after UFC 205, having created history and allowing him to piss about with Floyd.

Just gotten myself caught up. Thought everything aside from the main and co-main was a right slog to sit through, even the stuff I had decent hopes for like Diakese/Hooker and Condit/Magny. Tim Elliott had a good scrap on the prelims though for those that didn't check that one out. 

Cyborg's fight went mainly how I saw it going, minus the stoppage. Asking Holly to counter-strike and pick off somebody as aggressive as Cyborg without getting clipped too often was always going to be a massive task for her. Do we think Holly sacks off the whole 145lb idea now? That's two straight championship losses in a row, and 135lbs isn't exactly brimming with challengers at the moment, so it wouldn't take much at all to get herself back into title contention. Cyborg looked really good, I haven't seen much of Megan Anderson but I'd be doubtful of her chances at the moment. Like people have mentioned though, it's an incredibly weird division. She hasn't cleared it out in the same way Ronda did, or like DJ has at Flyweight where he's making top fighters look like rookies, there's just nobody for her to fight! Whether it's there not actually being anyone capable of being in the cage with her, or people downright refusing to fight her (GDR), it's such a bizzare situation. They pretty much created this division and platform explicitly for Cyborg, without having any idea on how to build up the rest of it.

Khabib looked scary. Utterly terrifying. Barboza is an elite level fighter and this fucker is garnering a 30-24 scorecard against him? That's mad. Every time Khabib fights I have doubts about him, be it through his time off, or his striking, or his weight but he just obliterated all of those with that performance. I think he mauls Conor, and I wouldn't even want to see him try. Hooker looked decent, Diakese is a bit of a cock so I was happy to see him lose. Disappointed with Cynthia losing, but she's still young in her career and she's training at Alpha Male so there's only bright things ahead. Condit couldn't give less of a fuck, could he? Really flat note for him to go out on if he does decide to call it quits now.

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