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UFC Fight Night: Maia vs Usman - May 19


wandshogun09

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Dangerous for Usman as well, though. As has been pointed out on here before, fighters very rarely ever look good against Maia, even when beating them. This wouldn't be a problem if everybody remembered this, but nobody ever seems to, and as a result end up slagging off fighters who face him, whatever the result.

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It definitely is yeah. And Usman also deserves praise for taking a completely different style of fight on. To go from prepping for pretty much a pure striker in Ponzinibbio to maybe the best grappler in the game is gutsy.

But at least from Usman's POV a) the risk is worth it, if he beats Maia then it's his biggest scalp to date by far. A win here would be a bigger win than a win over Ponzinibbio would've been really, considering Maia's fought for the title and mixed with some big names. Then b) he's not got anywhere near the miles on him that Maia does. He's younger and fresher. If he loses this it's not good but he can say it was short notice against a completely opposite style of opponent to what he'd been training for and he's still got some time to bounce back from it. Despite Maia being tricky and hard to look good against as you rightly say, I can see the reasons why Usman accepted this fight. He has a lot more to gain and if you look at it from Usman's perspective he's probably thinking he's catching an ageing Maia on the slide, coming off losses and on a short camp. And Maia's cardio isn't the best down the stretch as it is. Plus style-wise, Maia has struggled in the past against guys he can't take down, for obvious reasons. With Usman's wrestling he must fancy the job of stopping the takedown and beating Maia up on the feet. I can see Usman's logic. The pros far outweigh the cons for him.

On the flipside for Maia, he's coming up against a younger, in form, full camp guy who he might not be able to take down. They must've offered him a sweet bonus to save this show because, other than desperately wanting to get a W coming off 2 L's, I can't see much upside in this for Maia. 

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Think this is gonna be a bad night for Maia, i expect to see him flop to his back a few times as this goes on. I wouldnt even be surprised to see Usman beat Maia up from on top, Usman just seems too fresh and strong for Maia at this stage.

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That's my feeling. There's still plenty of guys in the division who I think Maia can school with his grappling but Usman is going to be one of the trickier matchups for him because of his wrestling and his physical strength. Aside from the Chael Sonnen fight years ago, Maia has never really looked good against wrestlers. Because if he can't take his opponent down then his biggest weapon, which is obviously his world class BJJ, is redundant. We saw that against Woodley and Covington in his last two fights. So to fight another guy in that mould in Usman straight after and on short notice, seems like a bad move to me. 

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I had forgotten this was on this weekend. Usman needs a win on Saturday. He could be a player in this division, but this is a step up and a big test. I think he'll get the win, as long as he doesn't sleep on Maia. The division kind of needs that to be the case as well. Maia is one of the good guys in the sport though, so I don't like to see him lose. 🤔

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Just now, Egg Shen said:

this card has taken some hits, looking at it though i find it strange that Moreno/Borg is buried on the prelims here. That could/should be the co-main event.

Ray Borg pulled out of that fight a few weeks ago, due to his child undergoing surgeries 

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2 minutes ago, Egg Shen said:

this card has taken some hits, looking at it though i find it strange that Moreno/Borg is buried on the prelims here. That could/should be the co-main event.

Moreno vs Borg isn't happening now either, never got round to editing the opening post. Borg had to pull out because his kid needs brain surgery. Moreno's fighting Alexandre Pantoja now. 

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Yeah, Pantoja is decent. He had a good grappling heavy fight last time out against Dustin Ortiz. He lost but Ortiz is underrated himself, IMO. And he had a cracking fight with Neil Seery on last year's Scotland show, which was Seery's retirement fight. Moreno vs Borg was a fight I wanted to see but this is a very solid replacement. The Borg fight seems destined to never happen. 

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Usman won, whilst looking unimpressive, as tends to be the case with most people that beat Maia. Technically he is further up the ladder after it, but his potential opponents for me are still the same. Thompson, Till, Ponzinibhio (when he's fit), Masvidal, and the loser of Covington Vs RDA. It's a damn talented division is Welterweight. Next to 155 it's got the deepest roster, and both divisions are littered with guys in the top ten who could all take wins from one another. Putting together streaks in these weight classes is extremely tough. The guys that are doing it are at the top of their game. 

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missed this but caught a spoiler in a youtube thumbnail so i decided to look up results. Main event seemed to play out as expected. I think its about time the UFC cut Maia loose, if the UFC cut someone like Jon Fitch because he was on downside (all whilst having incredibly dull fights), Maia had to be in the same boat. Hes nothing but a spoiler these days.

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Yeah, that Puelles comeback was the highlight of the card for me. Prelims weren't bad, to be fair. The slam KO in the Benitez-Bandenay fight was proper highlight reel shit as well. 

This Dominick Reyes guy looks worth keeping tabs on. That's 3 first round finishes for him now in the UFC. He's unbeaten, still the right side of 30 and seems the vocal type who isn't shy about calling someone out. Cannonier isn't championship material but he's a tough guy and went the distance with Glover Teixeira not too long ago. For Reyes to put him away in a round was impressive. Not sure how far he goes but he's definitely the kind of new blood 205 needs right now. 

I like what we've seen so far of Tatiana Suarez as well. Her ground game is quality. It's still relatively early days but I've got a feeling she could be in that title mix at strawweight before too long. Alexa Grasso hype has come to a screeching halt for now but the way Suarez ran through her, I can see her giving a lot of girls problems with her grappling. Amazing story as well with her beating cancer. 

Usman vs Maia... ugh. It was the kind of fight most expected but it does suck for Usman a bit that he's just bagged his biggest career win by far, yet he won't get much credit or much of a boost because it was an awkward fight. Maia is just so hard to look good against. Usman himself Isn't known for being particularly exciting but Maia always seems to be in these fights. I really like Maia, when he's on and he does his thing he's great to watch. And by all accounts he's one of the nicest people involved in the sport. But man, he's had his share of duds over the years. Maia fights seem to go one of two ways - 1) he runs right through his opponent and looks like a monster. Or 2) he struggles to take the opponent down and just stinks the place out by looking like THE single most uncoordinated, sloppy, gassed, awkward and unnatural striker ever. 

Take the main event out and I don't think this was a bad show. Usman vs Maia playing out as it did killed it off and left a sour taste though.

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