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UFC 234: Whittaker vs Gastelum - Feb 9 🇦🇺


wandshogun09

Who wins and how?   

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Absolutely gutted. Ordered the PPV last night after watching the weigh-in, thinking it was safe.

Rob's basically the middlleweight Cruz at this stage. It's worse though because UFC are trying to build international expansion around Whittaker, first in Perth and now Melbourne. I'd be beside myself if I had bought tickets and gone down to Melbourne. As it is I'm out $70 for a very average card.

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I had that 29-28 to Adesanya. He clearly won rounds 1 and 3. I had Anderson edging round 2. I think everyone came out of it looking okay. Adesanya got the rub and Anderson didn't disgrace himself. The first two rounds were a lot of fun to watch as well. 

The Middleweight division is mental. We have Whittaker, Gastelum, and Adesanya in the box seats. You also have the winner of the Romero vs Costa fight. Jacare is still around as well. I wouldn't be surprised if any of those ended up holding a version of the title in the next 18 months or so. And amazingly, the division would have been even more congested had Rockhold not moved up to 205lbs and Mousasi had stuck around. Lightweight has the star power with McGregor and an impressive supporting cast of Cerrone, Khabib, Tony and Aldo. But for sheer depth, 185lbs is the best division in MMA. 

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Can we have Israel/Anderson on every show please? That was bags of fun. Understandable, but 5 rounds would have been wonderful. Proper Tekken/Street fighter stuff. 

There was a great shot just after the 2nd round ended when the camera panned to the crowd. 2 blokes sat there grinning like fuck, bumped fists in a 'this is fucking brilliant' moment. And it was. 

Adesanya is an absolute star. 

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Fantastic main event, I was surprised that Silva was able to keep up and he was still as fast as ever. I expected a 1 round KO by Israel but I was pleasantly surprised. 

It's a huge shame we didn't get to see the main event title fight seeing as the 185 division is really heating up now. Hopefully Kelvin can fight for the interim title against some one soon.

Does anyone know if Kelvin gets compensation money for Whittaker pulling out of the fight? Do the UFC still pay him his fight fee minus all of the potential bonus's?

 

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36 minutes ago, Zebra Kid Mark said:

Does anyone know if Kelvin gets compensation money for Whittaker pulling out of the fight? Do the UFC still pay him his fight fee minus all of the potential bonus's?

Cruz made a point to say on the show that Kelvin is getting money for the late pull out by Bobby Sicknote.

The main event went much better than anyone expected. Early doors it looked like Silva's old chin was going to let him down, as we all feared, but he remained composed and seemed to realise Adesanya's power and speed wasn't a massive problem, so started taking more risks towards the very end of the first. Of course, a big reason the fight was so much fun is down to the slow realisation and relief that Silva is still very much a top 10 fighter, despite age and injury chipping away at much of his greatness.

Adesanya is pure charisma. I think Cruz was right saying he seemed a little miffed and annoyed he couldn't batter this version of Silva, like he was supposed to, but I think that's largely down to all of us completely downplaying what Silva still has left.

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I was busy yesterday and last night and didn't have a chance to keep up to date with what was going on. This morning when I stuck the show on I went right to where I thought the co-main was about to start, with Anderson's walkout. Bruce Buffer was doing the ring announcements and Kelvin Gastelum was standing there with a fucking title belt over his shoulder, and next thing Bruce says it's time for the main event of the evening. I said to myself, 'whoa, whoa, whoa what the fuck have I missed here? Are the UFC doing a WWE and putting the title fight on first and fucking about with the natural order of things?'

So I watched the main event the whole way, thinking that Gastelum had beaten Whittaker in the opener and that Adesanya was going to be facing Kelvin, probably in the summer. The whole time imagining how Bobby Knuckles was feeling getting beaten for the belt in his home country. Israel does his interview and I thought, maybe something else has happened. I went back to the start of the show to learn that Rob Whittaker's insides exploded and Kelvin Gastelum is walking around looking like a grade A berk with Henry Cejudo's title belt. He deserves ten rounds with Yoel Romero for that. I hope they bypass him now altogether and go with Adesanya Vs Whittaker. 

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That was a pleasant surprise. I had a feeling it was going to go the distance but I thought it would be sadder than that. I was expecting Anderson to see the final buzzer but also a very one sided fight but it was a good back and forth. I mean, Adesanya definitely won but Anderson was competitive throughout and, like Jim, I had him winning the second round. Adesanya was just the sharper of the two though at this stage and it showed early and late with him taking rounds 1 and 3 fairly clearly I thought. I was also half expecting a lack of action and a load of taunting and dancing about. There was some of that but just the right amount of it to be entertaining and the action itself delivered. Enjoyed the shit out of it. 

I will say though, I’m not so sure this tells us more about Anderson or Israel. Granted, I don’t think Anderson is as shot as people like to make out, but I don’t think this fight necessarily means he’s still got a run in him. Adesanya is a fantastic striker but he’s not been a KO machine, in the UFC at least. He’s got stoppages but aside from the Brunson blowout, he’s not really shown serious power. He’s been more of a surgeon than a butcher in there, technically picking opponents apart. He went the distance with Brad Tavares and Marvin Vettori not long ago. I think the Brunson fight had people expecting Adesanya to destroy Anderson but Anderson’s a crafty old fuck and was never going to approach a fight with someone like Adesanya the way Brunson did. Brunson’s a good fighter but he’s got form for bullrushing in and it costing him. He did it against Adesanya and he also did it against Whittaker a couple of years ago. I think the way Adesanya breezed through Brunson flattered the perception of his power a bit. 

Regardless, such a fun fight and I can’t wait to see how the title picture plays out going forward. As Jim pointed out, 185 is so loaded right now. If Whittaker doesn’t get himself in the cage soon I guess they’ll go with a Gastelum vs Adesanya interim title fight. And of course there’s Romero vs Costa to come yet! It says a lot about how awesome 185 is that fairly recently the division lost Bisping, Rockhold and Mousasi and yet it still feels fucking stacked. 

And yeah, I’m with WeeAl. What a Grade A twat Gastelum looked swanning about with that belt. People gave Tim Sylvia shit for wearing his belt everywhere but at least he actually won the sodding thing, it was his belt. 

Undercard was pretty fun actually. 

Nice to see Groovy Lando back to winning ways. He made an easy night of it was well, didn’t he? It was a full on squash match, Rosa didn’t have a clue on the ground. 

Thought Ricky Simon vs Rani Yahya was a cracking fight. I just knew something would go wrong for Yahya now though, finally gets on PPV and goes and loses. I’ll not be indifferent to Ricky Simon next time he fights though. Thought he looked a bit of a beast at times last night. Dealt with a really experienced and tricky customer, shut him down, hurt him and won convincingly. Thought the 30-25 scorecard was a little bit harsh on Yahya but whatever, the right man won. Should’ve known Simon must be a bad motherfucker really, rocking a mullet like that in 2019. 

Montana De La Rosa vs Nadia Kassem was one way traffic. De La Rosa had a good showing here. She was the better grappler and stuck to that. Shitty time for Kassem to lose her O, on home soil and coming off a lay-off. I thought she might be a real prospect. She’s got time to bounce back. 

Crute stopping Alvey was a good way to open up the main card. Just can’t be doing with Alvey or the forced ‘Smilin’ Sam’ schtick. Crute looked good. Nearly burst my eardrums in the post-fight interview though, the twat. Talks normally, THEN SHOUTS, then talks normally, THEN SHOUTS. What the fuck, man? Didn’t know what volume to have it on. 

Prelims were decent enough but mostly forgettable. Apart from Kang and Ishihara going all Korean Zombie vs Leonard Garcia before Kang realised he could just make life easier and sub him. 

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Eh, I'm not too fussed about Gastelum fannying around with a belt. In my eyes, he's got to do something to keep himself in the picture, and I think he realises that as well. I mean, I think more people were talking about him wearing a belt after the show than they were talking about his fight going into it. If he's at the show smiling and shaking hands and taking pictures, then nobody is going to bat an eyelid. If he shows up with a belt declaring himself the champion through "forfeit" then at least he's getting some recognition, which worked for him as well with Adesanya name-dropping him after his win, and McGregor calling him out on Twitter. I've no doubt with Kelvin that it's all business, as he seems like a decent enough guy, he just realises he's got an opportunity to draw some attention.

I think he realises that in a division of killers, he's done very well for himself to get a title shot, and then through no fault of his own, he sees it get taken away. I'm no physiotherapist, but it doesn't sound like Whittaker's going to be around for a while. In that time, you've got Adesanya as a top contender, Jacare coming off a big win, the outcome of Romero/Costa, Weidman and Rockhold coming back into the fold. It's going to be very easy for him to get overlooked, and I think the whole situation at Welterweight with Covington has opened eyes to that. He probably considers himself replaceable, which is only going to intensify given the lukewarm build to this fight, and he's trying to do something to keep himself up there. It must be really shitty, being within hours of potentially becoming champion to perhaps not even being involved in the next title fight, without even getting a crack at the belt.

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28 minutes ago, wandshogun09 said:

Why’s Dana taking medical advice off Matt Damon? If we’re playing that game then I heard Adam Woodyatt reckons Whittaker should be good to go in 2 weeks. 

Don't worry, sweetness. In the post-fight presser, Dana was going on about Bobby Nitwit probably being fine to fight in a couple of weeks, but mentioned in passing that Matt Damon had similar issues and could barely batter a terrorist or escape from Mars for months.

I took it more as Uncle Dana name dropping like a mug.

Whittaker is lucky his body failed him before the fight, going by what Dana was saying. If he'd taken a well-placed shot in the correct place he and the UFC would be in some bother, right now.

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