UFC Vegas: Dern vs Rodriguez - Oct 9 🇺🇸

[kev2050]

It's got to be up there as one of the worst main cards ever for me. Just not a lot to get excited about. Normally even if you end up with a bit of a boring caed you've got a bit of name value that helps keep you invested a bit, and makes it an easier watch, but there was none of that here. 

I'm yet to watch the prelims, they sounded alright so I'll check them out later. 

[David]

For me the Apex shows are mostly up & comer fights, with a bog-standard main. Nothing more. They clearly save their top fights and attractions for the PPV's and rightfully so.

[wandshogun09]

That’s definitely true but even within those parameters there are still levels to how good or shit they are. Like you’ll get a card like this Dern vs Rodriguez one or this weekend’s Ladd vs Dumont bollocks but then we’ve also had cards like the one headlined by Dillashaw vs Sandhagen in July, or Barboza vs Chikadze in August. Then in December there’s one with an Aldo vs Font main event plus a really strong undercard with Brad Riddell vs Rafael Fiziev and Matt Brown vs Bryan Barberena. I don’t think anyone expects the Fight Nights to be mega loaded up from top to bottom but there are definitely some that look a lot better than others. This was undeniably one of the weakest in a while.

All that said, I did enjoy the main event. I rate Rodriguez but honestly I thought Dern’s ground game would overwhelm her. Especially as the fights I’ve seen that Rodriguez has lost or gone to draws in, she’s been taken down and controlled for spells by much lesser grapplers than Dern. So I fancied a Dern submission here. Pleasantly surprised by Rodriguez, she’s clearly been putting the hours in with the grappling. A few fights ago I don’t think she’d have got out of that second round. 

20 hours ago, Dai said:

Dern fell off a cliff completely after Round 2. It was shocking to see how gassed she was in R3, as you'd assume she could do that ground stuff for hours. I remember she looked fairly good in the stand up in her last fight, but she looked completely average in this one.

That’s the thing, if Dern could’ve made this mostly a grappling match I think her conditioning would’ve held up fine. She can do that stuff all day. And whenever they did exchange in the grappling here, you could see how lethal she was there. Obviously the second round was her best but there was also that bit at the end of (I think) the 4th, where they kind of sloppily clinched up and fell to the canvas and Dern turned that into landing in the full mount. I think if she had another 30 seconds there she actually might’ve caught Rodriguez in something but she ran out of time. For the most part though, Rodriguez did a good job of forcing Dern to fight her fight and Dern looked more desperate and sloppy as it went on. It’s fights like this that make the decision to do 5 round non title main events years ago a great one for me. Because that 5 round experience is big and it’s probably good for fighters to get a taste of that before they challenge for a title. Dern’s conditioning wasn’t really up to it here but it’s something she’s felt now and can learn from. 

Nice win for Rodriguez. The commentators were on about what’s next and her ‘possibly fighting for the title in the future’ as if she’s still a way off but I’d throw her in next myself. Give her the winner of Namajunas vs Zhang 2. Fuck it. She’s gone 5 rounds in back-to-back fights now, has made weight even under the chaotic circumstances of the Waterson fight week, and she’s been winning. If not her then it’s got to be Carla Esparza. But no doubt if Zhang beats Rose in November, they’ll go straight into the rubber match.

If the title shot isn’t next for her though for whatever reason, I must admit a Rodriguez vs Joanna Jedrzejczyk fight wouldn’t upset me one bit.

Thought Randy Brown looked good. I’ve quite liked him for a while but he’s had a few setbacks along the way. I think he’s got the raw skills to do better though and he seems to be growing in confidence now. Hopefully he can string some more wins together. This though…

The disrespect! Shame it broke his toe. I think it was clear over the course of the rest of the fight that Brown had more about him of the two. If he wasn’t hindered by the toe I reckon he’d have probably found the finish at some point but it wasn’t to be.

Mariya Agapova looked impressive. Really liked the finish as well. The way she jumped on the choke after rocking Mazo. 

Don’t know what happened in the Shana Dobson fight. I don’t know a ton about Agapova but I remember being impressed by her UFC debut, then she lost to Dobson, now she’s back to winning ways and looking a bit of a handful here. From what I have seen, she’s got no business losing to a jobber like Dobson. Hopefully it was just a really shitty blip because she could be a lot of fun to watch going forward. 

Was happy to see Romanov win again on the prelims and keep his unbeaten record. 15-0 now. Don’t see it lasting too much longer but I like him. Fuck me though, does Jared Vanderaa’s face have to fall off every fight?

That’s two fights on the trot now he’s left the cage looking like a spare rib. He’s basically the Heavyweight Darren Elkins at this point. 

Lupita Godinez breezing through Juarez with a quick submission was pretty sweet. She looked really good here but I didn’t know Juarez going in so  she might be cack for all I know. I’d read good things about Godinez before her debut but she lost to Jessica Penne on short notice. This was quite a bounce back performance, to be fair. 

If you didn’t see it, Garcia vs Ontiveros was entertaining for a nothing fight. Garcia got dropped a few times but came back with a TKO. Some comeback.

One of the worst cards of the year on paper and it wasn’t great in practice but it had its moments. 

Edited October 11, 2021 by wandshogun09