Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted January 20, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted January 20, 2023 (edited) You know the score. Another Saturday at the Apex ?Ā ESPN MAIN CARD Derrick Lewis vs Sergey Spivac Da Un Jung vs Devin ClarkĀ Marcin Tybura vs Blagoy IvanovĀ Doo Ho Choi vs Kyle NelsonĀ Yusaku Kinoshita vs Adam FugittĀ ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS Anshul Jubli vs Jeka SaragihĀ - Road To UFC Lightweight Final Jeong Young Lee vs Yi ZhaĀ - Road To UFC Featherweight Final Toshiomi Kazama vs Rinya NakamuraĀ - Road To UFC Bantamweight Final Seung Guk Choi vs Sung Hyun ParkĀ - Road To UFC Flyweight Final Jun Yong Park vs Denis TiuliulinĀ Tatsuro Taira vs Jesus AguilarĀ Ā Crikey. I might be being overly harsh, maybe those āRoad To UFCā fighters are little beasts and we just donāt know it yet. But just looking at this card, itās got to be one of the weakest Fight Night cards weāve had in years. Weāve had worse main events but Iām not sure how many cards weāve had that were as shallow looking as this overall. Even at the Apex. This was initially supposed to be in Korea and be headlined by Korean Zombieās farewell fight. Zombie got injured and thatās apparently scuppered the whole thing and the UFC changed plans. Oddly though, this is still gonna be on at a Korean friendly time so weāre looking at a 6AM START TIME for the main card! Yeah fuck that.Ā Ā Ā Derrick Lewis vs Sergey Spivac tops the bill. A second attempt to get this fight in the cage. Not the best headliner, not the worst. Not the best Heavyweight fight, definitely not the worst. Love the Beast and I donāt mind Spivac. Itāll do. Quite like this actually. Although not so much from the standpoint of being a Lewis fan. I think this could be another bad result for him sadly but weāll see how it goes. They were originally set to square off in the Apex back in Novemberā¦ It got right to the eleventh hour, literally the show was underway, and the word came down that Lewis had withdrawn due to ānon-COVID, non-weight cutting related illnessā. Iām gonna hazard a guess that either his balls were hot again or he needed a humongous shite that wasnāt gonna be a quick squat and drop job. Either way, it was a weird one. I donāt think the actual reason for him pulling out of the fight was ever confirmed but I think it was the first time in UFC history that a main event has had to be binned while the show is actually going on. Anyway, itās back on. Back in a headline spot and back at the shitty Apex. I donāt wanna jinx it but Iād be pretty amazed if this needs the full 5 rounds. Iāll be a bit surprised if it goes past 2 rounds, to be honest. And hopefully it doesnāt because Heavyweight fights that go longer than 10 minutes are rarely much fun to watch. The āBlack Beastā badly needs a win here. He had an awful 2022. He got knocked out and faceplanted by a big elbow from Tai Tuivasa in February. Then in July he was stopped in just 55 seconds by Sergei Pavlovich. There were cries of āearly stoppageā in that one but, either way, he was hurt and it looked like it was only going one way. To rub salt in the wounds, these losses both came in big Derrickās home state of Texas. No homefield advantage for the big man. Love Lewis though. One of my favourite fighters on the roster these days and itās not even so much for his fighting, more his personality. Itās been shite seeing him losing back-to-back fights, especially in the manner they ended. But truth be told, heās never been quite good enough to hang at the absolute top level in the division. He is good and at times I actually think heās a bit underrated and kind of dismissed as just a ācharacterā. But heās better than he lets on. Heās beat some quality names over the years and that doesnāt just keep happening by accident. But itās clear as day where his ceiling is. Itās not like itās a deep division and heās better than most at HW but whenever he steps in with that little cluster of top tier Heavyweights, the gulf in skills is clear. Still one of the most popular fighters on the roster easy though. People love him. He turns 38 a few days after this show. Thatās not so old by Heavyweight standards but I fear we mightāve seen the best of him now and itās all gonna be downhill from here. I hope heās still got a few big knockouts and moments in him but heās had a lot of rough fights and taken a fair bit of damage over the years. You canāt keep getting whacked by 20st men for a prolonged period of time without the wheels falling off eventually. Spivac is not only younger, fresher and with less miles on him, on paper heās also got a style that could potentially give Lewis fits. Heās 28 years old and has a record of 15-3 and 13 finishes. Standout wins include a submission over Tai Tuivasa in 2019, a decision over Alexey Oleynik and in his last couple of fights he got TKO finishes over Greg Hardy and Augusto Sakai. Hereās him battering Hardy, just because itās always worth seeing againā¦ āŗļø So yeah, heās been operating on a much lower level than Lewis. No doubt about that. Lewis has been in with nearly all the top players in the division. Heās done fairly well at times, not so well others, but has even beat a few of them. But like everything in life, timing is important and I just feel like Spivac might be catching Lewis at the perfect time. Heās in a bit of a slump, heās taken a lot of knocks and heās getting up in age. And Spivac is coming in confident and has the kind of grappling that could cause Lewis real issues. Lewis has shown a weird ability to ājust get upā at times when heās been taken down in the past. And if youāre trying to grapple him, youāve always got to be mindful of possibly ducking into that horrible uppercut he flattened Curtis Blaydes with. But if Spivac can get the takedowns going, even if Lewis gets up a few times I think itāll do its job of wearing him down. And as much as I like Lewis, weāve seen what happens when he starts getting frustrated and disillusioned in fights. Iād love to see Lewis get back in the win column here, and Iām certainly not counting him out. Spivacās shown himself to be susceptible to the early KO a couple of times in the past (see the Tom Aspinall and Walt Harris fights). I can definitely see a scenario where Lewis clobbers him early. But Iāve got a gut feeling Spivac is gonna make this a miserable night for him, drag him about for a couple of rounds, soften him up then stop a demoralised Lewis in the middle rounds. Hope Iām wrong. I donāt even dislike Spivac but I hope he eats canvas in this one. Ā Da Un Jung vs Devin Clark. Ugh. Might be alright. I vaguely remember Jung being generally quite entertaining to watch and looking up his record to refresh my memory backs that up. Heās 15-3-1 with 13 finishes, 11 by knockout. Knocked out Kennedy Nzechukwu in a round in 2021 but got sat down in a round by Dustin Jacoby in his last fight. Live by the sword, die by the sword. Heās never going far but heās rarely involved in anything boring as far as I recall. Clarkās going nowhere. Never particularly rated him and for the longest time I saw him as one of those guys whoās a good athlete but never really liked to get into a fight. Heās proven me wrong a couple of times in recent fights though and shown heās double tough. Unfortunately heās just not that good. Heās had a mega patchy run in the UFC and comes into this one off a TKO loss against Azamat Murzakanov in August. Not a terrible matchup but looks well out of place in the co-main spot as it currently stands. Even for an Apex card this shouldnāt be that high up the bout order. Ā Marcin Tybura vs Blagoy Ivanov is doing very little for me. Like most of the fights on this card, itās two guys who arenāt bad fighters but it just feels like a completely nothing happening pairing thrown together for the sake of it. Tyburaās 37 with a record of 23-7. In fairness to him, heās on a decent little run. Heās won 6 of his last 7 and has wins over the likes of Andrei Arlovski, Stefan Struve, Sergey Spivac, Ben Rothwell and Walt Harris. Not a whoās who but itās not bad. He put a temporary halt to the Alexandr Romanov hype train in his last fight as well. Like I say, heās a solid enough Heavyweight but heās one of those guys who you watch and then forget he exists as soon as itās over. Nothing memorable seems to happen. Ivanov has become much the same as well. Heās got an interesting story. Beat Fedor in a Sambo competition back when Fedor was on top of the MMA world. He had a fight with Ilir Latifi early in his career that ended in a No Contest when they broke the bastard ring. And he came back from being stabbed and almost dying and went on to return and have decent runs in Bellator and WSOF. Heās been dull as shit in the UFC though. Six fights, six decisions and I donāt think I enjoyed one of them. Can see this being a right slog. Ā Doo Ho Choi vs Kyle Nelson is ***WANDāS ONE TO WATCH***Ā here. Not much to choose from at all but the āKorean Superboyā is back and I think it deserves highlighting. We havenāt seen him since 2019. To be honest I assumed he must be doing his mandatory military service or something but apparently heās just been shagged by injuries. Heās 31 now, far from on the scrapheap, but he could do with making up for lost time. Who knows how heāll look after 3 years away? Especially in a division like Featherweight. Itās not like heās coming back in a shallow weight class, 145 is full of killers. And Choi wasnāt on the best of form when he last fought either. He was on a 3 fight losing streak and got stopped by Jeremy Stephens and Charles Jourdain in his last two fights. The fight people are always gonna associate him with though, is the FOTY with Cub Swanson in 2016. A mental 15 minute barnburner that has since been put into the Hall Of Fame. I think a rewatch of that is due, I donāt think Iāve seen it since around the time of the fight. Itās a shame this card isnāt still in Korea as originally planned. Choi making his return with the big homecoming wouldāve been cool. But maybe itāll be a blessing in disguise and take some of the pressure off him. Itās been a hell of a layoff. Nelsonās no world beater and heās not an insurmountable task for Choi to overcome. Heās a tough scrappy guy from what I remember though. Heās coming off losses to Billy Quarantillo and Jai Herbert but heās obviously been more active than Choi. Weāll see. Itād be nice if the Superboy can return with a win though. I just hope itās a fun fight really. This card needs a few of these fights to deliver and this probably seems the safest bet for that but who knows what weāre getting from Choi at this point? Ā Yusaku Kinoshita vs Adam Fugitt. Donāt know. Never heard of Kinoshita. Looking him up heās 22 years old with a 6-1 record and all his wins coming inside the distance. Heās coming off a TKO win on DWCS in August. Not a bad start at all. Iāve only seen Fugitt once and he came in on short notice and got beat up by Michael Morales. That was his UFC debut and a far from ideal one. Mightnāt have been a true reflection of his skills either. Heās 8-3 with 7 finishes. Not a clue how this goes but Kinoshita is 12 years younger and a finisher so theyāve probably set this up with a showcase for him in mind. Whether thatās how it plays out remains to be seen. Ā Jun Yong Park vs Denis Tiuliulin. Feel like a stuck record but, again, itās just there. I like Park. Iāve got time for the āIron Turtleā. Heās usually in entertaining scraps and I remember loving his losing effort against our boy Gregory Rodrigues a while back. Thatās Parkās only loss in his last 6 fights as well. Heās 15-5 now and coming off a submission win over Joseph Holmes in October. But Tiuliulin as the opponent isnāt grabbing my interest. This is the problem with this card, and a lot of these Apex shows in general, a lot of times there are fighters you like on the cards but theyāre matched with opponents youāve either never heard of or youāre indifferent to. Tiuliulin is 10-6-0-1 and coming off a TKO over Jamie Pickett in September. Before that though, he got choked by Aliaskhab Khizriev in his UFC debut. Donāt know what to make of him but hopefully Park can drag him into a bit of a slugfest. Ā Tatsuro Taira vs Jesus Aguilar is one of the only fights on this card that Iād say is worth going out of your way to see. So what do they do? Bury it in the curtain jerk position. Taira looks promising so far. He turns 23 just before this card and heās undefeatedĀ at 12-0Ā with 9 finishes and Iāve thought heās looked really impressive in his first two Octagon appearances. He schooled Carlos Candelario to a decision in his UFC debut in May, then submitted CJ Vergara in October. Obviously thereās a long way to go and a ton of questions to be asked as he goes up in levels of opposition. But Iāve liked the little Iāve seen so far. For someone so young, heās looked really composed and relaxed under the bright lights. Iām not familiar with Aguilar but he sounds like a good opponent. Heās 26 years old and 8-1 with 6 submissions. His last loss was his MMA debut so heās on an 8 fight streak, heās gone into a 5th round before and heās coming off a submission win on DWCS in August. Ā Ā Not gonna bother previewing the āRoad To UFCā stuff. I donāt know any of the fighters, I didnāt follow any of the show and frankly I canāt be arsed to do any research. Hopefully theyāll throw up some pleasant surprises. Donāt know how much of this Iāll end up watching. No way Iām getting up at 6am for the main card and certainly not 3am for the prelims. Guessing Lewis vs Spivac should be in the cage around 8:30ish UK time so I might catch that live and just skim back through the rest.Ā ?? Edited February 5, 2023 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted January 21, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted January 21, 2023 i'll give them a pass on this considering it's been switched from Korea. It'll be a main card only job for me I think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kfogg1991 Posted January 31, 2023 Share Posted January 31, 2023 This is mental the fight pass prelims start at 3am, prelims start at 4am and the main card 6am. Fucking unbelievable but at least I can sleep and watch when I wake up not missing anythingĀ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted January 31, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted January 31, 2023 i'm assuming that's to benefit the Asian crowd watching for the Road to the UFC fights. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted February 1, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted February 1, 2023 had seen a photo of Lewis looking slimmer a few weeks ago but has thought it was just the angle of the photo, but another photo has surfaced and it looks like he's really dropped a fair bit of weight: Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 2, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 2, 2023 (edited) Yeah, I think I saw the same picture youāre on about. Fuck knows. I didnāt take much notice at the time. I just thought back to all those Roy Nelson fights years ago where youād see pictures of him looking slimmer in the buildup, only for him to turn up looking his same old roly poly self on fight week. Lewis definitely looks in better nick in that photo youāve posted though. Iām just not sure how much itās gonna matter now. It feels like a case of ātoo little, too lateā really. This one is winnable. Him and Spivac is about 50/50 to me. But beyond that, I think heās already peaked and itās probably all gonna be downhill from here sadly. Hope Iām wrong. Shite card but itāll probably work out quite nicely for us, getting up on Sunday morning and catching the main event live. Itās just really crap foreplay before the good stuff next week with Makhachev vs Volk.Ā Edited February 2, 2023 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 2, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 2, 2023 Sodiq Yusuffās card breakdown here might genuinely end up being the best thing about this whole show. Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted February 2, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted February 2, 2023 ?Ā good stuff, the Choi/Nelson pick got me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members WeeAl Posted February 3, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted February 3, 2023 14 hours ago, wandshogun09 said: Sodiq Yusuffās card breakdown here might genuinely end up being the best thing about this whole show. Ā ? Fuck I'll have to follow him after that. Had no idea he was a smart arse, funny bastard.Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 3, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 3, 2023 āAdamā¦Fugitt. I feel the same way Adam. Next fight.āĀ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted February 4, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted February 4, 2023 sometimes it only takes a 17 second weigh in video to convince me to watch a fight, i'm such a sucker for this stuff: Ā tremendous work. The other Road to the UFC fight I have my eye on is the Nakamura/Kazama fight. Nakamura is 6-0 and one of the top freestyle wrestlers from Japan. Ilistened to a couple of previews and he'll come out aggressive and try get this thing done early, sounds a real prospect: aye, sign me up Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 4, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 4, 2023 (edited) Yeah them āRoad To UFCā fights are the x-factor on this card. I donāt know enough about them to say Iām genuinely that invested but Iāll give them a bash. If those fights deliver this could actually be a strong card. Itās at least giving me hope seeing those four fights are in the āgood divisionsā of 155 and under. Not like weāre being subjected to unknown Heavyweights and 205ers most likely shitting the card up. Oh and another reason to like Sodiq Yusuff, a UFC fighter whoās not a sad bastard Andrew Tate fan? Win! Randy Brown as well.Ā Edited February 4, 2023 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 4, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 4, 2023 Full card graphic and start times. The 6am main card start actually works out alright, I reckon. Iāll just get up tomorrow and whack it on live with my breakfast and maybe catch up on the prelims later.Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dai Posted February 4, 2023 Share Posted February 4, 2023 After seeing those pics of Lewis in this thread, he's surprisingly still weighed in at 265 for this one. Couldn't see a huge difference in his physique either on the scales.Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted February 4, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted February 4, 2023 2 minutes ago, Dai said: After seeing those pics of Lewis in this thread, he's surprisingly still weighed in at 265 for this one. Couldn't see a huge difference in his physique either on the scales.Ā Iām telling you itās the old Roy Nelson effect. Fuckerās been catfishing us for weeks.Ā Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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