Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted October 24, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted October 24, 2023 (edited) We’re off to São Paulo… ESPN MAIN CARD Jailton Almeida vs Derrick Lewis Gabriel Bonfim vs Nicolas Dalby Rodrigo Nascimento vs Don’Tale Mayes Caio Borralho vs Abus Magomedov ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS Elves Brener vs Kaynan Kruschewsky Elizeu Zaleski Dos Santos vs Rinat Fakhretdinov Vitor Petrino vs Modestas Bukauskas Angela Hill vs Denise Gomes Eduarda Moura vs Montserrat Conejo Kaue Fernandes vs Marc Diakiese Seen this card get a bit of criticism but I quite like it myself. It’s not the most loaded but it’s got its good points and I think they’ve done a decent job of spreading the quality throughout the card here. I think the prelims might outshine the main card on this one. As usual, the bout order is probably gonna change multiple times before fight night. I’ll edit this as and when. Jailton Almeida vs Derrick Lewis is your São Paulo headliner. Was originally supposed to be Almeida against Curtis Blaydes, which would’ve been the true litmus test for Jailton but Blaydes pulled out and here we are. On paper it sounds like a nightmare matchup for the ‘Black Beast’ but we’ll see. Time will tell. Fair play to him for stepping in because it’s really not a favourable matchup if you just look at their styles. This’ll be a special night for Almeida. All of his pre-UFC fights were in Brazil and, even since signing, he beat Shamil Abdurakhimov on the Rio card back in January. But this is his first time main eventing a UFC card on home soil, he’s on the poster, he’s the main man and he’s going up against an established name in Lewis, who’s probably the most popular and loved fighter in the division. Almeida hasn’t put a foot wrong yet in the UFC. He’s 19-2 overall with all 19 wins coming inside the distance. His 2 losses were early in his career and you’re going back to 2018 for the most recent one. He’s coming into this fight on a 14 fight winning streak. Got into the UFC off a submission win on DWCS in 2021 and since then he’s rattled off a 5-0 record in the span of just over a year in the Octagon. The opposition so far hasn’t been stellar. But he’s beat those lower level opponents like Parker Porter, Danilo Marques and Anton Turkalj in the style any fighter of real substance should. In his last fight, he headlined for the first time on the Charlotte card in May and crushed Jairzinho Rozenstruik with ease in a round. While Rozenstruik isn’t elite, he’s experienced and has mixed with a lot of the top guys. It was Almeida’s first step up but he passed with flying colours. So we’re still not sure where Almeida stands in the Heavyweight pecking order. But he’s clearly above most of the ham and eggers. He’s ready for the big boys. Enter Derrick Lewis. Love the bloke. I’ve been saying for a while though, I think he’s on the way out. Before his last fight he was on a horrible 3 fight losing streak and got stopped all 3 times. A bad KO from Tuivasa, a 55 second stoppage from Pavlovich, then he got ragdolled and subbed by Spivac. He’s 38 years old now, he’s been through a lot of rough fights, he’s been finished 9 times and, as much as we all love him, we’ve known where his ceiling is for years now. He’s got the kind of power in his hands that can change the course of any fight. But his game hasn’t evolved at all over the years and it’s not going to this late in the day. Fun fighter, even more fun personality, but if we’re honest he peaked getting that title shot against Cormier years ago. And we saw how that went. He did stop the rot in his last fight though… 🤣 He badly needed that. Coming off those 3 losses, he couldn’t afford to be losing a 4th to a slug like Marcos Rogerio De Lima. Lewis got the KO in just 33 seconds, then took his shorts off to let the hot balls breathe. As you do. We talked about it on here at the time but he became a free agent after this win and I was surprised he didn’t sign with the PFL. No doubt they’d have been interested. They need opponents for Francis Ngannou and Lewis has that win over Ngannou, albeit in an absolutely awful fight. Lewis probably would’ve got a sweet deal. And it was part of Ngannou’s negotiations that his PFL opponents would get $2 million. So the Ngannou rematch alone would’ve bagged him the biggest payday of his life, at a time when his career is winding down. But I don’t even know if Lewis entertained the idea. Within weeks it was announced that he’d re-signed with the UFC for another 8 fights! At 38, that’s surely gonna see him through to retirement. Fair play if it works for him and I’m sure the UFC are paying him good money given his tenure in the promotion and his popularity. But I don’t know, I think he might look back when it’s all said and done and regret not pursuing that PFL coin. So this is the thanks Lewis gets for showing loyalty to the UFC? Pricks. I’m torn on this. I’ll never actively root against Lewis but a win here adds nothing to the division. There’s no upside there anymore and it’ll just be a case of same old with him where he’ll get a couple of knockouts then look horrible and lose a couple. Rinse and repeat. The Heavyweight division desperately needs new blood. Especially as it’s looking like both Jon Jones and Stipe Miocic will be retiring whenever they eventually fight. The division badly needs guys like Almeida, Aspinall and Pavlovich to step up. Otherwise I genuinely think we’re heading for the worst spell in the division since the Tim Sylvia days. It’s not great now but at least there’s a few at the top end worth getting a bit excited about. Just looking at both men’s styles here, it’s hard to see Lewis getting much positive out of it. He’s done surprisingly well in the past at ‘just standing up’ when he’s been taken down but that’s getting less and less effective. We saw how easily Spivac was able to just roll over him in the grappling back in February and Almeida should be able to do the same. Where it gets interesting is if it goes long. The Rozenstruik fight in May was the first time Almeida’s been scheduled to fight 5 rounds but he ended it in the first round so we never got the answer. And in his 21 career fights, he’s only ever gone past the second round once…and he lost that fight on points. That was years ago and maybe I’m reading too much into it. Or maybe it suggests that his weakness is the cardio. It’s why I was looking forward to that Blaydes fight because I could see Blaydes at least extending him into a longer fight. I’m not sure this Lewis fight is gonna be the one to answer those questions but it’s something to think about. Gabriel Bonfim vs Nicolas Dalby is decent, although looks a bit out of place as co-main. I get it though. Bonfim is looking like a serious prospect so it does make sense to give him a bit of spotlight, especially on a Brazil card. He’s just turned 26 years old and he’s undefeated at 15-0, all finishes, former LFA champ. He made his UFC debut on the Rio PPV in January and beat Mounir Lazzez via guillotine choke in just 49 seconds. The mad thing was, despite the impressive performance, he kind of got upstaged by his brother Ismael, who scored a ‘Knockout Of The Year’ contender against Terrance McKinney earlier in the night. Gabriel was back out at UFC 291 in July and… Guilly Gabe strikes again! Subbed Trevin Giles with another guillotine. Took him a bit longer this time, 1:13 of the first round. Slacking. But yeah, he’s looking like a handful. Need to see more of him. All we’ve seen in his first couple of UFC fights is that he’s got a wicked guillotine. He’s gone into the third round before though and still got the finish. Be interesting to see how he looks in a longer fight and when he faces adversity but so far, he’s looking good. Dalby isn’t the type who gets steamrolled either. He’s about to be 39 and I haven’t found him the most exciting to watch but he’s not bad. He’s 22-4-1-2 now and coming off 3 wins, so he’s in decent form. And he’s never been finished. So this is an interesting fight. A guy who does nothing but finish the opposition against a guy who’s never been stopped in a 13 year, 29 fight career. It’s the perfect next test for Bonfim, isn’t it? If nothing else, Dalby should give Bonfim a bit more cage time than we’ve seen so far. Should give us more of an idea what Bonfim’s got. And if he does deal with Dalby the way he’s squashed his last two opponents, it’ll be quite a statement. Rodrigo Nascimento vs Don’Tale Mayes 2. Sigh. An epic rematch that I didn’t even realise was a rematch. Again, why do they insist on whacking a shite Heavyweight fight in the middle of every Fight Night main card? Maybe it’ll surprise me. To be honest, my low expectations for this fight really shouldn’t be hard to surpass. We’ll see. Forgive me if I don’t do my rewatch and review of the first fight. They met back in May 2020 and Nascimento got the second round submission. Not sure why the rematch is happening, other than there’s not much else going on for either at the moment. Nascimento got sparked by Chris Daukaus his next fight after this, a loss that hasn’t aged well at all. He’s turned things around recently with a couple of split decision wins over Tanner Boser and Ilir Latifi. Mayes isn’t much good. He’s 10-5-0-1 and coming off the biggest win of his career, stopping Andrei Arlovski back in June. Think that says more about where Arlovski’s at than anything though. Before that he’d only beat scrubs and lost anytime he stepped up. I see no reason why we’d get a different result in this rematch. Or why it’s on the main card. Or why it’s happening at all. Caio Borralho vs Abus Magomedov is kind of intriguing. Borralho’s a funny one though. He’s 14-1-0-1, looks like he’s got some potential and it was clear the UFC rated him when he came in off DWCS and was immediately put in a couple of co-main events. But it’s been a bit of a weird start to his UFC run. His debut ended in controversy due to an illegal knee. He still seemed quite happy with it though… 😂 And then his wins over Petrosyan and Muradov were a bit lacklustre. He subbed Michal Oleksiejczuk in his last fight in April and my fuzzy recollection is that he did look pretty good in that one. But so far, for whatever reason, it just feels like we haven’t seen the best of him. And Abus Magomedov, fuck knows? He’s the guy Sean Strickland beat up in an Apex headliner back in July. Still baffles me why that fight was even made, let alone main event, but whatever. Magomedov had fought once in the UFC before that, squashing Dustin Stoltzfus in seconds. And in fairness, he was giving Strickland all he could handle. For about 3 or 4 minutes anyway. Then he completely faded and Strickland took over and overwhelmed him for the second round finish. To come into a 5 round fight with only 1 round’s worth of cardio is embarrassing. No excuse either. He’s 25-5-1. By the time you’ve had 31 professional fights, you should have your conditioning and pacing down. Whether it was the adrenaline and pressure of his first UFC headliner fucking with him or what, who knows? But he looked bollocksed by the end of the first round. Pathetic. He looks dangerous and hopefully he’s learned from that loss. But up against a big strong grappler like Borralho here, it could be another miserable night for him. Elves Brener vs Kaynan Kruschewsky is a late card change. Bit disappointed. It was supposed to be Brener vs Esteban Ribovics, which was a matchup I had high hopes for. It was my ‘one to watch’ on this card but unfortunately Ribovics is out and UFC newcomer Kruschewsky is in. Don’t know anything about him but, regardless, it’s gonna be worth a look for Brener. He really got on my radar in his last fight. He’d made his UFC debut in February and won a forgettable decision against Zubaira Tukhugov. I never paid any attention to him after that, so when he was matched up with Guram Kutateladze (who I do rate) in July, I expected it to be a relatively straightforward night’s work for Kutateladze. I wasn’t ready for what we actually got. Kutateladze was putting it on him big time and opened up that sickening gash on his head. Brener absolutely refused to go away but going into the third round it looked like Kutateladze was going to come out on top. Kutateladze was blasting him with every strike in the book but Brener just kept coming at him. Then it happened… Somewhere along the line, Kutateladze just seem to break. Whether he’d punched himself out trying to put Brener away, or maybe he’d become disheartened at Brener still being there and constantly pressuring. Maybe a combination of all the above. But it was like his energy bar just suddenly drained to zero and that punch just slumped him. Awesome stuff. Instantly made me a fan of Brener. Impossible to watch that fight and not be won over by him. One of my favourite fights of the year that nobody talks about. Like I said, never seen this Kruschewsky bloke but according to Sherdog he’s 32 years old with a record of 15-2 and 13 finishes. A quick glance at his record tells me he’s coming off a first round submission win on DWCS back in September, he’s on a 4 fight win streak and he has a 2019 points win over Adriano Martins, who to date is still the only man to have a win over Islam Makhachev. Kruschewsky is actually from São Paulo as well so it’s a cool opportunity for him in his hometown. Elizeu Zaleski Dos Santos vs Rinat Fakhretdinov is a solid matchup. Dos Santos is getting up in age now. He turns 37 the week after this fight. He’s always struck me as one of those Francisco Trinaldo types though, who remains a tough night’s work for pretty much anyone. Can test the up and comers and, if you’re lacking, he’s still good enough to find you out. He’s 24-7 now and coming off a split decision over Abubakar Nurmagomedov in June. Shit fight as I recall but I’m blaming Abubakar for that. Plus Dos Santos was coming off a lengthy layoff. He’d dished out a horrible beating to Benoit Saint-Denis in his previous fight. A beating so bad the ref got heavily panned for not stopping the fight and was actually removed from the rest of his reffing duties that night. Saint-Denis has been on a tear ever since so that win for Dos Santos has aged well. He also has a first round KO over Sean Strickland on his record from 2018. He’s up against it here though… That’s how Fakhretdinov’s last fight ended. Kevin Lee had just got back in the UFC and that was his welcome back. Fakhretdinov dropped him with pretty much the first punch he threw, then choked him unconscious. All within 55 seconds of the fight starting. Fakhretdinov might be a real problem in the Welterweight division down the road. He’s 21-1 now, with 17 finishes and currently on a 20 fight winning streak. I remember him boring me to tears in his points win over Bryan Battle but looking at his record and finish rate, that probably wasn’t typical of his style. Really strong wrestler and his striking looked improved in the short time he was in there with Lee last time. If nothing else he had a strong jab and an accurate right hand with some power on it. Interesting fight this because he shouldn’t be having an easy night against Dos Santos. If he walks through him it’s time to really start taking notice. Vitor Petrino vs Modestas Bukauskas sounds alright. Petrino’s looked a right handful so far. For one, just looking at the fucker he’s impressive enough. He’s a unit. Looks like a WWF Hasbro come to life. And so far, he’s done nothing but win. You’d have thought they’d wanna put him on the main card here but here we are. He’s just turned 26 years old and he’s unbeaten at 9-0 with 7 finishes. He got in the UFC off a stoppage win on DWCS just over a year ago and has since gone 2-0 in the Octagon. Beat Anton Turkalj on points in a FOTN winner. Then in July on the big UFC 290 card… He pretty much bullied Marcin Prachnio around and nearly squeezed his head off with an arm triangle. His first win by submission. Absolute tank. Not sure how far he can go but it’s been a good start. The thing I like about him as well is he doesn’t seem like your typical musclebound gasser who fades terribly if he doesn’t get the early finish. His DWCS win was a second round KO, his UFC debut went the distance and his last fight went into the third round and he got the sub. Bukauskas should be a decent step up for him. He’s 15-5, coming off 4 wins, former Cage Warriors champ. He’s no world beater but he’s alright from what I remember. Beat Tyson Pedro and Zac Pauga in his last couple of fights. Not a bad matchup. Angela Hill vs Denise Gomes feels like a real ‘out with the old, in with the new’ piece of matchmaking. Hill’s got to be coming to the end of her career at this point. She’ll turn 39 in January, which is ancient by Strawweight standards, and her record is now 15-13. She got really outclassed my Mackenzie Dern in their 5 round headliner in May. Seemed like a combination of Dern having one of her strongest performances and Hill having one of her worst. But Hill was even getting beat up in the striking in that one. When you’re a standup fighter and Mackenzie Dern is getting the better of you on the feet, it’s not a good sign, is it? And now they’re throwing her in with this… Denise Gomes is much younger at just 23 years old and she’s coming off a big win at UFC 290 in July. She knocked out highly rated Mexican prospect Yazmin Jauregui in just 20 seconds. Gomes was known to pack a punch but this was a bit of a shocker all the same. It was a brutal finish. She hurt Jauregui right off the bat and then every follow up was on the button. She’s 8-2 now. Her first loss was her MMA debut so whatever. Some of the greatest fighters in MMA history lost their pro debut. Her only loss in the UFC was her UFC debut against Loma Lookboonmee but she took that on a week’s notice. So from this, it seems it’s debuts that are her kryptonite. She’s fought in São Paulo before so at least this isn’t her São Paulo debut. Hill’s fucked. Eduarda Moura vs Montserrat Conejo is just filler but I’ll give it a look. Moura’s making her UFC debut here, coming off a first round submission win on DWCS back in August. She actually campaigned to get on this card after that win. Of course she wants to fight on home soil but, also, she’s a teammate of Jailton Almeida. She’s 29 years old and undefeated at 9-0 with 8 finishes, 6 of them in the first round. Doesn’t sound like a bad signing. She’s welcomed to the UFC by Conejo, who’s 10-3 and coming off a couple of losses to Amanda Lemos and Jaqueline Amorim. I seem to remember Conejo being more of a grappler but she got schooled by Amorim on the ground last time out. If Moura is gonna go on to be something in the Strawweight division, this is the type of fight she should be shining in. Kaue Fernandes vs Marc Diakiese is just kind of there. Not familiar with this Fernandes bloke. He’s Brazilian, trains out of Nova Uniao and he’s 8-1 with 6 finishes. He’s coming off a 45 second KO via headkick in his last fight in LFA. But there’s not a ton of information out there on him. Sherdog doesn’t even have his age or height listed. And Diakiese’s in a bit of a funny spot. He’s been on the roster since 2017 and he’s still only 30 years old. But it’s just not working out for him. He’s 16-7 now and has gone 2-4 in his last 6 fights. I don’t know if the bout order is gonna stay like this but seeing him in the curtain jerk spot against a debuting fighter here just shows that the matchmakers don’t really give a shite about him. In fairness, he was a bit hard done by in his last fight against Joel Alvarez. He got submitted that night but they had a clash of heads just before which led directly into the finish. We’ll see how it goes but it does feel like Diakiese might be one loss away from being binned. Obrigado 🇧🇷👊 Edited November 6, 2023 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted October 24, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted October 24, 2023 Assumed this an Apex card, absolutely delighted to read it isnt! And great work as always wand. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted October 26, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted October 26, 2023 Ahh bollocks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted October 27, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted October 27, 2023 Just bollocks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted November 1, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted November 1, 2023 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted November 1, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted November 1, 2023 Yeah. That’s my ‘one to watch’ down the shitter. Saw Derrick Lewis got arrested for speeding the other day as well. Fight’s still on but it just seems like this is gonna be one of them cards. Expect more pullouts and craziness over the next week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted November 3, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted November 3, 2023 Fuck me. Both the Ismael Bonfim vs Vinc Pichel and Daniel Marcos vs Victor Hugo fights have been binned after Bonfim and Hugo came in heavy and didn’t try to cut anymore weight. Eduarda Moura also missed weight (came in at 119.5lbs for a Strawweight fight) but her fight with Conejo is going ahead. She’s being fined 30%. Considering this is her UFC debut, a 30% deduction probably leaves her with just about enough for a chippy tea and an Uber home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted November 3, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted November 3, 2023 Brazilian's letting the team down. Was looking forward to watching both Bonfim brothers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted November 3, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted November 3, 2023 Hopefully this is it now… Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kfogg1991 Posted November 3, 2023 Share Posted November 3, 2023 Christ this card has taken a pounding. It wasn't exactly the strongest anyway but today has hurt it even more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted November 4, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted November 4, 2023 Its still solid, and I prefer it when a card is left to 10-11 fights. I heard the Fight Disciples refer to this card as Brazil's version of that Paris show from a while back, lots of hot prospect Brazilians matched favourably, should make for a wild show. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted November 4, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted November 4, 2023 Yeah I still like the look of what’s there. And I do prefer a shorter card. If this was on European time it’d be perfect Saturday night viewing tonight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted November 4, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted November 4, 2023 (edited) 10pm prelims according to Fight Pass. Its still being advertised as being on BBC Sport too? Edit* apparently the BBC Sport thing is radio commentary. Edited November 4, 2023 by Egg Shen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted November 4, 2023 Author Paid Members Share Posted November 4, 2023 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Carbomb Posted November 6, 2023 Paid Members Share Posted November 6, 2023 Guessing nobody watched this, then? I saw from the results that Spoiler Almeida went to five rounds for the first time in his career - it's a good statement, considering his only other decision was a loss. Also saw that the undefeated Bonfim brother is now no longer undefeated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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