UFC 296: Edwards vs Covington - Dec 16 🇺🇸

[Carbomb]

1 hour ago, David said:

Anyone else get the feeling that Leon is going to chin Covington and put him away? I don't know why I do, but that's the feeling I have.

I'm not confident - I've got a horrible feeling that the same dickhead gods that blessed Prickland are going to give Cuntington some kind of miracle that goes against all expectations - but I really, really hope he does.

[Browser Brady]

Is this available on demand anywhere to watch tomorrow ? 
 

like can i get it on Now TV ?

[wandshogun09]

Not a good fight but HA! Fuck Colby. 

[WeeAl]

Edwards winning popped up on one of those Google suggestions things when I opened a new tab. At that point I decided I wasn't paying another £20 for this show so checked up the rest of the results. 

From what I can gather from a quick glance, Josh Emmet killed Bryce Mitchell stone dead. Shavkat is still the next big thing. Mad Tony is as shot as we knew while Paddy continues to try to limbo under the already low bar we have set for him. I've no idea about Pantoja/Royval other than Pantoja winning a UD, didn't see much mention of that one. The main event sounded like a stinker, but all is right in the world that Colby's layoff did him exactly zero favours and Leon outclassed him while taking very few risks. That about right? 

[David]

Man, that was amazing to watch. And you know what was even better? The commentary team doing all they can to downplay Edwards. Especially Rogan and DC.

Joe - "This isn't how Leon would want to finish the fight."

"Yeah, but he's winning the fight though?"

"Oh yeah, he's winning the fight, but this isn't how he'd want to win the fight."

Then by the middle of round 5, we were getting the whole "Yeah, he's beating Colby, but he won't be able to do that against Belal/Shavkat."

It's simple. Colby "didn't look like himself" because he couldn't deal with the speed and skill of Edwards. Edwards dealt with the takedown, negated the cardio-machine, and even took the smug fucker right down himself.

I'm sure we'll hear how the next challenger is the man to topple Leon.

 

[wandshogun09]

I said similar on Twitter earlier. Rogan especially looked gutted when they were recapping the fight at the end of the show. I’ve had to mute this tweet because my mentions got absolutely flooded with sad twat Rogan bumlickers getting all wound up 😂

Divs saying I’m making shit up when Rogan’s the one talking complete bollocks about Belal having “very good success” against Leon before the eyepoke. Anyone who remembers that fight knows Belal was getting schooled. Then I had people saying I was “creating a false narrative”. I’ve got less than 500 followers. I’m sure I’m gonna do irreparable damage to Rogan with his 12 million followers and even more millions of dollars.

Rogan and Colby fans are up there with McGregor fans. Proper weirdos who full on hero worship these pricks and put them on a pedestal. Like a fucking cult. You don’t even have to say anything particularly bad about them and they’ll swarm with their crap immature attempts at put downs. 

Edited December 17, 2023 by wandshogun09

[neil]

Commentary as per usual was the drizzling shits - only comment that I thought was kind of interesting was DC bringing up Lennox Lewis which I could see.

What a total joke of a performance from Covington though. In previous fights, despite the shitty gimmick or whatever, at least when he got in the cage he actually fucking brought it and delivered a performance win or lose. This was just terrible though, so timid and the total opposite of him imposing his style of fight, totally afraid of Leon. He got better in the later rounds but seemed like Leon was just treating it like sparring rounds at that point too. Would've love to have seen Leon turn it up and starch the fucker, but oh well.

Post fight interview from Covington was so cringey - even the MAGA idiots turned on him and started booing.

[David]

3 minutes ago, neil said:

Post fight interview from Covington was so cringey - even the MAGA idiots turned on him and started booing.

Including King MAGA. It seems The Donald fucked off sharpish after the main event, not bothering to stick around and hear Covington chatting shit.

[Bruce85]

Sadly Colby didn’t get KO’d but this might have been more embarrassing. As others have said he just had nothing for Leon, he reacted and flinched to pretty much every faint Leon put out. I think part of the reason Colby couldn’t get going is due to how crisp and clean Leon looked. It wasn’t the best fight and he didn’t get the stoppage but I thought it was a great performance from Leon. 
 

I echo the sentiments about the commentary, utter garbage. I normally like DC but when Rogan is there he’s dreadful! 
 

Strange card, some really good fights but don’t feel it ever really caught fire, which could be due to the fact all the fights on the main card were one way traffic. 

[wandshogun09]

A lovely way to start a Sunday morning this was.

Wasn’t the most exciting fight to watch and it would’ve been better if Leon could’ve ended it with a brutal KO. But whatever. It was so satisfying just seeing pretty much everything Colby tried get shut down. Seen a load of talk about how the layoff affected him and insinuations that Leon somehow didn’t beat ‘the real Colby’ but I never heard much about that going in. The layoff and ring rust has only become a story post-fight really. Not even saying his time on the shelf had zero effect on his performance here but I don’t think it was a make or break thing in how this played out. It seemed to me like the main reason he couldn’t push the pace like he usually does in the early rounds was because whenever he’d try to advance, Leon was stinging him with leg kicks or teeps to the body down the middle. Colby was flinching and hesitating all over the shop and he wasn’t ever really getting in range to effectively grapple or get his little striking flurries off in those first few rounds. And even later when he was able to get hold of Leon and wrestle a bit, Leon came out on top in pretty much all those wrestling exchanges except the one at the end of the 5th round. And even then, Colby must’ve known he needed to make the most of that opportunity and he got the grand sum of fuck all done. It was the most I can remember enjoying what was really a bit of a dull fight in forever. Just because of who was involved. Even funnier post-fight to see Colby tragically try to win the crowd back with his Trump worship. You know Trump blocked his number before he’d even got out of the cage.

Gotta be Belal or Shavkat next for Leon. Seen Islam Makhachev mention fighting Leon, and I do think that’s an interesting fight down the line. But for now, I’d rather they both stay in their own respective lanes and defend their belts in their own weight classes. As for Colby, he’s calling out Wonderboy now, which seems proper random. He’s saying Wonderboy’s been “talking shit about him”. When does Wonderboy talk shit about anyone? No surprise though. Colby was asked by the media after the show about potentially fighting Shavkat and he shut that down. But of course he wants to fight 40 year old Wonderboy coming off a one sided loss. Of course he does! For all his talk though, he’ll probably sit out for a year again now, the star spangled waste of skin that he is.

Not much to say about Pantoja vs Royval 2 really. Wasn’t a bad fight but never fully caught fire like I hoped. Suppose Pantoja winning pretty much every round took a lot of the steam out of it. Still, it was entertaining to watch and Royval had some moments in there which kept it alive. That one knee he cracked Pantoja with was clean and hard as fuck and Pantoja somehow ate it and just kept coming at him. Insane chin on Pantoja. Not sure there’s another man in the division who would’ve stood up to that. Pantoja’s a machine. Even when he looks dog tired as he did at points in this fight, he just keeps marching forward.

Gonna be a tough man to take the title off. Guessing that upcoming Moreno vs Albazi fight will determine the next challenger for Pantoja now. Looking at the rankings, nothing else makes sense as the next move.

Shavkat vs Wonderboy wasn’t the best to watch. Usually I put that down to Wonderboy’s style but Shavkat opting to just hold him against the cage for a lot of it wasn’t how I expected it to go and it made for very dull viewing. In fairness though, a lot of that probably was because Shavkat was a bit unsure how to tackle Wonderboy’s style and just wanted to pin him down and stop him moving around. Also read a Laura Sanko tweet saying she spoke to Henri Hooft and apparently Shavkat messed up his ankle during camp and should’ve had surgery but delayed it so he could make it to this fight. And he still got the finish towards the end of the second round. His undefeated record stays intact, his perfect 100% finishing rate stays intact, it was his biggest win yet, he took pretty much zero damage and he’s basically positioned himself as the most dangerous challenger for Leon Edwards going into 2024. Got to think his next fight is either gonna be a #1 contenders match or he’s next for the title shot. Belal’s the only one possibly ahead of him but I can see Shavkat jumping ahead now just because the unbeaten record and being a finishing machine makes him an easy challenger to promote. Although saying that, you know the UFC loves a rematch and Leon and Belal have history. We’ll see.

Pimblett vs Ferguson was pretty much as expected. Ferguson looked done again and Paddy somehow still ended up being underwhelming.

Cornrow Paddy 🤢 he was asked about it at the post-fight press conference and he said he did it because his hair was getting in his eyes in fights and he had to keep lifting his head and chin up so he could see. Sounds logical and I can see why it would be a hinderance and annoying. All makes sense until you watch this fight with Ferguson, his hair is all tied back and he’s still got his chin up on a flagpole. Anyway, yeah, Paddy obviously won this but that doesn’t say much in 2023. And despite a strong first round where he nearly finished Tony, and despite Tony barely having a pulse at this point, Paddy still managed to go the distance with him and faded horribly in the third round. I guess we just have to be thankful that he didn’t knock Tony out. That’s what I was fully expecting here and Paddy still somehow fell a bit short.

Not sure what’s next for Paddy. There was a fair bit of talk that he's taking his career more seriously now, plans to not balloon up in weight so much etc. I’m sceptical but time will tell, I guess. Heard him mention he’s got twin daughters on the way so maybe that’ll be the kick up the arse he needs and maybe, just maybe, he’ll actually mature a little bit. Not gonna hold my breath on that. He wasn’t as unbearable this week as he has been in the past. Don’t know if it was a case of him just being overshadowed and upstaged in the dickhead stakes by the likes of Covington and all the shite with Strickland and DDP and shit. That side of him will be back though. Wanna see him against someone ranked next. Let’s stop with the fucking around. Looking at the Top 15 as the UFC’s website has it at the moment, of who’s not booked already,  Dan Hooker would make sense. Would’ve said Benoit Saint-Denis but apparently Paddy wants to train with him. That’s one way to get out of fighting him. Make friends 🤣 As for Ferguson, I said before that I felt like they were only keeping him around to give Paddy a win. Well fuck me, Dana’s now saying that Tony should retire. We’ve all said it’s been over for a while and Dana kept booking him. Now he’s got what he wanted though, he’s happy to call time on Tony’s career.

Yeah, Josh Emmett straight murdered Bryce Mitchell. As scary a one punch KO as I can recall in a long time.

The sickening noise it made when the punch connected, the way Bryce dropped like he’d been shot from the grassy knoll, the convulsions…

Terrifying KO. Can’t remember the last time we saw Dana jump in there after a knockout like that. In hindsight, Bryce jumping in on short notice here was a colossal mistake. I never had much of an opinion or gave it much thought going in but, thinking about both men’s styles, this always had the potential to be a really bad matchup for Bryce style-wise. With Emmett’s punching power plus his wrestling background meaning he wouldn’t be easy to take down, Bryce would’ve had his work cut out even with a full camp. Disaster for him. Hopefully he’s alright. On the flipside, this was a much needed result for Emmett coming off those beatings from Topuria and Yair this year. It’s been a rough 2023 for him but at least he’s ended the year on a positive note.

Prelims were actually better than the main card, in my opinion. I never expected to be typing that today.

Who’d have ever predicted that, on a stacked card like this, Irene Aldana vs Karol Rosa would get FOTN? Had zero expectations for this but I gave it a chance just because Aldana’s one of the only watchable fighters in the women’s 135 division these days. She didn’t let me down here.

It wasn’t pretty but it was actually lot of fun to watch. They both proper went for it. I knew Aldana had that in her but we haven’t seen it in a long time. Never expected Rosa to be the type to have a war with her though. Way, way surpassed my expectations.

Cody Garbrandt vs Brian Kelleher was what it was. Like anytime Cody wins, the talk starts up again about him being ‘back’ and being a contender and all that cobblers. In fairness it was a peach of a punch that ended it…

It didn’t tell us anything we didn’t know before the fight though. We’ve always known he packs a punch. That wasn’t ever in question. And Kelleher was coming in off a long layoff and neck surgery. It wasn’t the type of win that we can read too much into. People forget we saw this story before with Cody. He scored an even better KO against Raphael Assuncao a few years ago and that went nowhere. He’ll pull one of these finishes out every now and then. Still don’t see him putting a run together though. Especially with how strong Bantamweight is now. Don’t know whether it’s bravery or stupidity him calling out Figgy post-fight. That fight was actually supposed to happen in 2020 when Cody was trying to be a Flyweight. Can see them making it now. My hopes for Figgy vs Petr Yan are out the window anyway now Yan is booked against Song Yadong. So fuck it, why not do Cody vs Figgy?

Ariane Lipski had, from what I can remember, the best performance of her UFC career. I don’t particularly rate Casey O’Neill so it wasn’t mega impressive or anything but I expected this to be a bit of a 50/50 thing. One of those fights that ends up looking like a bit of a sparring match. Lipski came in years ago with some buzz but has been lacklustre more often than not. But she looked bang up for this and really put a stamp on the fight. The armbar finish was nasty as well.

Enjoyed the Ulanbekov vs Durden fight. Some nice grappling in that one and the standing rear naked face crank that ended it was gnarly.

Durden seems a bit of a knob so I was quite pleased with how this played out. Hopefully Ulanbekov can stay more active next year. I’ve enjoyed the fights of his I’ve seen but too many gaps in between. 

Andre Fili’s first round knockout against Lucas Almeida was ace.

Short and sweet. Was half expecting this to be the sleeper on the prelims. Fili is never involved in anything dull and I thought Almeida would be a good dance partner for him. But Fili just took him out early.

Even the fatty fight in the curtain jerker was inoffensive enough and had a finish. Wasn’t overly impressed by Shamil Gaziev but he looked a couple of shades better than a lot of the dross in the Heavyweight division. Think they said Buday had never been stopped before this as well. Not a blow away performance but a decent enough debut for Gaziev. 


Not the best card to end the year on. It wasn’t the worst card ever and there were a few high points but, given how stacked it looked going in, it didn’t quite live up to expectations for me. Still, Leon beat Colby so I’m not gonna complain. 

Onto 2024…

[David]

5 minutes ago, wandshogun09 said:

Seen a load of talk about how the layoff affected him and insinuations that Leon somehow didn’t beat ‘the real Colby’ but I never heard much about that going in.

In much the same way as we heard Rogan make the quip about how Covington fought "prime Usman," which is a backhanded way of saying that the Usman Edwards beat wasn't the real deal.

[Egg Shen]

11 hours ago, David said:

 The Donald fucked off sharpish after the main event, not bothering to stick around and hear Covington chatting shit.

He did stick around, the camera cut to him when Colby was doing his MAGA pish.

[Hannibal Scorch]

5 hours ago, Egg Shen said:

He did stick around, the camera cut to him when Colby was doing his MAGA pish.

He was seen in a cutaway, but 

 

[Egg Shen]

 there goes The Donald

[Keith Houchen]

Has this been mentioned here at all? Or is it a case of “It’s Strickland so fuck him”