UFC 301: Pantoja vs Erceg - May 4 🇧🇷

[Egg Shen]

Look at this heartwarming shit, how do you build a fight with Steve Erceg? The blokes a diamond. Pantoja too, this really is just a fight between 2 lovely fellas. 

 

 

[wandshogun09]

Definitely an all babyface clash. You wouldn’t want it every PPV but it’s a refreshing diversion from some of the toxic bollocks we’ve had in title fight build ups in recent times.

Agreed on Paul Craig. If fights were won on staredowns he’d probably be UFC champion by now. 

[wandshogun09]

Edited May 4 by wandshogun09

[Egg Shen]

Yep, im in.

Are the Erceg supporters getting ahead of themselves though? Im starting to feel I am.

 

[wandshogun09]

If you’re betting on the fights tonight, probably go the opposite of this, but here’s my picks anyway…

[sirdobbo89]

Michel Pereira is a superstar. I remember a good long while back he was doing flippy shit like the lad from Tekken and got caught out and lost a decision from memory. Yeah, he is still doing flippy shit but when it ends like that, you can't knock him. He's must see TV every time he's on. 

Aldo doing Aldo things, coming back like he never left. Always a fan of seeing the old guard coming back and not getting sparked out. He looked tremendous. 

[Kfogg1991]

Michel Pereira is a fucking absolute superstar I've been a fan and fully behind him for years now and oh my god he's showing the world he's not fucking about I screamed so loud and his last four fights have gone just over a minute and a half he's fucking fantastic and currently the breakout star this year 

[SuperBacon]

17 minutes ago, Kfogg1991 said:

Michel Pereira is a fucking absolute superstar I've been a fan and fully behind him for years now and oh my god he's showing the world he's not fucking about I screamed so loud and his last four fights have gone just over a minute and a half he's fucking fantastic and currently the breakout star this year 

If you can go until the end of the year on here without saying the word "fucking" I'll donate money to a charity of your choice.

[Kfogg1991]

22 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

If you can go until the end of the year on here without saying the word "fucking" I'll donate money to a charity of your choice.

I will absolutely take you up on that offer. Can this be made official and legit and I'll throw back if I break it I'll do the same thing to you.

 

This deal goes until new years eve at midnight.....or New years day as my friend just joyfully chipped in 

[SuperBacon]

1 minute ago, Kfogg1991 said:

Can this be made official and legit

I mean, apart from it being on here, not sure how more official and legit it can be 😆 Did you want to meet for a weigh in?

2 minutes ago, Kfogg1991 said:

I'll throw back if I break it I'll do the same thing to you.

No need mate, I'm the one that offered

 

[Carbomb]

Kfogg at the end of the year:

[Dai]

Three lovely finishes to start the main show. Both Martinez and particularly Erceg will be kicking themselves a lot right now. I know Aldo is still great, but Martinez just seemed like he was giving him way too much credit. He should have took a few more chances and try and make Aldo feel uncomfortable in there.

Erceg will forever regret the decision to grapple in that last round. What a really awful choice of tactics, and one that he paid for dearly. His reaction when the scores were being read and it dawned on him that he blew it in the last round was heart breaking for him. Cant remember exactly what he said in his post match interview, but Im sure it was DC levels of dejection, and he also said something like "I blew it" in the most depressing manner too. A real tough lesson for him, but I see him learning from it and coming back stronger. Hes only a win away from another title fight anyway.

[wandshogun09]

Finally caught up on all this. Saw some of it on Sunday but was busy with family stuff over the bank holiday weekend so only just got around to watching everything else. Decent show.

Thought Pantoja vs Erceg was a brilliant fight. That’s kind of been lost in all the talk of the scoring but that’s always the case when there’s a close or debated decision. What a fight though. I’d liked what we’d seen of Erceg in his previous UFC fights and I thought he might give Pantoja a good fight but I hadn’t seen enough to be confident in his chances or anything. His stock went up here for me, regardless of the result.

He gave Pantoja all he could handle. He did well on the feet as expected but even in the grappling he was doing some good stuff defensively. I felt like it was 2-2 going into that last round but a couple of them probably could’ve gone either way. But yeah, like @Dai says, Erceg’s decision to shoot for the takedown in the 5th was baffling. And ultimately it cost him the fight.

Mind boggling. Even worse because he did the same thing at the start of the round. He took Pantoja down, it backfired and he got reversed. He managed to get free and have success on the feet for a good chunk of the round after that and it was all still up for grabs. Then he did it again, it backfired again and Pantoja ended the round on top of him and 2 of the judges gave him that round. Fucked it. A massive error on his part and one that’s gonna haunt him for a while. Had he kept it on the feet, there’s every chance that belt would be in Australia right now. 

Seen all kinds of robbery talk. You expect it after every close fight now but I’m not having it. I felt like it was close and it was all to play for in that 5th round. In the end, Erceg shat the bed with that ill-advised takedown. Seeing people talking like Erceg clearly won and was robbed is shite. And once again, I think most of it is based solely on Pantoja’s cut. A lot of fans these days seem to think a cut is the be all/end all when it comes to scoring fights. But that could come from one exchange and fights are scored round by round. The “yeah but look at his face” thing is just pure laziness a lot of the time where they’ll lose track of the scoring so just go by whoever looks more beat up facially when the fight is over. The one judge having it 49-46 Pantoja was off, yeah, it wasn’t that wide. But Pantoja winning wasn’t a robbery by any stretch. We’ll likely see a rematch at some point in the not too distant future. It’s Flyweight, of course we will! The matchmakers love a rematch, especially in the Flyweight division. But I don’t wanna see it next. Even with how close this was, it wasn’t like it was some mega controversial decision and Erceg is the one who threw it away at the end. He should at least have to beat another top contender now before getting another crack at it. Maybe they just go ahead with Pantoja vs Mokaev next. Although I’d have thought Mokaev would be in a prominent fight on that Manchester card in July and I can’t see Pantoja fighting again that soon. I don’t know. Pantoja vs Mokaev and Erceg vs either Royval or Moreno seems like the way to go but we’ll see.

Seeing Jose Aldo back in there looking so sharp was so satisfying. One of the best of all time hands down. What a career. I saw a few doubting him on social media before the show and kept seeing talk about his ‘2 years away’ and stuff. But like I said earlier in the thread, it’s not like he’d been inactive. He had those 3 Boxing fights in 2023. If anything he’d been more busy since we last saw him in the Octagon than he’s been in years.

The man. And it wasn’t like Martinez even looked bad. But this was just the difference between a very good fighter and an all time great fighter. Even an out of prime Aldo is still a handful for most. It’s why a lot of the talk around fighters primes is bollocks. A lot of the time it’s people either saying you’re in your prime or you’re washed up. There’s a middle ground there. You can be past your absolute peak but still really, really fucking good. And that’s where Aldo is now. I wouldn’t pick him to beat all the top contenders today. He’s not quite that guy anymore. Although, call me crazy, I don’t think O’Malley is a terrible or unwinnable matchup for him. But he most likely loses more than he wins at the very top of the current Bantamweight division. I think he still schools the vast majority though.

Not even sure what’s next for Aldo. It’s common knowledge that this was the last fight on his UFC contract. It seemed like his return came out of the blue but maybe he wanted to just get that last fight out of the way so he’d be contractually free to go wherever he wants after. Maybe this was a one and done thing and he’ll go and do more Boxing now or even entertain PFL or something. I think his Boxing fights last year were all on Fight Pass so that’ll probably be why the UFC were cool with him taking those fights while still being under contract. Now he’s an actual free agent. But I don’t know, maybe he sticks around and signs for a few more fights? The fact that he says he was asking for Top 5 ranked opponents here suggests he’s looking at another run. Why ask for a top ranked guy if it’s a one-off? If he’s gonna fight on, I’d like to see him stay in the UFC. If he can make more money elsewhere, more power to him of course. But purely as a fan, there aren’t many obvious fights for him outside the UFC. There are still big fights for him in the UFC, at 135 and 145.

Anthony Smith completely killing the Petrino hype was not how I expected that one to go at all. Smith’s had the look of a fighter on his last legs to me for a while. Even physically, he looks like he doesn’t put the work in like he used to. And Petrino was the younger, bigger, stronger, undefeated powerhouse on the rise. For Smith to go to Brazil and derail him in his backyard like this was a surprise.

I think I said in the opening post, my expectations for Petrino had cooled off a bit after his lacklustre win over Tyson Pedro in March. But still, I was fully expecting him to put a beating on Smith here. And it was looking like it was heading that way in the early exchanges. Then he left his neck out there and tried to slam his way out of the guillotine. Bad look for Petrino this. Obviously Smith has a lot of experience but it wasn’t even like he caught Petrino with some crafty veteran move. The choke couldn’t have been more transparent, you could see it coming a mile away and Petrino still got caught up in it.

Michel Pereira! What a crazy fun fighter to watch. I was expecting an entertaining fight out of these two and was kind of disappointed it ended so quick, to be honest. But Pereira just running through the opposition is becoming one of my favourite things in MMA. He’s one of the only good things the Middleweight division has going for it these days. Although the moonsault with the knee coming down on Potieria’s head was clearly illegal…

Honestly, Potieria has a perfectly legitimate case for appealing this result. I know we all love Pereira but there’s absolutely no argument that that wasn’t illegal. Sure it mightn’t be intentional but that’s the thing, doing backflips and moonsaults and shit on your opponents, you can’t 100% control where your legs are landing. If this was Pride, Pereira would no doubt be going for 450 curb stomp knockouts and all sorts. But that was effectively a grounded knee and who knows how buzzed Potieria was by the time that choke got slapped on. Whatever. Even if he appeals it, nothing is likely to come of it.

On 5/5/2024 at 10:21 AM, sirdobbo89 said:

Michel Pereira is a superstar. I remember a good long while back he was doing flippy shit like the lad from Tekken and got caught out and lost a decision from memory.

Yeah, that was the Tristan Connelly fight where he was pissing about so much he seemed to gas out and got outworked to a points loss. He got a load of shit for that performance and the criticisms stuck with him for a while after that, even when he was winning fights it was a stigma and a knock on him for a bit. I think people need to drop that now though. Whatever happens with Pereira from here on in, it’s clear he’s done a good job of finding a healthy balance with that style and it’s more effective these days. Then you couple that with him actually being in the right weight class and he’s in a much better place now. Still only 30 as well.

I don’t know where his ceiling is. I feel like I’m always half expecting him to get derailed going into fights and then he just blitzes the opponent away in hilarious fashion. It does feel like the run could all end in an instant but what a joy he is to watch. Never a dull moment. And to be fair, he’s now on an 8 fight winning streak, 3-0 since moving up to Middleweight and he’s won his last 3 fights at 185 in around a minute apiece. Looking at the rankings, I’d give him a Fight Night headliner next against either Dolidze (#11) or Hermansson (#9).

What can you say about Caio Borralho vs Paul Craig? I like Craig but I thought he looked awful here. Probably the best Borralho has looked so far in the UFC but I’m not sure if this was a case of him stepping his game up or him looking good because Craig looked bad. Either way, it couldn’t have gone worse for Craig.

I think most MMA fans like Craig. He’s a likeable guy. But man, he’s struggling now. At 36 years old and 1-4 in his last 5, I think it’s time to accept that he’s just never gonna get over the hump. He’s got the capability to beat good fighters but there’s just not enough to his overall game. The grappling is obviously his bread and butter but even there he came unstuck against Brendan Allen in his last fight. And the striking, gotta say he’s rotten. Just looks really unsure of himself, doesn’t commit to anything, doesn’t really set anything up and doesn’t move his head at all. He was a sitting duck here for the KO and Borralho jumped on it.

Brito vs Shore, where do you even start? First off, all credit to Brito. I thought he looked like a real problem. He was racking up damage with all those leg kicks right from the off. He was winning the fight for as long as it lasted. The doctor stoppage was mad though.

Yeah, it looks bloody vile. But it’s not like this was a cut above the eye or something. And Shore was still able to stand on the leg, walk on it and was still in the fight. He didn’t seem particularly bothered by it. The doctor takes a look at it, which is fine. But the way he was digging his bastard fingers into the cut? Nah. What the fuck was that? Then he stops the fight. Shore’s old man has been tweeting about it.

Obviously a cut like that and all the swelling and stuff would be no fun. But it’s a fight. There’s gonna be damage. Shore wanted to continue and there was nothing that urgently required the fight to be called off, in my opinion. Shore’s dad was saying the doctor in the cage said the leg was fractured and that’s why the fight was stopped. Then they went to the hospital, no fracture just some stitches and they were off home. Bullshit. I usually always agree with erring on the side of caution but stopping a fight for a cut on the shin? I’d understand if you could see bone poking out and stuff but not this. Again, Brito looked great. The way the fight was going, unless Shore created some big turnaround, Brito was most likely gonna win anyway. But it was a shite way for it to end.

Lucindo vs Kowalkiewicz was about what you’d expect when you’ve got a 22 year old on the rise against a 38 year old on the decline. Sad for Karolina, she’s always seemed lovely and it’s been nice seeing her have a bit of a late career revival with the little win streak she’s been on. Had a feeling it was coming to an end here though and while Lucindo didn’t blow her away, I did think she made Kowalkiewicz look her age here. Not sure how much longer Kowalkiewicz is gonna keep doing this. It was her first loss in a while but, pushing 40, it’s hard to see where she goes from here. She’s clearly not getting back in the title mix at this stage of her career and I doubt she’s getting the kind of purses that make sticking around all that worthwhile. Fully expecting her to be back out on an Apex card in the next few months though.

Really enjoyed Orolbai vs Brener. Despite highlighting it as my ‘one to watch’, I didn’t really know what to expect just because I’ve only seen a handful of fights from them combined. Yet to be disappointed in either though and this was more of the same. Definite Orolbai win but, as Brener showed against Kutateladze, he doesn’t go away easily. Granite hard little bastard. Orolbai’s wrestling was the big difference maker in this one. Plus, despite his striking not being very good, he certainly carries power and Brener felt it more than once.

The knockdown in the last few seconds of the fight really sealed it for Orolbai. Even with the point deduction, he’d built up too much of a lead by then. Brener is tough as shit though. Really thought he might pull out the come from behind finish the way the last round was going at times but it wasn’t to be. Good fight. Both were exhausted in that third round but just kept pushing through it.

Drakkar Klose vs Joaquim Silva was alright. Thought it was a close (no pun intended) one that came down to how you scored the second round and I really felt like it could’ve gone either way. Didn’t have a problem with Klose getting the decision but Silva definitely had a strong argument and I can see why he’d feel hard done by. It was one of them though where neither really put a stamp on it or clearly pulled ahead to where they can gripe about it too much. 

Mauricio Ruffy had a quite a UFC debut. And of course, anytime someone has an impressive debut, the comparisons to Conor McGregor come. I thought that was a bit much myself but whatever. I liked Ruffy here.

Just schooled Mullarkey and put him away inside a round. Fair play, he certainly made his debut a memorable one. The performance itself plus he made the most of his post-fight interview. When you’re name dropping the champ after your debut, it’s gonna get some attention.

“I have a message for Islam Makhachev. Enjoy your days at the top. I know you’re upset because I beat your friend. Enjoy your days, because a new king is coming.” - Maurício Ruffy

Apparently he stopped Makhachev’s teammate on DWCS last year. It seems mad talking about the champ this early but I kind of like it. Why not aim for the top? Remains to be seen if he can back it up but he’s thrown it out there now. If he does go on to be a serious contender, and Makhachev is still champ if/when he gets there, that clip and quote is gonna be all over the promos. Long way to go though and we need to see a lot more from Ruffy. He looked great here, really sharp and accurate. But you have to put it in perspective, Mullarkey might be the most hittable sod in the division. He was kind of tailor made for a precision striker like Ruffy to style on. Good debut all the same. But I wanna see more before we start declaring him 155’s next big thing.

That Dione Barbosa vs Ernesta Kareckaite fight didn’t hold my attention. I gave them a chance like I always do with debuting fighters, but it didn’t grab me. Didn’t take long for my mind to drift. Saw a few cries of robbery and, from what I did see, I was half expecting Kareckaite to get the nod. But it went to Barbosa. Whatever. Can’t say I’m fussed. About the decision or to watch either’s next fight.

Was happy to see Ismael Bonfim get back to winning ways. Especially at the expense of Vinc Pichel who I’ve long thought seems a bit of a dick. Wasn’t a mind blowing performance but I thought Bonfim looked good on the whole against a tough, ageing journeyman. Hopefully he can build himself back up off this now. He’s still only 28 and already has a decent amount of experience. Be interesting to see who he’s matched up with next.

And Alessandro Costa looked really good kicking off the Fight Pass bit. Just broke Borjas down with horrible leg kicks at the end there. Feel like he’s a bit better than his 2-2 UFC record suggests. The 2 losses were against Albazi (ranked #3 currently) and Erceg who just ran the champ mega close in a great fight. Costa vs Erceg was a cracker as well from what I remember. Costa’s worth keeping an eye on, I reckon. At the very least, he’s fun to watch.

 

Solid card, not amazing. Wasn’t anywhere near 300’s league, or 299/298 before that, but it was never gonna be. Still, the main event was excellent and Aldo’s triumphant return ranks among my favourite Brazilian card moments. Some good stuff on the undercard as well. Let’s face it, I was never gonna give a thumbs down to a card where Shogun Rua gets announced for the Hall Of Fame!

Bless him. Goes without saying, absolutely 100% deserved. Seen a few comments from the numbskull newer fans acting like he’s a bum or something. Pricks need to educate themselves. Pretty much all his fights are out there and easily accessible, most of them are on Fight Pass. There’s no excuse. Funny thing is, most of these accounts have clowns like Strickland as an avatar and are the first to call others a “casual” if they have an opposing take on something 😂 Shogun was the bollocks. DC was spot on when he said that by the time Shogun got to the UFC, he was already probably out of his prime. The injuries had already set in and he was on borrowed time physically. The fact that, despite that, he still solved the Machida puzzle, became UFC champion, knocked out Chuck, had an all time great fight with Hendo etc, just shows the fighter he was. And of course, his run through the 2005 Pride GP is still surely the best tournament streak by any fighter in MMA history. The fact these two are both going in the HOF the same year warms my heart. Chute Boxe taking over the Class of ‘24!

WAND SHOGUN 👊🇧🇷

Edited May 8 by wandshogun09

[Dai]

Yeah, Shogun is an absolute legend. One of my favourates during the Pride days. 

Especially after that Coleman UFC fight, people were being very quick to write him off and say he was past it. I think it's fair to say he was definitely on the decline from the start of his UFC career, which is insane as he was only 28. 

 

He was only 33 too for that OSP KO loss too, and was definitely considered way over the hill at that point. Plenty of Pride and UFC highlights to fondly look back on though. 

[Kfogg1991]

I really believe on the discussion about Michel Pereira he has considerably proven he's been working unbelievably hard on all aspects of his game because the last three or four fights he's not just gone in there and won by knockout, he's pulled out fast submissions aswell as shockingly huge knockouts. He's always been such a entertaining fighter from day one and he's again learned from past mistakes and isn't going in and demolishing his gass tank throwing video game style things. He's bringing out the back flip into full mount moves when it's right and high chance of getting the position intended which really does show he's putting the work in training and the gym. 

Once again no damage taken so I expect he will be fighting again with a quick turnaround and I know it's slightly biased but get that Man on the Manchester ppv he would get a unbelievable reception here and I hope his phenomenal rise and win streak continues.