UFC 306: O’Malley vs Dvalishvili - Sep 14 🇺🇸🇲🇽

[wandshogun09]

This is fast approaching then. The big card at the Sphere everyone’s been banging on about. I don’t even know what the full title of this show is. Seen places calling it ‘UFC 306 Riyadh Season Noche UFC’ and all sorts. Right mouthful. Sod that.

Anyway. Here it is. A Mexican themed event, presented to you by the Saudis, in Las Vegas, headlined by an American against a Georgian. I gave myself a concussion just typing that.

PPV MAIN CARD
Sean O’Malley©️vs Merab Dvalishvili - Bantamweight Title 

Alexa Grasso©️vs Valentina Shevchenko - Flyweight Title

Brian Ortega vs Diego Lopes

Daniel Zellhuber vs Esteban Ribovics

Ronaldo Rodriguez vs Ode Osbourne  

ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS 
Raul Rosas Jr vs Aoriqileng

Irene Aldana vs Norma Dumont

Manuel Torres vs Ignacio Bahamondes 

Edgar Chairez vs Joshua Van  

Yazmin Jauregui vs Ketlen Souza 

 

Only 10 fights here but apparently that’s the complete card now. Seen a lot of negativity about this but I think it’s gonna turn out to be a lot of fun myself. Like with UFC 300, I think Dana bigging this up and acting like it was gonna be the bestest, most fantasticest, most stacked card ever that was gonna blow everyone’s minds before a fight was even announced raised expectations to a level they couldn’t be met. It’s a cracking card though. It’s not loaded up on massive names and ‘stars’ granted, but it’s chock-full of exciting fighters…and Norma Dumont’s arse. Short of a McGregor fight or Alex Pereira against an opponent out of left field, I’m not really sure what massive fights people were expecting? But yeah, Dana’s gonna be hyping this beyond belief. It’s gonna cost the UFC an arm and a leg to run the Sphere so you best believe he’s gonna hype this almost as enthusiastically as he does Power Slap. Almost.

 

 

Sean O’Malley vs Merab Dvalishvili tops the bill on this historic card. Seemed to take ages to get this one over the line for whatever reason but I’m happy it’s on now. Must admit, when it had been rumoured for a while but not officially announced I did start to wonder if O’Malley was stalling to try and swerve Merab and fight someone else. Not saying he’s trembling with fear or that he can’t win but I think it’s obvious that he’d rather have avoided this fight if possible. I’m glad it’s happening. It’s one of those fights where I don’t really know what to expect. It mightn’t be the most exciting fight, or maybe it’ll be a pleasant surprise, who knows? But it’s the right fight, it's the one that needed to happen and Merab is the rightful next in line. It’s been brewing for a while this one, and there’s an extra added element of revenge (for Aljo) on Merab’s side.

The ‘Suga Show’ rolls on. I’ve made no secret that I wasn’t a believer in O’Malley for a long time. Never bought into the hype at all from the time he came off DWCS to him beating mediocre opposition on the way up to the weird loss to Chito Vera to them then rehabbing him by feeding him more easy wins. It all just felt like the matchmakers saw him as a future ‘star’ so they were babying him with relatively soft matchups. When they finally bit the bullet and chucked him in with Petr Yan in late 2022, I was surprised they’d gone from protecting him to suddenly throwing him at Yan. I also expected Yan to wreck him. I was wrong. It was a close one and I’m still not 100% sure who should’ve got the decision, but O’Malley got the nod and he did well enough that I had to admit he was better than I thought. That was the fight that changed my opinion on him big time, I think it was the turning point for most of his doubters. That win earned him number one contender status but the champ at the time, Aljamain Sterling, had a hurdle to clear first.

UFC 288, May 2023 - This is where the wheels were really set in motion for this Suga vs Merab thing. Jacketgate! Champ Sterling had just successfully defended his title against Henry Cejudo. It had been made pretty clear that Sean O’Malley was gonna challenge for the belt next, so it was no surprise when he came into the Octagon post-fight to face off with Sterling. It was obviously the next fight but the funniest thing about it was that Merab kind of stole both of their thunder! He was there supporting his friend and teammate but, in all the chaos of O’Malley and Aljo squaring off and all the security in the cage, Merab jumped on the chance to swipe O’Malley’s jacket and jumped on the cage with it. Something of nothing but it was amusing and the fact it didn’t go down well with O’Malley was an added bonus. They’ve had digs back and forth at each other ever since but they both had other shit going on at that time.

O’Malley got the title shot at UFC 292 in Boston last August…

He knocked out Aljo in the second round to become Bantamweight champion of the world. Pretty sure I was favouring Aljo going into that one. There were some dodgy circumstances going in, Sterling took the fight on a fairly quick turnaround and said the UFC pressured him into that, while O’Malley had 10 months after the Yan fight to heal up, rest up and level up. Even still, the way he put Aljo away was impressive.

Sterling had been quite vocal going into that fight that it was probably gonna be his last fight at Bantamweight, the weight cut to 135lbs was getting too much and he was looking at moving up to Featherweight. The loss to O’Malley here made that choice easier plus it left the door open for his teammate Merab to make a run at the gold.

That Serra-Longo team are known to be tight knit and I think Aljo and Merab are close enough friends that they’d never have fought each other. They both publicly shot down any chance of them fighting each other and you can imagine how happy Dana was about that. Of course, Aljo losing to O’Malley and deciding to make a go at 145 made things a lot easier. Now the path would be clear for Merab.

I felt like Merab should’ve got the first crack at O’Malley’s belt after he won the thing. He was ranked #2 at the time, on a 9 fight winning streak and was coming off back-to-back wins over Jose Aldo and Petr Yan. Nobody deserved the title shot more. But we ended up with O’Malley vs Chito 2. I got it to an extent. It was an easy story to tell, Chito was the only man to hold a win over O’Malley and sounded like an entertaining fight on paper. But I think there was definitely an element of O’Malley just wanting a more favourable stylistic matchup as well, no getting around that. I’m sure getting to avenge that lone defeat on his record played a big part but he really didn’t sound keen on the Merab fight at that time and obviously saw the Chito rematch as the easier option. Turned out to be correct. He schooled Chito in their UFC 299 main event in March. He battered Chito the whole 5 rounds for a clear cut lopsided decision. Unfortunately for him, Merab had just fought at UFC 298 in February and made himself pretty much undeniable as the #1 contender.

He beat Henry Cejudo up and looked good doing it, en route to a convincing points win. I had my doubts going in that it was gonna be very entertaining to watch but I really enjoyed it. All that was missing was a finish but it was far from boring and it just felt like Merab did enough to make the fight a fun and memorable one that it would’ve been difficult to deny him or pass him over again. I was pleasantly surprised after the fight when Dana confirmed Merab would be getting the title shot.

They had their little face-off at the Sphere recently and it looked like it might get a bit heated while they were doing media. I was a little bit surprised at that because the videos they’d been putting out previously were all fairly light hearted piss taking. I guess it’s getting real now there’s a date and venue and they’re coming face to face. Looking forward to this. My initial thinking is Merab dominates him. I’m sticking with a Merab win but fuck knows really. We’ve seen Merab get tagged and hurt in the past and O’Malley certainly has the tools and capability to do the same. And his height and lankiness might be a major factor in this one. I’ve just got a feeling Merab’s pace and pressure and the wrestling might overwhelm O’Malley here but we’ll see. They’ve both only gone 5 rounds once (O’Malley vs Chito 2 and Merab vs Yan) and they both had it all their own way in those fights so I’m not sure how much we can read into that. But again, the pace Merab is able to keep is scary. Even in the Aldo fight, it was at high altitude and that didn’t even slow him down. Despite them both only going 5 rounds once, just the kind of performances Merab’s put in, you can just tell his conditioning is ridiculous. Whereas O’Malley, I don’t know. I’ve got no reason to think his cardio is bad but we haven’t seen him deal with the kind of suffocating, relentless grinding and grappling Merab brings. There’s three ways this can go, in my opinion. 1) O’Malley catches him early and we don’t really find out anything new. 2) Merab puts O’Malley’s grappling and conditioning to the test and O’Malley passes the test and still finds a way to win. Or 3) Merab kind of ragdolls him and drowns him with his non-stop pressure. I’m leaning towards the third scenario but it’s a very intriguing fight.

 

Alexa Grasso vs Valentina Shevchenko 3 then. Unless I’m overlooking something, this is the first ever trilogy in women’s MMA. And it’s the third straight time these two are fighting each other. It’s becoming the Figgy vs Moreno of womens Flyweight but whatever. I don’t really mind it given how close their last fight was. They’ve been tied up coaching the latest season of The Ultimate Fighter for the last few months and, by the time this fight happens, it’ll have been a year almost to the day since both last fought. Apparently, Shevchenko injured her hand in their last fight anyway and had to have surgery, so it’s all worked out in the end.

It’s been nice seeing Alexa Grasso as champion. I never saw any of her Invicta fights but she signed with the UFC in 2016 and it didn’t take long for me to become a bit of a fan. She came in as a Strawweight and didn’t get off to the best start but I remember her having a couple of really fun fights with Randa Markos and Karolina Kowalkiewicz back then. She did have losses to Felice Herrig, Tatiana Suarez and Carla Esparza though, taking her Strawweight run in the UFC to 3-3. Even then though, the Esparza fight was fantastic. And how many times have we been able to say that? Grasso dragged Esparza to her only FOTN and the best fight of her career by far. I remember the decision being debatable as well, think I had it a draw. Grasso moved up to Flyweight in 2020 and hasn’t looked back since. She’s gone 5-0-1 since and she’s now the Queen of the 125 division. She beat Ji Yeon Kim, Maycee Barber, Joanne Wood and Viviane Araujo on the way up the ranks. Then the opportunity came…

Valentina Shevchenko had been a dominant champion for the short time the Flyweight division had been a thing. She beat Joanna Jedrzejczyk to win the vacant title in late 2018 and then went on to successfully defend the belt 7 times. OK, the competition wasn’t the best but she could only beat who was there at the time. And if you look at Shevchenko’s career as a whole - wins over Holm, Pena, Joanna, Andrade - she had a decent run. She also went the distance with Amanda Nunes twice and ran her close the second time. But, and it’s definitely benefit of hindsight stuff, looking at her record on paper it doesn’t look quite as good as I remembered it. That title run saw her having to defend against the likes of Jessica Eye, Liz Carmouche, Katlyn Chookagian, Jennifer Maia and Lauren Murphy. Not the best. The signs that Shevchenko’s reign might be coming to an end were there in her fight with Taila Santos in June 2022. Shev got the decision that night but it was a bit controversial. I haven’t watched it back myself but I do remember thinking you could’ve made a strong case for Santos winning. And there was one mistake Shev kept making in that fight. She’s always had a tendency to give up her back, either via throwing (sometimes spamming) spinning kicks on the feet or trying those silly head and arm throws and leaving her back exposed. She got away with it for the longest time but Santos was the first to really take advantage of it and gave her problems.

Team Grasso were obviously taking notes…

Grasso’s title shot came in March 2023 on the undercard of Jones vs Gane at UFC 285. And she did it. She knocked Shevchenko off the throne. A lovely moment but one I really never expected to happen. Like I said, I’d become a fan of Grasso but I just didn’t think she’d be the one to end the reign of Shevchenko. And it wasn’t like it was some fluke win. The fight lasted 4 rounds and it was competitive but Grasso was having success throughout. Then she capitalised on Shev’s reckless spinning shit and pounced on the choke for the finish. New champ.

I was happy with the result. I don’t strongly dislike Shevchenko or anything but I had soured on her a bit after that dodgy Santos decision. Obviously the judging isn’t her fault but the way she carried on after like she’d won comfortably and shooting down the idea of giving Santos a rematch, she didn’t come off great. She was also quite dismissive of some of the other contenders coming up (Blanchfield, Fiorot etc) and having little digs at them. And not digs like she wanted to fight them for daring to wanna challenge her. That’s fine and I like a bit of that. Whenever she’d talk about these women coming up the ranks, there was a condescending tone to it all like they weren’t even worthy of fighting her. I said it before but I really think she got a bit too comfortable with all those tick-over, kind of easy title defences and it seemed like she was almost in cruise control and quite content to coast out the rest of her career. I don’t think she feared anyone but I do get the feeling that she saw them as a bit of a threat and it put her nose out of joint a bit.

They did the immediate rematch in September on the last Mexican Independence Day card. I think from the second the first fight finished, everyone knew they were gonna run it back straight away. Fair enough given Shevchenko’s dominance as champion. I remember Shev was a bit arsey in the build up, calling Grasso “a chance fighter” and basically chalking up the loss in the first fight to her making one mistake. I was kind of expecting Shevchenko to win the rematch. Despite how the first fight ended, Shev did have quite a lot of success with the takedowns. I was thinking she’d come in with a much more tunnel vision, wrestling heavy approach and take a points win to even the score at 1-1. Didn’t quite play out like that though.

A draw. A motherfucking, cocksucking, sodding draw. I think I said it at the time and I stand by it - there should be no such thing as a draw in title fights. Do a sixth ‘sudden death’ round or something. Play rock, paper, scissors for all I care. Do something. A title fight should always have a winner. A draw just feels like a great big fat waste of everyone’s time. I think I had Grasso winning 3-2 but it was razor close. Shevchenko was fuming post-fight and flat out said she thought the judges felt “pressured to score for the Mexican fighter on Mexican Independence Day” or something. It came off bitter and sour grapes but the scorecards were all over the shop with one judge scoring the 5th round a 10-8 to Grasso, which I remember thinking was bollocks. Shev came off as a bit of a twat but it’s hard to blame her for thinking there was something dodgy going on with the judging when you see a card like that. Shevchenko, of course, thinks she won.

“It’s crazy how that decision was made. I rewatched the fight again and again, I won that fight. I know that. I also know I can’t change that. It’s unfair but it’s not going to stop me from moving forward.” - Valentina Shevchenko

Obviously with it being a draw, there was no choice but to do a third fight. The initial talk was that they might do it on the Mexico City card in February but that came and went. Shevchenko’s hand wasn’t gonna be healed in time anyway. Then it was announced that these two would be coaching TUF…

Yeah, like we’ve discussed elsewhere, TUF is dead these days. As I type this they’re 8 or 9 episodes into this season and I can honestly say I haven’t watched a single second of it. Even more telling is that we’re this far into the season and I’ve literally seen nothing of it on social media. Not one clip or gif or tweet, fuck all. I don’t think anyone’s watching TUF these days. We all know that, barring a couple of exceptions, generally the TUF coaches will fight after the show wraps up. But even going back months, the rumour was always that Grasso vs Shevchenko 3 would most likely go down on this big Sphere show people were talking about. And Shevchenko didn’t seem too thrilled with fighting Grasso on another Mexican Independence Day card.

“We fought on Mexican Independence Day before. I think it’s more fair if one for her, one for me. Now we have to find something with Kyrgyzstan. So it has to be one for her, one for me, so that this is a fair game.” - Valentina Shevchenko

I don’t think we’re getting a Kyrgyzstan themed event anytime soon though. Grasso’s been smart with this. She’s been dead set on fighting on this Sphere card. When Shevchenko started making noises about not wanting to fight on another Mexican themed card, Grasso politely put it out there that Shev could basically take it or leave it.

 

She pretty much said that, while she wanted the third fight with Shevchenko, if Shev wasn’t gonna do it then Manon Fiorot could step up and get her shot. Funnily enough, Shev hasn’t been complaining as much since then 🤣 Nice bit of gameswomanship from Grasso there. As soon as Shevchenko realised there were other options for Grasso, she said ‘OK, the Sphere it is then.’

“I’ve seen some memos about how the fight could look inside that place. It looks amazing. I’ve been working so long for this opportunity, for this championship. I truly worked so, so hard from the start of my career until now. Being a champion is way different. Now every time I wake up, I think to myself, I have to be better than yesterday.”

“I would love to fight with Valentina. She has done so much for the sport. Me too, as the first Mexican female champion. We are both doing a lot of big things. She’s someone that I’ve been looking at for a long time. She’s a big inspiration for women. We have a lot of history and I’m truly inspired to be competing with someone at this high, high level. We both didn’t like the draw, honestly. Any of us don’t like to draw. This third fight could be the point to see who’s the best one.” - Alexa Grasso

Like I said, I’ve watched nothing of TUF but I get the impression from bits and pieces I’ve seen and read that Grasso and Shevchenko have grown to quite like each other.

They had a friendly face-off when the fight was made official and obviously they’d have had to be around each other a lot during the filming of TUF. That usually leads to tension and bad feelings but it seems to have had the opposite effect with these two.

“I got to know Alexa. I don’t have any bad feelings towards her. She respects martial arts, she’s doing her job, I’m doing mine. We both want to win. She’s doing what she’s doing and definitely the result, the first fight we had - whatever. The result was the result. The second fight was a draw but, in my opinion, I know she was gifted the decision. But I don’t have anything against her. She has the passion for martial arts, we were sharing the same things in common with our view for martial arts. I think our relationship now is kind of good.” - Valentina Shevchenko

Even with the little comment again about Grasso being “gifted the decision” last time (which she wasn’t, it was a draw), that’s about as nice and friendly as you’re getting out of Shevchenko. It doesn’t make for the most exciting build up but I think it’s clear that Grasso has earned Val’s respect.

How does this one go then? I’m not sure what to expect. I’ll have to watch the first two fights back before this one to refresh my memory but my gut feeling is that it’s just Grasso’s time now. Never thought I’d be saying that 2 years ago. As likeable and entertaining a fighter as she was, I never saw her on that level. But she’s definitely levelled up over the course of those 9 and a bit rounds sharing the Octagon with Shevchenko. And let’s face it, Shev’s no spring chicken now. She’s 36 years old and between MMA, Kickboxing and Boxing she’s had 89 pro fights starting in 2003. So 21 years in the game. And depending on how accurate her Wikipedia page is, she started training in Taekwondo at just 5 years old and was already having Kickboxing fights by the time she was 12. It’s been a lifetime in martial arts for her and she’s always seemed absolutely in love with it. But the body can only take so much and I can’t help thinking her best days as a fighter are way behind her now after such a long career in combat sports. Grasso’s a few years younger, a lot fresher and has way less miles on the clock. She’s also had the benefit of studying Shevchenko for years while working her way up the ranks. All that said, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Shevchenko gets a win back here. She was giving Grasso all kinds of problems with the takedowns in the first fight and the rematch was as close as it gets. While I’m saying she’s probably past her physical prime, I wouldn’t say she’s shot or anything. Her and Grasso have been neck and neck and it’s been little errors at crucial moments that have cost Shevchenko. I’m favouring Grasso slightly but don’t be shocked if Shev wins. And then they’re 1-1-1 and you know what that means…Grasso vs Shevchenko 4 in 2025.

 

Brian Ortega vs Diego Lopes is ***WAND’S ONE TO WATCH*** and hopefully we actually get to watch it this time. We should’ve seen this already. They were all set to fight at UFC 303 in June and I was buzzing for it. It got added to the card very late, think it was just 2 weeks out or something, because the McGregor vs Chandler main event fell apart and the card had to basically be completely rebuilt. Far from ideal circumstances but I couldn’t wait to see the fight. All went tits up though. It was originally supposed to be at Featherweight, then the day before the weigh in it got changed to Lightweight because Ortega was struggling with the weight cut. Then on the very day of the event, while the show was going on, Ortega withdrew with an illness and the fight was off.

You prick, Bri! The way that whole thing played out was almost typical Brian Ortega in a way. He’s been such a frustrating fighter to follow at times. Always entertaining to watch once he’s in the cage but there’s been so many layoffs and setbacks over the years that his career has been very stop/start and disjointed. He’s 33 now, he’s not ancient and there’s still some time. But I don’t see him ever getting over that last hurdle. He’s not a million miles away. Even in his title fight against Volkanovski a few years back, he had that moment when he caught Volk in a nasty mounted guillotine choke. It was the most danger we’d seen Volk in at that time but, ultimately, Ortega took bad beatings in both his UFC title shots against Volk and Max Holloway. In fairness to Ortega though, he can never be accused of being a quitter or a front runner. He’s came back from some bad losses, injuries and layoffs. And even his last fight in February, he had to fight through some adversity but he submitted Yair Rodriguez in their fun rematch in Mexico City. He’s tough as fuck and, while he’s been soundly beaten at the very top level, you don’t just walk through Ortega or get him out of there easily. Which is why I’m very interested to see how this one goes…

Because Diego Lopes has started making a habit of just blitzing through the opposition. Lopes is easily one of my favourite additions to the UFC roster over the last year or so. Just a tornado of bad hair, shite tattoos and rapid fire punches. He’s class. He’s coming into this fight with a record of 25-6, and 22 of his wins didn’t require the judges. Made his UFC debut last May and, right from the off, he made a fan out of me. He stepped in on short notice against undefeated Russian wrestler Movsar Evloev, a man not known for having exciting fights. Lopes ended up losing on points that night but he gave Evloev such a great fight that his stock only raised in defeat. Since then he’s gone 4-0 with 3 of those wins ending in the first round. He subbed Gavin Tucker, knocked out Pat Sabatini and crushed Sodiq Yusuff in about 90 seconds at UFC 300. That was meant to be a step up and his toughest test since the loss to Evloev. I remember thinking Sodiq might be a step too far for Lopes but he wrecked him quick. Then we came to UFC 303 in late June.

What we were supposed to get vs what we actually got…

Dan Ige stepped in on like four hours notice! One of the maddest sets of circumstances around a fight week that I can remember in all my years watching this shit. Like I said, Ortega pissing about with the weight all week was bad enough. To then pull out just a few hours before the fight? Crazy. They’d weighed in, done the face-off and everything at that point. It was on, until it wasn’t. I watched an interview with Ortega and it sounded like he was genuinely really rough with whatever the sickness was. As crap as it was that he pulled out, I’m glad he didn’t try to fight like that. Sounded like he just underestimated how hard the cut was gonna be on short notice. Usually when a fight falls out that late in the day, it’s obviously too late to sort a replacement and both guys end up scratched from the card. But Ige was there and offered to jump in. Madness. It was a good fight from what I remember but neither guy’s best performance. Which is completely understandable given the fucked up circumstances. Lopes won on points and Dana was practically blowing them both after the fight, saying they could basically call their own shot next time and promising both a spot on this Sphere card. Well Lopes got his wish. Ige has found himself booked against Lerone Murphy on the October PPV in Abu Dhabi somehow.

It’s happening then. For now anyway. How do you see this one going? I’m chuffed it’s back on. I was absolutely gutted when it got binned the first time, it was the fight I was most looking forward to at 303 and to go through the buzz of the weigh in and seeing them face-off, to get to within a few hours of the fight starting, only to have it snatched away was fucking shite. Hopefully none of that here. Unlike 303, they’ve both got plenty of time to prepare for this one and Ortega’s got time to get the weight cut right. It does also mean he’s got more time to injure himself though as well. It’s a coin flip with him. You know what he’s like. Hopefully he makes it through camp though because, if they can actually get these two in the Octagon, you just know it’s gonna be an incredible fight. Their styles don’t really allow for anything else. At this point I’m thinking Lopes wins but you never know with Ortega and you can never count him out of a fight. I honestly thought Yair was gonna spank him in February, and he was early on, then Ortega rose from the dead and strangled him. Can’t wait for this.

 

Daniel Zellhuber vs Esteban Ribovics is a fight that’s probably not gonna get much attention going into this show. There’s very little fanfare around both and neither are big names. If you’ve watched them fight though, you’ll be excited for this one. Seriously, this is one of my favourite fights on the card and I won’t be surprised one bit if these two end up stealing the show.

Zellhuber’s Mexican, 25 years old and has a record of 15-1 with 10 of his wins coming inside the distance. The one loss was a decision in his UFC debut against Trey Ogden. Watching him fight, I don’t know how he managed to lose to a ham and egger like Ogden. Maybe a touch of the old ‘Octagon debut nerves’ were a factor. He’s gone 3-0 since then with wins over Lando Vannata, Christos Giagos and Francisco Prado. He subbed Giagos and picked up a POTN bonus and him and Prado got FOTN on the Mexico City card back in February. I remember that being a belter actually. Zellhuber looks good. Had that blip in his debut but he’s still young and he seems to be improving with each fight he’s had since in the UFC. Ribovics is no joke though. He’s Argentinian, 28 years old and 13-1 with 12 finishes.

There’s Ribovics wiping out Terrance McKinney in just 37 seconds in his last fight in May. Brutal. Nothing against McKinney but I was happy to see Ribovics get a big finish like that. Like Zellhuber, Ribovics only loss also came by decision in his UFC debut. He came up short on the judges scorecards against Loik Radzhabov in March last year. It was a really entertaining fight though and I instantly took a liking to Ribovics. He’s since gone 2-0. He beat Kamuela Kirk on points last July, then the headkick KO over McKinney in May this year. Really like the matchmaking here. Two young guys on the rise, both only have one loss but both have bounced back in style, both exciting to watch. Should be a fun one.

 

Ronaldo Rodriguez vs Ode Osbourne is set to kick off the main card for some reason. It’s not a bad fight but it definitely looks a bit out of place opening up a PPV. Oh well, should be entertaining to watch. Rodriguez is Mexican, 25 years old and he’s 16-2 with 12 finishes. He’s coming fresh off a successful UFC debut on the Mexico card in February, where he submitted Denys Bondar in the second round. He was entertaining from what I recall, it was a solid debut. He’s up against Osbourne here who’s become a bit of a journeyman and a guy they feed to prospects and up and comers. He’s Jamaican, 32 years old and has a record of 12-7-0-1. He’s actually not a bad fighter. He managed a split decision win over Charles Johnson last year and I vaguely recall him having success against Manel Kape before Kape took him out with a flying knee. He’s never gonna amount to much but he’s not bad to watch. Make no mistake though, he’s being brought in to lose here. Rodriguez looks like more of a submission guy and Osbourne’s been subbed in his last two fights. Feels like this is purely designed to start the PPV off with a Mexican win but we’ll see how it goes. 

 

Raul Rosas Jr vs Aoriqileng is a really fun fight on paper. Rosas had that blip last year with the loss to Christian Rodriguez but I honestly think that’ll be a positive in the long run. He’s still only 19, for fuck’s sake. A points loss at that stage of his career is just experience gained and a learning curve for him. And he’s responded about as well as you could’ve hoped with a quick knockout over Terrence Mitchell and a submission over Ricky Turcios.

Can’t wait to see and hear this on the humongous screens at the Sphere 🤣 He’s obviously gotta get past Aoriqileng first though. I’m never sure whether it’s Aoriqileng or Aori Qileng, I’ve seen it listed both ways. Regardless, he’s a tough customer. He’s Mongolian, 31 years old and has a record of 25-10-0-1. Not a huge finisher, he’s only stopped 9 opponents in his 36 pro fights. But he’s a scrapper and he’s durable. He’s only been finished himself 3 times and 2 of them were early in his career. If you want an idea of the kind of fighter he is, I’d recommend giving his war with Jeff Molina from UFC 261 a watch. If you never saw it, trust me, you won’t regret it. So yeah, Aoriqileng is definitely a beatable opponent for Rosas but it’s a good fight to put Rosas in at this point, against an experienced and aggressive fighter who doesn’t go away easily.

 

Irene Aldana vs Norma Dumont is a weird one. Good chance this is gonna be the worst fight on the card but we’ll see if Aldana can drag something watchable out of it. To be fair, Aldana’s always been one of the only fighters in the women’s Bantamweight division who actually comes to scrap. Whether it’s just the Mexican in her or what, she’s had a few fights I’ve really enjoyed. Her UFC debut against Leslie Smith way back in 2016 was a wild slobberknocker, she had that peach of a left hook KO against Ketlen Vieira, that mad upkick to the body finish against Macy Chiasson, then in her last fight in December…

She dragged Karol Rosa to the best fight she’ll probably ever have in her life. On paper, UFC 296 was one of the most stacked cards of 2023, you’d never have predicted that these two would steal the show. Aldana lost a decision that night but they rightly got the FOTN bonus. She’s 36 years old now though. Not sure how long she wants to keep doing this. She’s never gonna be a UFC champion but, I’ll say this, whenever she does finally retire the division is gonna be even poorer. Most of 135 is complete arse. And speaking of arse…Dumont brings somewhat of a ‘Sphere’ of her own. She brings spherical buttocks and little else, if we’re being honest. And bless her for it. But man, she’s just no fun to watch once that cage door closes. She’s far from the worst in that wasteland of a division. She’s been winning fights, 4-0 in her last 4, ranked #10 currently and Aldana’s ranked #4 so this is a good opportunity for her. But her fights are pretty much always one of the most boring on any card she appears on. Genuinely the only intrigue for me here is to see if Aldana can get a fight out of Dumont that doesn’t send me to sleep.

 

Manuel Torres vs Ignacio Bahamondes is another fight that could well be a bit of a darkhorse show stealer. Mexico’s Torres is 29 years old with a record of 15-2 and 14 finishes. He comes into this one on a 6 fight winning streak with all 6 wins ending inside the first round. The one that jumps out to me is that standing elbow KO he took Nikolas Motta out with last year. He’s since followed that up with a quick submission over Chris Duncan on the Mexico card in Feb. Bahamondes is my guy though. He’s from Chile, 27 years old and has a 15-5 record with 11 finishes. We last saw him in April and…

He stopped Christos Giagos with a crushing headkick in the first round. Love watching Bahamondes. I don’t necessarily expect him to ever become a contender or champion or anything like that but he’s always a treat to watch. Right from his UFC debut back in 2021, he lost a split decision to John Makdessi but it was a tremendous scrap and I instantly became a fan. He had that awesome spinning kick KO against Roosevelt Roberts as well, which is up there with Edson Barboza’s against Terry Etim for me just for the beauty of the kick itself. Big fan. I was actually hoping/half expecting they’d do Bahamondes vs Zellhuber on this card and I still kind of wish they went that route but whatever. This should be a quality all-action type fight.

 

Edgar Chairez vs Joshua Van is a late switch up and a fantastic one. Chairez had originally been scheduled to face Kevin Borjas on this card but Borjas dropped out a couple of weeks out from the show. I was already looking forward to that fight but Van stepping in is even better. Big improvement on what was already sounding like a very solid fight. Chairez is 28 years old, 11-5-0-1 with all his wins coming inside the distance. He’s coming into this one off that weird 2 fight series against Daniel Lacerda which he finally put to bed with an easy submission in February. Before that he’d lost his UFC debut against Tatsuro Taira but that loss is ageing pretty well and he did take Taira the distance and had some success in the striking. He took that fight on short notice as well. Van’s taking a risk jumping in here but he seems to be one of those guys who’s always training, in shape and always ready to step in on late notice. It backfired last time, he got knocked out by Charles Johnson in July in another fight that came together pretty much last minute. But he’s still only 22 years old and he’d shown real skills in his wins before that. He’s 10-2 now with 8 finishes and has an entertaining fighting style that should make for some fireworks against Chairez here. Tremendous matchup and an improvement on the original in my opinion.

 

Yazmin Jauregui vs Ketlen Souza is kicking off the night and could be a good little scrap. I really like Jauregui. One of the best prospects in the Strawweight division and I stand by that despite her suffering that shock 20 second knockout loss last year at the hands of Denise Gomes. She was undefeated before that and she’s still only 25 years old. She’s got time to rebuild. She did bounce back with a points win over Sam Hughes in February. It wasn’t her best performance but I thought she looked good, she got 3 rounds in and she won a clear cut decision. I think coming off that kind of loss, it was exactly what she needed. Still think there’s a lot of potential there but we’ll see. She definitely has a tendency to get a bit reckless at times on the feet. Even before the loss to Gomes you could see that. It’s partly what made her fights exciting but she’ll definitely need to tighten up her defence going forward. Souza’s 28 years old with a 14-4 record. She had an absolute nightmare UFC debut last year where she got kneebarred in a round by Karine Silva and you could actually see her whole kneecap shift on the replays. Horrible stuff. She was out a while after that, understandably, but she returned in April with a decision win over Marnic Mann which I think I skipped. Sensible matchmaking for Jauregui and a winnable fight but we’ll see. I hope she can keep going from strength to strength anyway. She could be a great boost to the Strawweight title picture in the future if she can keep winning.

 

 

 

See you at the Sphere…

Edited Saturday at 06:26 AM by wandshogun09

[Panhead]

I've been recording TUF but I'm a few episodes behind. Not sure I'd be tuning in if Alexa Grasso wasn't on it though ? 

[wandshogun09]

@Panhead every time it’s a Grasso card…

[Panhead]

.

 

She worked the jab all the way into my heart ?

[Egg Shen]

18 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

I think Dana bigging this up and acting like it was gonna be the bestest, most fantasticest, most stacked card ever that was gonna blow everyone’s minds

To be fair to pebble head, did he ever say that? I always thought he was promoting the actual Sphere and what they were gonna do with it as being the thing that was going to set this thing apart? I might be wrong.

Also, is there a reason Brandon Moreno isn't on this card? 

[wandshogun09]

6 hours ago, Egg Shen said:

To be fair to pebble head, did he ever say that? I always thought he was promoting the actual Sphere and what they were gonna do with it as being the thing that was going to set this thing apart? I might be wrong.

He’s definitely been talking more about the Sphere itself yeah but you know most MMA fans don’t read articles past the headline. And shit like this has been everywhere…

From that kind of talk, you can see why expectations would be raised. Plus, surely a mega stacked card goes hand in hand with a venue like this? For the money they’re forking out to put this event on, you’re not gonna put something like Pennington vs Pena on top, you’re gonna put fights on that you expect to sell a lot of PPVs to at least get a decent return on that investment. 

I’ve got no problem with the card myself, as I said in the opening post. But when you’re saying a card is not just gonna be a great fight card but, “the greatest sporting event of all time”, whatever you announce for the card isn’t gonna be good enough for a section of the fanbase. Even knowing that, I was still a bit surprised how negative some of the reaction was when the card was announced. The only options that might’ve felt bigger would be Topuria vs Holloway, maybe a Pereira fight or McGregor’s return. Where else were these monster fights that fans seemed to be expecting gonna come from?

6 hours ago, Egg Shen said:

Also, is there a reason Brandon Moreno isn't on this card? 

I thought that when I was doing the opening post. I looked it up and apparently Henry Cejudo called out Moreno for this card earlier in the year but Moreno decided to take a break from MMA for a bit after those back-to-back losses to Pantoja and Royval. Probably for the best. Just looking at his last few years, out of his last 7 fights he’s gone 5 rounds 4 times, gone a total of 15+ rounds against Figgy and had that gruelling FOTY war with Pantoja last year. He’s said he’s definitely coming back but he just needed to “give his mind and body a rest”. I think it’s a good move. Flyweight has been rematch city forever at the top end of the division but just Moreno being out of the picture for 6 months or whatever has given a few other Flyweights a chance to break through. In his short absence we’ve already Steve Erceg and Tatsuro Taira rise up the ranks. You’ve also got Kai Asakura coming in any day now and, who knows, maybe there’s still a chance they come to terms to bring Muhammad Mokaev back? That’s 4 completely fresh fights for Moreno right there. 

Edited August 5 by wandshogun09

[wandshogun09]

Card improvement alert! Kevin Borjas out, Joshua Van in.