UFC Vegas: Cannonier vs Borralho - Aug 24 ??

[wandshogun09]

This is days away then. Back to the Apex we go…

ESPN MAIN CARD
Jared Cannonier vs Caio Borralho 

Angela Hill vs Tabatha Ricci 

Ryan Loder vs Robert Valentin Frey - TUF Middleweight Final

Kaan Ofli vs Mairon Santos - TUF Featherweight Final

Neil Magny vs Michael Morales 

Edmen Shahbazyan vs Gerald Meerschaert 

ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS
Dennis Buzukja vs Francis Marshall

Jose Medina vs Zach Reese

Viacheslav Borshchev vs James Llontop 

Josiane Nunes vs Jacqueline Cavalcanti 

Wang Cong vs Victoria Leonardo 

 

As you can see there, this is also serving as the TUF Finale card. If anyone gives a single shite. Has anyone watched a second of this season? As I type this, I’ve seen who 3 of the 4 finalists are but I’ll leave those fights listed as ‘TBA vs TBA’ until next weekend, just incase anyone is watching this TUF and avoiding spoilers. Anyway, yeah…it’s an Apex card. Self explanatory really. This isn’t as bad as a lot of them though, in my opinion.

 

 

Jared Cannonier vs Caio Borralho, by Middleweight Apex main event standards, isn’t so bad. We’ve had a lot worse at the Apex and a lot worse Middleweight headliners. I’m not buzzing for it or anything but it’s alright for a Fight Night. Feel bad for Cannonier though. Seems like he’s destined to spend the majority of what’s left of his career fighting at the Apex. They let him out last time to headline that Louisville card, he lost, now he’s back in the shed. He’s still ranked #5 somehow, Borralho’s sitting at #12 at the minute. So this is a big opportunity for the Brazilian. A win here would be his ticket into the Top 5.

You wouldn’t know it to look at his physique but Cannonier’s getting up there in age now. He’s 40 years old, coming off a loss and has already had a crack at the belt and came up short. As down as I am on the 185 division these days, I don’t mind Cannonier to be fair. He’s not a favourite of mine but he’s alright. He’s racked up some solid wins over the likes of Vettori, Strickland, Brunson, Gastelum and Hermansson. Even has a win over Anderson Silva. OK, it was a badly faded Anderson at the end of his run but it’s still a nice name to have on the record. But yeah, he’s faltered a couple of times when he’s had big chances against Adesanya and Whittaker. And in his last fight in June, he came back off a year layoff and got stopped by Nassourdine Imavov. Not ideal. But from what I recall the stoppage was a bit premature and Cannonier was ahead on the cards at the time the ref waved it off. Given the layoff and the circumstances of the way the fight ended, I don’t think that loss is as bad as it looks on paper. I think this fight should give us a better idea of what Cannonier’s got left now he’s shaken the cobwebs off from the year out. The matchmakers haven’t exactly done him any favours though…

Caio Borralho is the much younger and fresher man at 31 years old. He’s probably in his absolute physical prime right now. He’s 16-1-0-1 with 9 of his wins coming inside the distance. He got a quick win on DWCS in late 2021 and was making his UFC debut by April 2022. It wasn’t the best of starts though. In his debut he won via ‘technical decision’ after hitting his opponent with an illegal knee that he couldn’t continue after. He then won a couple of forgettable decisions over Armen Petrosyan and Makhmud Muradov, subbed grapplephobe Michal Oleksiejczuk and won another lacklustre decision against Abus Magomedov. I’ve found him quite frustrating to watch because he seems to have all the physical attributes and many of the skills required to be shining a lot more than he does. But for whatever reason, he’s been routinely putting in these underwhelming performances. He’s not an easy man to beat, he hasn’t lost since his second pro fight all the way back in 2015. But he hasn’t been much fun to watch, up until his last fight anyway.

He chinned Paul Craig at UFC 301 in Brazil in May. Finally, he had his standout moment in the UFC and in front of a home crowd. And look what’s happened, he’s immediately been put in a main event. Amazing what one big finish can do. It was easily the best Borralho’s looked so far in the UFC but I’m not sure how much of it was that and how much of it was just Craig looking shite. I think we all like Craig but we can also probably agree that he’s massively inconsistent and his striking is arse. He basically froze in front of Borralho at times, didn’t move his head, was a sitting duck and Borralho took full advantage. Criticisms of Craig aside though, this might’ve been the confidence booster Borralho needed to start pulling the trigger more in fights. He’s in a position now coming off that KO win where he could move into the title mix quite quickly if he can keep the ball rolling and build on his momentum.

Not sure how this goes. Feels like it’s Borralho’s time and I’m sure the matchmakers were looking at it that way when they booked this one. Out with the old, in with the new. We’ll see. You never know at Middleweight and Cannonier can be a bit hot and cold. It’s definitely the toughest test of Borralho’s career to date. Cannonier’s been in with almost all the top 185ers of the last decade and he’s headlined and been 5 rounds multiple times. Borralho’s never gone longer than 3 rounds. Not expecting a barnburner but I am interested to see how it plays out. Maybe Borralho’s one of those fighters who will up his game as he moves up in levels, maybe it’s all just gonna click for him in one of these fights. Or maybe Cannonier derails him.

 

Angela Hill vs Tabatha Ricci isn’t setting my world alight. Maybe it’ll be a pleasant surprise but my expectations aren’t high, to be honest. I’ve basically given up trying to predict Hill’s fights at this point. She’s 39 years old with a 17-13 record and I’ve been talking about her retiring for what feels like ages now. But it seems like nearly every time I write her off, she wins a fight I gave her no chance in and sticks around. She’s coming off a submission win over Luana Pinheiro in May and she beat Denise Gomes on points before that. She’s now won 4 of her last 5 and, in fairness, she’s had a few decisions go against her over the years that might’ve been harsh. Memory’s hazy now but I’m sure I had her winning the Lemos, Waterson and Gadelha fights and the judges went against her in all three fights. It’s all delaying the inevitable at this stage though. She’s gotta be near the end and she’s never gonna beat the top few Strawweights. Fair play to her for avoiding the axe as long as she has though. Ricci’s a decade younger at 29 and has a record of 10-2. She’s not a terrible fighter but she hasn’t been that impressive in her wins in the UFC and she’s coming off what I remember being a bit of an iffy decision win over Tecia Pennington in May. And considering Tecia was coming off 2 years out to have a baby, Ricci barely squeaking a split decision wasn’t a great look. She’ll probably beat Hill but, yeah, fuck counting Hill out at this point.

 

Neil Magny vs Michael Morales is kind of similar to the main event for me. It’s the experienced, cagey veteran against the younger guy on the rise who hasn’t really hit his stride and wowed anyone yet. Broken record on Magny but he really has become the ultimate litmus test in the Welterweight division, hasn’t he? People sometimes mistake the term ‘gatekeeper’ as a slight but I don’t think it is. Magny’s never gonna be champ, at 37 years old I think even he knows that deep down. But he’s the guy you have to get through to get there and he’s had some great wins along the way in his career. I think many forget he’s beat Robbie Lawler, Carlos Condit, Johny Hendricks, Hector Lombard etc. And he’s been a hurdle a few rising contenders have fallen at as well. He derailed another one in his last fight in January, submitting Canadian prospect Mike Malott, in Canada! Magny’s no future champ but he’s also no pushover. You have to have something about you to beat him. Now it’s Ecuador’s Morales turn to take the ‘Magny Test’…

He’s just turned 25 and he’s undefeated at 16-0 with 12 not making it to the judges scorecards. It sounds way harsh criticising him at all because he’s still young and developing. I’ve got no doubt there’s better to come from him. But based on what we’ve seen in the UFC so far, there’s still a way to go. I remember when he debuted and knocked out Trevin Giles, I saw loads of people getting carried away and declaring him the next big thing, a future breakout star, more impressive than Khamzat etc. But I thought it was way too soon for that talk. Who knows, maybe he will end up going further than Khamzat when it’s all said and done. But fighters develop at different rates and I think Morales might be a slow burn. He’s coming off a couple of decision wins over Max Griffin and Jake Matthews now and I don’t remember either fight being particularly good. No big deal, wins are wins and it’s all valuable experience and cage time for Morales. But I’m not convinced just yet. Not sure how far he can go. Like Borralho, it feels like he’s got the physical tools but something hasn’t clicked yet. Maybe it never will but Morales has a bit more time at 25 years old. Feels like this Magny fight could tell us a lot.

 

Edmen Shahbazyan vs Gerald Meerschaert is ***WAND’S ONE TO WATCH*** this time. Always gotta highlight our Gez’s fights and I think this is a good one. Shahbazyan’s had a right weird up and down UFC stint but he’s still only 26 years old and there’s time to possibly turn things around and make a proper run of it. Looking back, I think when he broke in, the association with Ronda Rousey and how young he was meant he was looked at as this mega hot, can’t miss prospect and got pushed a bit quicker than he probably should’ve been. And to be fair, he was backing it up in the cage early on. He went 11-0 initially with 10 first round finishes. All came to a crashing halt though in 2020, when he lost 3 fights on the bounce against Brunson, Hermansson and Imavov. He’s struggled to get back on track ever since and hasn’t been very active in the last few years but he’s coming into this fight off a first round TKO win over AJ Dobson in March. As for Meerschaert…

He also fought in March and subbed Bryan Barberena in the second round. I like Barberena but it was really satisfying to see Meerschaert get that finish. He’d had a shite 2023 and he needed that win. Also pretty cool that, with that sub, he tied with Anderson Silva for ‘Most Finishes In Middleweight History’, which is a cool little stat. I’d love to see him break that record here but I’m really not sure how this one goes. You never know with Shahbazyan. For all his faults, he’s dangerous. And we’ve seen Meerschaert get slumped early in the past. Then again, the type of opponents who have seemed to be Shahbazyan’s kryptonite were mostly strong grapplers in that similar kind of mould as Meerschaert. Feels like anything could happen in this one. Could see it being a round of chaos or a gruelling dogfight or a mad comeback form either guy. Nothing against Shahbazyan but needless to say I’m fully rooting for Meerschaert here.

 

Dennis Buzukja vs Francis Marshall is a very late switch up. Buzukja was supposed to fight Danny Silva here but Silva withdrew injured just a few days out. Marshall’s not a bad replacement though, to be fair. He’s 25 years old with a 7-2 record but he’s coming off a couple of losses here so this is a bit of a gamble. I remember him looking good in his debut, stopping Marcelo Rojo, but it’s gone wonky since. He’s gone from being undefeated to losing back-to-back fights. It’s a rough game. We last saw him getting mauled and finished in a round by Isaac Dulgarian and that was August 2023. So over a year out and then jumping in on short notice here? Not sure it’s a good idea but he must fancy the job. Buzukja’s a Longo-Weidman fighter, 26 years old with a 12-4 record. He lost a decision to Sean Woodson in his debut then got stopped in less than a minute by Jamall Emmers in his next fight. He finally got that first elusive UFC win in March, TKOing Connor Matthews on the Atlantic City card.

 

Jose Medina vs Zach Reese. Not a clue. Never seen Medina. This is his UFC debut and he’s coming in off a points loss on DWCS. Unusual a fighter gets a contract off a loss on the Contender Series. Fuck, there’s been fighters who’ve won on there in the past and not got signed. Whatever. He’s 33 years old and 11-3 with 10 finishes according to Sherdog. Reese is 30 with a 7-1 record, all finishes. He couldn’t have had a shittier UFC debut. He came in undefeated and was matched up against useless job boy Cody Brundage. Presumably this was the matchmakers trying to give Reese a nice squash match for his debut. So what did he do? He went and got himself powerbombed into unconsciousness. By bastard Brundage the bum. In fairness, Reese came back in style in June, smashing Julian Marquez up in just 20 seconds. He had to redeem himself and that was a good start. Still though, imagine being on Cody Brundage’s highlight reel getting powerbombed into oblivion? No matter what he does from this point on in his career, that’s gonna be a stain against his name that’s not gonna wash off easily.

 

Viacheslav Borshchev vs James Llontop. Fuck knows? Love Slava Claus but his UFC run has been hard to watch at times. He came into the UFC in 2022 off a win over Chris Duncan on DWCS and then absolutely folded Dakota Bush with a nasty body shot in his Octagon debut. It didn’t take long for his complete lack of anything resembling wrestling or BJJ to be highlighted though. And Marc Diakiese and Mike Davis exploited that weakness in back-to-back fights. Slav never got finished by those guys but it would’ve probably been kinder if he did. He got totally exposed. He bounced back somewhat with a TKO win over Maheshate and a draw with Nazim Sadykhov in their banger at MSG last November. It was back to the loss column in May though, and back to his lack of grappling being taken advantage of, when Chase Hooper subbed him. Hard to see how anything changes going forward. He’s never gonna fix that big glaring weakness in his game and everyone knows about it now. As for Llontop, I don’t know. He made his UFC debut in April and got submitted by Chris Padilla. Don’t think I saw that fight. Llontop’s Peruvian, 25 years old and 14-3 with 8 finishes.

 

Josiane Nunes vs Jacqueline Cavalcanti is just pure prelim filler. Nunes is Brazilian, 30 years old and 10-2 with 7 knockouts. Yeah, to be fair to her, for a woman standing 5’2”, she packs a punch. She’s not much good though. She was on a 9 fight win streak up until her last fight but never beat anyone notable on that streak. Then she lost her last fight to Chelsea Chandler. And Cavalcanti is Portuguese, turns 27 just after this fight and has a record of 6-1 with 3 finishes. She was the LFA champion and beat the mighty Zarah Fairn in her UFC debut on the Paris card last September.

 

Wang Cong vs Victoria Leonardo. Again, just Apex prelim fodder. There’s not much to say. Might give Cong a chance though. She’s making her Octagon debut here after winning the Road To UFC tournament in May. She’s 32 years old, undefeated in MMA at 5-0 and also beat former UFC fighter Wu Yanan back in January. Represented China in Sanda and won a couple of gold medals in the World Wushu Championships and Asian Games for whatever that’s worth, according to her Wiki page. I’ll give her a look. Leonardo is a ham and egger from my very vague memory of her though. She’s 9-5 in MMA, 1-3 in the UFC and hasn’t fought since Natalia Silva battered her in a round well over a year ago.

 

 

Yes Jared, let’s get you away from these freaks and back to the Apex…

Edited Wednesday at 06:29 PM by wandshogun09

[wandshogun09]

This happened then during the forum blackout. Did anyone watch? I wouldn’t blame you if you skipped it, wasn’t the most stacked card going in. But I thought it was actually pretty enjoyable in the end. I only watched the main card and one of the prelims but it was a fun watch from what I saw.

Borralho vs Cannonier surpassed my expectations. I didn’t mind the matchup anyway and I thought it was a step up from a lot of the Apex headliners we’ve seen recently. But it turned out to be a right dogfight on the night and much more of an entertaining fight than I thought it would be. Borralho looked like a proper future contender here. I get that Cannonier is getting long in the tooth now but Borralho really put a beating on him here and, to be honest, I thought he was unfortunate to not get the finish. I felt like Cannonier getting stopped by Imavov last time was a premature stoppage. With this fight, it went the distance but I felt like it absolutely could’ve been stopped in that 5th round.

I think if Dan Miragliotta had stopped the fight there, not a soul would’ve complained. Cannonier looked done. His toughness was never in question and he did well to survive the minute or so of Borralho on top of him after the knockdown. But he looked fucked there at the end. Really strong performance from Borralho. Shame he never got the finish because that would’ve really catapulted him but, after a very lukewarm start to his UFC career, the KO over Paul Craig and now this win over Cannonier, it definitely feels like he’s turned a corner. And thank fuck because the 185 division needs new blood. I don’t see him becoming champ or anything but who knows at this point? This is a division where Sean Strickland wore the belt. Wonder what’s next. Looking at the updated rankings, Borralho has moved up to #5 now so he’s put himself right in the mix with this win. The DDP callout was pointless, he’s not getting the next title shot. But the rest of the names above him are already booked apart from Israel Adesanya and I can’t see Izzy being interested in a Borralho fight now. I wanna see Borralho vs Paulo Costa. Sod it. Borralho would be fighting down in rank but Costa’s still a bit of a name, it’d be another big win for him and no doubt a fun fight. The only alternative is to sit out and wait for one of the guys ranked above him to become available but he’ll probably wanna stay active now to build on the bit of momentum he’s now got.

Wasn’t a fan of the Tabatha Ricci vs Angela Hill fight but I didn’t expect a barnburner. Not even sure I agreed with the decision but that’s kind of Hill’s career in a nutshell. She’ll win a couple of fights then lose a decision by the narrowest of margins, rinse and repeat. Forever. It’s a win for Ricci but she’s really not much fun to watch. Most of her strikes seem to miss and when they do land they seem to have nothing on them. So even though much of this fight was in close quarters and they were exchanging, it wasn’t much good to watch because there was nothing significant happening and no real consequences when shots were connecting.

Enjoyed the two TUF finals despite seeing nothing of and knowing sod all about any of the four men going in. Mairon Santos was the standout for me.

Nasty finish that. Looking forward to seeing him again. Bisping immediately jumping in with the Anderson Silva comparisons was a bit much though. Doesn’t really help these guys when comparisons like that are thrown on them the nanosecond they get in the door, does it? Remember Philipe ‘The Next GSP’ Nover? Yeah, not many do.

Michael Morales passed ‘The Magny Test’. A strong win for any up and comer but putting Magny away in a round was impressive. I think I said in the opening post that Morales hasn’t exactly looked spectacular in his last couple of fights but this was definitely a step in the right direction and should be a nice confidence booster for him.

Gerald Meerschaert does it again! If you’ve watched him for any significant length of time you’ll know that probably 8 out of 10 of the fights he wins he takes a proper arse kicking first. It’s a tale as old as time. Nearly every single fight he has he gets battered whether he ends up winning or losing. It’s part of what makes him entertaining to watch but I dread to think of the state he might be in when he retires. He’s got a lot of miles on him both in the sheer number of fights he’s had and how rough they usually are.

With this win, Meerschaert broke Anderson Silva’s record for most finishes in Middleweight history. Don’t know where Shahbazyan goes from here. Still young but he just can’t seem to get going. Meerschaert really just out-toughed him here and once Shahbazyan’s big burst of aggression failed to secure him the finish and Meerschaert was still there, Shahbazyan seemed to just shrink in there. I liked Meerschaert’s callout of Paul Craig. That feels like a natural matchup.

Didn’t bother with the prelims but I did give the debut of Wang Cong a look. I’m glad I did.

A one minute, clean KO in the women’s Flyweight division? Get the fuck out. If I didn’t see it with my own eyes I wouldn’t have believed it. Turns out Cong is gonna be someone to keep an eye on. Had no idea she beat Valentina Shevchenko in their Kickboxing days. Not that it means much in MMA a decade later but it’s still a cool little instant hook coming in the door. That aside though, I just liked everything about this. She seems to have a bit of personality, she’s got the Joker gimmick down for the weigh ins and stuff and obviously she packs a punch. Remains to be seen what the rest of her MMA game looks like and a win over a ham and egg merchant like Victoria Leonardo doesn’t tell us much at all. But if nothing else, it was a debut that sticks out and one they can use to hype her up going forward. I like her already. 


Yeah, not a bad card at all. Not sure what the rest of the prelims were like but the stuff I watched was enjoyable. 
 

Edited Wednesday at 06:38 PM by wandshogun09