UFC Vegas: Royval vs Taira - Oct 12 ??

[wandshogun09]

We never stray from the Apex for long…

ESPN MAIN CARD
Brandon Royval vs Tatsuro Taira

Brad Tavares vs Jun Yong Park 

Chidi Njokuani vs Jared Gooden

Grant Dawson vs Rafa Garcia 

Daniel Rodriguez vs Alex Morono  

ESPN+/FIGHT PASS PRELIMS
CJ Vergara vs Ramazonbek Temirov

Jonathan Pearce vs Pat Sabatini 

Niko Price vs Themba Gorimbo 

Junior Tafa vs Sean Sharaf 

Cory McKenna vs Julia Polastri

Dan Argueta vs Cody Haddon

Clayton Carpenter vs Lucas Rocha 

 

Same old Apex stuff, although that main event is significantly better than the slop we’re usually fed. Couple of bits and bobs on the undercard I don’t mind but this is mostly a one match show, isn’t it? That’s the bout order as I type this, according to Marcel Dorff. I’ll edit as we go.

 

Brandon Royval vs Tatsuro Taira is a quality main event. Love this fight. Shame it’s not gonna be in front of a proper crowd but whatever. I’m always torn when they actually put a good headliner in the Apex. On the one hand, we always moan about the low quality main events that are usually on these cards so at least it’s not two Heavyweight slugs or dull Middleweights or something. On the other hand, it’s always ‘fuck the Apex’ with me. It’s obvious at this point that it’s not going anywhere. Dana’s gone from occasionally talking about wanting to move away from it and get these cards “back on the road” to recently saying they’re spending millions of dollars on expanding the thing. So they’re gonna persist with it whether we like it or not. We’re stuck with it.

Royval’s in a bit of a weird spot now. He’s ranked #1 and just beat Brandon Moreno in their rematch on the Mexico City card in February. Easily the biggest win of Royval’s career to date and he avenged the loss (via injury) in their first meeting. The only problem is, he’s already 0-2 down to the current champ Alexandre Pantoja, their last fight was only December and it was one sided. Even for a division like 125 that’s basically been built on endless rematches, the chances of him getting another shot are very slim for the time being. As long as Pantoja wears the strap, Royval’s gonna have his work cut out trying to get another title shot.

“I will be very happy if I can fight my title shot against Pantoja in Japan and then be first Japanese champion.” - Tatsuro Taira

Can he do it? It’s mad to think really that there’s never been a Japanese UFC champion considering they pretty much started this shit. Huge opportunity for Taira here. After a fairly quiet start to his UFC career, it’s all happening quite quickly all of a sudden. He’s only 24 years old, undefeated at 16-0 with 12 finishes and he’s only gonna improve with each training camp going forward. His first 5 fights in the UFC were on the prelims, 4 of them on the Fight Pass stream. The common theory I saw for that was that they were probably putting him on early so the Japanese viewers could watch him live at a reasonable hour. Maybe. Either way, he’s at a point now where he’s definitely outgrown Fight Pass. He went from jerking the curtain to the main event in his last fight, headlining against Alex Perez at the Apex in June. It was a significant step up and a fight where I thought we’d get some questions answered on Taira. Didn’t exactly work out like that.

It was a total anti-climax as Perez’s knee just buckled while Taira had the standing body triangle in the second round. Never seen anything quite like it, to be honest. But in fairness to Taira, it wasn’t some fluke thing. As unfortunate as the injury was, it was Taira’s techniques and the way he was applying pressure, leaning back and throwing his body into different positions which forced the injury. It’s a shame though because I remember Perez winning the first round and I was really interested to see how Taira might do if the fight went into the 4th and 5th rounds. Can’t fault Taira but we never really learned anything new apart from if he gets your back, good luck getting the fucker off you.

Interesting times in the Flyweight division. Like I said, Taira going from the Fight Pass prelims straight to being a Top 5 contender is a bit sudden and I’m not sure he’s ready for this. We’re about to find out though. And even if he loses, he’s still young enough to bounce back and use it as a learning experience. I’m intrigued to see how this is gonna play out though. If Royval’s able to keep it mostly on the feet, he’s gonna have a big advantage. The grappling could be very interesting, although I’d favour Taira in that area. Then there’s the x-factor of this being Taira’s first 5 rounder and it’s coming against his toughest opponent and biggest test yet. Great, great fight.

 

Brad Tavares vs Jun Yong Park is back on and it’s ***WAND’S ONE TO WATCH*** now. This was originally supposed to go down in July but got scrapped after the weigh in when Park wasn’t medically cleared for some reason. This has the potential to be a really fun fight actually. Tavares is no spring chicken now. He’s coming up on 37 and he’s had a whole bunch of gruelling fights and rough losses. He usually comes to scrap though. It’s crazy to think how long he’s been on the roster. I first saw him on the Chuck vs Tito season of TUF back in 2010 and over the years he’s fought the likes of Nate Marquardt, Tim Boetsch and even Phil Baroni. He’s never been a contender but he’s been in with some of the best and even went the distance with Israel Adesanya and Yoel Romero. He’s struggling now though. He’s 20-9, has lost 3 of his last 4 and just got bashed up by Gregory Rodrigues in February.

The ‘Iron Turtle’ is back! ?

Always quite liked Park. He’s from South Korea, 33 years old and has a record of 17-6 with 11 finishes. No world beater but in general I’ve found him entertaining to watch and that goes a long way in a division like Middleweight that isn’t exactly bursting at the seams with exciting fights or fighters. He’s coming into this fight off a split decision loss to Andre Muniz in December, in what turned out to be a rare dull fight from the Turtle. Pretty sure I had it as my ‘one to watch’ but it was shite as I recall. Hopefully this is a return to form. Tavares is the ideal type of opponent for Park to have a silly slobberknocker with so I’m optimistic.

 

Chidi Njokuani vs Jared Gooden is OK undercard fodder. Quite like Chidi but he’s had a right mixed bag of results since arriving in the UFC in 2022. He couldn’t have asked for a much better start. In his debut he ironed out Marc-Andre Barriault in just 16 seconds, then followed up with a first round elbow KO over Dusko Todorovic. He lost 3 fights on the bounce after that though and only just snapped the losing streak in March with a split decision win over Rhys McKee. He did have that mental scrap with Gregory Rodrigues in there as well where he put a massive hole in Robocop’s forehead but Chidi somehow lost that one. Gooden’s a bit of a ham and egger. He’s 23-9 and hasn’t really done anything of note. He submitted Wellington Turman in his last fight in December and, in fairness, I do remember that being surprisingly more enjoyable than I expected.

 

Grant Dawson vs Rafa Garcia is inoffensive enough but it’s not doing much for me really. Dawson’s got a respectable 21-2-1 record and was on a solid unbeaten run for a while before Bobby Green put an end to that by chinning him in 30 seconds last October. Dawson’s not the most exciting fighter to watch and not a shit talker so it’s not like he had built a ton of momentum anyway but there was starting to be some talk of him maybe being a bit of a darkhorse at 155. That all completely evaporated after the loss to Green though. He bounced back with a decision win over Joe Solecki at UFC 302 in June but it was a bit of a snoozer with Dawson content to just hold top position and take the points. Garcia I’m hazy on. He’s 15-3 and hasn’t fought since April 2023, taking a decision off what feels like an ancient Clay Guida at this point. My only real memory of Garcia is him bleeding like 80s Ric Flair in one of his previous fights. A proper gusher it was but I can’t remember, nor be arsed to check, which fight it was. Not expecting much out of this. Probably another less than spectacular Dawson win.

 

Daniel Rodriguez vs Alex Morono is whatever. Can’t say I’m too fussed. Not a terrible fight but I’m just not arsed about either of them. Kind of hoping D-Rod can claw a win out of this though and stop the rot. It’s been a rough couple of years. He beat Li Jingliang back in 2022 in what many felt was a bit of a controversial decision. He’s more than paid for that though, going 0-3 in his last 3. He got D’Arce choked by Neil Magny, headkicked in a round by Ian Garry, then in June he lost a decision to a Kelvin Gastelum who took the absolute piss by seemingly deliberately missing weight. Morono’s a guy I’ve joked about in the past for looking like the most generic, bland bastard on the planet. The blank CAW template you used to get on Smackdown games. He’s a tough guy but he’s always seemed to me like a guy who’s been plucked from the prelims of a Fight Night card in 2002. He’s coming off a loss in a surprisingly boring fight against Niko Price in June.

 

CJ Vergara vs Ramazonbek Temirov might be worth a look. Vergara’s 12-5-1 and has had a forgettable run in the UFC with the exception of that absolutely barmy back and forth banger with Daniel Lacerda last year. Seriously, one of the best undercard fights/hidden gems of the last few years. If you never saw it and want some fun random fights to watch, give that one a go. Not much else to say about Vergara though. Whenever they’ve thrown him in with a prospect like Taira or Almabayev, he’s been caught lacking. We’ll see how Temirov stacks up. He’s from Uzbekistan, 27 years old and has a record of 15-2-1 with 9 finishes. I don’t recognise any of the names on his record but, for what it’s worth, he’s on a 9 fight winning streak, his last couple were in Rizin but he’ll have been inactive for over a year by the time this fight rolls around.

 

Jonathan Pearce vs Pat Sabatini is, again, just filler. I feel like a broken record but these cards are just full of these kind of fights aren’t they. Not bad matchups but a lot of fights that are just kind of there. There’s not a ton to talk about but I’ll go through the motions. Pearce is 14-6 and has some decent wins over the likes of Darren Elkins and Christian Rodriguez but he’s coming off back-to-back losses here against Joanderson Brito and David Onama. Sabatini’s similar. He’s 18-5 and was on a 6 fight win streak before surprisingly getting TKO’d in a minute by Damon Jackson a couple of years back. He submitted Lucas Almeida in his next fight but then got wrecked quick by Diego Lopes on the MSG card last November and hasn’t been seen since. Both decent enough fighters here but they’re both kind of floundering at the moment.

 

Niko Price vs Themba Gorimbo is a fight I’m torn on. Price has been a lower card favourite of mine for a few years now. He’s one of those fighters who you knew was never gonna make a splash in the rankings or the title picture or anything but I’ve always been happy to see his name on a card and he’s brightened up many an undercard over the years. The only time I’ve rooted against him before was when he fought Robbie Lawler in Lawler’s retirement fight last year. We saw how that ended, Niko got obliterated and I felt bad for him. He came back in June and beat Alex Morono in a rare lacklustre fight. But he really needed that win so I was happy enough for him. I might have to go against him again here though. Anyone who saw that video of Gorimbo and The Rock last year knows his story. Impossible to not wanna see him do well. Sadly, I haven’t been convinced his ceiling is that high and at 33 years old already and 13-4 he’s not got bags of time. But he’s on a 3 fight win streak now and he’s at least got some funds and resources to have proper training camps now. I know The Rock putting that video out there was beneficial for his image as well so I’m always a tad sceptical of the motivation behind that stuff but, even still, Gorimbo’s story is such an inspiring and feel-good one and whatever he can squeeze out of the rest of his career, I’m fully invested in it.

 

Junior Tafa vs Sean Sharaf has been cobbled together at almost the eleventh hour. This actually started off as Chris Barnett vs Waldo Cortes Acosta but Acosta dropped out. Tafa stepped in against Barnett. Then Barnett withdrew and here we are. Shambles. Sharaf steps in on just a few days notice and this is his UFC debut. Never heard of him but Sherdog tells me he’s 31 years old and 4-0, all first round knockouts. And while Tafa’s not great, he’s basically all striking. So this could actually be pretty fun for what it is.

 

Cory McKenna vs Julia Polastri is a late card switch. McKenna was booked against Polyana Viana but Viana withdrew for some reason. Don’t really know anything about Polastri but she’s jumping in on a couple of weeks notice. She’s Brazilian, 26 years old and 12-4 with 7 finishes. She made her UFC debut on the prelims of one of the Apex cards I think we all skipped back in June, and lost on points to Josefine Knutsson. As for McKenna…

Hello! Must admit, I wasn’t familiar with McKenna’s game. I’m rooting for her and not just because of that picture. She’s Welsh but trains out of Team Alpha Male, she's 25 years old and 8-3 with 4 finishes. Fought in Cage Warriors before getting in the UFC via DWCS in 2020. She’s gone 3-2 in the Octagon since and she’s coming off getting subbed in a round by Jaqueline Amorim in March. Hoping she wins this. It’s a shame Viana dropped out really because her lack of ground game would’ve made her a very winnable fight for McKenna. I don’t know enough about Polastri to predict it one way or the other.

 

Dan Argueta vs Cody Haddon. Don’t know. Argueta’s had possibly the strangest start to a UFC run ever. He came into the UFC undefeated, now he’s 9-2-0-2. He lost a decision to Damon Jackson in his UFC debut, then won a fight, then had back-to-back No Contests somehow. Then his last fight in April he got submitted by Octagon newcomer Jean Matsumoto with literally one second left in the round! Just a disastrous stretch. Haddon’s making his debut here. He’s Aussie, 26 years old and 7-1 with 7 finishes. Noticed he has a decision loss against Steve Erceg on his record from 2021. He’s since won 5 in a row and got a first round submission on DWCS back in April. Sounds alright. Shocking ‘tache though.

 

Clayton Carpenter vs Lucas Rocha might actually be a sneaky potential show stealer. I’ve seen very little of Carpenter and nothing of Rocha but, on paper, it sounds like a fight that should probably have gotten higher billing than opening the Fight Pass bit. Carpenter’s 28 years old and undefeated at 7-0 with 5 finishes. He beat Edgar Chairez on DWCS in 2022 and then submitted Juancamilo Ronderos in a round in his UFC debut. That was February 2023 though. Not sure why he’s been off the grid since, most likely injured. Looked back at the thread for that card to refresh my memory and I seemed impressed with what I saw the short time it lasted. Brazil’s Rocha is making his UFC debut. He’s 24 years old, already 17-1 with 14 finishes and is on a 6 fight winning streak. He was signed a while back, I think, and his debut’s been delayed a couple of times. Looking at his Tapology page, he was briefly scheduled to fight Joshua Van in April but fell out. Hopefully he makes it this time.

 

 

That’s all folks.

Edited October 11, 2024 by wandshogun09

[wandshogun09]

Fight week then. Not the deepest card but I really like this main event. Feels like the UFC have taken a bit of a gamble here, hoping that Taira comes through with the win. If he does, finally we have a fresh face in the Flyweight title picture. But the risk they’re running is if Royval wins, all you’ve done is eliminate and derail a fresh contender and young prospect. Because Royval’s already 0-2 down against the champ Pantoja. Regardless, I’m well up for this fight. Huge test for Taira.

Didn’t realise they’ve trained together in the past as well…

 

[Egg Shen]

Yeah, excellent main event. May have to venture back into the void for this one.

[wandshogun09]

The Anthony Hernandez vs Michel Pereira fight the week after is at the Apex as well. Two great Apex main events two weeks in a row? 

[Egg Shen]

Maybe they've got the memo, no women/no heayyweights.

[wandshogun09]

The card a day out…

Sadly Chris Barnett is out. Is he ever gonna fight again? Newcomer Sean Sharaf steps in against Junior Tafa.

[wandshogun09]

Wouldn’t be a UFC card without a last minute fight cancellation, would it?

 

[wandshogun09]

[Dai]

Really enjoyed Royval/Taira. Proper engrossing 'ground vs standup' match up. Both came out of this one looking good I thought.  Looked like Taira was done for in R3, but then somehow still looked good then for the championship fights. Great stuff. 

Enjoyed most of what was on the main card of this one. Can't remember skipping anything. 

Very nasty elbow by Dawson. One of those horrible ones where you see the blood spray from the head as soon as it's done. Gross, but impressive victory. 

Classic Dominic Cruz commentary moment as well. Njokuani, after 2 rounds, had well over 5 minutes of clinch control and landed 50+ body strikes unapposed. What is Doms pearls of wisdom? That he should back off and "get some space", and that Gooden was "choosing to clinch", despite being absolutely mauled from that position. 

[Egg Shen]

Yeah, not really a fan of Cruz on commentary these days. Maybe its because i associate him the Apex. 

 

[wandshogun09]

Finally all caught up on this.

Royval vs Taira, as expected, was a cracking fight. I was kind of sad to see Taira lose just because I wanted to see some new blood and a fresh face in the Flyweight title race but he’s still young, he’s got time and having your first loss be a split decision against a top contender like Royval in a fight like that, there’s no shame in it. This was one of those fights where you can absolutely see Taira learning a lot from it and coming back stronger. There’s definitely things he needs to improve on, his striking needs a lot of work. But we finally got a better look at him here and learned more what he’s about and I think the overall signs are good. He can always work on his striking and no doubt he will be. But the important thing is that the stuff you can’t really teach like heart and being able to push through that mental barrier when fatigue sets in, he seems to have those qualities in him already. Great fight. It wasn’t the result I wanted, like I said before, Royval’s already 0-2 against Pantoja so all this fight really achieved was to eliminate Taira from the title mix for the time being. But you can’t hold that against Royval. And now he’s coming off beating Moreno in Mexico and then handing Taira his first loss. He’s rebounded from that last loss to Pantoja brilliantly.

Iron Turtle vs Brad Tavares was a bit flat. Didn’t enjoy it much. Was expecting a bit of a dogfight but found it quite uneventful and disappointing. I like the Turtle but this is twice now I’ve highlighted his fights as my ‘one to watch’ only for the fight to be a letdown on the night. Oh well. At least I got this gif out of it…

Not sure how the one judge had Tavares winning but whatever. It’s not a MMA card without some wonky scorecards, is it?

Always happy to see Chidi Njokuani get a W. Particularly enjoyed seeing him busting out the knees from the clinch, which is something you don’t see a whole lot of these days. Was hoping he’d get the finish and he probably should’ve really because Jared Gooden’s pretty shit. But whatever, a win’s a win.

Grant Dawson had what was surely his most memorable and noteworthy night in the UFC here. In the cage and on the mic after. First off, for once he wasn’t boring. Now granted (no pun intended), he was in with a bang average opponent in Rafa Garcia so it’s not that hard to look good. But even against outmatched opponents, Dawson’s default mode is usually to just ride out a dominant decision. Not this time…

He was noticeably more aggressive here. He wasn’t just holding position or advancing and then sitting there waiting for the round to end. Here there were actual consequences to his grappling and he was looking to inflict damage more than he usually does. Again, that might just be because Garcia had nothing for him on the mat but, either way, it was the most watchable Dawson’s been in some time for me. Nice to see him actually force a stoppage as well. Then there was the post-fight interview…

? Wasn’t expecting that out of him. Be interesting to see who he’s matched up with next.

Wasn’t into the Rodriguez vs Morono main card opener. Both are capable of a decent enough scrap but this one didn’t grab me. Kind of happy to see D-Rod get the win though, snapping a rough three fight losing streak. Especially as the last loss came against Fatty Gastelum who missed weight obviously on purpose to gain an edge, the filthy big glutton.

Ramazan Temirov stole the prelims in his UFC debut. Absolutely battered CJ Vergara from pillar to post, had him running for his life, patiently but aggressively chased him down and dismantled him for the first round stoppage.

Loved seeing him go to the body at the end there. A lot of fighters, especially in MMA, would get excited and just headhunt looking for the KO in a situation like that. Temirov mixed it up and it paid off beautifully. Not gonna read too much into this. Vergara’s nothing special, I need to see more of Temirov. But this was quite a debut and I’m definitely gonna be looking out for his next fight. Could be a great addition to the Flyweight division.

Pat Sabatini rolling over Jonathan Pearce and choking him in a round was exactly what he needed. Last time we saw him he was getting blitzed in 90 seconds by Diego Lopes and that was just shy of a year ago now. This was the perfect bounce back.

Nice to see Themba Gorimbo pick up another win, just a shame it came at the expense of Niko Price. Was always gonna be bittersweet for me this one. That’s four wins on the trot for Gorimbo now. Sadly I think this is about his ceiling as far as the level he's gonna be winning at. I'll be happy for him if he proves me wrong but, at 33 now, I just don’t see him making big improvements at this stage. I think his recent success is probably partly just down to his general training and living situation improving and him actually starting to get some money to fund his training camps better now. But I don’t see him doing much above this kind of level. He’s looked decent recently but I just don’t think he’s got enough about his overall game.

Junior Tafa stopping Sean Sharaf was a mercy killing for the viewers as much as it was for Sharaf. Pretty embarrassing stuff, only lasted a round and a half yet they were still plodding about looking winded before the first round was over. Heavyweights! Sharaf did step in on late notice, to be fair. But still, this was sloppy bollocks.

Only caught the Fight Pass bit from the Julia Polastri vs Cory McKenna fight on. Was hoping McKenna could get back in the win column here but it wasn’t to be. Despite the split decision, even as someone who was rooting for McKenna, I didn’t really see the argument for McKenna and I thought Polastri rightly deserved the win. McKenna’s been released from the UFC off the back of this loss as well, which is a shame but unsurprising given her 3-3 stint and now coming off back-to-back losses.

She’s still young enough that maybe she’ll be back one day but, honestly, harsh as it sounds, she’s gonna have to improve pretty drastically. She mentions Atomweight there and maybe she’d do better at 115, to be fair. Not sure if/when we’ll actually see an Atomweight division in the UFC though. 


Yeah, decent card overall and I really enjoyed the main event.