The GSP vs Penn fight ended up going 4 rounds with GSP becoming more and more dominant round by round. GSP had a smart gameplan and he implemented it perfectly. He mentioned after the fight that he wanted to take down Penn and get blood running to his shoulders and away from his hands so that his boxing would be nullified. That’s exactly what seemed to happen. The ironic part came at the end of the fourth round after GSP had continually side mounted Penn and peppered him with hammerfists and elbows. BJ didn’t seem to know where he was, having to be redirected to his own corner which Penn criticized GSP for in their first fight after the initial round.

The doctor examined Penn after the fourth round and appeared willing to let the fight continue. BJs brother tapped the Dr on the shoulder and gave the signal for the fight to end. BJ himself did not protest. So much for fighting to the death. Although trash talking can be seen as just hyping up a fight, it really can make someone look foolish if they lose – especially in the same way they uttered contempt for anyone who would tap from strikes like a ‘little bitch’ which is essentially what BJ did.

Next up for GSP – Thiago Alves.  Somehow I don’t think Alves will be trash talking like BJ did. Alves has already demonstrated respect for GSP.

I was eagerly anticipating the fight between Thiago Silva and Lyoto Machida. My criticism of Machida in the past wasn’t so much that he avoided strikes but moreso for his lack of offense and aggression which in turn made it just look like he was running away the whole fight. Machida may have finally put things together for this fight. He definitely looked the more aggressive of the two fighters and landed numerous strikes and at the same time, avoided punishment. I had not been much of a fan of watching Machida in the past, but I was happy to see him show a more complete performance this time around. It will lead to more success for him, more entertaining fights and perhaps even a light heavyweight title.

Nate Diaz vs Clay Guida. Clay Guida managed to outwork Diaz in this fight. Diaz seemed like he didn’t even show up. Diaz seemed to lack any zero sense of urgency. What didn’t help Diaz’ chances was that Guida basically hugged Diaz for the preponderance of the fight and the referee failed to separate them despite Guida not doing any damage whatsoever.

Overall it was a good night of fights and it did well to deliver on a much hyped event.

The winner of this matchup would be invariably forced to coach the following season of the Ultimate Fighter. Rich made it abundantly clear that he did not want to endure this a second time. Henderson, on the other hand, seemed to relish the opportunity. In addition, the impending coach of the Ultimate Fighter would end up fighting against Michael Bisping at 185 pounds. This is the weight class that Rich just left (as per nudging from the UFC) after getting dismantled twice by Anderson Silva. Also, the filming of the Ultimate Fighter would take several months and this would mean that the coach would not fight until the end of the season. My feeling is that Rich wants to stay at 205 pounds,  does not want to coach on the Ultimate Fighter and would not favor a long layoff before fighting again.

The conclusion — Rich Franklin had nothing to gain by winning the fight against Dan Henderson.

The result of the fight was a decision victory by Dan Henderson which I agreed with wholeheartedly. Rich lacked any killer instinct and did not seem himself. He had previously mentioned his confidence in the clinch yet he offered very little offense in this position. I counted one flailing knee and did not see any type of ongoing forward movement or aggression until the third round when Franklin was clearly down by two rounds. There was no sense of urgency on Rich’s part, it seemed, in round 3 either.

While I’m not saying for sure that Rich threw the fight, I cannot ignore it as a possibility. The complete lack of incentive to win and the uncharacteristic performance definitely garner some suspicion. I suppose only Rich will truly know what happened.

As an afterthought, I was watching this event with a friend who is relatively new to viewing MMA and I must say that I felt embarrassed by the Coleman vs Rua fight. I have to give Coleman credit for competing at his age and acknowledge his impressive physique, but Rua has no excuse. Rua looked terrible against Forrest Griffin and looked just as bad against Coleman. I even thought the stoppage was questionable. While Coleman definitely looked spent, both fighters looked exhausted since the first round! Had Coleman looked incapacitated all of a sudden, I could justify the stoppage, but Coleman looked gassed from early on in the fight and so did Rua. This one probably should have gone to the judges. Just my opinion.

I went 7 for 10 on my picks overall with which I was happy since there were some really tough picks. Unfortunately one of the fights I lost was the Alexander vs Schafer bout.

I’m sure Alexander will never read this nor anyone who trains him, but nonetheless, the secret is out: there is an easy formula to beat Houston Alexander and he proved it that night. As great of a fighter that Thiago Silva is, it was surprising how easily he dominated Alexander in his victory over the Nebraska native. Houston was exposed. He had a weak ground game, possibly nonexistant ground defense. After that loss, one would think that Houston and his trainers would work tirelessly to improve his ground game as he looked completely helpless and dominated by Silva. We didn’t get a chance to see it tested until Fight Night 15 because his previous fight was a knockout courtesy of a superman punch landed by James “The Sandman” Irvin. Schafer divulged his own strategy for beating Alexander: get through the intial onslaught of punches and then take over, which is exactly what Schafer did. I was impressed with Schafer’s ability to work through that barrage since some of Alexander’s strikes landed cleanly and would have knocked out many a foe. Schafer then took over and it was a carbon copy of the Silva fight. Alexander is now 2-3 in the UFC and had just signed an extension with the MMA juggernaut prior to this matchup. UFC is notorious for releasing fighters when they don’t win, but Alexander is still a big draw due to his all or nothing fighting style.

Alexander is a very likable character and seems like a genuinely nice guy, but if he wants to stay around in the UFC, the ground game or take down defense needs to improve prior to his next fight or it could be all over.

Here is a quick rundown…

The main event was Georges St. Pierre in his first title defense since regaining the welterweight championship from Matt Serra. GSP started off against Fitch very aggressive and did a lot of damage in the first round. Despite all of the talk about Fitch being tough, surely a lot of observers including myself were surprised that Fitch made it out of the first round. Not only did Fitch make it out of the first, he endured 5 full rounds of beatings until GSP was awarded with a unanimous lopsided decision. Fitch commented in a post fight interview saying that GSP was essentially too fast for him and after the first round, he had vision problems which plagued him for the remainder of the onslaught. After the fight, BJ Penn entered the Octagon and seemed extremely eager to set up a rematch between himself and GSP. GSP of course obliged but it will up to the UFC. BJ will need to move up to welterweight as he has done in the past. GSP vs Penn may be one of the biggest draws in UFC history if it comes to fruition.

Similarly, Brock Lesnar was equally dominant over Heath Herring. Lesnar opened the first round with a flying knee and later connected on a punch that sent Herring not only to the ground but head over feet toward the cage. Herring’s vantage point upon his vision returning to normal would have seen Lesnar charging toward the vulnerable Herring. What a sight that must have been even for a veteran of over 40 fights like Herring! Lesnar continued a dominating performance for the duration, focusing on his smothering wrestling scoring a unanimous 30-26 decision. Lesnar could be the answer to the sometimes dull heavyweight division. Lesnar has personality evidenced by his head nodding along with the crowd chanting for him during the battle as well as his excitement of watching his own replays after the fight. Although Lesnar was completely effective in nullifying any offense strategized by Herring, he obviously is very young in his MMA career at 2-1 and needs to work on some techniques. Lesnar had numerous opportunities to put in hooks while on top and never did so. It was quite possible he could have choked out or arm barred Herring but instead Lesnar used his amateur wrestling skills to smother Herring and beat him mercilessly. While this may look intimidating to some MMA competitors watching, Lesnar will need to become more well rounded as surely he is aware and working on.

Kenny Florian vs Roger Huerta was almost a carbon copy of the GSP vs Fitch fight. It was very obvious that Florian was the far more cerebral and technical fighter while Huerta revealed that he was limited to being a brawler. Huerta will have a great future, but needs to learn more technique.

Also on the card:

Demian Maia defeated Jason MacDonald by a choke in the third round.
Tamdan McCrory beat Luke Cummo by unanimous decision in what Joe Rogan called “The Battle of the Geeks”
Cheick Kongo proved too much for Dan Evenson with a TKO victory at 4:55 of the third round.
Rob Emerson disposed of an over aggressive Manny Gamburyan at 12 seconds of the first round with strikes.

check the UFC website for more results.

Overall I went 7 out of 10 on my picks.

In the main event, Alves looked ripped and bigger than Hughes and it showed as he seemed more powerful in the match. In fact, Hughes looked overmatched in just about every category of this fight. Hughes was scarcely ever able to get Alves to the ground and when it happened, Hughes wasn’t able to punish Alves at all. It was Hughes who looked beaten and battered. After the fight which ended in the second round with running knee into Hughes head, Alves asked Dana White for a title fight during his interview with Joe Rogan. Alves didn’t get down on his knees but he made it clear that was he ready to take on the winner of GSP vs. Fitch.

There were a lot of unhappy fans due to what many considered a premature stoppage in the first round. Vera looked more like his old self landing knees, kicks and punches and working his Muay Thai but ended up getting mounted by Werdum and eating several unanswered punches right before the first round was set to end. Granted, Vera was in an awkward position, however; he was intelligently defending himself in my opinion. He had his hands actively covering up and there were only 15 seconds in the round when referee Dan Miragliotta called an end to the matchup. Vera immediately was distraught and frustrated by the stoppage saying he was fine to fight. The crown in London at the o2 Arena chorussed in boos obviously appalled at the result. Joe Rogan even admitted that he felt the stoppage was premature. The really interesting part about this conclusion was the fact that Miragliotta officiated the Kimbo Slice vs James Thompson fight where Thompson had Slice mounted in the second round for well over a minute and threw over 70 unanswered punches and elbows yet Miragliotta allowed that fight to continue. This seems incredibly inconsistent. It’s very unfortunate for Vera as he looked quite good in this performance and this fight was meant to get him back on track, but instead, this will take him farther away from the title shot he wants. Perhaps it’s a good time to move to light heavyweight? The main thing is that the heavyweight division is somewhat weak with Arlovski, Sylvia and Couture gone which may keep Vera in that class.

The only other fight I want to comment on is Michael "The Count" Bisping vs Jason Day. Bisping moved down to middleweight and fought Charles McCarthy (Captain Miserable as some call him) and sent him into retirement at a relatively young age of 27. This was Bispings second time out at middleweight and he took on Jason Day who looked great in his first UFC appearance, dismantling the very skilled Alan "The Talent" Belcher. With that said, Bisping looked to be in great shape, came in with a lot of energy and swarmed Day the entire fight and came out with a dominating first round victory. After seeing this, I would really like to see Rich Franklin vs Michael Bisping. Bisping was very impressive in this victory.

Overall, it wasn’t a favorite card of mine. There were a lot of problems with injuries in terms of the main event so it didn’t end up being the original matchups many were anticipating, but it was fairly entertaining nonetheless. The Vera fight was nothing short of a rip off in my opinion in terms of the premature stoppage. While it is the job of the referee to protect the fighters, these guys train very hard and it is their livelihood on the line when they are competing. It’s a tough job, but it’s important to give a guy a chance to come back in a fight. Dan Miragliotta at times looks like an amateur compared to the likes of Yves Lavigne or even Herb Dean. While Miragliotta may be ‘big’, he is also no ‘big’ John McCarthy.  The UFC needs to sort this guy out and do it fast.

The first fight was between Brett “The Grim” Rogers and Jon Murphy. This fight took only 61 seconds before Murphy was caught with a haymaker and the fight was stopped. Rogers is on a knockout win streak and seems poised for a shot at Kimbo Slice.

Smokin Joe Villasenor managed to dismantle Phil Baroni about a minute and a half into the fight. Baroni, who is know for his ripped physique and entertaining ring entrances and trash talking, is now at 10-10 and clearly very disappointed with the outcome of the fight. Baroni was very emotional at the post fight press conference when speaking about the unswerving support of legend Mark ‘The Hammer” Coleman. It is unclear what will happen with Baroni from here.

In the only women’s fight of the night, Gina Carano managed to outlast Kaitlyn Young to earn a victory. It was pretty clear as the fight grew longer that Carano was too powerful for Young. Carano weighed in at 144.5 lbs for this fight which was more than the 140 lb limit. This is something that is commonplace for Carano as she has been over the weight limit for her last 4 fights. This means that either Carano has not learned how to cut enough weight yet or perhaps that there needs to be some leeway with weight classes for women. Perhaps upping the current weight class to 150 lbs or perhaps creating a different division would be a good idea. Like men, not all women are meant to be in the same weight category and forcing them to do so can result in unhealthy and unfit fighters as they would be so dehydrated from cutting weight that it would affect their performance in the right and their health. Also, if the women really want to be taken seriously, they need to fight full 5 minute rounds. Otherwise, it will be the classic argument of not playing on the same field.

In my opinion the best fight of the night was between Scott “Hands of Steel” Smith and “Ruthless” Robbie Lawler. There was some drama with this fight as at times fans were heard booing the action which probably irritated any true fans as the action was fast paced and both competitors clearly came to put on a good show. To the casual fans – these are professional athletes that train full time, you will not see them swinging wildly 100% of the time. There is a lot of technique that goes into the performance. The excitement lies in the  impending result, not in the actual one haymaker that may flatten an opponent. The eagerness is in knowing that these guys have the capacity and talent to make this happen.
This fight ended part way through the third round when Smith was accidentally poked in the eye by Lawler. Lawler immediately acknowledged it and apologized. The rules state that Smith gets up to 5 minutes to recover. During this time, a doctor came into examine Smith upon which she was told by Smith on two occasions that he could not see out of the affected eye. If Smith wanted the fight to continue, this was a huge mistake. This is where the rules perhaps some adjustment or clarifying. Smith felt that although he could not see properly, he would have the full 5 minutes and then make a determination at that point. Smith clearly did not expect the fight to be stopped. One of two things needs to happen to make this situation right in the future: 1) Smith needs to keep his mouth shut when talking to the Dr. who is bound by the rules to make a decision on the fight should Smith give any self-diagnosis that would result in the fight being stopped, or 2) The Dr. needs to consider anything mentioned by the fighter initially as a tentative assessment and offer re-evaluation after the full 5 minutes unless the fighter clearly states that he cannot continue. As disappointing this result was to many fans (including myself at the time), a rematch is almost a guarantee. Overall, I am glad with the outcome because I have seen way too many fights where someone gets poked in the eye and then does not fight the same afterwards and loses. The fans generally consider this result as gospel, however; I always wonder if things would have been different if the eye poke never took place. A rematch gives fans the opportunity to see truly who the better fighter will be. So, while I do believe that the rules need to be amended, it will end up better overall for the sport in the end.
A side note for this fight is that I believed that it should have been the main event. It was a title fight and both competitors are at the top of their game and proven fighters.

Lastly the main event was between Kimbo Slice and James “The Colossus” Thompson. I don’t have much to say about this one. Kimbo ended up winning due to referee stoppage in the third round. I do believe that it was a very even fight overall until then. As per MMA rules, the fight should have been stopped at the end of the second round due to Thompson delivering numerous unanswered and undefended elbows and punches while on top of Kimbo. This scene lasted for well over a minute with no referee intervention.
Ironically, the fight did end with Kimbo punching Thompson’s massive cauliflower ear resulting in blood squirting and followed up by further haymakers causing the referee to call the fight over. Thompson was so disgusted with the decision to stop the fight that he put his hand in the face of the referee in frustration. Mauro Ranallo, one of the announcers, mentioned Thompson’s cauliflower ear on numerous occasions while commentating the fight. This will definitely go down in controversy but EliteXC still has the Kimbo hype intact so they should be happy about that.

Overall, it was a good showing. The main points were that the fans require further education, the women’s division needs some adjustments and more events to come will help dictate whether CBS will consider this a good investment.

On another note, I was disappointed to see that Gina Carono did not make weight for this event. She was fined 12.5% of her purse which will go to Kaitlin Young who will allow the fight to go ahead anyway.

Kimbo Slice vs James “Colossus” Thompson will be the main event although I believe the real fight to watch will be Robbie Lawler vs Scott Smith. Both throw very heavy hands and are veterans of the game. Lawler is champion right now so that adds to the intensity of the fight.

Initially, I will discuss the Tito Ortiz fight with Lyoto Machida in some detail and then make some comments on Tito and his past, present and future. Yes, I have watched the Ortiz / Lyoto fight a few times.

A lot of MMA fans feel that Tito Ortiz is not the fighter he once was. I am not sure I agree with that. Apart from injuries, I believe that Tito Ortiz is not far at all from being the quality of fighter he was when he was champion. The difference we are seeing is that his competition is much better well rounded. Tito surely has trained submissions (as we saw during the Lyoto fight) but I am not sure I have seen much of anything else in terms of refining his skills. I haven’t seen any improvement in his standup over the years. The other thing one has to wonder is whether Tito training himself with his usual cohorts is a good idea or not. The best fighters tend to move from one camp to another over the years to refine their skills in myriad categories. I can’t recall Tito ever doing such a thing.

Was Lyoto elusive or did he run? There seems to be a stark contrast between fans who differ on this topic. Fans are really passionate and are staunch in their opinions on whether Lyoto found intelligently or whether he ran away from Ortiz. For what it’s worth, it was a bit of both. There is merit to Lyoto avoiding Tito’s aggression in the cage as an intelligent strategy. After all, counter punching is the very thing that wins fights for Chuck Liddell. Having said that, the problem with Machida doing this is that he doesn’t have that impending doom factor of a Liddell or Anderson Silva where we are anticipating the unavoidable dismantling by the elusive counter puncher. Tito Ortiz came into this game as an alternate originally and was able to ride the wave through being a champion for several years and one of the most recognizable faces in all of MMA. Ortiz knows how to hype his fights and he draws fans to pay per views and events.  Let me put it this way: I bought this PPV in HD and it cost me $54.99. If Tito Ortiz wasn’t fighting on the card, I probably wouldn’t have splurged. As much as I can respect Machida, I would not be too excited to see him fight again. I think he has great potential, but he needs to add a lot of aggression to his game. He needs to be elusive when necessary, but most importantly, aggressive as well whenever possible.

What happens to Tito now? In the post fight interview, Ortiz did say that he hasn’t decided on what he is doing after the fight. I do not think Ortiz will be back with the UFC and while I am a fan of Ortiz and believe he can bring in a lot of fans and money to the box office, I do not believe the UFC is a good venue for him anymore. Likewise, I do not believe that the UFC would be smart to continue to invest in Ortiz. Ortiz has not done anything spectacular in terms of wins over the past fews years with the exception of the Shamrock rivalry. I believe Ortiz would be much more successful fighting in another company where he would be able to showcase his showmanship and fighting skills against opponents that he would be more likely to dominate. The UFC has become a lot about who wins the fight regardless of style or entertainment value and while there is nothing wrong with that and I don’t say that as a criticism although it does result in some boring fights sometimes, it is not a good place for Ortiz to be.

Ortiz has a lot of stuff on his plate. He is doing a book tour and continues the Punishment clothing line as well as mentioned getting back into training with a group of people. Ortiz may mourn his legacy in the UFC but he eventually will be too busy to think about due to other exciting future ventures.

Good luck Tito. Thanks for all of those years you gave the fans and I personally look forward to seeing more of the Huntington Beach Bad boy!

And on to the fights…

First up on the televised event was Thiago Silva vs Antonio Mendes. I had picked Silva and I was rather concerned when he was caught with a high kick and was rocked but he kept his composure and ended up catching Mendes with enough strikes and ended the fight with some ground and pound causing Mendes to tap. I picked Silva to win putting me at 1-0.

Surprisingly the next fight was Tito Ortiz vs Lyoto Machida. This seemed more like it would be played out later in the night considering the popularity of Ortiz (whether you love him or hate him). Unfortunately this ended up a boring fight. Can’t really blame Ortiz for that as he did try to engage with Machida but Machida was extremely evasive and avoided most of Ortiz’ punishment. Surely Ortiz wasn’t happy with being decisioned by Lyoto. Probably the most exciting part of the fight was within the last minute of the third round when Ortiz had Machida in a triangle and then transitioned to an arm bar. It seemed that Ortiz had it hooked in, but somehow Machida slipped out perhaps using the sweat to slip out. Tito was given the mic after the fight and called his interactions with Dana White ‘bullshit’ but was sure to thank the Fertittas for their support. Ortiz was very gracious to the fans. Strangely enough when Joe Rogan asked whether this was really Ortiz’ last fight in the UFC, Tito said he wasn’t sure and would decide over the next couple of weeks. A quick funny sidenote in the fight was when Yves Lavigne slipped and fell on his ass. I had picked Ortiz with my heart and not my head so this led me to 1-1.

The next fight was Wilson Gouveia vs Goran Reljic. Reljic came in undefeated for his UFC debut. Goran trains with Mirko Cro Cop and this showed with his hard kicks to Gouveia’s head all on the right side. Soon enough Wilson’s right arm was bruised. This fight went back and forth with Relic seeming to have the upper hand for the first while until Wilson took over and looked dominant until getting caught with a punch to his temple putting him on the ground and eventually losing via stoppage. I picked Gouveia so this loss lowered my tally to 1-2.

Keith Jardine indicated that he was surprised to see that we was an underdog for this fight against Wanderlei Silva. Wanderlei has had 3 fights in the UFC and has lost them all. In his defense, these were all against top notch opponents. Dana White has openly expressed his admiration for Wanderlei’s fighting style in that he fights to put on a good show, win or lose. With that said, Wanderlei really needed this win as his back was against the wall with these 3 prior losses. Jardine also claimed that his standup was better than Silva’s. The fight opened very aggressively with the two exchanging punches. Silva looked dominant again like his days in Pride catching Jardine with a punch that knocked him down and then Silva lived up to his “Axe Murderer” moniker by swarming on Jardine resulting in a referee stoppage just 36 seconds into the first round. Jardine was down for quite some time before being able to walk out of the Octagon under his own power. Silva was extremely gracious in his victory complimenting Jardine and thanking the UFC for the opportunity to fight as well as the crowd in attendance for their support of such a great sport. I picked Silva. Back to even at 2-2.

In the main event, Sean Sherk entered the octagon first with a record of 35-2-1 with his only losses to Matt Hughes and Georges St. Pierre at 170 lbs. Upon entering the octagon, Sherk looked ripped as usual. Throughout the course of the first 3 rounds Penn took advantage of his reach and hit Sherk with numerous jabs and Sherk ended up coming up short on the striking yet continued with the same gameplan.  At the end of the third round Sherk made the same mistake he made against Franca by ducking his head when his opponent came at him and BJ caught him with a knee to the head that stunned Sherk and then Penn followed it up with a series of blows as the bell sounded ending the round. It was determined that Sherk couldn’t continue and BJ was crowned the undisputed lightweight champion. BJ had nothing but respectful words for Sherk after the fight. Sherk, who was disappointed, did say that he would continue fighting and made a point of thanking his loyal fans that stuck by him over the past 10 months.

Overall, it was a decent PPV. I was personally disappointed with some of the results, but I have to admit that I was not surprised at all.

I actually ordered this PPV as it was shown FINALLY in HD by Rogers. Of course, the HD channel was $10 more expensive. Even though some may view this as unreasonable, the HD version is a great deal clearer than the regular version so I went for it. Plus, it was Ortiz’ last UFC fight.

M1-Global was an ill fated attempted at merging Russian and North American promotions.  As with any businesses, the result from failing can create something much more successful and promising than the intention of the original endeavor. Enter Affliction.

The major complaint of certain fighters in the UFC lately have been that they are underpaid, under promoted and too restricted by their contracts. Affliction may be trying to revolutionize the sport by avoiding all of these problems. Tim Sylvia has expressed that he appreciates freedom in his contract so that he may fight in other organizations. He does make a good point in that if he fights and he does incur any injuries that require lengthy healing, he may be able to fight again shortly thereafter and consequently make more money in a short amount of time and have the opportunity to either continue momentum after a win or recover following a loss.

What gives Affliction a lot of promise is putting together a great card full of competitors that were either ousted by the UFC or estranged from there:

MAIN CARD (PAY PER VIEW)

• Fedor Emelianenko vs. Tim Sylvia
• Josh Barnett vs. Pedro Rizzo
• Ben Rothwell vs. TBA
• Paul Buentello vs. Aleksander Emelianenko
• Matt Lindland vs. Fabio Nascimento
• Renato “Babalu” Sobral vs. Mike Whitehead

PRELIMINARY CARD

• Ray Lazama vs. Justin Levens
• Mark Hominick vs. Savant Young
• J.J. Ambrose vs. Patrick Speight
• Brett Cooper vs. Mike Pyle

This card gives everyone the opportunity to see whether the hype behind Fedor is deserved or not as he is fighting a former UFC champion who has proven himself as one of the best heavyweights over the past several years (despite the Tim haters opinions).

I am really excited to see Babalu fighting again. He was supposed to fight Vernon Tiger White not too long ago but that show was cancelled due to financial reasons on behalf of the company. I will very interested to see how he does against Mike Whitehead who is a talented opponent.

The matchup of Paul Buentello vs Alexsander Emelianenko could be a real war as well. It’s great to see Mark Hominick back in action again also.

The MMA world is getting bigger and Affliction is just one way of realizing the growth of the sport.

Affliction Banned will be available to watch on July 19th on Pay Per View. There could be connections with HDNet in the future as well for airing events.

Check out the event trailer

I always laugh when I see this. Classic. Charles McCarthy lost to Michael Bisping and decided to go into early retirement to focus on coaching instead.

St. Pierre went through the death of a young cousin and endured a serious illness suffered by his father. These are undoubtedly very traumatic events, yet, it would be fairly unheard of to call off a fight due to mental anguish. Typical fans would expect a physical injury to be the sole reason for delaying a bout.

In terms of a prediction, it is foolish to go against St. Pierre this time, although surely anyone who is on the Serra bandwagon will end up looking genius if he wins again. This time has all the right ingredients to be a different outcome. St. Pierre is no longer dealing with those emotional issues and in fact hired a sports psychologist to help with straightening out some things. Anyone who squaks at this method lacks the capacity to understand the pressure that St. Pierre who is still fairly young at 26 is under. Having a solid foundation in terms of dialog is definitely an asset. Georges also has had 2 fights since his last fight with Serra. He beat Josh Koschek and destroyed the greatest Welterweight of all time – Matt Hughes. St. Pierre is hungrier now more than ever. You can compare this to BJ Penn’s past. BJ was able to get by on his talent and therefore didn’t train as hard as he could have, this is not necessarily a carbon copy of those events, however; St. Pierre understands much better now what it takes to stay on top. Of course none of these claims discredit Serra. In fact, out of the entire Welterweight division, Serra may be the fighter with the best chance to hang with Georges in the Octagon. Serra is very underestimated. People generally still don’t give him enough credit even though he won the Ultimate Fighter TV show and then beat the champ. The kind of mental toughness and belief in yourself to accomplish that along with a black belt in BJJ are true assets that very few combatants possess.  I can’t resist – St.Pierre with a first round TKO. It must be so. This also sets up Serra vs Hughes which Hughes has already requested due to ‘unfinished business’.

I’ve been a Rich Franklin fan for a long time and I genuinely empathize with the personal struggles he has faced over the past year or so. It has been a collapse for Rich in that he was the defending Middleweight Champion with no one in sight that could defeat him. Everything changed. His father died unexpectedly which was a devastating loss. Also, Anderson Silva came along and as much as Rich respects Silva, surely he would be much happier had Silva never come to the UFC. Rich suffered a brutal loss to Silva and then fought his way back to a title shot in his hometown of Cincinnati. This resulted in virtually the same outcome – even the trademark broken nose was administered. This time around, Rich faces a fellow victim of Anderson Silva in Travis Lutter – another winner of The Ultimate Fighter TV show. This should be an interesting fight. Each fighter has been open about his strategy. Lutter wants to take it to the ground and Rich would rather stand and kickbox. Both fighters really need a victory – this is likely Lutter’s last run at success in the UFC and Rich needs to keep himself in the upper echelon of the weight class. Although the fan in me would somewhat like to see Lutter win if only because he may get a rematch with Anderson Silva – and I truly believe he may be the only one who can beat the Spider (he came close last time and that was after a terrible weight cutting that cause it to be a non-title bout), I am going to have to go with Franklin in this one. I just think Rich is too strong for Lutter. Rich was able to make pretty good work of Yushin Okama who was touted as the physically strongest fighter in the division, so Lutter will suffer the same fate, I believe. The only way to beat Franklin is to out skill him on the feet like Silva has done.

Here is the full card: (my picks are in bold)

Main card (televised):

185 lbs.: Rich Franklin (22-3) vs. Travis Lutter (9-4)
185 lbs.: Kalib Starnes (8-2-1) vs. Nate Quarry (9-2)
185 lbs.: Michael Bisping (15-1) vs. Charles McCarthy (10-4)
155 lbs.: Mac Danzig (17-4-1) vs. Mark Bocek (5-1)

Under card (may not be broadcast):

185 lbs.: Jason MacDonald (19-9) vs. Joe Doerksen (39-11)
185 lbs.: Alan Belcher (12-4) vs. Jason Day (15-5)
155 lbs.: Sam Stout (13-3-1) vs. Rich Clementi (30-12-1)
170 lbs.: Jonathan Goulet (21-9) vs. Kuniyoshi Hironaka (11-4)
265 lbs.: Cain Velasquez (2-0) vs. Brad Morris (10-2)
185 lbs.: Ed Herman (14-5) vs. Demian Maia (6-0)

And once again, Rogers disappoints by not showing this in HD

I truly believe this was the cause of several fights results. Notably, Tim Boetsch completely gassed which was very unexpected and I believe this caused him to lose.

Kenny Florian was very impressive in his fight against Joe Lauzon. I expected it to be a lot closer and actually picked Lauzon to win as Florian hadn’t looked all that great to me recently. Perhaps Florian is back on track?

Thiago Alves caught Karo Parisyan with a knee to the face that dropped him and he was not defending himself momentarily and it was stopped by the referee. Parisyan was very upset with the stoppage. There are a lot of Karo haters out there that criticize him for putting on boring fights and eking out wins. This win by Alves will surely make them happy. Parisyan is now even further away from a title shot now that he was once poised to receive in the past but was unable to compete due to injury.

Houston Alexander got knocked out in 8 seconds which started with a superman punch from James Irvin followed by a solid connecting punch while Alexander was down which cemented the victory. Alexander claims he was fine and pled to Steve Mazzagatti that it was stopped prematurely.

Probably the fight of the night (although I haven’t seen the rest of the undercard) would be Nate Diaz vs Kurt Pellegrino. This fight was action packed from the start and teetered back and forth with momentum until Diaz finally through ‘Batman’ into his patented triangle choke upon which locking up, Diaz threw his arms out signifying victory and also flexed to place an exclamation point on his impending win.

It was awesome to see free UFC on Spike for 3 hours which is what the fans asked for in droves. It was great to see them respond and I’m sure the ratings will indicate that it was worth it. As mentioned though, I would never again put on a show in Denver again. Also, while I’m asking for favors – how about showing this in HD? Now that would be amazing!

• Randy Couture vs Fedor. Now that Fedor has become a free agent, many are expecting or at least hoping that the ultimate match up will take place. For some reason, I just don’t think this will live up to the hype even if it did take place. Fedor hasn’t fought anyone of a good caliber in a long time. The only fight that really lived up to its billing after being hyped up was Chuck Liddell vs Wanderlei Silva.
• The path of Chuck Liddell. Even though Chuck has said that he would even like to fight Fedor, this is not likely going to happen. Although, admittedly, this would be one hell of a warm up match if Fedor was ever scheduled to fight Couture like a lot of fans want to see. Chuck is actually in a pretty good position even though he lost his belt and suffered a loss to Keith Jardine. He has a reason to be motivated and to improve his skills. Although, he is aging, a motivated and hard training Liddell is very dangerous and it will be exciting to watch his path back to the belt as he intends.
• Tito Ortiz has said he is definitely leaving the UFC after his fight with Lyoto Machida. Although I am a fan of Ortiz, he really hasn’t performed well in his last several fights. He scraped by Forrest Griffin in a fight that many thought Griffin actually won. He had a draw against Rashad Evans where he looked defeated in the final round. I see him either dominating Machida and then giving Dana White the bird or causing some kind of huge controversy. Don’t expect this fight and the surrounding hype to be anything less than a spectacle.
• The Lightweight title. Sean Sherk vs BJ Penn will be one of the most anticipated matches in recent UFC history. There is plenty of ammunition for bad blood in this one (literally) as Penn has outright called Sherk a cheater over the steroid controversy that surrounded Sherk after fighting Hermes Franca and successfully defending his Lightweight title. Sherk did manage to reduce his suspension handed down by the NSAC but the fog of suspicion on his steroid use will be with him until he returns and dominates a game opponent. A match against Penn is the best thing for Sherk in terms of redeeming himself. Penn is training hard these days so this should be one hell of a fight. Expect both men to be well prepared.
• Georges St.Pierre is one of the most likable UFC competitors. Not only is he seen as the complete package as an MMA fighter with his abilities, but he embodies the spirit of the sport much like Anderson Silva does. For these reasons and for being scheduled to face the current welterweight champion Matt Serra in his hometown of Montreal, he will be heavily favored in the books and also in the arena where the capacity crowd will surely erupt in an explosiveness never before seen.
• Brock Lesnar matching up against Frank Mir was a flatout mistake on the part of the UFC. The only thing right about it was that it was Super Bowl weekend and they had a fight that garnered a lot of attention and probably helped sell a few more pay per views. There are plenty of people for Brock to fight before facing former champions who look poised to take the heavyweight title again.
• Anderson Silva is clearly the best pound for pound fighter in the world right now. I don’t believe anyone can beat him at the natural weight of 185 lbs. The only thing remaining in terms of a test is his mental stability. Him requesting to fight Roy Jones junior indicates a lack of purpose in his mind regarding the UFC (easy to understand) and maybe some boredom?
• The Ultimate Fighter season 7 looks like it could be best season ever with Forrest Griffin and Quinton Rampage Jackson as the coaches. While both men are very entertaining and mild mannered, watch for their competitive streaks to show a different side of them during the show.

That’s it for now. More topics to be discussed soon!

Mir vs Lesnar. This fight was highly anticipated and really could only go 1 of 2 ways. Either Mir would submit Lesnar thereby showing Lesnar’s inexperience in the art of submission. The other way this could have went was with Lesnar performing ground and pound and forcing a TKO. This time it was the first prediction. Let’s keep in mind that this was Lesnar’s first UFC appearance and he admitted that he had practiced getting out of leglocks about a 1,000 times but somehow got caught in Mir’s. I suspect that Lesnar will be around for a while and will come back more comfortable in the octagon.

Tim Sylvia vs Antonio Nogeuira was the surprise fight of the night for me in terms of the outcome. Nogeuira looked very good and typical of previous performances, he just takes a lot of punishment and then waits for his opponent to tire and then takes advantage.  Nogeuira is now the only  fighter to hold two titles at once time in the UFC – the Pride heavyweight championship along with the UFC heavyweight championship.

The last few UFC PPV events have been fairly good so hopefully this trend continues.

The main event was between BJ Penn and Joe Stevenson. When I first heard about this fight, I honestly did not know who to pick. I really wanted to wait and see what BJ’s attitude would be in terms of training for it. In the past, he had been a bit lazy with his training and if came off as underestimating Joe, then it would be a really tough call. BJ had plenty of interviews where he stated he was taking his career seriously and wanted to leave a legacy behind. He seemed to have a fire in him that had not been seen before. This is why I picked BJ to win. I didn’t expect he would win in the way he did which was basically because of a glancing elbow he landed to Joe’s face  causing excessive bleeding and clearly had a huge impact on the fight’s outcome. BJ landed this elbow cleanly and deliberately which in a mounted position. Although the cut did not officially end due to a cut, it did have a huge effect on the match. This occurrence happens in MMA and is expected. After all, it was BJ’s efforts that put him into a position to accomplish this. Unlike the fight between Couture and Gonzaga which was an incidental broken nose to Gonzaga in a previous UFC pay per view, Joe was cut as a deliberate blow in battle.
Following the fight, BJ was interviewed by Joe Rogan where he uttered “Sean Sherk – you’re dead!” Ironically Sherk had been a guest commentator on the title fight and said nothing negative about BJ the entire time. Sherk entered the octagon and asserted that BJ would have to beat him before he could call himself the champion. BJ came back into the octagon and shook Sean’s hand in a respectful way and said that it would be a good fight. This future matchup should be fantastic.

A heavyweight rematch between Gabriel Gonzaga and Fabricio Werdum ended up being a bit of a surprise. Gonzaga issued several devastating leg kicks to Werdum from the start which caused Werdum to collapse to the ground on a few occasions. One would think with this type of an advantage from the outset, that it would just be a matter of time before Gonzaga finished the job. Werdum managed to turn the tables on Gonzaga and became aggressive until the fight was finished in the second round by Werdum. Gonzaga didn’t look nearly as fresh in the second round which led to questions about this conditioning.

Probably the most disappointing performance was that given by Kendall Grove who was clearly overwhelmed by Jorge Rivera who is several years the elder of Grove. I had gone against Grove the last couple of events and this had proved correct, however; with news of him rededicating himself to training and laying off his marijuana drug habit, I thought the outcome would be different. I should have went with Rivera which is what I originally wanted to do, but I thought I would give the supposed former pothead a chance as there should have been a real sense of urgency for Grove in this fight, but instead he looked weak and got beat down easily.

I bet Jason Lambert is very disappointed after losing to Wilson Gouveia. Lambert was dominating Gouveia until he left himself open and took a shot on the chin that knocked him out. It was mentioned during the broadcast that even Dana White was saying that Lambert was too strong for Gouveia. Suddenly, the fight was over and Lambert had no idea what had happened. I had picked Lambert who really should have one, but got sloppy. He will learn from this mistake though.

Marcus Davis continued his winning streak by defeating Jess Liaudun  by knockout. Davis is an exciting fighter to watch and he just opened himself up to more fierce competition. It will be interesting to see who his next opponent will be. I had picked Davis.

In similar fashion, Alessio Sakara defeated James Lee which helps get Sakara back into the winning column after his loss to Houston Alexander.

Antoni Hardonk got back into the win column as well by defating Colin Robinson easily with a brutal kick and a connecting punch that sent Robinson to the ground. Hardonk still has a lot of climbing to do to get into title contention as this is his first win since being easily disposed of by Frank Mir in his last fight. I picked Colin Robinson although I didn’t know much about him.

Paul Kelly and Paul Taylor in my opinion should get the fight of the night. These gentlemen were true sportsmen and exemplified the respect of the arts to each other and once the opening bell rang, unleashed a flurry of punches that may be unmatched in any other UFC bout.  Paul Kelly ended up winning, but this reminded me somewhat of Griffin vs Bonnar part 1. Only one fighter got a win from this, but neither left as a loser in a proper fan’s mind. I had picked Kelly.

Sam Stout won a decision over Per Eklund. Apparently Sam’s “hands of steel” could not put away Eklund. I picked Stout.

This was not a great PPV, but entertaining enough. Part of the incentive for the UFC is to bring in hometown guys like Paul Taylor, Paul Kelly, Colin Robinson and Marcus Davis (well, Davis is now in Maine but is constantly flashing his Irish descent). While most were entertaining, I am not sure that Colin Robinson put on his best performance. It will be interesting to see the line up for the UFC PPV coming to Canada in April.

In the main event, both Hughes and St. Pierre came out looking confident as the crowd anticipated a great third match between these two high level competitors. GSP looked very dominant in the first round, causing Hughes’ corner to offer him reassurances after the first round. Hughes seemed fairly unphased. The second round was more of a repeat of the first with GSP stuffing not only Hughes’ take down attempts, but taking Hughes to the ground and reddening his face with ground and pound. After GSP wore out and overwhelmed Hughes, he scrambled on the ground with him at first appearing to try a kimura but then grabbing onto Hughes’ arm and cinching in an armbar which forced Hughes to tap. This was an ironic style of victory because Hughes was supposedly the more dominant ground fighter with his stellar wrestling background. St. Pierre demonstrated the new breed of fighter as a weapon in all areas. GSP looked dominant in every aspect of his game. Upon winning, GSP refused to wear the ‘interim’ welterweight belt claiming that Serra was still champion and that he would look forward to a rematch when Serra is healthy. GSP has all the motivation he needs for the rematch with Serra which was an embarrassing loss. If GSP is able to become the undisputed champion at that point, he could be quite an unstoppable force for a long time to come. I picked GSP to win this fight, putting me at 1-0.

Chuch Liddell vs Wanderlei Silva has been one of the most anticipated fights and was finally able to manifest due to Zuffa purchasing Pride where Silva had been fighting. This was a difficult fight to pick for many reasons. Chuck has not looked very good in his last couple of fights and being 38 years old and seemingly not having the same tolerance to age as Couture, he is not the same fighter as he used to be. Even still, a good striker is always dangerous and Chuck’s counterpunching style would seem to fit well with Silva’s aggressive predisposition. I ended up picking Chuck to win this fight and the deciding factor was that it was Silva’s first UFC bout since the Pride acquisition. Very few fighters coming over from Pride have been very impressive in their UFC debut. I had expected that Chuck might be able to knock out Silva and he did land quite a few flurries of strikes that were equivalent to attacks that knocked out previous opponents. Silva did prove that he had a solid chin and stood with Chuck for all three rounds. Silva did look hurt at different times but never went down. Chuck slipped a couple of times but bounced back up and continued. In the end Chuck won a unanimous decision and will start a climb back to the light heavyweight championship. In the meantime, in true Liddell style, he had an after party to attend. My record went to 2-0.

One of the most interesting fights of the night was between Rich “No Love” Clementi and Melvin “The Young Assassin” Guillard. There was a great deal of trash talking between these fighters and the hand gestures continued into the octagon itself as Guillard flipped off Clementi who returned a gesture of his own. In the fight itself, Clementi looked dominant and eventually got Guillard’s back with about a minute left in the first round and upon submission, Clementi made a gesture above Guillard which infuriated the young assassin. Guillard spewed that this feud was not over as he was leaving the octagon. I picked Clementi to win so I moved to 3-0.

A quick run down of the other fights…

Manny Gamburyan made quick work of Nate Mohr submitting him with an ankle lock in the first round and seemed to injur Mohr in the process. I chose Gamburyan to win this fight. I couldn’t go against Manny as he was extremely motivated after having to tap out and forfeit his chance to win the Ultimate Fighter TV show due to a recurring shoulder injury. Still perfect at 4-0.

Undefeated Brazilian Lyoto Machida took on the African Assassin Sokoudjou who was hyped up by a highlight reel showcasing quick and devastating wins. Again, with Sokoudjou being out of his element in the octagon, I chose Machida to continue his winning streak. Although it did surprise a lot of people when Machida won, it was even more shocking to see Lyoto be so dominant over the African. Machida reminds me a lot of Anderson Silva in that he is a very deliberate striker with precision in his movements. Machida could be a real threat at light heavyweight and I think he was too tough of a challenge for Sokodjou in his first UFC fight. I sported a 5-0 record after this fight.

Another newcomer – Sao Palelei took on Eddie Sanchez in the heavyweight division. Eddie Sanchez was expected to lose by many as Sao Palelei had a highlight reel of his own of dominant performances outside of the UFC. Eddie Sanchez stood with Palelei who seemed to gas and eventually the referee stopped the fight after Sanchez had bloodied Palelei’s face to the point where his vision was impaired. I picked Sanchez notching me up to 6-0.

More undercard results:

James Irvin defeated Luiz cane due to a first round disqualification. I picked Irvin, going to 7-0.

Tony DeSouza lost to Roan Carneiro due to a TKO in the second round. This was my first loss causing a 7-1 record.

Canadian Mark Bocek overwhelmed Doug Evans and won a decision. This was my second loss, now 7-2.

Dean Lister won a decision over Jordan Radev. I picked Lister, improving to 8-2.

All in all, this was arguably the best Pay Per View for the UFC of 2007. The UFC really needed an event like this to not only look good on the marquee but also live up to its hype. UFC 79 did not disappoint, offering many entertaining fights. It is consistent events like UFC 79 that will show the rest of the MMA world that they are the leader in the MMA industry.

I’ll discuss the top 3 fights on the card. First up was Paulo Filho vs Chael Sonnen. Chael dominated Filho for the first couple of rounds which surely surprised a lot of people watching. Sonnen made a sloppy mistake with just 5 seconds left in round 2 and was caught in an armbar. Sonnen clearly was in a lot of pain, but after the fight stated that he was not submitting, but instead pleading for the ref not to stop the fight. Regardless, the ref stopped the fight on a submission victory for Filho. In the postfight interview, Sonnen admitted that he should not have gotten caught in the armbar and acquiesced the loss. I personally found this a bit contradictory. I can see Sonnen wanting to be a good sport, but if he really didn’t get submitted, then a real competitor would have been quite disappointed and would have continued the protest. I have a feeling that Sonnen realized that even if he didn’t submit, he would have a broken arm and would not be able to fight and that would have been a worse fate.

WEC 31 marked the return of Jens Pulver to MMA action. Jens was always a smaller 155 lb fighter and despite his successes at that weight class in the UFC, after his loss to BJ Penn, Jens joined the featherweight division at 145 lbs. Jens was undefeated at 7-0 coming into the fight against Cub Swanson who was a hometown favorite. Jens and Cub were previously scheduled to square away months earlier, however; Jens reported a knee injury which delayed the matchup. Cub was outwardly perturbed with this hiatus and at the very least suggested but rather even accused Jens of ducking him. Jens flatly denied any of these claims and demonstrated in the cage that he had nothing to be apprehensive about as he submitted Cub with an anaconda choke only 35 seconds into the first round. While these things happen at times and in some cases are not true indications of a fighters overall ability, but rather a costly lapse of strategy, it still must be a frustrating loss for Cub who had promised to take out his ferocity on Jens. Jens is now touted as the #1 contender for the featherweight title by many. Is just one fight enough to prepare the former UFC lightweight champion for the featherweight title in the WEC? It shouldn’t take long to find out as Jens has asked to fight within the next few months.

So, who would Jens be matched up against for the featherweight title if this should occur? The winner between Urijah Faber and Jeff Curran would produce that opponent. This bout resembled the Chael Sonnen and Paulo Filho fight in many respects. It went past the first round and well into the second with the challenger seemingly dominating. However, as champions always do, Faber rose to the occasion and picked his time to amp up the energy level after Curran may have tired himself trying to gain a more favorable position with which to choke out Faber. Faber cut Curran with some vicious elbows and ended up submitting him with a guillotine choke of his own. After the fight, Faber asserted that he was never in trouble and was prepared to fight for five full rounds if required. Faber also mentioned that it would be an honor to fight Pulver if the WEC puts that match together.

Again, the WEC put on a great show. The undercard was entertaining as well with its own rivalries. As mentioned, the WEC is becoming more successful with more recognizable champions such as Filho, Faber and Doug Marshall who retained his belt as well. Also, the WEC has recognized that the lighter weight classes are a nice market and make for very entertaining fights. With the increased great performances by their champions and bringing new quality fighters into the mix like Jens Pulver, the WEC is doing well to place its own mark in the world of MMA.

Ultimately Huerta will continue his title path and Guida will continue to face top competitors in a stacked lightweight division.

In other action, Mac Danzig did end up getting a victory over Tommy Speer to win the 6 figure UFC contract. Although I do believe that Mac Danzig is a very talented fighter and perhaps he could defeat Tommy Speer in a number of ways, I do not believe that we saw the best Tommy Speer performance.Tommy did not seem himself at all. Perhaps the first time experience of all of the cameras, bright lights and the capacity crowd contributed to his being overwhelmed. Tommy was defeated by a rear naked choke. In many cases, this type of victory is caused by a fighter being too tired to fight back or to a certain extent, acquiescing to a situation.

Jon “War Machine” Koppenhaver found some untapped reserve energy in the third round to mount Jared “J-Roc” Rollins after a very bloody battle. Koppenhaver was very emotional after the fight commending J-Roc on his performance and wishing both could have won. After such a spirited battle from both competitors, surely the UFC and its fans would consider them both winners.

Other winners included George Sotiropolous (over Billy Miles) who looked back on track as well as Ben Saunders edging out Dan Barerra. We will likely see many of these competitors again the UFC as the TV appearance will definitely help their popularity.

There are many fights on this card, however; once again, the worst thing is that many of them unfortunately won’t be televised due to time restrictions. This is really too bad for the fighters because TV exposure is the best way for them to show their skills, become more well known and therefore become a bigger draw at events. This all leads into more financial success and more time dedicated to training and getting higher quality trainers and equipment.

The main event is between the poster boy of the UFC lightweight division – Roger “El Matador” Huerta and Clay “The Carpenter” Guida. These are two very well conditioned guys who each have the stamina to go 3 full rounds at full speed. I have a feeling that this fight will be short for some reason. Everything tells me that this should be a decisioned fight after 3 rounds of torrid action. It seems lately in the UFC, when the outcome appears predictable, something unpredictable happens. Stay tuned.

In other action, there is Mac Danzig vs Tommy Speer for the 6 figure UFC contract. Both guys are very motivated for this award. I would have said that Mac Danzig would win by submission but after I saw Tommy not give up after being in a deep triangle choke and then come back to win in his Ultimate Fighter bout, while covered in his own blood, I don’t see it being that easy to call. If I had to pick a winner, I would say Tommy by decision. I just see him grinding things out. That guy can take a lot of punishment. Mac could still win by submission but it would take a great deal of strength to do it and he could burn himself out trying, ending up vulnerable to a stronger fighter. It should be interesting.

UFC 78 proved to be one of the toughest cards on which to make predictions. I have to say that I have a lot of respect for anyone who earns a shot in the UFC or for that matter anyone that dedicates the time it takes to get into shape and compete in MMA at a high level. Now, with that disclaimer, I was completely disgusted with Spencer “The King” Fisher’s performance at UFC 78. Maybe his opponent Frankie “The Answer” Edgar was just too much and I am not taking anything away from Edgar as I have seen him fight before and he impressed me. However, Fisher looked like he was either hurt prior to coming into the fight or was coming down with a really bad staph infection, but either way, for a guy who hasn’t had a fight in the UFC in quite a while, it was a dismal and embarrassing performance. I’m not just saying that because I picked him to win. Fisher looked winded, disinterested and apathetic.

Now onto something more interesting. Joe “El Dirte” Doerkson vs Ed “Short Fuse” Herman was next up. Doerksen had beaten Herman in the past but that was over 3 years ago and Herman was adamant that things would be different this time. Herman did end up on the right track with an eventual knockout over Doerksen in the third round after wearing him down. Doerksen nearly got a triangle choke win at the end of the second round and I don’t imagine Herman would have been able to escape if it wasn’t for the bell ringing to end the second round. I lost this pick as well, putting me at a dismal 0-2.

Karo “The Heat” Parisyan took on former Pride fighter Ryo Chonan. Neither the crowd nor Karo were happy with his performance, but he did end up with a unanimous decision. As boring as this fight was, I predicted the exact result – Parisyan with a decision. After this fight I was 1-2.

Houston Alexander took on Thiago Silva. This was a very hyped up fight as Houston Alexander had won 2 straight fights in the UFC in a combined under 2 minutes against Keith Jardine (who has defeated Forrest Griffin and Chuck Liddell) and Alessio Sakara who was a reputable boxer. The opponents were very tough but Alexander just walked right through them. This fight ended up disappointing the New Jersey sellout crowd. Alexander displayed a very weak ground game as Thiago Silva who went 12-0 mounted Alexander and pounded him until he went out. As it turns out, Alexander has some work to do on his ground game if he wants to continue to compete in the UFC. I lost this one as well putting me at 1-3. Ouch!

In the main even between “Sugar” Rashad Evans vs Michael “The Count” Bisping, two undefeated fighters and two Ultimate Fighter winners squared off for the first time. This was a crucial fight for both as it would vault the winner into the top 5 light heavyweights. This went to a decision and ended up a split. The US fans really didn’t seem very supportive of Bisping. The fight wasn’t overly exciting as it was fairly predictable with Evans taking down Bisping and The Count getting up each time and not taking any punishment on the ground. Both were about even in the standup but I would say that Rashad won the fight based on his relentless attempts at takedowns. I won this fight so I went to 2-3. I’ve had some really good results in past UFC events so this one is by far my worst, but there was still the undercard…

Joe Lauzon who is 23 years old was next up against the 18-0 Jason Reinhardt who got his first shot in the UFC at 38 years old. The 15 year difference may have proved a factor as Lauzon submitted Reinhardt in the first round with a rear naked choke. Lauzon looked very impressive and dominant which could be in part thanks to him training full time and living in Hawaii and being trained under BJ Penn. I won this fight so I went to an even 3-3 on my picks. The rest of the undercard put me at 5 of 9 correct which is my worst picking so far, but as mentioned at the top of this entry, this was the toughest UFC event to call yet.

Well, I was almost perfect with my picks this time. Yes, I picked Anderson Silva to win over Rich Franklin and Tim Sylvia to win over Brandon Vera. The only fight I lost was the Jorge Gurgel fight.

The Anderson Silva fight was somewhat predictable. Rich Franklin kept saying it would be a war and while the fight did last longer than the first encounter but it was far from a war. Silva displayed how his game is on a whole different level than Franklin’s or any other middleweight he has fought since coming to the UFC. He dismantled Chris Leben and dominated both Nate Marquardt and Travis Lutter. It’s hard to imagine that anyone in that division will be able to take the belt away from Silva anytime soon.  Franklin is now in a very odd position in that he can appear to defeat anyone else in the middleweight division other than Silva. Franklin can continue to fight the same guys reproving himself and then become the #1 contender again. Facing Silva again would be futile unless Franklin made some serious improvements to his skills. Franklin is a big guy for a middleweight. He could try going up to light heavyweight to test his skills there for a while. At least he would see some new competition. Frankin is already cutting to get to 185 so he could easily get to 205. It will be interesting to see what will come next for Rich.

The crowd is never happy with Tim Sylvia even though he has defeated just about every heavyweight out there. When Sylvia fought Randy Couture and lost his title, he was still ailing from major back problems and while Sylvia still didn’t look fantastic against Vera, he did enough to neutralize Vera’s threats and keep his talents at bay. The funniest part of that fight was Vera’s post fight interview when asked if he would drop to light heavyweight after losing, Vera asked the crowd if they felt that Sylvia had kicked his ass to which the audience resoundingly responded with boos and Vera indicated “then I guess I will stay at heavyweight bitches!!!!”. What a great way to end the fight. It was probably more entertaining than the fight itself.

The only pick I lost was the Jorge Gurgel fight. After watching Jorge’s last fight where his cardio looked great and he kept the pressure on for all 3 rounds, showing great heart, I knew he would come into his hometown and put forth a good effort. Unfortunately, Alvin Robinson had too much firepower and talent and own handily. What was really classy and loyal was seeing Gurgel corner Rich Franklin even though his face was battered and taped up.

There are basically two main events for this pay per view.

First is Rich Franklin trying to avenge his title loss to Anderson Silva. Rich does seem a lot more refocused for this fight, but Silva is a very well rounded fighter. A lot of fighters are classified as ‘well rounded’ but Silva is not mediocre at a few things, he is outstanding at numerous aspects of the game. As much as I like Franklin and respect his game, I have a hard time seeing him winning this fight.

Brandon “The Truth” Vera will challenge Tim “The Maine-iac” Silvia for a contender spot for the heavyweight championship title vacated by Randy Couture. Some herald Vera as the new breed and future of the heavyweight division. He is a perfect 8-0 although the criticism is that he is untested. Silvia did not look very good in his last few outings including a title loss to Couture; however, Silvia has since had his back injury taken care of and claims to be in top form. There are two questions for this match – which Tim Silvia will we see and even if we see the best Tim Silvia, can that version beat Vera? This should be a great fight. Vera hasn’t found in the UFC due to managerial issues but says he has been training the whole time. Training is not the same as fighting, but Vera will be truly tested facing Silvia at UFC 77.

A lot of people were shocked that Forrest Griffin picked Mauricio “Shogun” Rua as his next opponent. After watching Shogun’s Brother “Ninja” lose decisively to Robbie Lawler in EliteXC, I had the impression that Chutebox wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. I knew Forrest had incredible heart as well so I picked Forrest to win by decision. Griffin ended up finishing Rua just 15 seconds before the fight was over. This was a bit annoying for me because I picked Griffin to win by decision, if he had just let the fight go to the scorecards

Jon Fitch went up against crowd favorite Diego Sanchez. I actually had seen Fitch fight before and after seeing Diego’s uninspired loss to Koschek, I decided to go with Fitch which turned out to be a wise choice as he won a decision.

Overall, I went 6 for 9 including the undercard picks. Not too bad considering some of the undercard fighters I had never heard of before.

Luckily for MMA fans, these other organizations have some great fighters that may or may not have had some Octagon time and are now thriving elsewhere and a good example of that is someone like Robbie Lawler. Also, it can be a place where fighters can prove themselves perhaps for the first time or maybe for a comeback like Nick Diaz.

The free televised card started off with Jake Shields vs Renato Verissimo. Shields looked like he might have been in trouble at one point but quickly turned the tables and dominated with ground and pound and earned a TKO victory. This was a good fight, but it was over quickly. Shields overmatched Verissimo on this night.

The most peculiar match of the night was between Gina Carano and Tonya Evinger. This was the first women’s bout I had seen in a high profile event like this EliteXC one, but that isn’t what made it seem odd to me. First, for those of you who don’t know, Gina is known as the poster girl for women’s MMA. There is every reason for promoters to want to see her do well and push her popularity as she is a perfect marketing tool. She has talent and the look. In the fight with Tonya Evinger, it seemed very clear to me that Tonya was stronger than Gina and when the fight went to the ground (an area Gina isn’t nearly as skilled in compared to her standup), it was definitely to Evinger’s advantage. Strangely though, seconds before the round ended when it seemed that Evinger was in total control, Evinger gave up her dominant position and looked like she went limp flat on the ground, giving her back and neck to Carano for a rear naked choke victory. Evinger looked disgusted when Carano’s hand was raised in victory. I know it’s terrible to think of something like this being set up and maybe I’m tainted by all those years of my youth watching wrestling entertainment, but it just didn’t feel right to me.

Joey Villasenor took on up and comer Riki Fukuda. This was an excellent fight. It went the distance and both of these guys proved their each have good chins. This fight was very evenly matched and exciting to watch. This was basically a gatekeeper match in my eyes with Villasenor proving he still has some fight in him, but beating a younger opponent after a full three rounds.

Nick Diaz was in his first fight since coming off a 6 month suspension for testing positive for marijuana use causing his victory over Gomi to be ruled a no contest. Diaz has been very outspoken in interviews indicating that he had been using marijuana for numerous fights in the past and was never tested for it. He also stated that he was high for the recent marathon he participated in.  He has also said that he will never test positive for marijuana again. Versus “Iron” Mike Aina,  Diaz showed his precision boxing skills while Aina used more of a brawl style. Both fighters stayed in the fight and competed very well. I personally thought Aina had won the fight but it was a close decision. It did end up being a close decision going to Diaz which wasn’t very pleasing to the hometown crowd. It’s one of those decisions that reinforces that it is always best not to let a fight go to the judges, but I certainly wouldn’t call the decision unjust in any way. It really could have gone either way. I thought Aina was more aggressive and I don’t know why Diaz didn’t use more of his BJJ skills because I do believe he could have got a submission. Either way, it was a very entertaining fight.

In the main event, “Ruthless” Lawler took on Mauricio “Ninja” Rua who had said that although he respected the Miletich camp, that he felt that Chutebox was better. From the start of this start, I could tell that Lawler was in better shape and was just biding his time, looking to figure out his timing, while Rua just threw shots. It seemed only a matter of time before Lawler got his chance to rip apart Rua’s standup. In the third round, Lawler got his chance as it was very clear that Rua had gassed himself and along with Lawler figuring out the timing on taking his shots, proved to be the advantage Lawler capitalized on. Lawler connected on a glancing uppercut and then timed a few other punches perfectly until Rua hit the canvass and then in trademark style, Lawler reared back his right arm and leveled several haymakers while Rua was on the ground. Lawler ended up walking out with the Elite XC belt. I was really impressed with Lawler’s patience in this fight.

In the post fight press conference, Diaz, who would have seemed to go on forever as he appeared to in his post fight interview, thanked Elite XC and referred to Aina as “this guy” several times. Also, Elite XC’s live promoter Gary Shaw made a point of saying that Elite XC would have as many weight classes as necessary to keep fighters healthy and that he felt that having to cut weight was a concern and should be avoided when fighters are not in a good position to rehydrate themselves. It certainly seems to be attracting a lot of attention from the fighters and their payouts are quite comparable to UFC’s so it could set a nice precedent.

This Elite XC event was just as entertaining as virtually any UFC PPV I have seen and frankly was probably better than the last 4 or 5 in recent recollection. Excellent job Elite XC!

The story of the night more than anything else was the ability to come back from adversity in fights. And on to the results…

Houston Alexander was first up against Alessio Sakara. Alexander was coming off a quick knockout vicory of Keith Jardin who will be fighting Chuck Liddell next (not sure how that makes any sense). Alexander came out explosive as he did in his previous fight, determined to show that is last victory was not a fluke as he mentioned in pre fight interviews. Alexander did end up overwhelming Sakara and seemed to prove himself as a real legitimate contender at light heavyweight. I had picked Alexander so I was 1-0 after this fight.

Next up was Marcus “The Irish Hand Grenade” Davis vs hometown favorite “Relentless” Paul Taylor.  Taylor caught Davis with a crushing leg kick to the side of the head, knocking Davis over and it appeared that the fight was all but over. Davis kept his composure and went into a clinch on the ground and finally recovered and turned the tables on Taylor, overpowering him. It was a nice comeback for Davis for sure. I had picked Davis to win, putting me at 2-0 at that point.

Mirko Cro Cop who was knocked out in highight reel fashion by Gabriel Gonzaga was opposing Cheick Kongo who looked menacingly larger and more fit when the two met in the middle of the ring for the refs instructions. Cro Cop appeared slightly more aggressive in the early going, but it was Kongo was seemed to dominate and push the pace, eventually getting Cro Cop to back up. It  was disappointing to see Cro Cop in this state after he said he was embarrassed from the Gonzaga fight. I was really disappointed with Cro Cop’s performance and expected much better from him. It seemed like he was avoiding another knockout at any cost. He looked far too tentative. I had picked Cro Cop to win, putting me at 2-1.

The end of The Ultimate Fighter  3 would have pitted Matt “The Hammer” Hamill against Michael “The Count” Bisping if it wasn’t for Hamill suffering a concussion and not being able to compete. Hamill had been calling out Bisping in email interviews and such so there was some bad blood between the two leading up to this fight. The fight overall was very back and forth, but I strongly felt that Hamill was more aggressive and had Bisping backing up most of the time. Hamill’s standup was much improved, indicated in part of cuts under each of Bisping’s eyes.  The fight ended up going to a decision. One judge had scored the fight 30-27 for Hamill while the two others probably didn’t want to get stabbed in the London parking lot and gave 29-28 scores to Bisping. Situations like this make me feel like the location of the venue affect the judging. It made me feel sick to my stomach. Hamill won this fight in my mind. I really don’t know how anyone in their right mind could give this fight to Bisping, but that’s why it’s always better not to let a fight go to the scorecards. I did pick Bisping to win, this upped me to 3-1.

Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and “Dangerous” Dan Henderson’s title unification bout surprisingly went all five rounds and the proper decision was made as Jackson won a unanimous  decision. Henderson clearly looked winded as the rounds went on. I had picked Jackson to win. I ended up 4-1 on the televised picks.

Disappointing again was that the UFC did not televise the undercard. I have not seen these fights but do plan on watching them as they tend to be some of the best ones to watch – especially the lightweights.

There is another UFC event in two weeks. It will be interesting to see if the UFC will keep up this pace of events. From a marketing and business point of view, it would be a good idea as the popularity is peaking right now.

Also, disappointing is the fact that three of the best fights were not shown on the PPV. The two lightweight fights and also the Babalu fight were not televised as part of the PPV. The Babalu fight was probably the fight that was most discussed after the PPV as it had controversy relating to Babalu apparently intentionally holding a choke after the referee signaled to let go and Babalu apparently waited until Heath passed out.

The end result was that Babalu was fined his $25,000 fight bonus and also released from his contract from the UFC and this fight was foolishly not even a part of the PPV. I ended up going 8 for 9 on my picks. The only fight I lost was the Frank Mir fight against Antoni Hardonk. I wasn’t sure that Frank was ready to come back yet but it looks like he did very well. I like Mir and hope he continues his winning in the UFC.

The next UFC event is on September 15 from London where Michael Bisping will try to continue his winning streak in front of the home crowd. This event is going to be televised free on Spike. Let’s hope for a full card to show and some good fights where we truly get to find out which is the better fighter.

Main Event – Gabriel “Napao” Gonzaga challenges Randy “The Natural” Couture for the heavweight title. Of course the big tagline for this fight is that Gonzaga knocked out Mirco Cro Cop. Although it was an impressive and unexpected knockout, it could have been a lucky kick as well. I don’t see Couture suffering the same fate. Couture is successful because of his mental game and physical preparation – he is in phenomenal shape for any age, let alone a guy in his 40’s. Gonzaga is a highly skilled fighter as well and he does have as good a chance as many to beat Couture, but I don’t see it happening. Couture can be a little bit short lived when it comes to belts, it’s as if he just wants to prove a point and then let it go sometimes. Anyway, I’m still going with Couture in this one.

Georges “Rush” St Pierre vs Josh Koschek. St Pierre will likely win this one, he is too hungry to get the belt back after losing, Koschek is still very young and has lots of time to make his move to champion status. Something to watch for — watch St. Pierre and the low blows. He has a tendency to do this in his fights. The only way I seeing Koscheck winning this fight is in a borefest with two overly cautious fighters, otherwise, Pierre will catch him with a knockout or win by decision. I don’t see Koscheck being submitted.

Renato “Babalu” Sobral vs David Heath. I really would like to Sobral make a comeback. He has a great record and has only really lost to champions. It’s an important fight for Babalu, if he loses, he will need to fight some scabs to make his way back up.

Two Lightweight bouts: Roger Huerta vs Alberto Crane and Clay Guida vs Marcus Aurelio. All I can say is that I hope they show both of these fights, because the lightweights usually end up stealing the show.

Once again, I will likely not order this only because Rogers does not show these events in HD. If Rogers makes this available in HD, they can consider me a monthly subscriber to them, but until then, I’m not paying $40 for a regular quality tv broadcast.

Hermes Franca challenged for the lightweight title. Hermes had dropped to his knees, begging Dana White for a title shot in true GSP form and he ended up getting his chance. The fight went the full duration of 25 miunutes. Sherk dominated the fight, taking Franca to the ground at will and then controlling him like a rag doll from there. Franca was successful with kneeing Sherk in the head at the start of nearly every round but Sherk’s hard skull endured the strike each time and then the match continued with Sherk’s ground domination. Surely, lots of fans considered this a boring fight, but Sherk’s impressive ground skills for those who appreciated the tenacity demonstrated by the Muscleshark. Sherk took a unanimous decision victory. The only downfall is that he was only paid $28,000 for his efforts.

The Ortiz and Evans fight ended up a draw due to Ortiz grabbing the fence too much and being deducted a point. This may have worked in Tito’s favor because he seemed even happier at the idea of a rematch. Considering his $210,000 payout, the next fight promises to garner more attention and a bigger earning for him. Tito appears ready to retire and trying to build up enough money to comfortably do so. It likely would have been a worse scenario had Ortiz dominated or outright won. Ortiz did clearly dominate in the first round but seemed to weaken as Evans got stronger through the next two rounds. Ortiz did report a couple of injuries after the fight. While this may not go to 3 fights like the Ortiz / Shamrock rivalry, a rematch is already a done deal. If Ortiz is healthy and wants to prove something, he has the capacity to win.

In the Middleweight championship bout, it was Anderson Silva vs Nate Marquardt. Even though the UFC tried to tout up Nate as much as possible for the fight, he was easily disposed of by Silva’s precision strikes. The best news about this result is that it sets up a rematch between Rich Franklin and Anderson. These are two class act fighters that always keep things exciting so whichever PPV this is shown on, is well worth the price of admission.

Overall, “Stacked” wasn’t a failure by any stretch, however; it definitely did not live up to to its billing.

Anderson Silva makes his second title defense, this time against Nate Marquardt. Surely Rich Franklin is hoping Silva wins so he can have a rematch for the title.  I would expect Franklin to win if a rematch took place.

Also on the card is Hermes Franca challenging for the Lightweight title owned by Sean “The Muscleshark” Sherk.  If Franca fights at his best, he should win the title. The last time Sherk fought, he looked gassed in the third round. It has been a long time since Sherk fought in a UFC event as well and this will be his first title defense since winning the belt in a fight against Kenny Florian who is back himself to take on Alvin Robinson. In another lightweight even Frank Edgar is going to battle Mark Bocek which should be interesting since both fighter are undefeated. Edgar is a very exciting fighter to watch.

Stephan Bonnar and Jorge Gurgel also make appearances on the card. This should definitely be a great show.

The lightweight battle was between Clay Guida and Tyson Griffin. Once again, the lightweights demonstrated amazing conditioning and excitement in the fight. There were numerous submission attempts and take downs. There was not a great deal of standup but the transitioning and striking from the ground was equally entertaining. Although the fight was very close, it was Guida who looked more fresh in the third round and was more in control overall. Griffin did a great job of defending and being offensive even in defensive positions, but Guida looked like he wrapped things up in the third round by being on top for the majority of the round. Surprisingly, the judges awarded the fight to Griffin. The crowd was very displeased with the announcement and booed Griffin. In the post fight interview, Griffin did mention that the fight could have gone either way. Ultimately, the decision wasn’t the most important thing about the fight, but rather it was the conditioning of the competitors and entertaining nature of the fight itself. Either of these guys are worthy of PPV status.

Jason MacDonald fought his third TUF fighter (after beating 2 others: Ed Herman and Chris Leben), Rory Singer. These fighters were very evenly matched in the 185 lb division. Jason last lost to Rich Franklin but was looking to get back on track. After the first round, MacDonald looked a lot like he did in the Franklin fight. Singer was in control overall and had a few submission attempts as well as doing well in hte standup. In the second round, MacDonald did well to listen to his corner who instructed him to make sure he mounted Singer do some striking. In the end, the fight was stopped due to ground and pound by MacDonald.  This makes three victories over TUF competitors for MacDonald.

The Forrest Griffin vs Hector Ramirez fight displayed a very different Forrest Griffin. Forrest spent the rounds picking his shots instead of engaging in flurries. Ramirez had no answer and was looking more for a brawl which never happened. Eventually, Griffin picked apart Ramirez which led to referee stoppage. Forrest must be very relieved that he is back in the running again. Ramirez seemed a bit gassed as the fight went on.

The Main Event featured Rich Franklin vs Yushin Okami. There was a great deal of talk about Okami’s strength before this fight. This fight went the 3 round duration. Franklin did appear to overpower Okami on several occasions. Okami did not mount any offense of any significance until the third round where he almost submitted Franklin a few times. Franklin ended up winning a unanimous decision at 29-28. Franklin did look fairly impressive and appears ready to fight to regain his middleweight title against the winner of Anderson Silva vs Nathan Marquart.

Overall, it was a pretty good PPV despite there being no title matches. The UFC has already announced the cards for the next two PPV events which look very good.

Jason “The Athlete” MacDonald vs Rory Singer. Jason lost to Rich Franklin who seems to be back on track (more on Rich below) but has put on some really stellar performances but was clearly overmatched by Franklin. Rory singer, who was a contestant on The Ultimate Fighter, has had a few impressive fights since the tv show. I would predict that MacDonald would win this one, but Singer won’t be a pushover.

Forrest Griffin vs Hector Ramirez. Forrest is coming off a devastating knockout loss to Keith Jardine. Forrest, as always is a consummate hard worker and described as someone who works too hard at times by Randy Couture. Forrest, who is a very popular fan favorite, needs to win this fight to get back on track. Ramirez will come fully prepared and this should be a fairly even fight. This will come down to a lucky punch or who is in better shape. Griffin has indicated that he won’t quit.

Tyson Griffin vs Clay Guida is a lightweight contest that will likely end up stealing the show. Many fans feel that the lightweights are the most entertaining fighters to watch. Watch the last UFC PPV’s and you’ll see why. Tyson Griffin is one of the most entertaining fighters to watch. His conditioning is excellent and he is well rounded. Don’t miss this one!

The main event is Rich Franklin vs Yushin Okami. There is a lot of anticipation for this one. For Rich Franklin, this fight means everything. He must win this. If Franklin loses, it will inevitably look like his decline in the sport after an amazing run of title defenses. Yushin is not going to be an easy victory though. He has won 6 fights in a row against decent opponents. While I do believe Franklin can win this fight and even make it look impressive, it will be interesting to see what Franklin thinks of the rumored super human strength of Okami. Mike Swick was heard in his corner saying how strong Okami was.

Although there is no title defense on this card, it will definitely set up the winner of the Franklin vs Okami fight to challenge for the title from the winner of Silva vs Nathan Marquart.

And onto the fights…

The first televised fight was Chris Leben vs. Kalib Starnes. This overall was a pretty good fight. There were different parts where it seemed either guy could win. Both fighters looked fairly gassed though as this one went the full 3 rounds and ended in a decision for Kalib Starnes.

Next was Keith Jardine vs Houston Alexander. Jardine was irritated in a pre-fight interview indicating that he was frustrated that he was being made to fight Alexander prior to getting a title shot. At the start of the fight, it seemed like Jardine might be right as he appeared to catch Alexander with a punch that dazed him. Following that, Alexander ignited into a flurry of his own punches and eventually knocked out Jardine with an uppercut that made his knees buckle. It will be interesting to see what Jardine says after this one.

Then it was was Terry Martin (so called Mike Tyson lookalike) vs. Ivan Salaverry. Martin was very confident coming in saying it was a mistake for his Salaverry to even take the fight. Martin did end up dominating the fight winning on referee stoppage.

Josh Burkman against Karo Parisyan had a lot of pre-fight tension. The fighters refused to touch gloves in the ring and stood with their faces pressed together while the referee uttered instructions for the fight. The first couple of rounds were fairly even, but I would give the edge to Parisyan as he seemed to control the pace and his punches were landing more squarely while Burkman missed with numerous haymaker style shots. Burkman looked a lot more winded going into the third round than Parisyan.  In the third round, both fighters looked a bit winded.  Parisyan ended up winning a unanimous decision at the end of the fight. Parisyan then pleaded with Dana White for a title shot.

The fight between Din Thomas and Jeremy Stephens who is making his UFC debut at the age of 21 had a great opportunity.  Although Stephens was dominated on the ground in the first round, Stephens did an excellent job avoiding any submissions including several attempts by Thomas to sink in a rear naked choke. Right before the end of the first round, Stephens managed to stand up and then aggressively threw a flurry of punches.  In the second round, there was a controversial stoppage as it didn’t look like Stephens tapped but Thomas has the armbar locked in so hard that he would have broken Stephens’ arm if the fight hadn’t been stopped.

The Main Event was  a rematch between Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Chuck “The Iceman” Liddell. Rampage is the only fighter to defeat Chuck Liddell where Liddell had not avenged the defeat. Liddell looked very loose coming into the octagon while Jackson looked extremely focused. Liddell was not overly aggressive at the start of the fight and Jackson signaled for Liddell  to bring it. Once the exchanges began, Liddell went for a body shot and upon coming up, Jackson caught him with a right cross that sent Liddell to the canvas. From there, Jackson laid into Liddell until McCarthy stopped the fight.  Liddell didn’t argue the decision but seemed quite dazed after the fight.

Yet another Championship fight upset took place.  This has been an interesting year showing Franklin’s loss to Silva, Hughes loss to St. Pierre followed by St. Pierre’s loss to Serra and now Liddell’s loss to Jackson. There are no guarantees in MMA which is what makes it so exciting to watch.

I’ve seen Chuck in some interviews and I have a feeling that concussions have gotten the best of him. Chuck has a fighter’s spirit but maybe it’s time to consider going out a legend.

Hometown favorite Michael Bisping won his bout after dominating it for its duration until he was in danger of being submitted, then came back with a barrage of ground and pound until it was over. Bisping’s young son ran into the ring to offer congratulations and was just in time to hear the post fight interview where Bisping uttered obscenities.

The rest of the headliners were fairly uneventful. Notably, Cheick Kongo and Andre Arlovski were both victorious in their contests, seemingly fighting not to lose instead of putting on a good show for the fans.

UFC 71 is approaching where Chuck Liddell will defend his Light Heavyweight belt against the only unavenged competitor who has defeated him in the past. There have been so many titles changing hands lately other than Liddell’s that he appears to be the only mainstay champion.

It would be nice to see more lightweight fights at 155 lbs. Where the hell is Sean Sherk these days anyway? Let’s get going on watching these guys who are the most exciting and well conditioned athletes in the sport!

WARNING – Do NOT read this if you have not watched UFC 69, it will contain spoilers! UFC 69 was another decent pay per view. This time I did not order it as my cable company provider does not seem to show the UFC pay per view events on one of their HD channels (I’ll have to ask them about that). It was still a good showing overall.

In the main event, Matt Serra surprised probably everyone other than himself by earning a tko of George St. Pierre in the first round. Everyone has a puncher’s chance and Serra caught St. Pierre with a shot to the back of the head that dazed him and it was over from there. St. Pierre will definitely want a rematch but I would instead like to see Serra go up against Matt Hughes and then see the winner of that match face St. Pierre. On a side note, in reference to a previous blog where I mentioned I had noticed a tendency for George St. Pierre to give several low blows to opponents, he did not utter even one in this match, nonetheless, it was a defeat, not a victory.

The best fight by far was the lightweight bout between Roger Huerta and Leonard Garcia. The entire fight was a slugfest with a few well timed take downs. While at times the fighters did seem out of breath, they showed great heart and put on a fantastic show for the fans, neither of them getting gassed. Each had a puncher’s chance to end the fight and it was truly a battle of the iron jaw and neither fell. Huerta did get the better of Garcia and admitted that he came into this fight in the best shape of his life where Garcia had only one month to prepare. Had this type of fight been the finale of The Ultimate Fighter TV show, surely Dana White would have awarded two contracts. A rematch should ensue for sure.

Hometown favorite Mike “Quick” Swick seemed to have no answer for Yushin Okami who overpowered Swick throughout the fight. The only bright point for Swick was when he connected with a few shots and had Okami stumble a little but Swick was not nearly agressive enough on his standup and Okami wore Swick out on the ground to the point where Swick was both demoralized and spent of energy. Swick had looked very impressive until this fight.

There was a lot of hype built up for the fight between Diego “Nightmare” Sanchez who brought his undefeated record of 19-0 into the cage against fellow former Ultimate Fighter TV show entrant Josh Koscheck. Koscheck outwardly admitted that he found Diego’s style of staring down his opponent and then performing zen like hand gestures annoying. Koscheck did fight intelligently though as he seemed to lull Diego’s Nightmare moniker into a harmless Daydream as Koscheck was hardly touched throughout the 15 minute duration. Probably more damaging to both competitors and to the sport itself was the incessant booing by the fans who were clearly watching a boring fight. Surprisingly, even when Diego must have known he was losing, his level of intensity did not change. Koscheck ended up winning a unanimous decision after 3 rounds and was clearly gloating afterwards announcing Sanchez’ record now as 19-1. Koshcheck may be in the running for a title shot before long.

Finally Kendal Grove won by a choke submission against Alan Belcher and inevitably earned the submission of the night due to it being the only televised submission victory.

Speaking of televised, there were 3 other fights that were not even televised on the pay per view. When fans are spending $40 to watch a pay per view as the company would like, it would be nice to be able to see the show in its entirety.

This time around it is George St. Pierre who won the welterweight belt from Matt Hughes and then was scheduled in a previous pay per view but could not perform due to injury. St Pierre will fight Matt Serra who won the Ultimate Fighter TV show in the welterweight division. Serra is very tenacious and will not go down without a fight, he has won fights in decisions due to his resilience alone. St Pierre will need to employ his precision placement of punches and kicks. I have personally only seen St. Pierre fight about 3 times and each time he had several low blows against his opponent so I will be watching to see if there is a trend.

On the official UFC 69 website, it does indicate that four of the scheduled bouts may not be televised. This could mean that some of the best fights may not be seen. Probably the most anticipated fight is between Josh Koschek and Diego Sanchez. Each were contestants on the Ultimate Fighter TV show. Each has done very well after running up very successful records. Another fighter that is nearly always exciting to watch is Mike “Quick” Swick. He will face Yushin Okami who has an impressive 20-3 record.

Certainly the most impressive and exciting fight was the Couture vs. Sylvia bout which brought Couture out of retirement. The 43 year old Couture looked far more conditioned than the giant 6′8″ Sylvia who looked winded after even the first round. Couture opened with a nice combination within the first 15 seconds that rocked Sylvia causing the already excited crowd to erupt in anticipation of an early underdog knockout.  Couture did exactly what he said he would do – he shot in close to Sylvia to take away his reach advantage and then took Sylvia down at will and attempted some submissions and the usual ground and pound. Sylvia had been quite arrogant in interviews and was booed throughout most of the fight. The fans rejoiced when Couture earned a decision victory after the completion of 5 rounds. Sylvia looked like a 43 year old punching bag while Couture came out relatively unscathed. Sylvia also mentioned in the post fight interview that he was injured going into the fight which resulted in more crowd disgust which caused Sylvia to attempt to mitigate his comments by indicating that Couture still deserved to win.  Couture has certainly proved his point. At 43, he is a force in the UFC. What remains to be seen is who will face Couture for the belt next and how long Couture will stay in the sport this time around.

The Heavyweight title on the line in the contest between Randy “The Natural” Couture vs. Tim “The Maine-iac” Sylvia. Randy is coming out of retirement to challenge for the belt. While some critics may feel like the title shot is being handed to Couture prematurely, Couture has kept himself in great shape following his retirement along with the fact that there really isn’t a lot of competition in the heavyweight division excluding Mirko Cro Cop who just recently entered the UFC. Couture has uttered some critical words of Sylvia claiming that Sylvia fights to not lose his title instead of trying to win convincingly like a true champion. Couture’s words do ring true as while Sylvia has won his last few title defenses, he has not done so in convincing fashion. His rematch against Andrei Arlovski was downright boring in parts and when Sylvia defended against Jeff Monson, Sylvia did defend take downs very well and even Monson’s submission attempts even to the extent that Sylvia had Monson in vulnerable positions on a few occasions. Yet, Sylvia never looked as dominating in either fight as his menacing size would appear to permit. Sylvia seems irked by Couture’s comments and this may be the motivation for Sylvia to demonstrate what he has been lacking on a large stage.

With great anticipation I have been eagerly awaiting Matt Hughes and Rich Franklin returning to action. Both looked virtually unstoppable prior to each losing their respective titles in convincing fashion to George St. Pierre and Anderson Silva. Hughes and Franklin are both awesome competitors and how they respond to adversity as true champions will be tested at UFC 68. Hughes will face Chris Lytle of The Ultimate Fighting Championship TV Series acclaim and Franklin will face Jason “The Athlete” MacDonald who is a solidly built up and comer who has consecutive wins in the UFC. Both should be good battles.

The rest of the fights involve fighters trying to make their mark in the UFC including Matt Hamil, the deaf competitor from The Ultimate Fighter TV series. Also, there are two fights at the 155 pound division taking place which is likely the most exciting weight class to watch.

The UFC has planned well for this pay per view (perhaps at the expense of the last one). This one is probably the best lineup in a long time. If you ever had thoughts of ordering a UFC ppv, this is the one to get – especially if you have an HDTV.

Here are the highlights from UFC 67… UFC 67 marked the debut of Quinton “Rampage” Jackson who battled Marvin “The Beastman” Eastman. This fight was less than exciting and was partially explained by Rampage following his victory by attributing it to nerves on his part.

The other debut was of Miko Cro Cop who apparently obtained his moniker due to being a Croatian Police Officer in the anti-terrorist unit in his off time from UFC. Cro Cop’s debut was the most impressive of any of the recent new acquisitions, scoring a KO of Eddie Sanchez in the heavyweight division.
In the title fight, there was a lot of accompanying drama as Travis Lutter who a lot of people gave a decent chance to contend for Anderson Silva’s title, did not make weight. Lutter does not have a coach as he prepares himself. It was clear that Lutter was very disappointed as even though the bout still took place, it was no longer for the middleweight title. At times Lutter looked as though he may be in control – especially on the ground, but Lutter appeared to gas out and Silva ended up getting an arm bar locked in tight and then rained elbows on Lutter’s head causing him to tap. Following the fight, throaty screamer Rogan conducted his usual interview with the victor and Silva was the most animated I have ever seen him, grabbing the microphone and exclaiming in his native language. Silva had indicated that he was somewhat insulted by Lutter not making weight and disappointing the fans. Silva appears to be a man of principle in that he values respect among fighters above all else as well as the fans who show their support. Silva may be champion for quite a while.

Without a doubt, the most exciting bout of the night was between Tyler Griffin and Frankie Edgar who clashed in a lightweight fight. These warriors exhibited every exciting component of an entertaining UFC contest. Both fighters were very well prepared in terms of cardio conditioning as you never saw either fighter get gassed throughout the 3 rounds that were completed. The see-saw battle almost seemed scripted in the sense that it showcase excellent ground skills, transitions and standup. Many fans feel that the lightweight division is the most exiting and these two fighters are adding to the list. Even though Griffin lost the decision, he fought so well that he should be considered for many future opportunities and at only 22 years old, this will surely happen at his will with his continued training.

Dana White is trying to make the UFC more exciting and is doing a reasonable job in doing so, however; lately the Pay Per Views could be more well constructed. UFC 68 appears to be one worth ordering. Let’s hope this is used as a blueprint for future PPV’s.

Also on the card was Chris Leben from the Ultimate Fighter Season 1 fame vs Jason “The Athlete” MacDonald hailing from Edmonton, Alberta. Jason MacDonald took advantage of an odd angled choke causing Leben to attempt to tap before passing out.

Crowd favorite Forrest Griffin suffered a devastating defeat in the first round. Forrest was basically knocked out on his feet in the first round. Griffin collapsed in emotional agony after realizing his loss. Forrest, who is described as one of the hardest working guys in the UFC, will most certainly be back.

A reminder to anyone who views UFC fighters as one dimensional brawlers was given a clear reminder of the efforts given to this sport by these dedicated competitors. Losing is tough in any sport but with the UFC everyone has a punchers chance at winning and training hard can definitely get you physically prepared for a fight but once you are in the octagon, anything can happen and the result can be devastatingly disproportionate compared to the hard work, sacrifices and injuries. There is no other sport that offers such instant elation in the course of a fight and such vulnerability to sudden devastation. This is one of the reasons why the UFC is one of the most exciting sports around.

I am especially looking forward to this one because it is the first ppv I will be ordering since getting my new HD widescreen tv. There is a specific web page with everyone showing on the card and analysis linked off the main UFC site.

The fight at the 155 lb weight class was also quite good. It featured Kenny “KenFlo” Florian vs. Sean “The Muscle Shark” Sherk. Kenny was known for his participation on The Ultimate Fighter which may not have yielded the best results, but in his defense he was fighting at the wrong weight class. Sean Sherk, known for his immaculately impressive physique, had been dominant over his opponents and boasted losses only to the most elite competitors who handed him those defeats at a higher weight class. The fight went the distance and the only concern was the cut that was opened on the top of Sherk’s head by one of Florian’s sharp elbows. Blood poured out round through round as this occured in the second frame. The blood seemed to be as much of a problem for Florian as Sherk as when Sherk was in the mount position, blood spouted into Florian’s eyes and face. Thankfully doctors allowed the fight to continue and Sherk was crowned Champion. The title was previously vacant as Jens Pulver had left after winning the title and the 155 class eroded but now appears to be back and as popular as ever.

Although there had been some disappointing turnouts from some competitors in previous pay per views, UFC may not have exhibited its title very well, but it surely did not disappoint. There were pleny of other great fights on the card as well.

The fight last about 2 or so minutes into the first round and ended almost exactly as the second installment as I mentioned. What was probably more entertaining than the fight itself were the ring entrances (notably Ortiz who always has a decent entrance) and the aftermath. John McCarthy stopped the fight after Ken could not defend himself and probably let it go a bit further than necessary but still not far enough to get any flack. Ken was unable to even get up on his own power after eating the barrage of fists and elbows from Ortiz. Finally after Ken rose to his feet with some assistance, he immediately wanted to go and see Ortiz who promptly flipped him off shortly after his typical gravedigger re-enactment. Ken still persisted on wanting to see him and although the fans could not hear Ken’s words, it seemed like a sincere appreciation for Ortiz’ efforts not only in this fight but in ones past and future – a passing of the torch. Ortiz appeared to respond more respectfully and they embraced with the crowd cheering at the end.

Although a lot of people are not Ortiz fans because of antics in the past (he is tagged as the “Huntington Beach Bad Boy” after all, please remember that it was Shamrock who behaved in a suspiciously contrived oppositional manner on TUF 3 where they were coaches for opposing teams. Ortiz did well to put his personal feelings aside and did an excellent job training his team of fighters which was evident in their destruction of team Shamrock who felt cheated by the lack of focus and training Ken provided. As accomplished as Ken is as a UFC fighter, he appeared to behave selfishly almost fixated on just having a good time and goading Ortiz in an attempt to raise the hype, perhaps in preparation for his retirement, trying to make a few extra bucks? Only Ken will truly know, but it certainly looked more than suspicious. So, it wasn’t the best of fights, but at least it can put that rivalry to rest beause I think if it went on any longer, it would make the UFC reputation suffer.

Lately I’ve been watching a lot of The Ultimate Figher TV Series. Yes, this is a reality TV show, however; it is the authenticity that lends itself to being credible. The premise is that you start the season with 16 or 18 guys all vying to be rewarded with a 6 figure, 3 year UFC contract. In the first season, it is Chuck Liddell and Randy Couture that are elected the coaches of two teams as the guys are divided evenly into two teams using the grade six schoolyard baseball method. What makes it more interesting is that all of these guys have to live in the same house (more like a mansion) and if they are caught fighting, they are instantly eliminated. Also, they are given a state of the art training facility in which to train. They participate in challenges (a la Survivor) and the winning team gets to pick one representative from their team to fight any member of the opposing team in hopes of weakening the other team. As the season goes on, there is one fight at the end of each show with the loser leaving the facilities immediately. The training is gruelling and demanding and reveals the fortitude of each of the combatants. Definitely worth checking out for anyone who is interested in competition, fitness or even the mold of this type of reality tv product.