Official UFC Thread

[Mace Bloodstone]

Hope it's full of upsets tonight! t:

 

[BAH HUMBBUG!]

People who think that the Shields and GSP fight will be full of lay and pray don't pay attention to fights. GSP always fights to his opponent's weaknesses, and for Shields that is obviously on the feet. I highly doubt that Shields could keep GSP down. If he could I wouldn't even spend my time complaining about it. I'd just praise the hell out of Shields for doing something that no one has even come close to doing, and that it's hard to submit GSP so outgrappling him would be an amazing feat.

Of course there are many MMA fans who post on message boards that don't understand sports. They think fighters should do ******ed stuff instead of admiring skill. Oh well, they're only the vocal minority anyway. PPV numbers show that the ones complaining after every takedown don't matter much to the bottom line. /rant

I'm pretty sure he was busy feeding Koschek a GSP knuckle sandwich during their fight last time? Koshcheck's strength is his standup.

Although I do agree, if Shields can even manage to take GSP down that would be impressive.

 

[BAH HUMBBUG!]

Picks for tonight?

GSP via TKO
Aldo via TKO
Machida via TKO
Brilz via decision
Bendo via decision

A) Agree
B) Aldo KO
C) Machida decision

 

[El Bastardo]

I'm pretty sure he was busy feeding Koschek a GSP knuckle sandwich during their fight last time? Koshcheck's strength is his standup.

Although I do agree, if Shields can even manage to take GSP down that would be impressive.

No, Koscheck's strength is his wrestling pedigree, as was on display when GSP had a very, very difficult time getting or keeping Koscheck down.

Koscheck does have a strong stand-up game, but it's not his strength if we're speaking strictly of only one.

 

[BAH HUMBBUG!]

No, Koscheck's strength is his wrestling pedigree, as was on display when GSP had a very, very difficult time getting or keeping Koscheck down.

Koscheck does have a strong stand-up game, but it's not his strength if we're speaking strictly of only one.

Ah I stand corrected, I was thinking Lebon. I always get those two mixed up.

 

[Paroxysm]

Whaaaaaaat!!!!

Crane Kick??????

Ouch, Randy should have swept the leg because Machida just went Karate Kid on his ass.

 

[Gamma Burst]

Whaaaaaaat!!!!

Crane Kick??????

Ouch, Randy should have swept the leg because Machida just went Karate Kid on his ass.

Crane Kick, indeed! Daniel -san was the first thing thate came to mind when I saw it tonight.t:

 

[E-Man]

I'm still a fan of GSP, and y'all have seen me defend him against the "Finish Brigade." I'm disappointed with him tonight. Even before the eye injury he was being far too passive against a guy who couldn't take him down and who had zombie striking. I don't care about finishes at all. His fights against Fitch, Alves, and Kos were brilliant. Tonight he just showed great footwork with nothing behind it. If Jake had better takedowns I could see him being passive, but he was the perfect opponent for a beatdown that GSP never delivered.

Regardless of that, this was a really great card. Two great barn burners in Bendo/Bocek and Aldo/Hominick. A spectacular flying triangle, and another swift triangle from MacDonald. A sweet spinning backfist, Ellenberger being the man, and Rory MacDonald going Kurt Angle on Nate Diaz. Then you got the Machida kick. This is easily the best card of the year so far.

 

[B]

I only just woke up in time to see Matyushenko quickly KO'ing Brilz so I missed a whole load of prelims which I usually watch.

Couture never looked like he was gonna beat Machida, he honestly just looked too slow to beat him & he also played right into Machida's style of standup. The reason I feel that Rampage & Shogun (twice), beat Machida is because they put him under a consistant barrage of attacks. This buisness about trying to feint their way to close the distance doesn't work against Machida, he keeps his head that far back that he can pretty much tell whether a feint or actual attack is coming.. even moreso against Couture who looked quite slow in comparison.

Lyoto's finishing flying front kick was superb, it turns out Steven Seagal is one bad mo-fo. But seriously, they need to make the cage smaller to stop Lyoto running so much, if he would actually take a forward step more often he'd be more of a fan favourite.

Jose Aldo & Mark Hominick was a great fight I thought. Jose Aldo is one beast of a fighter, I think I heard them say something about having a hard weight cut which contributed to the fact his stamina wasn't up to power & even with this, he still gave Hominick a crazy beating. The hematoma he gave him from that short elbow was absolutely sickening after it had fully swollen up.. if that had burst after the doctor somehow let it continue it would have been disguisting. Great fight though between the 2, Jose Aldo is a beast.

GSP vs Shields was a 5 round snoozefest, but I wish GSP wouldn't apologise for fighting smart after every decision win. That's the reason he probably is the pound for pound best, because hes so well rounded. That being said, this performance was one of his worst.. at least he gave Koscheck a boxing lesson, he didn't really teach Shields anything. He barely did enough to win & nothing more. I know Shields somehow hurt his eye, but still.. 'I'm not impressed by his performance.'

In some ways I personally liken his performance to Anderson Silva's vs Damian Maia. GSP looked like he had every advantage he needed to really finish Shields, he had technically better standup, he was stronger & faster.. he should have been pressing Shields backwards & giving him a beating rather than allow Shields & his wooden standup style to be pressing him backwards. If GSP really wanted to impress & send a message he should have taken Shields down & beat him in his own specialty.

He has to move up to MW now, he has cleaned the WW division out & his next opponent will either be Jon Fitch or BJ Penn... 2 guys he has already definitively beaten, neither of which have improved since last fighting GSP & being beat.. with BJ actually probably declining.



EDIT - Oh yea I forgot to say, Shields hardly covered himself in glory either. There was me thinking he'd show what he has shown in every other fight I've seen him in & that is relentless grappling. I dunno if it was because GSP was so conservative that he just couldn't get a proper chance to get hold of him without blindly running into a barrage of punches.

I'll watch the rest of the prelims later but of the 4 fights I watched, 3 of them were entertaining.

 

[CrypticOne]

I boo'd loudly and said "GSP sucks!" at my local Buffalo Wild Wings. GSP is so scared it's not even funny. The dude is an amazing athlete. But that's it. He could of finished Shields at any time but chose to play it safe because he is so scared to commit to something ever since Serra made him tap to strikes. I've never been a fan of his. I want someone to go in there that has good TDD and just wreck him.

I also don't want to see him fight Anderson. You can just tell he's scared of him. Don't make that fight happen Dana.

Amazing front kick from Machida. Simply amazing. But Couture shouldn't have been in there in the first place.

Aldo looked slow tonight. Maybe the long layoff was the cause.

 

[B]

I boo'd loudly and said "GSP sucks!" at my local Buffalo Wild Wings. GSP is so scared it's not even funny. The dude is an amazing athlete. But that's it. He could of finished Shields at any time but chose to play it safe because he is so scared to commit to something ever since Serra made him tap to strikes. I've never been a fan of his. I want someone to go in there that has good TDD and just wreck him.

Joe Rogan said it best, GSP vs Shields was like a replay of GSP vs Koscheck without the threat of Koscheck's 1 punch power.

GSP just doesn't seemingly have the aggression to really assert his dominance over people like Shields. If GSP really couldn't asert the far superior & visible striking advantage over Shields to at the very least make this win convincing.. I mean I don't have much faith in him being able to finish many fighters.

Look at how a vurtually gased Jose Aldo reacted when he dropped Hominick (one of the times) & then look at how GSP reacted when he dropped Shields with that headkick.. or wobbled him with that straight. Jose Aldo absolutely swarmed on Hominick with hammerfists, sidefists, elbows.. whatever he could throw he threw it, Hominick managing to survive though. GSP however dropped Shields & wobbled him with a straight, both times he didn't show any aggression to finish Shields & as a result he allowed him to easily recover.

It's hard to put any sort of reason for it.. however before he was with Greg Jackson & before the Matt Serra beat him, he was more of a risky & exciting fighter. He took the peak Matt Hughes on in his area of expertise.. twice, fair enough he lost one, but it showed the confidence in his own ability.

After thinking about it, I say give GSP, Nick Diaz so he can further bury himself as the greatest WW in history & then make him move up to MW to face Anderson Silva providing he manages to get past Okami, which I expect him to do.

 

[E-Man]

I really don't care to see GSP fight Diaz. At least not over him moving up to 185. The Diaz fight would be entertaining since Nick would get his ass beat as bad as Kos and Fitch did, but I want to see GSP pushed a bit by someone that's a real threat. I'm thinking Rousimar Palhares since he is a freaking tiny machine that keeps coming. GSP should be done at 170. There is virtually nothing for him besides fighting a Diaz who wouldn't even get past any of his recent opponents to deserve a shot. Sure he's the Strikeforce champ at welterweight, but that's like being the president of Sri Lanka compared to Barack Obama. Diaz probably wouldn't fight him anyway because he has a habit of talking **** in circumstances where there is no chance for him to fight someone. He'll probably go to boxing to be boxing's version of Kimbo Slice, fighting old and way out of prime guys. Then after beating some scrub he'll start talking **** about how GSP is scared of him and all that noise.

 

[BAH HUMBBUG!]

STEVEN ****ING SEGAL!!!! You SOB!

 

[Colossal Spoons]

He's gonna be taking credit for that kick until he dies lol

Henderson/Bocek was FOTN for me

 

[E-Man]

One day I want to see Bendo go all Debo on the crowd after he wins.
"Las Vegas can I get an amen?!"
*crickets*
"Well **** you then punk!"

 

[Colossal Spoons]

Haha

 

[Siddean]

Steven Seagal teaches Anderson Silva some moves

Here's a video of Seagal training with Silva. About 5 minutes in you can see him showing him the front kick. He's just doing it against the wall, but it's there.

Dig the 'nose locks' Seagal is showing him. Hah.

 

[zanos]

I think GSP has lost me as a fan. I can't stand his fights now. Getting beat up by Shields in the standup was really the last straw for me.

 

[B]

So both Frankie Edgar & Grey Maynard are out of UFC 130 with injuries.. both of them. Rampage vs Hamill is now the headline fight. I bet right about now, Dana White is thinking he should have given Rampage a far more credible opponent to face for the No.1 contendership.. sucks big time I was looking forward to Maynard/Edgar rematch. No new date has been set for the rematch.. which sucks.

And in other news Brock Lesnar is also out of his UFC 131 bout with Junior Dos Santos after having a reoccurance of the diverticulitis problem that kept him out while he was champion. According to Lesnar he was apparently still suffering slightly from it against Carwin & Velasquez, however in this training camp the pain increased, he had another scan revealing an infection & his gut is 'inflammed'. He apparently has had to skip days of training camp against Carwin, Velasquez & now Dos Santos because of pain & also I'm assuming weakness/tiredness as a result of the disease. It's a real career ending problem & according to Dana White, Brock has to make some choices in the current weeks regarding the treatment of the illness that could impact his future in MMA.

Stepping up for Lesnar will be none other than Shane Carwin. So it still should be a great fight none the less. Sucks for Lesnar though, hope he can beat the illness for good & make it back into a UFC cage.. from the comments I've read he seems to have already made his choice regarding treatment & plans to find a way to get back into the octagon.

 

[Mako]

Damn that sucks

 

[Colossal Spoons]

Seriously, crap news all around

 

[BAH HUMBBUG!]

I think people are jumping on the "GSP can't finish fighters/can't assert his dominance" wagon too fast. Take a look at Roy Jones Jr. when he was younger and was absolutely superior to the rest of the field, but he hardly made the fight a forgone conclusion and people didn't like this. But he didn't need to, he was so much better than the opponents he fought, that he would just do enough to beat them or win the fight without obliterating them.

Sure he didn't knock Koscheck out but he basically played target practice with his head all night. And who knows how much his eye was really bothering him other than GSP himself? He's also a fighter that wants to continue to get better and add more to his arsenal which can only help prolong his reign as champ.

Unlike other past champs which seem to rely on one set of skills and don't bother to branch out very much. imho.

 

[Paroxysm]

Carwin will loose via lactic acid again.

 

[Colossal Spoons]

Haha

I'm guessing it'll be JDS/Carwin to fight Cain and the winner of that watch fights the winner of Mir/Nelson? I swear, the heavyweight division is made up of the same 6 dudes.

 

[E-Man]

I feel bad for Brock. I think he had a great chance to beat Dos Santos on his wrestling strength, but now I just hope he gets well. JDS vs. Carwin is a terrific fight anyway, so it's not a total loss. Plus Cain doesn't have the threat of a rematch since he's never fought either guy before.

The Strikeforce heavyweight division needs to be merged with the UFC soon. Both org's divisions are thin as hell right now. The Heavyweight Grand Prix should be damn near done by now anyway.