Ennis' Take
ENNIS: UFC on FX 2 reactions; McCall-Johnson blunder, flyweights, Kampmann, and more
Mar 3, 2012 - 12:30:07 PM ENNIS: UFC on FX 2 reactions; McCall-Johnson blunder, flyweights, Kampmann, and more

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By: Shawn Ennis, MMATorch Senior Columnist

I didn't have a chance to watch the FX show live last night, but I just got through the fights this morning and I've got some quick thoughts.

-First and foremost, the Johnson-McCall blunder is inexcusable. Plenty has been and will be said concerning that mess, but on the plus side, we'll get to see another three rounds of what was in my estimation a Fight of the Year contender. On the flip side, it could have been even more epic with the added drama of a Sudden Victory round.

-Martin Kampmann was on his way to actually legitimately losing a decision until he pulled off one of the better comebacks you'll see this year (maybe not quite Boetsch-like, but we'll talk about that another time). I think a fight between Kampmann and Jake Ellenberger is in order, and if anyone is going to get a shot at Carlos Condit, it should be the winner of that fight or Johny Hendricks if he gets past Josh Koscheck.

-The flyweight division is going to be an awful lot of fun, even if there are only six flyweights on the UFC's roster right now.

-I haven't been much of a believer in Steven Siler, but the guy keeps winning. After taking out one of my favorite fighters in Cole Miller (though I'm interested to see how Miller looks after he's used to the cut to featherweight), I want to see what he's really capable of. He's not ready for the big time yet, but a guy like Daniel Pineda, who pulled off a great submission against Mackens Semerzier, would be a good matchup for him. I'm loving what I've seen from Pineda. I had him on my up and comers list in the Featherweight Lay of the Land, and he continued to impress yesterday.

-It's always fun when the local fighters win on the international shows. It looks like it could be time to start moving James Te Huna and Anthony Perosh up the ladder just a bit to see what they can handle. Ricardo Romero and Aaron Rosa aren't exactly world beaters, but Te Huna stopped them both emphatically. Ryan Jimmo is debuting at some point; that would be a good matchup. Perosh isn't getting any younger; you can either keep him around for the Aussie cards and not much else, or you could throw him in there with the winner of Kingsbury-Teixeira.

-I'm also interested to see what Shawn Jordan has. He owns a submission win over Lavar Johnson and looked more than capable of slugging it out against Oli Thompson - why not put him in there with the winner of Travis Browne vs. Chad Griggs next month?

-From what we've seen out of debuting fighters and guys who haven't been in MMA all that long, it's going to get tougher and tougher to dominate over divisions like we've seen over the last little while. Every time a new crop of young fighters comes in, they look better than the last one. It used to be that I didn't get all that excited to see a guy debut in the UFC whom I hadn't heard of. That isn't the case anymore. I look forward to everything.

-The UFC is really upping their game with the card quality this year. We've seen some insane events so far, and it's only going to get better. Last night's fights, especially if you were able to catch the Fuel prelims, were great. There have been seven UFC events so far this year (four non-PPV), and it's March 3. I remember a time when we had about that many in a year, or fewer. It wasn't all that long ago. We've said it so many times over the last few years, but it's a great time to be an MMA fan.