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By: Shawn Ennis, MMATorch Senior Columnist
The UFC's inaugural event on Fox Sports 1 is finally in the books. There were some interesting storylines and some fantastic performances coming out of the show. Let's take a look at what happened.
Thumbs Up: to the ticker across the bottom of the screen. Now, I should probably clarify this. I don't love the ticker, or tickers in general (I think they're distracting and I don't like seeing the same news about which I don't care at all over and over again. And seriously - there are smart phones now. And smart televisions. I can find my news my own self.) But if we're talking about the choice between the ticker that we saw during the event as compared to the ticker on the Fox cards containing tweets from fighters and other MMA personalities? It's not even close. I hate that thing.
Thumbs Down: to Diego Brandao's cardio. It's certainly not a new problem for him, but it would have been understandable for someone to assume that the move to Greg Jackson's camp would signal an improvement. That wasn't the case, as Brandao won a borderline 10-8 round and then soundly lost the second round. The fact that Brandao was able to pull out the win in the third speaks more to the inability of Daniel Pineda to recover sufficiently than to Brandao's superior conditioning. The worst part is that Brandao is so good. If he can fix his gas tank, he can potentially cause some real problems for a lot of featherweights.
Thumbs Down: to stupid stats. Max Holloway came into the fight second to Cain Velasquez in strikes landed per minute? Look, I'm a stat guy. A numbers guy. But can't we weight these things somehow? Are all strikes and opponents equal? When it comes down to it, the stats are basically a marketing tool. They can use a lot of numbers without context and make it look like guys are better or more seasoned than they are.
Thumbs Up: to the measured dominance of Conor McGregor. It's easy for a guy coming in with big of a hype to UFC experience ratio to come in, swing wildly, and blow up after half a round. McGregor didn't do that. He looked like he'd been on the big stage for years, confusing his younger opponent with unorthodox striking and mixing in takedowns later in the fight against an opponent who has been shown to be dangerous on the ground. It would have been all too predictable for a guy in McGregor's position to have his hype train derailed, so to speak. The fact that he didn't and the manner in which he avoided it speaks to his potential as a future contender. His outing was absolutely tremendous.
Thumbs Up: to Michael McDonald and Brad Pickett. Speaking of tremendous, McDonald did it all in this fight. The first two minutes had to be two of the longest minutes of Pickett's career as he took three rounds worth of punishment in that short span. But this fight spoke volumes about both fighters. For someone who is McDonald's age, coming off of a tough loss in his first bid for a title, it would have been understandable if he folded after he put that kind of punishment on Pickett and the Brit didn't go down. But the former title challenger kept his composure, landed more strikes when the opportunities presented themselves, and ultimately seized a brief opening and locked in a perfect triangle/armbar after spending most of the second round on his back. That kind of performance isn't supposed to come from a guy who is 22 years old against a tough veteran like Pickett. And for his part, Pickett showed again that you're not just going to walk into the Octagon and put him away with a few big strikes. He was smelling around corners after the first round, but he came back and brought the fight to McDonald in the second. That was fantastic stuff by both men, but the rest of the bantamweight division should be seriously worried about Michael McDonald.
Thumbs Up: to the Ving Rhames opening vignette. I love it. Give me a Ving Rhames voiceover all day long.
Thumbs Down: to pacing. This is nothing unusual, but I don't talk about it all that often since I almost always watch non-PPV events on delay via DVR. But it's worth mentioning that the first punches on the main card weren't thrown until 8:15. It really shouldn't take that long to get things going. If you're going to start an event, especially on a new platform, why not skip the exposition and get right into the pre-fight vignette and the first round of the first fight without any commercial breaks? It's hard to hook viewers with that much time before the fights start in earnest.
Thumbs Down: to the continued inability of judges to use 10-8 scores. So what you're telling me is that no one scored a 10-8 round for Conor McGregor when Holloway got virtually no offense in the first round, but the same set of judges had one of them score two 10-8 rounds for Michael Johnson? I did not see that one coming.
Thumbs Down: to the Uriah Hall hype train. I thought he could come back and reacquire the momentum he had coming out of the most recent TUF season, but I couldn't have been more wrong. Hall looked like he didn't know what to do when John Howard wouldn't just stand there and let Hall tee off with telegraphed strikes. It was the second straight uninspired performance by Hall, and at this point it's hard to see how Hall can avoid the same fate as Phillipe Nover, who was the last unheralded TUF contestant who was heavily lauded by Dana White before the season began airing. Hall lived up to the hype on the show unlike Nover, but he's looked lost since leaving the house. (Bonus thumbs down for the buildup to this fight on the broadcast where they called this a contest between knockout artists. Come on, son.)
Thumbs Up: to the Matt Brown hype train. Look, I'm not saying that Matt Brown is going to beat GSP. I'm not even saying he's going to run roughshod over the UFC's top ten welterweights. But at this point, the guy has won six in a row. And are you telling me you wouldn't want to see him fight Rory MacDonald or Nick Diaz? Because I love both of those fights. He probably loses both of them, but then again I thought Stephen Thompson, Mike Swick, and Jordan Mein were going to beat him.
Thumbs Up: to everything concerning Urijah Faber. Faber could absolutely sit back and cherry pick showcase fights or wait on a title shot. Instead he takes a fight with almost no upside against Iuri Alcantara, who is an almost unknown beast. Keep in mind, Alcantara is the last guy to beat the streaking Ricardo Lamas, knocking him out at featherweight. And here is Faber, fighting a dangerous unheralded fighter in his third bantamweight fight. And on top of all that, he weathered an early storm in which it looked very plausible that Alcantara could have ended it. Of course, not only did he weather the storm, he came back and won the first round on all three scorecards en route to sweeping all three rounds. That's impressive. I know Faber has lost a lot of title fights, but it's gonna be tough to keep him out of another shot at gold if things continue like this. If that's not in the cards right now, would anyone argue with a fight against Michael McDonald? That sounds like one I'd watch. I'm just sayin.
Thumbs Up: to Jon Anik actually mentioning Alistair Overeem's failed drug test. That was a surprise, and not something we would have heard from Mike Goldberg (Though he kind of negated it a minute later by touting Overeem's physique in contrast to how he looked against Bigfoot Silva). Speaking of the announce team, I was pretty good with them tonight. I didn't hear every word because of how I watch these events (DVR), but if we get the team of Anik-Rogan and Goldberg-Stann going forward, that sounds pretty good to me. It won't happen, but I could dig it. That having been said, Anik was mostly a non-presence tonight, and I'm not saying that's a bad thing. Goldberg tends to be overtly annoying, whereas Anik tonight was just kind of hanging back while Rogan called the fights.
Thumbs Down: to Overeem's ability to weather. As well as Brad Pickett took the onslaught that Michael McDonald poured on him, that was how poorly Overeem handled it. The very definition of a frontrunner, Overeem seems completely incapable of winning a fight at this point in his career if he faces any adversity at all. Part of that is probably due to his blown up physique, which he seems to sport to the detriment of his cardio. Travis Browne, for his part, was also masterful in this fight. To be able to keep one's wits while being savaged as Browne was for the first part of the round is impressive indeed. Typically the crumpling reaction that Browne experienced after the body shots with which Overeem hit him is a death knell for the crumpled fighter's chances of winning. But Browne was able to withstand and take advantage of Overeem's non-existent gas tank and incomprehensible hubris as he came forward in a barely-defensive stance.The fighters representing the last two wins on Bigfoot Silva's record seem to be heading in opposite directions.
Thumbs Up: to Chael Sonnen actually finishing a fight. If you had told me that Shogun would get a takedown at one point, but at the end of the first round Sonnen would pull guard and tap him with a guillotine, I'd tell you that you had the fighters' names mixed up. That having been said, a win over Shogun right now is not the same as a win over Shogun in 2006. Also, did Sonnen have a sponsorship from a mortgage lender? Because that's hilarious.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
STAFF COLUMNISTS: Shawn Ennis - Jason Amadi
Frank Hyden - Rich Hansen
Chris Park - Matt Pelkey
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