By: Frank Hyden, MMATorch Senior Columnist/b>
Bellator 281 and UFC Fight Night: Blachowicz vs. Rakic were this
weekend and we have another contender for worst match of the year.
Let’s get to the rundown.
Bellator 281
GOOD- Luke Trainer vs. Simon Biyong
Biyong starts the fight by landing a few punches before getting a
takedown. Trainer gets back to his feet and lands a takedown of his
own. Trainer works some nice ground-and-pound until the first round
ends. Biyong drops Trainer and starts raining down hammerfists and an
elbow cuts Trainer. They grapple back and forth for the rest of the
second round. Trainer’s fighting in the mud and gets dropped in the
third round. He survives, though. Biyong takes the third round and
wins the fight by decision. Biyong improves to 8-2 while Trainer is
handed his first loss and falls to 5-1. Good win for Biyong.
GOOD- Paul “Semtex” Daley stops Wendell Giacomo
Giacomo gets an early takedown but Daley pops right back up. Giacomo
drags him back down but Daley works his way back to his feet
eventually. Giacomo gets him down again but Daley reverses and pops
him before the first round ends. Daley starts touching him up in the
second round so Giacomo goes for and gets another takedown. He’s
hanging on and keeping Daley off his feet until he gets elbowed and
stunned with a big left hand. Semtex then lives up to his name and
ends the fight with a huge right hand that knocks Giacomo out a little
over four minutes into the second round. What a finish, a fitting end
to Daley’s career as he plans to retire. Daley improves to 44-18-2
while Giacomo falls to 9-3. Good win for Daley.
GOOD- Kana Watanabe submits Denise Kielholtz
Kielholtz quickly pops Watanabe with a right hand but Watanabe gets a
takedown to recover. Not much else happened in the first round. The
second round starts with Watanabe getting another takedown that gets
quickly reversed. Kielholtz kicked Watanabe in the face when they were
both grounded and got a point deducted. Watanabe takes Kielholtz’s
back and transitions to a triangle choke that gets the tap three
minutes into the second round. Watanabe improves to 11-1-1 while
Kielholtz falls to 6-4. Good win for Watanabe.
GOOD- Fabian Edwards stops Lyoto Machida
They start with a few kicks before Edwards stuns Machida with a big
elbow and finishes him off with some big left hooks not quite three
and a half minutes into the first round. Wow. Edwards improves to 10-2
while Machida falls to 26-12 and has now lost 4 fights in a row. Good
win for Edwards.
BAD- Michael “Venom” Page vs. Logan Storely
This fight sucked. There’s no way around it, this was a boring fight.
Storely had part of a nice strategy, he was going to wrestle MVP to
the ground and beat him there. He didn’t want to fight MVP on the
feet, that’s smart. However, there were too many times where he was
content to just lay on MVP. The lack of action led to this fight
sucking. Storely did no damage and never threatened MVP. Storely won
by Split Decision and is now your Interim Bellator Welterweight
Champion. Storely improves to 14-1 and has won 3 fights in a row while
Page drops to 20-2. It’s a win for Storely.
UFC Fight Night: Blachowicz vs. Rakic
GOOD- Jake Hadley vs. Allan Nascimento
They trade kicks early before it becomes a grappling battle. I missed
a large portion of this fight, something happened here that I had to
take care of. From what I saw it appeared that Nascimento exerted more
control on his way to the decision win. Nascimento improves to 19-6
while Hadley is handed the first loss of his career at 8-1. Good win
for Nascimento.
GOOD- Manuel Torres stops Frank Camacho
They started trading strikes until Torres peppered Camacho with bigger
and bigger strikes. Torres then dropped Camacho and the referee was
forced to stop the fight nearly three and a half minutes into the
first round. Torres improves to 13-2 and has won 4 fights in a row
while Camacho falls to 22-10 and has lost 5 of his last 6 fights. Good
win for Torres.
GOOD- Katlyn Chookagian vs. Amanda Ribas
They went to the ground after trading strikes but they stalemated and
got back to their feet. They traded more strikes to end the first
round. Things continued that way in the second round as they continued
to trade. The third round was more of the same, with them trading
strikes. This was a really close fight. Chookagian won by Split
Decision, which I happen to agree with but this was close. Chookagian
improves to 18-4 and has won 4 fights in a row while Ribas falls to
11-3. Good win for Chookagian.
GOOD- Davey Grant stops Louis Smolka
They traded strikes during the first round, with Smolka feeling the
pain a few times but it was close. Grant was working leg kicks. More
of the same in the second round, though Smolka seemed to land more.
Things were close and tight heading into the third round, where those
leg kicks from Grant added up and Smolka’s leg gave out. Grant rained
down punches until the referee jumped in to stop the fight not quite
fifty seconds into the third round. Grant improves to 14-6 while
Smolka falls to 17-9. Good win for Grant.
GOOD- Ryan Spann submits Ion Cutelaba
Cutelaba got a few takedowns but Spann fought him off and wrapped up a
slick guillotine that forced the tap not quite halfway through the
first round. Spann improves to 20-7 while Cutelaba falls to 16-7-1
with 1 No Contest. Good win for Spann.
GOOD/BAD- Jan Blachowicz beats Aleksandar Rakic by Injury TKO
They trade kicks early then start mixing in some punches before going
back to kicks. Rakic was also attacking the body in that first round.
The second round saw Rakic get a takedown but not a whole lot came
from it and the round ended. The third round sees Rakic land some good
punches while Blachowicz works the body but then Rakic’s knee just
gives out. They showed a replay and you could see Rakic’s knee and leg
spasm when the injury occured. It was like when Kevin Durant’s
Achilles snapped during the 2019 NBA Finals. That was an Achilles and
this was a knee but it’s just gross to see and you hope Rakic can
recover fully. The fight was fine up until then, you just hate to see
injuries determine a winner. Blachowicz improves to 29-9 while Rakic
drops to 14-3.
My fantasy book is now out. It’s called Kingdom of Zarias: Undeath and
the Dewester Set. It’s a fantasy epic that begins with the Summers
siblings but spreads out to encompass a large number of characters
across multiple stories as the world faces a threat from a vile
necromancer. There’s lots of action, magic, and monsters in the
Kingdom of Zarias. It’s like a tabletop game in novel form. It’s on
Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and many other places. If you’re interested, I
would greatly appreciate it if you would check it out and support me.
Here’s the link to my book- My Book Thank you very much,
have a good day.
Comments and suggestions can be emailed to me at
hydenfrank@gmail.com and you can follow me on Twitter at @hydenfrank.
Thanks for reading and have a good day.
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