This bout could only be described as disappointing. I thought it would be one of the best of the night, but Elvis lost quickly in roughly the same manner he lost to Tito Ortiz on UFC 32. Tanner forced the fight against the cage because Elvis' non UFC bouts, the majority of his resume, haven't had one. Elvis decided to go down as that's his advantage, but the positioning was bad because he was pushed right up against the fence when Tanner got into his guard. Elvis climbed up the fence in an attempt for an arm bar, but Tanner saw it coming. Tanner soon threw a series of nasty forearm/elbows that opened up the scar tissue in the middle of his forehead, which lead to a questionable doctor stop. There wasn't even any blood dripping during Elvis' post match interview, which in my opinion indicates the cut wasn't too bad. Later, perhaps to stop the complaints at a cheap stoppage, one of the announcers said it was due to Elvis being foggy rather than the cut. However, their website says it's a TKO from cuts, so who knows?

1R 2:06

Matt Lindland vs. Pat Miletich

Miletich came in at a UFC high 183 pounds, moving up to the middleweight division because his fighter Matt Hughes is the welterweight champion. Going up in weight class hurt Miletich, but his opponent also fought a near perfect fight. The Olympic wrestling silver medalist took Miletich down right away and pinned him against the fence. Rather than stay in Miletich's guard the whole time, Lindland kept a wide base leaning over and used his reach advantage to throw punches down. Miletich was able to make one attempt for a triangle, and instantaneously when he saw it wasn't working an arm bar, but that was his only offense of the fight. Lindland rolled back into the guard with his right arm around the back of Miletich's neck. He was high up on Miletich (although still somewhat in the guard) and just threw left hand after left hand around Miletich's right arm to his face. These weren't great blows by any means, but every one was hitting. After about 45 seconds, Lindland passed the guard and threw punches down with both hands. Although from a distance these looked much better, they were actually pretty ineffective because Miletich covered up. The ref said, "It's on the arm" seemingly to let the fighters know he realized they weren't getting through, but then stopped the fight 4 seconds later. I can see the argument for and against the stoppage. On one hand, Miletich hadn't done anything other than take punches for over a minute and there was no sign that he was about to make an attempt to improve his position. On the other hand, since Lindland took the mount he'd barely hit Miletich anywhere other than the arm. The thing that annoys me is if the ref was about to stop the fight because Miletich was just covering up than he should warn Miletich rather than essentially tell him that he's doing a good job of blocking.

1R 3:09

This is one of those fights that's good to watch live, but probably not great to watch on tape. Hughes dominated the fight, but Sakurai is one of those guys that could win at any time regardless of position. He definitely had a better chance in standup, and as John McCarthy isn't one of those biased native favoring refs we see in PRIDE when Inoki's creations fight, Sakurai got his chance when Hughes would slack off on his ground and pound.

Like the previous UFC import from Shooto Caol Uno, Sakurai is an exciting fighter that's not afraid to take chances. In the first minute, he'd already thrown a wild spinning middle kick and almost reversed into a crucifix submission. The differences between Shooto and UFC rules clearly hurt Sakurai though. Sakurai was ill prepared for Hughes utilization of the cage, and his defense against elbows was less than stellar. That said, Hughes won because he's the better fighter.

Hughes also fought a great fight. He weighed one pound less than Sakurai, but he seemed much bigger. He's just too strong for most of the guys in this division. Well, it's not pure strength, but the combination of his power and his wrestling technique that makes him so deadly. He's going to control the fight. Against a guy as dangerous as Sakurai, he only got caught once with a left jab, obviously not one of his best blows. It was good enough to put Hughes down momentarily, but Hughes kept his composure catching Sakurai running in with a knee and taking him down to stop his comeback dead. The rest of the time he either took Sakurai down before he could strike or had his strikes timed so well that he had him down the first or second time he threw.

Hughes won every round. He got Sakurai down repeatedly. At first it was more Sakurai going down willingly to avoid the slams, but as the match progressed Hughes started slamming him to inflict that extra punishment. On the ground, Hughes scored and did some damage by mixing up the styles and location of his strikes like all Miletich guys do, while at the same time not giving Sakurai a chance to do anything. Hughes did everything he needed to do to win. My only criticism of him would be that he wasn't active enough while on top, but obviously it didn't hurt him this time.

Hughes opened round four with a spectacular switch step right hand. After about two minutes of ground and pound against the fence he mounted Sakurai and just took his time picking him apart. Sakurai tried going for a kneebar and giving Hughes his back, but Hughes retained the mount and it was just a matter of time before McCarthy had to step in.

4R 3:01

Pedro Rizzo vs. Andrei Arlovski

You've probably seen me write I'd rather just watch a kickboxing match before, but this entirely standup bout would have been just as excellent if it took place on a K-1 show. Arlovski wasn't impressive in his match against Ricco Rodriguez, but he took this fight a lot more seriously, came in in much better shape, and in spite of the eventual outcome proved he could more than hold his own in standup against arguably the best kickboxing shooter in the world.

Arlovski knows Rizzo is a counter puncher, and refused to play into her hand. The effectiveness of this was somewhat lessened, I think, because Rizzo seemed determined to be more active and aggressive tonight anyway. Certainly, this was a determined looking Pedro Rizzo.

I always thought Rizzo underused his deadly low kicks. He caught Arlovski with a couple nasty ones early, but after that Arlovski made sure he got his leg up to block them. Both fighters were precise with Arlovski kicking Rizzo in the left knee several times, particularly with a left sweep to the inside. My complaint about Arlovski would be that he didn't use his reach advantage. For both of them, they could have tried a little harder to put together a combination rather than always settling for one hit.

It was an intense fight with both men hammering each other, but we saw a lot of patience and strategy as well. Sadly, the fans couldn't appreciate this and were actually booing one of the best standup fights ever in UFC after the second round. I'm not sure if in the arena you could tell how good some of these strikes were. A lot of them were short quick strikes, not necessarily less damaging but not as obvious or glamorous.

In the third round Rodriguez started calling for Rizzo to throw the straight right saying he was 2-2 when he threw them against Arlovski. Rodriguez was goofy as hell claiming to be an expert on Japan then saying Japanese don't play baseball and Sakurai, who fights most of his fights in front of around 2,000 people, keeps getting mobbed by his millions and millions of fans. He was really good on color talking strategy and pointing out what guys could or should be looking to do. Sure enough within 45 seconds Rodriguez used a stiff left jab to open up a straight right hand that not only knocked Arlovski out but probably broke his nose. The fans somewhat redeemed themselves by chanting "Pedro" after this stunning KO. Definitely the fight of the night. If only Rizzo could give one of these performances when the title was on the line.

3R 1:45

UFC Heavyweight Championship Match: Randy Couture vs. Josh Barnett

Couture went about business as usual in the first round. He ducked under Barnett's punches, drove him into the cage, jerked him down, and got his ground and pound going. Despite giving up 17 pounds, Couture was the stronger of the two and with his wrestling prowess it looked liked he'd stay in control and find the distance for his punches. Barnett did a great job from the bottom though. He tried for a kneebar, armbar, triangle choke, and even hit Couture with a stiff elbow. Barnett looked like a legitimate threat and clearly got into Couture's head, especially when he got to his feet after Couture hopped away from his kneebar. Couture was still looking good though, retaining control with a front guillotine, hitting Barnett with a good knee to the gut, and working his strikes with Barnett against the cage.

The second round started off as a replay of the first, but you started to get the sense that Couture was being overly cautious if not fighting somewhat scared. When he mounted Barnett with more than 4 minutes to go, I thought that was going to be it. Couture just waited though, so Barnett kind of pushed him up. Couture started punching at that point, but Barnett got a half guard without suffering any notable damage. Barnett got the full guard and started throwing some elbows from the bottom, probably to set up a submission. Couture backed off then made an attempt to pass the guard, but Barnett going after Couture's knee forced Randy to spin into a bottom position in amateur wrestling. Barnett then took the top and exploded. Although as I said Couture was not striking me as his usual self, I was really shocked by how quickly the pendulum swung to Barnett. It was a slow fight and then all of a sudden Barnett was just teeing off on the champ. Couture rolled to his back because Barnett was crushing him with both hands, but then he was stuck against the fence. Barnett not only threw heavy blows, but he used both hands and elbows, went to the body as well as the face so Couture didn't know what to try to block. Couture still seemed to have his sense, but just seemed helpless to get out of this position, almost like a turtle on his back. This segment really made the match. Couture, always a class act, put the belt around the waist of Barnett. Barnett just keeps getting better and better. This result and the previous bouts will hopefully give him a chance to avenge his lone loss, which was one of the best UFC fights of 2001.

2R 4:35

You could say this was a one move match, but it's really what set that one move up. In thrusting his elbow out from under Mir's knee while Mir was going for a triangle, Williams left this arm momentarily exposed. Mir caught it on the way out and brought it to his side, hooking it. When Williams tried to pull out Mir not only retained his lock, but used Williams momentum to bend the shoulder and elbow to the right, a direction they obviously don't move in. Williams had no idea what hit him, and Mir slid his knees against Williams stomach so he could apply more pressure by pushing out and arching. This armbar and elbow lock or shoulder crank or modified Kimura is a rare JJ submission that I don't believe has ever been locked in the UFC before. Great finish. One wonders if this is the end of the line for Williams in the UFC.

1R 0:46

Everyone was building this match up all night because they were so impressed by it. You wouldn't think a one-sided prelim match that didn't even last 3 minutes would have the people being interviewed who had no specific interest in shilling bragging about it. While not a great match, it certainly had one of the all-time classic segments. Serra got the full mount and started reigning punches, so Dullanty started to roll to his stomach. Before he could even get there, Serra hooked in a rear naked choke. Dullanty getting the life squeezed out of him for 30 seconds, but he found a way to sneak his head out. Unfortunately for him, he was right back in Serra's mount. In a magnificent spinning sequence, Serra tried for the arm bar, but Dullanty crunched him up and hit Serra with a right hand. Serra still had the arm though, and he got himself straightened out so he could lock in a triangle choke. Dullanty tried to spin out, but he was moving very slow from the lack of oxygen and quickly tapped. Absolutely spectacular.

2R 2:58