Best Matches Seen July 2020 |
UFC on ESPN 14 7/26/20: Mauricio Rua vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira 3R. Nogueira managed to avenge the first loss of his career to The Janitor 7 years later, but failed to avenge the second loss to the Shogun a decade later, more stinging defeats due to the Chute Box vs. Brazilian Top Team rivalry. Another five years have passed, and now, at 44-years-old in his final fight, Nogueira finds himself in his first trilogy bout giving it one last go against one of the few countrymen who have eclipsed him. The fight is similar to the previous two in style, competitiveness, and high quality. Shogun has a big advantage in kicks, and simply has too many weapons and options, as he can win likely win the clinch & ground games if he so chooses, but Nogueira's big left hand is the most consistent & deadly tool at either's disposal, keeping him close, and giving him a chance to take Rua out. Shogun often dictates, but Nogueira can be okay with that, because pulling him into the left hand increases his chances of the knockout. Round 1 looked to be a Shogun round, but Nogueira hurt him with the left straight with a little over a half minute left, and then again with a left hook, prompting Rua to score the semi-desperation takedown and ride it out. Nogueira isn't much of a mover or quick distance closer these days, but he made it ugly in the 2nd, backing Rua with powerful lefts then scoring a takedown with a shoulder bump. Nogueira was looking fatigued in the 2nd half of the round after Rua got up, and Rua began beating him up by being quicker & more direct. Given both men had a claim to each round, it was safe to say it was even going into the 3rd, though round 2 was more clearly Nogueira's than round 1 was anybody's. Nogueira's movement had decreased a little more now from all Rua's low kicks, as well as just being tired, and he was mostly using his right hand trying to bait Rua into eating the left hand in this round. The problem with this is Rua, who was the more active fighter to begin with, was now piling on more volume, mixing his attacks between coming high with the hands or low with the kicks. Nogueira, again, landed more of the best handful of shots, but Rua threw so many more that he doubled him in total strikes, as well as getting another takedown with 75 seconds left and finishing on top. As has always been the case in this rivalry, Nogueira was more likely to hurt Rua, but Rua was the more consistent fighter over the duration. Rua won a split decision 29-28, 28-29, 29-28. Good match.
UFC on ESPN 13 7/16/20: Mounir Lazzez vs. Abdul Razak Alhassan 3R. An odd fight because Alhassan was just bombing huge hooks to the head early, and it appeared he was going to take Lazzez out immediately, as has been his m.o.. Lazzez stayed completely composed & not only survived, but totally figured Alhassan out, and had answers that allowed him to control the rest of the contest, mostly by winning the standup that he was losing badly in the first minute. Lazzez was the much more diverse striker, and once he got himself into the fight, he had too many good counters for the more limited headhunter to deal with. You could see that Alhassan is a KO hunter right away as he just unloaded the tank as soon as he backed Lazzez into the cage, not going to the body at all despite Lazzez just covering & looking for the opening to answer with an elbow. Lassez began to come back when Alhassan finally stopped punching long enough for him to land a step knee to the midsection. Lassez then really began mixing his strikes brilliantly, using the step knee & low kick in the pocket, the front kick & jab at distance, the elbow down the middle on the inside. His use of elbows & knees was more toward top level muay thai than what we normally see in the UFC. Lazzez had a really high level combo where he followed a left hook to the liver with a right high kick. Surprisingly, it wound up being a Lassez round, and he really began to roll in the 2nd. You could see the difference in their kickboxing levels when Lazzez backed Alhassan into the cage because he could find the shot in between or around Alhassan's guard, using elbows & knees down the middle in addition to his punches. I liked this Daniel Movahedi ref because he didn't allow guys to rest while ever so vaguely pretending to be doing something. When the fighters were locked up, if you weren't moving or throwing, he just separated them, which he'll surely be criticized for because all the refs now are afraid of interjecting themselves preferring instead to just allow previously entertaining fights to completely stall out. Lazzez used a lot of good footwork, that allowed him to score while angling off. Early in the 3rd, there was a nice spot where he seemed to just be circling left to create space, but instead used a left hook into a right high kick. Alhassan tried to change it up in the 3rd, and was able to get a takedown timing Lazzez's knee. However, Lazzez was able to get up quickly, and was ultimately the one who had the ground control in the round. Lazzez won a unanimous decision 30-27, 30-27, 29-28. Good match.
UFC 251 7/11/20
Jiri Prochazka vs. Volkan Oezdemir R2 0:49. Prochazka is only 1 inch taller than Oezdemir at 6'3", but his 80" reach is about 4" above the Light Heavyweight average while Oezdemir's 75" is about an inch below. Prochazka isn't merely a long fighter, but his length greatly aids his totally unorthodox fight style where he values striking from odd angles over keeping his hands in a position to block anything. He'll keep his hands on this thighs, holding his glove with the other hand, do weird Bruce Lee or Karate Kid looking movements, anything he can think of to throw the opponent off by coming at them from an angle they haven't normally been defending. Oezdemir is the bigger pure puncher, more likely to just floor the opponent with an overpowering single punch, while Prochazka is more looking to get the KO by sneaking the clean shot through. Oezdemir may be one of the more feeble title challengers, but he's still a tough fighter to make your UFC debut against, even for a guy who has won 11 in a row. Oezdemir seemed to have a good strategy of keeping the volum high, using the jab, which was wide open, and the low kick to keep Oezdemir from coming forward. Oezdemir hurt Jiri early with a big right, and then again with a little more than a minute left. In general, things went very well for Oezdemir in the 1st, but Prochazka did begin to get into the fight with his body shots in the 2nd half of the round. Oezdemir was already looking tired at the start of the 2nd from the high output in the 1st, and that totally changed the fight. Prochazka needs time & forward movement to get his strikes off because he isn't starting them from a ready position. Without anything to keep Prochazka back, he was simply too deceptive to defend against. He wasn't kicking much in the 1st, but he landed the left inside leg kick to get Oezdemir thinking about it then went right to the left high kick to stun him. Oezdemir tried to fight through it, but was forced to retreat after Prochazka cracked him clean with a right hook. Once Prochazka got him against the cage, he finished with the jab then the right. Good match.
Rose Namajunas vs. Jessica Andrade 3R. Rose was in a better place mentally for this fight, and continued to use her length & speed to pick apart Andrade on the outside without allowing her to get hold of her often. What Rose did much better here is control the distance. Rose wasn't aggressively closing the distance as Andrade was trying to do (you usually don't want the longer fighter to do so because it negates their reach), but instead holding her ground & coming forward just enough to keep Andrade back and just out of range. Distance control plays well into Rose's advantage because their general striking style of Rose throwing straight & Andrade throwing short hooks greatly accentuates it. Andrade's big change was the head movement, which was making it more difficult for Rose to just snipe her with the jab. Andrade really doesn't use a jab or throw combos, but her hope was staying lower & swaying more would make it easier to either counter with the big power hook or throw something Rose had to defend that would allow Andrade to finish closing the distance & grab hold of her. These rarely panned out because Rose's footwork & balance were too good, and Rose was also too disciplined to get caught being too concerned about trying to go on the offensive with the counter. What Rose did really well was cut the angle on the retreat, particularly circling away to the right to open up the left hook while still being off center enough that Andrade couldn't either land the right hook or get the clinch. Rose could also just back away just enough then come right back forward on the reset. If Andrade did get the clinch, Rose would t do a quick knee down the middle then disengage. Andrade did do a good job of landing low kicks to try to deal with the movement & footwork advantages of Namajunas. Once in a while Andrade did land a power shot, but generally she was badly outmaneuvered when she tried to come forward and just had to stop her charges because it was clear nothing was there. Rose did a lot more moving, especially the more tiring backwards variety, and began to slow in the 3rd. Andrade did a better job of mixing things up, especially with Rose doing less to keep her back, throwing the hook to the body & actually throwing some combos. She landed a good uppercut & finally got Rose down with a hip wheel. Rose was able to use her legs to push Andrade off quickly, but her nose got busted up from the hooks that were beginning to find their mark. Rose tried to ride it out with a takedown, but Andrade immediately swept but both stood out of the scramble. I don't know if I liked Rose's chances if there were another 2 rounds, but this was a really standard 29-28 decision for Rose that 1 bad judge managed to screw up. Good match.
UFC Bantamweight Title Decision: Petr Yan vs. Jose Aldo R5 3:24. A very intense contest where they stood in the pocket & brought the heat. This wasn't a slugfest per se, but rather a fight where they feinted & faked a lot & defended well in the muay thai evade without moving your feet sort of way. The output wasn't high, but the shots that landed were very powerful. It was a very close fight for the first 4 minutes of each round, but then Aldo, the more muscled fighter & also the one who is more comforable fighting a division up, would slow down enough for Yan to take over & steal the rounds. Though I expected Yan, the younger fighter with a lot less wear & tear to win, this was a good matchup for Aldo because Yan is not only a striking specialist, but predominantly a boxer. Aldo's advantage is his ability to work the legs & body with kicks, but again, this is not the old Aldo who will just chew up your legs with kicks, Yan had to switch to southpaw because his lead leg was damaged from the few Aldo threw, but Aldo still wouldn't throw the leg kick that often, although certainly more than against the usual opponent who just wants to lay on him. Aldo came close to a double leg late in the 1st, but Yan stood and Aldo was caught on the ground. He thought he was just going to ride the round out on the bottom, but he allowed Yan to just stand over him & drop big punches down, and Aldo was hurt when Yan got him in the liver, leading to a flurry while Aldo was covering. Yan wasn't so much landing the jab when he went southpaw in the 2nd, as doing a good job of waving his outstretched fingers out there to keep Aldo off guard then once in a while cracking Aldo with his really fast left straight or cross, and once in a while mixing in the body kick. Although Yan was likely up 29-28, the fight was pretty even through the first 17-18 minutes with both setting personal bests in significant strikes landed. What made the fight so interesting is no matter who got off 1st, the other would respond right back, so ultimately the strike totals were a wash. Aldo just kind of ran out of gas and started to run away midway through the 4th trying to get a breather. Yan was already doing a better job of taking a little off his shots so he could use more hand speed & have a better chance of getting a combo in, but once Aldo backed himself into the cage Yan was able to work from closer range where he could use his uppercuts. Yan tripped Aldo up, and again Aldo's guard was just completely ineffective, not doing anything to keep Yan from having free reign to drop guard pass punches on him. Aldo may or may not have recovered in between rounds, but Yan hurt him immediately with a jab/straight & then dropped him with a short hook. Again, Aldo was really just helpless on the mat, though this time he had an excuse as Yan isolated his right arm, and just dropped lefts or elbows against the open side of Aldo's face. This could have been stopped a number of times, as Aldo literally took endless unanswered shots. Aldo clearly didn't want to give up, but simply moving every 30 seconds into another position where you just takes as many clean shots as the opponent has energy for isn't exactly intelligent defense. Aldo wasn't going to win a decision, and wasn't going to get up & get the KO, so there was really no point in Leon Roberts allowing this to going on as long as it did. Good match.
UFC Featherweight Title: Alexander Volkanovski vs. Max Holloway 5R. There are tons of bad decisions that are just blatant robbery, such as Michael Bisping vs. Matt Hamill, but for me the worst decisions are the ones like Henry Cejudo over Demetrius Johnston where the judges literally change the course of history. Holloway is going to be a Hall of Famer, and this was one of his crowning achievements, having changed his game in order to get his title back rather than just lose the same way once again & fade into the sunset. Instead of being 2-2 over his last 4, but once again holding the title and having the advantage & momentum going into a potential third fight with Volkanovski, he's now 1-3 with 2 losses to the current champ to the point that he'll only get a rematch because Dana White admitted the decision was a sham & doesn't really have anything better to do. As bad as the judges are, it's not so much that they suck but that the system itself is useless. No one could honestly sit there watching this fight & say that Volkanovski was the better fighter over the course of 25 minutes, which should be the point of, you know, declaring a victor. People complain the problem is that US MMA inherited the dumb boxing scoring system, but that's not accurate, the boxing scoring system at least knows that if you score a knockdown you get a 10-8 round, thus not just blindly considering every round to be equal no matter how large or small the margins. Now granted, there's tons of problems with the boxing scoring system, most notably that if you get totally hammered for 3 minutes but manage to stay on your feet it's usually a 10-9 round, and then a virtual slip in a round someone is otherwise losing winds up being a 10-8 in their favor, but at least, inherintly, you are theoretically given credit when the system happens to work for hurting the opponent & coming close to finishing the fight. If this were boxing, even in the worst situation, Max wins 47-46. I'm not saying these were dominant rounds, but that shouldn't be the criteria for 10-8 either, there are obvious rounds & then narrow rounds, Max had the two that fell in the former category. This was more like the infamous Dan Henderson vs. Michael Bisping II fight where Henderson did all the damage, but the champ conveniently got every round where he managed to stay on his feet even though he did nothing of note. And really, my problem here is that, even though Volkanovski deserves credit for getting himself back into the fight, ultimately he really didn't do much. Certainly, this is not the guy who was bombing people out for the finish or winning lopsided decisions. His low kicks were not really a factor this time, his wrestling was a few momentary meaningless position changes. Look, Max didn't slaughter him, even the rounds that Max was credited with winning were statistically close, but it never felt like Volkanovski got going and was actually landing cleanly, he racked up some numbers, but because Max defended well, Volkanovski's offense was kinda empty and even if Volkanovski is a bigger striker on paper, Max was the one who landed the game changing shots that had the real impact. Right away, we saw the changes in Max's game, shortening up his stance so he was less susceptible to the low kick that destroyed him last time, and relying on accurate, well placed counter strikes over pure volume where he used Volkanovski's momentum against him. Max still fought something of a pressure style, but it was more walking Volkanovski down without throwing much then waiting for Volkanovski to make his move forward to land the well timed counter. Numbers wise, Volkanovski was connecting, but Max was willing to take these inside leg kicks while holding the center & waiting for Volkanovski to make his move. Volkanovski was still landing these kicks on the outside, but very rarely connecting with the outside leg kick or getting into punching range. With 6 seconds left in the round, Max feinted with the left hook then dropped Volkanovski with the right high kick. Even though Max landed some inside leg kicks back, Volkanovski was winning the kick game, it's just that this wasn't an important part of the fight this time, Max just withstood it without slowing down or changing style or stance. The important aspect is that Max was making up for his lack of pure punching power through timing, and we saw this, for instance, when Max landed the knee up the middle to stop Volkanovski's advance. A better example, of course, came at the end of the 2nd when Max caught Volkanovski with an uppercut while Volkanovski was stepping forward for another flash knockdown. So we had two pretty obvious Holloway rounds, and while the next 3 were closer, I don't think there's any way you give all 3 rounds to either guy. Volkanovski was doing a better job of coming forward in the 3rd without getting countered, and finally landed a few punches. This round was close enough, and while people may have given it to Volkanovski more because he showed improvement, I would suggest that the 4th round is where the judges screwed up. Max was backing too much in the 3rd, and waiting for another big counter, and since it didn't happen in this stanza, he was probably slightly outworked. However, in the 4th, Max was holding his ground again and landing more solid blows. He stunned Volkanovski stepping in with a lead uppercut then again following with a spinning heel kick, the best shots of the round. Volkanovski had a meaningless brief position change, with the fight reseting on the feet within 5 seconds without any attempt at ground offense. He tried for another takedown, but Holloway fought his way free with 3 good uppercuts. For me, the two wrestling sequences were a net advantage to Max, who defended both well, and did the only actual damage. Max had a good right hand at the end of the round. I'm willing to give Volkanovski a slight edge in the 3rd on volume, but for me, the 4th was a pretty clear Max round, he landed the few crisp, damaging shots, as he had the whole fight. The only difference between this round and the 1st & 2nd is that Volkanovski took the damage better. The 5th round was the best round of the fight. Volkanovski was pushing hard knowing he needed the finish, but Holloway still looked fresh as you'd expect, & landed some sharp clean shots as well. Everyone acts like this was an obvious round for Volkanovski because he had two momentary meaningless position changes, but again, he got like 1 punch in and had like 3 seconds of control, maybe. The bottom line is Holloway very obviously got 2 rounds, and then there were 3 closer rounds that both guys had moments in, and there's a big difference between doing better by staying on your feet & getting into range more and turning the fight & convincingly winning it, Volkanovski should be credited for even doing the former, but not to the point he walked out with the belt. Volkanovski won a split decision 47–48, 48–47, 48–47. Good match.
