The Official MMA Discussion Thread

[TheKenwyne]

I had it 38-36 Misaki going into the last round. The last round was definetly 10-8 Santiago, giving the fight a 46-46 draw. If I had to make a 'must' decision I would've actually sided with Misaki: he won 3 rounds to Santiago's 2.

 

My scorecard: detailed

 

Round 1: 10-9 Misaki - Grappling was even, Misaki takes the edge on striking.

Round 2: 10-9 Misaki - Ditto. Miskai wins both this time but not convincingly. (20-18 Misaki)

Round 3: 10-8 Santiago - A near finish and next to no effective offence by Misaki means a 10-8 on my card. (28-28)

Round 4: 10-8 Misaki - Santiago's strong finish rescued him from a 10-7... he was getting dominated like Misaki was in Round 3 until he nearly put him out right in the last few seconds. The red card of course means this is 10-8 instead of 10-9, and would've made a 10-8 round a 10-7. (38-36 Misaki)

Round 5: 10-8 Santigao - A whole round of total domination? This is nearly 10-7 territory but for that Misaki sweep. (Assuming Misaki had survived minus the towel 46-46)

 

So my scorecard would've been 46-46 with a must decision for Misaki. Anyone else care to offer their opinion?

[Daffanka]

I agree with that scorecard but I'd give the must win to Santiago. Misaki won more rounds but Santiago won them more convincingly and did more in the fight as a whole.

[RingofHonorGuard]

Two days until James Toney puts Couture on his ass with a hook to the head and upsets the entire MMA world.

 

The closer and closer it gets to fight time, and the more videos that come out with Toney's training, and how much better shape he's got in. I think Couture is looking past him as well.

[brashleyholland]

 

The closer and closer it gets to fight time, and the more videos that come out with Toney's training, and how much better shape he's got in. I think Couture is looking past him as well.

 

With all due respect, you can't tell how fit someone is from a video, and any video that gets released of a guy training is released because that person wants it to be released. I couldn't tell you how many times I personally have been told to stop filming when someone starts getting tired, or doesn't look great. When I visited a gym in the US (that shall remain nameless) I was threatened with a blackball from the UFC unless I wiped the memory card on my phone camera, after filming somone walk out on a session through lack of gas (I had been asked and given permission to film the session, I wasn't prying). Most of the 'training vids' you see online are taken before training starts, after warm up. Then you get the 'cut-aways' halfway through a session when someone talks to the camera, covered in sweat. Point being, anything you see (especially from guys in the UFC's spotlight) is very, very carefully managed.

 

Toney has dropped a bit of chub, sure, but burning your belly off and getting in the kind of shape that someone who has never grappled before needs to be in to survive more than five minutes with a grappler are two different things.

 

Now none of this means anything if Randy stands in front of Toney for a few seconds and gets caught...but from what I hear, this one will be on the floor faster than you can say UFC > Boxing :-p

[Zoloftjunkie]

A good read on the FEG situation.

http://www.mmafighting.com/2010/08/26/feg-in-survival-mode/

[Dustin]

Two days until James Toney puts Couture on his ass with a hook to the head and upsets the entire MMA world.

 

The closer and closer it gets to fight time, and the more videos that come out with Toney's training, and how much better shape he's got in. I think Couture is looking past him as well.

 

You log onto sherdog every day don't you? Be honest, I'm not here to judge.

[TheKenwyne]

In my humble opinion Toney's condition means jack. Unless he clouts Randy really hard as Captain America comes in for the takedown, he's going to end up grounded and tapping the mat very quickly.

[brashleyholland]

A great reflection of the 'average' American MMA fan last night at Bellator: The loudest the crowd got was when Lisa Ward and Ais Daly ended up in the a-hem, 69 (c'mon, there's no other word for it) position.

 

That's not meant as a jab at American's by the way...the average Japanese fans are silent all the time anyway and the average British MMA fan has popped out for a smoke and a pint and a fight when the female fighters are introduced.

:-p

 

Other than that, Vega-Tims was a decent scrap and Carl-Stinson provided a couple more moments for the 'Bellator Highlight-Reel of Awesome'. Girls fight was dull (please, please will some fighters from GB/Ireland learn how to defend a takedown?) and the heavyweight fight was...a low level heavyweight fight. The UFC learned with TUF 10 that putting unprepared, low-level heavyweights in a tourney situation, where they know they're going to have to fight multiple times in a shorter-than-usual time-frame (hence they don't go as hard as they could), makes for mostly bad fights.

 

Still, more hits than misses for Bellator so far.

[Daffanka]

(please, please will some fighters from GB/Ireland learn how to defend a takedown?)

 

Not only does Hathaway know how to defend takedowns but he knows how to defend them as awesomely as possible

 

http://i49.tinypic.com/5yeo01.jpg

[brashleyholland]

A good read on the FEG situation.

http://www.mmafighting.com/2010/08/26/feg-in-survival-mode/

 

Yeah, I read that yesterday, it's a really good overview of the situation, and it's not a great situation by any means.

 

Couple of other interesting notes:

 

No money has changed hands yet between PUJI and FEG

 

K-1 are still paying off the huge tax bills from when Kazuyoshi Ishii (K-1's 'Godfather') went to prison for tax evasion, etc.

 

According to this interview with the editor of Kampiro, Tsui Saito (Japanese MMA mag), there's even more afoot.

 

- Japanese fighters aren't getting paid either, but are warned not to speak out.

 

- FEG have been using their profits from Dynamite! 2009 to pay fighters during the 2010 calender.

 

- At one point there was talk of canning Dream 16, the MAX Finals and even (GULP) the WGP 2010 Finals.

 

On the plus side, Dream 16 is going to shown on at primetime on TBS, with the latest Kameda boxing match as a lead in. Last time they did that their ratings were great.

 

Also, with the lack of money in Japanese MMA right now, there is less and less involvement from the Yakuza. They'll never leave the fight business alone, but they've actually taken to promoting their own MMA/fight shows (not for TV, obviously). They usually involve riots, brawls and random chaotic interludes at least three or four times an evening, but the fights come first. Now THAT I'd like to see on HD Net!

[brashleyholland]

Not only does Hathaway know how to defend takedowns but he knows how to defend them as awesomely as possible

 

http://i49.tinypic.com/5yeo01.jpg

 

Ahhh, the Schilt method of defending takedowns...gotta love it!

[RingofHonorGuard]

You log onto sherdog every day don't you? Be honest, I'm not here to judge.

 

Okay, so.... Because I give a boxer a chance of beating a near 50 year old MMA fighter who's been clipped a lot in his recent fights.... That makes me a daily user of Sherdog? Interesting...

 

Excuse the hell out of me for believing a guy who's been throwing punches for the greater part of his life has a chance of landing one on Randy as he bumbles in and then following with a couple more on the mat to finish it. Not very many fighters in the UFC have the kind of accuracy that Toney has.

 

I can't wait for Toney to win, Dustin, so I can serve you a monsterous piece of humble pie. Then maybe in the future you'll keep your snarky comments to yourself about sherdog or whatever lame MMA forum you want to use for a basis to flame someone.

[Self]

I'm interested in the freak fight. If Randy gets it to ground, he'll probably win, but... Toney could catch him. It could happen. I'm curious as to how it's gonna go.

 

However, I probably won't watch this show. The card doesn't thrill me. I have the Countdown special DVR'd and ready to go, but I can't bring myself to watch THAT let alone order the PPV. My love for MMA (and on certain other wrestling forums I come off as a gigantic proponent of MMA>Wrestling) still really depends on the characters, as opposed to the sport itself.

[brashleyholland]

I'm interested in the freak fight. If Randy gets it to ground, he'll probably win, but... Toney could catch him. It could happen. I'm curious as to how it's gonna go.

 

I think that's where the interest is. If it was Toney vs Machida, Shogun, Velasquez, Mir etc, then it'd be a much more cut and dry situation in most people's minds. Couture's supposed 'frailty' at his age is the x-factor in this fight.

 

However, I probably won't watch this show. The card doesn't thrill me. I have the Countdown special DVR'd and ready to go, but I can't bring myself to watch THAT let alone order the PPV. My love for MMA (and on certain other wrestling forums I come off as a gigantic proponent of MMA>Wrestling) still really depends on the characters, as opposed to the sport itself.

 

You make an excellent point, and I'm sure you're not alone in that way of thinking. I've been talking to a number of people in the business as well as fans, and one of the things I keep hearing is how surprised they are that the UFC didn't go for the real hard sell on this PPV.

 

Obviously the Toney/Couture fight was always going to be the selling point, but Edgar has received almost zero coverage. He's the champion, he's the number one ranked lightweight in the world...and he's fighting one of the best of all time in a 'revenge' match. This had UFC Primetime written all over it, even a dual one including Toney and Couture would have made sense.

 

I'm really looking forward to seeing the numbers for this one....

[Daffanka]

Okay, so.... Because I give a boxer a chance of beating a near 50 year old MMA fighter who's been clipped a lot in his recent fights.... That makes me a daily user of Sherdog? Interesting...

 

I think the mistake you're making is assuming Toney's success in boxing is going to automatically translate to MMA, just because he's a good boxer.

 

Toney spends his entire boxing matches parked near the ropes playing defense and countering. He's the least mobile fighter I've ever seen and he gets away with it because he's using methods that won't work when all a guy needs to do is get a hold of you to essentially win the fight.

 

I really, really hope Toney knocks Randy out because it'd be really funny and I don't like Randy at all but it's almost certainly not going to happen.

[TheKenwyne]

Everyone made weight.

 

Picks:

 

Penn

Toney

Florian

Maia

Diaz

Lauzon

Winner

Miller

Osipczak

Alves

[Dustin]

Okay, so.... Because I give a boxer a chance of beating a near 50 year old MMA fighter who's been clipped a lot in his recent fights.... That makes me a daily user of Sherdog? Interesting...

 

Excuse the hell out of me for believing a guy who's been throwing punches for the greater part of his life has a chance of landing one on Randy as he bumbles in and then following with a couple more on the mat to finish it. Not very many fighters in the UFC have the kind of accuracy that Toney has.

 

I can't wait for Toney to win, Dustin, so I can serve you a monsterous piece of humble pie. Then maybe in the future you'll keep your snarky comments to yourself about sherdog or whatever lame MMA forum you want to use for a basis to flame someone.

 

It's far from just this (even though it does seem to be the general consensus among shertards that Toney will score a KO within seconds). Almost all of your posts stand out to me, mainly because most people on this forum make sense when they post and yours are so sherdog esque.

[RingofHonorGuard]

It's far from just this (even though it does seem to be the general consensus among shertards that Toney will score a KO within seconds). Almost all of your posts stand out to me, mainly because most people on this forum make sense when they post and yours are so sherdog esque.

 

Okay, well, your posts stick out to me as well.. You come off as one of those douche bags that is sitting in a luxury leather chair, staring down over the top of your nose, and smoking from a pipe. You're an elitist, clearly... Or trying really hard to be.

 

So I guess we're even... Both drawing conclusions and looking foolish.

 

I think the mistake you're making is assuming Toney's success in boxing is going to automatically translate to MMA, just because he's a good boxer.

 

Toney spends his entire boxing matches parked near the ropes playing defense and countering. He's the least mobile fighter I've ever seen and he gets away with it because he's using methods that won't work when all a guy needs to do is get a hold of you to essentially win the fight.

 

I really, really hope Toney knocks Randy out because it'd be really funny and I don't like Randy at all but it's almost certainly not going to happen.

 

It's not so much that I care about Toney's mobility. I've watched a lot of his fights. It's the fact that he has good accuracy. Randy's been clipped by Lesnar(yes, I realize the dude has hands the size of most faces) and Nogueira, and neither of those two have a third of the accuracy that Toney will have.

 

Again, we'll see tomorrow night. I got Toney pulling the upset.

[Dustin]

Okay, well, your posts stick out to me as well.. You come off as one of those douche bags that is sitting in a luxury leather chair, staring down over the top of your nose, and smoking from a pipe. You're an elitist, clearly... Or trying really hard to be.

 

So I guess we're even... Both drawing conclusions and looking foolish.

 

 

 

It's not so much that I care about Toney's mobility. I've watched a lot of his fights. It's the fact that he has good accuracy. Randy's been clipped by Lesnar(yes, I realize the dude has hands the size of most faces) and Nogueira, and neither of those two have a third of the accuracy that Toney will have.

 

Again, we'll see tomorrow night. I got Toney pulling the upset.

 

Okay then, we'll agree to disagree. But, you wrote Sonnen off before his last fight and even said GSP would lose if I remember correctly. Is it a dislike of wrestlers that you have, do you want to be considered the guy who called an upset before it happened, or do you just buy into the hype?

[ampulator]

Okay then, we'll agree to disagree. But, you wrote Sonnen off before his last fight and even said GSP would lose if I remember correctly. Is it a dislike of wrestlers that you have, do you want to be considered the guy who called an upset before it happened, or do you just buy into the hype?

It's the belief that stirkers can beat grapplers. Yes, they can... but only if they can actually make the strike hit. Grapplers have a natural advantage against strikers. it's been proven in MMA. Unless Toney has learned TDD, he's going to be in trouble if he gets taken down.

 

In any case, GSP wasn't trained as a wrestler initially. He was doing karate before MMA, of all things.

[BHK1978]

I really wanted to go to the UFC tomorrow night in Boston. However, the tickets were a little to much for me. I mean nobody in their right might would pay $200 just to sit in the upper part of the Fleet Center/Gardens. I have had those very seats for Celtics and Bruins games and they flat out suck. You can't see crap from up there.

 

Oh well, I hope that UFC comes to Hartford or Providence (When I was in high school they had a show scheduled in Providence, but they had to cancel it. This was in the mid-1990's.) one day in the future so I can actually see them live.

[RingofHonorGuard]

Okay then, we'll agree to disagree. But, you wrote Sonnen off before his last fight and even said GSP would lose if I remember correctly. Is it a dislike of wrestlers that you have, do you want to be considered the guy who called an upset before it happened, or do you just buy into the hype?

 

Because I thought Chael Sonnen would lose(which he did), and I dislike GSP that means I hate wrestlers? One of my all-time favorite fighters is Matt Hughes, I'm a Midwest guy... We love wrestling here, a lot of people eat, sleep, and breathe it.

 

If you spent more time reading my posts instead of critiquing the ones you disdain, you'd see that I A) gave Chael props after he tooled Anderson for 4 rounds, and B) said I'd love to see a rematch.

 

As far as St. Pierre goes, I do blindly hate him because he's one of the most talented fighters in the world and is too scared to commit to a finish. It disgusts me, because you know how good both his standup and ground is...

 

So it's not so much that I dislike wrestlers... It's that I dislike wrestlers who like to turn a fight into a really really boring slobber-inducing comatic chess(one sided) match.

 

Does that clarify things any better? I'm not a "bad fan"... I just enjoy upsets, and James Toney beating Randy Couture would send a lot of shockwaves through the MMA world, imo. I really want to see more boxers transition over, because that's the only way we're really going to see accuracy.

 

Edit: Had to leave in the middle of my post, so I'll finish my thought...

 

I'm not buying into the James Toney hype machine. He's absolutely -no- threat to anyone that's a serious contender in the heavyweight division, but neither is Randy at this point. Dana saying if Toney beats Couture that he's in the "title mix" was very laughable. So again, I'm not delusional about Toney... But I'm also not one of those people who thinks Couture is going to come out and smash Toney with no regard for his punching ability.

[Dustin]

Thanks for clearing it up.

[Zoloftjunkie]

Where's all my fellow Kenflo fans at? Man I am nervous about tonights fight. I really hope he has the answer for his lay and pray. I don't know why but I kinda want to see Frankie win. There is something about Penn I just don't like but I can't put my finger on it. But on the other hand I would like Florians title shot to be against Penn so it doesn't look like a fluke if he wins over Edgar. Sorry just nervous ranmblings from a madman I will stop now

[Daffanka]

Edgar rules and he looked outstanding. It was a good fight, he clearly won all five rounds (or at least four out of five) and there was nothing controversial about it. He was taken down by BJ twice though, which makes me worried about Maynard. On the other hand Edgar swept him both times.

 

Honestly Edgar is just a really smart fighter with the tools to exploit anyone's holes. If he beats Maynard he's going to rule that division for a while.

 

BJ's corner was absolutely awful. BJ tried to fight the fight he always fights and it wasn't working. What did his corner tell him? "Go get him BJ." Compare and contrast to Edgar's corner that constantly told him what to do, how BJ was fighting and what openings there were. BJ really needs to get with a proper camp.

 

Couture - Toney went roughly as you'd expect. It was pretty gross to see a guy as punch drunk as Toney take so many punches though.

 

Maia - Miranda was certainly something. It's a shame Maia couldn't finish but he fought a good fight and didn't get smashed like I feared he would.

 

Florian - Maynard was pretty boring. Maynard fought his fight. A shame Florian lost because I really like him. Maynard is a big burly wrestler and I'm probably the only guy in the universe who's excited for Edgar - Maynard 2.

 

Diaz - Davis... ugh. Don't care.

 

I liked this card but someone who isn't a big Edgar fan probably wouldn't like it as much.