It’s been another packed weekend of MMA action as the UFC held two cards on back to back nights on different continents and Bellator and the Super Fight League wrapped up their 2012 schedules with title bouts. We’ll break those cards down in a minute, but first…
News
It’s been confirmed by the UFC that their March 16th card (UFC 158) in Montreal will be headlined by the much anticipated and somewhat controversial Georges St-Pierre vs. Nick Diaz Welterweight title match.
Now, we’ve been pretty clear that we’re not exactly behind a title shot for a guy coming off a loss and years suspension for a drugs violation, but you can’t deny that this should be a good fight and the whole back story, personal and professional dislike between the fighters should make it one of the red letter main events of 2013.
The card is also set to feature Rory MacDonald, fresh from an awe inspiring if somewhat heelish performance against BJ Penn getting a chance to redeem his only career loss against former Interim champ Carlos Condit who is looking to bounce back from his loss to GSP (although he did manage to threaten GSP and push him to his most compelling bout since the Serra rematch) and that should be a cracking match between two of the undisputed top guys in the division.
We also get the guy who SHOULD be challenging for the belt, Johny Hendricks facing off against perennial contender and a fighter with a very similar skill-set in the shape of Jake Ellenberger who is looking to build on his win over Jay Heiron and get back into the title mix.
For all that we have a philosophical objection to the choice of challenger on credibility grounds, we love the feud booking and a card in Canada featuring GSP and Rory MacDonald against guys they have history with is practically guaranteed to be awesome.
Hell, that’s six of the world’s top ten 170lb fighters on the one card, what’s not to love?
With that little snippet of booking out the way, lets have a look at the weekend’s action…
UFC on FX 6
Gold Coast, Australia
Effectively being the finale to the UK vs. Australia Ultimate Fighter season subtitled ‘the Smashes’ this was an action packed card that saw good performances, both in the cage and in interviews from our two new Ultimate Fighters – Norman Parke and Robert Whittaker – and a pile of impressive knockout victories.
Ross Pearson showed great composure to pick G-Sot apart en route to a round three KO and on this form he could well mount a significant run now that he is committed to staying at Lightweight.
This event also saw the UFC debut of the REAL Hector Lombard, following a lacklustre performance against Tim Boetsch he was back to the aggressive, heavy handed striker we’ve come to know and love, to the point that the usually quite scary Rousimar Palhares looked a bit scared himself.
MAIN (FX)
• Ross Pearson def. George Sotiropoulos via TKO (punches)
• Robert Whittaker def. Brad Scott via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28) – “TUF: Smashes” welterweight-tournament final
• Norman Parke def. Colin Fletcher via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 29-28) – “TUF: Smashes” lightweight-tournament final
• Hector Lombard def. Rousimar Palhares via TKO (strikes)
PRELIMINARY (FUEL TV)
• Chad Mendes def. Yaotzin Meza via KO (punches)
• Joey Beltran def. Igor Pokrajac via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
• Mike Pierce def. Seth Baczynski via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)
• Ben Alloway def. Manuel Rodriguez via KO (kick, punches)
• Mike Wilkinson def. Brendan Loughnane via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
• Cody Donovan def. Nick Penner via TKO (strikes)
The Ultimate Fighter 16 Finale
Las Vegas, Nevada
Two events in two nights and while neither had title implications, the UFC really presented back to back nights of really fun fights. Sadly, the exception to that was the TUF16 finale where Colton Smith ground out a very dull win over the more talented, but smaller Mike Ricci. However, with all but one of the other matches on the card being finished in impressive fashion we can’t really complain.
The number of notable KOs is almost too many to mention, but I have to single out Rustam Khabilov’s THREE belly to back suplexes en route to a KO of Vinc Pichel and Pat Barry’s stunning knockout of Shane Del Rosario.
In the main event, Roy Nelson had one plan which was to lunge forward and land a big shot. Sadly, Matt Mitrione miscalculated with his movement and took a Big Country uppercut which knocked him silly and Nelson swarmed for the win. Usually I wouldn’t complain about a KO, but Nelson’s continued lack of seeming to take his MMA career seriously and relying on his chin and sheer mass to win fights irks me.
MAIN (FX)
• Roy Nelson def. Matt Mitrione via TKO (punches)
• Colton Smith def. Mike Ricci via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-26) – “TUF 16” tournament final
• Patrick Barry def. Shane Del Rosario via KO (punches)
• Dustin Poirier def. Jonathan Brookins via submission (D’arce choke)
PRELIMINARY (FUEL TV)
• Mike Pyle def. James Head via KO (knee and punches)
• Johnny Bedford def. Marcos Vinicius via KO (strikes)
• Rustam Khabilov def. Vinc Pichel via KO (suplex and punches)
Anthony Waldburger def. Nick Catone via technical submission (triangle choke)
PRELIMINARY (Facebook)
• Hugo Viana def. Reuben Duran via TKO (punches)
• Mike Rio def. John Cofer via submission (armbar)
• Timothy Elliott def. Jared Papazian via unanimous decision (30-25, 30-25, 30-26)
Bellator 84
Bellator rounded off their 2012 calendar with an event that crowned a new heavyweight champion (replacing the retired Cole Konrad) as Alexander Volkov defeated Richard Hale in a tepid effort.
It’s also worth mentioning that this is the second Bellator card in a row to have its advertised main event cancelled on the night, this week because 20 year old Marcin Held was deemed too young to compete in the venue by the local commission, thereby cancelling his schedule Lightweight tournament final against Dave Jansen.
While this looks bad for Bellator, it transpires that the commission had authorised the fight, hence how Held was able to weigh in at the venue on Thursday but then a ‘higher authority’ moved the goalposts on the day.
As usual, Bellator head honcho Bjorn Rebney tried to turn the crown upside down by saying the match will take place in Bellator’s next season, probably in front of a far larger television audience on SPIKE TV.
Given the way that Bellator have stacked the first few cards of that season, it looks like their first season on SPIKE will be much more essential MMA viewing than the lacklustre end to their MTV2 tenure.
MAIN (MTV2)
• Alexander Volkov def. Richard Hale via unanimous decision (49-46, 49-46, 49-46, 49-46) – wins vacant heavyweight title
• Louis Taylor def. Joe Vedepo via KO (punch)
• Daniel Vizcaya def. Jack Hermansson via split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
• Felice Herrig def. Patricia Vidonic via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
PRELIMINARY (spike.com)
• Quinton McCottrell vs. Belal Muhammad
• Christian Uflacker def. Cliff Wright via technical decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
• Anthony Gomez def. Anton Talamantes via submission (rear-naked choke)
• Jerald Williams def. Joey Diehl via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
• Eddie Castillo vs. Dave Sharp
Robert White def. Kenny Booker via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
SFL 13 – Night of Champions
Mumbai, India
The Super Fight League finished their debut year with a card that featured four title matches and the highest calibre of home grown competition yet as their best faced off for the right to be called the inaugural SFL champions.
It’s clear that the grapplers had the advantage over the strikers throughout the card, but that’s to be expected in what is still an MMA scene in progress (the same was true of the first few UFC’s remember) and in general the confidence and well roundedness of the Indian fighters continues to improve and impress.
The main event in particular was a fun, technical match which showed kickboxer Bhabajeet Chowdhury spending a lot of time defending and reversing submissions after being dragged down. In the end, Shyam Prasad’s grappling won out and you can expect him, along with the other champions crowned to be the face of the SFL as they push on into 2013.
Shyam Prasad def. Bhabajeet Chowdhury via Submission (Rear Naked Choke) to win the SFL Welterweight Title
Anup Kumar def. Manoj Chuhan via Submission (Rear Naked Choke) to win the SFL Bantamweight Title
Bharat Khandare def. Narender Grewal via Submission (Guillotine Choke) to win the SFL Featherweight Title
Rajinder Singh Meena def. Sandeep Yadav via Submission (Guillotine Choke) to win the SFL Lightweight title
Warren De Reuck def. Mohamed Hassan Badawy via Submission (Triangle Choke)
Manjit Kolekar def. Monika via Submission (Rear Naked Choke)
Jamshed Khan def. Rouhollah Eidehlouei via KO/TKO (Retirement)
That’s about it for this week, but please let us know if there are any promotions that we’ve missed that you’d like us to cover in future.
KUMITE 