I remember watching some Youtube video years ago of Holly Holm, and people going "This girl is going to beat the piss out of Ronda Rousey" and I was like "Yeah, right. It's all hype."
Holm's first fight in the UFC versus Raquel Pennington was kinda bad. Even though Pennington has been more successful recently, I kind of saw her as like the gatekeeper to the bantamweight ranked women. Like, if you beat Pennington, then you got to go into the top 10. Then Holly fought Marion Reneau, and it was a point-win, 100%. So I'm like, "This girl's not getting to Ronda Rousey. There's no way she'll beat any top 10." So when they gave her the title shot, I was the first to say she was going to lose horribly.
Then, a funny thing happened. She beat Ronda Rousey decisively. I couldn't believe it. It was like a weird dream.
But then there was Miesha, and Valentina, and Germaine. This might seem mean, but I always thought GDR sucked, and that fight was Holly's for the taking. For whatever reason, Holm decided to clinch and wrestle with GDR and not take her down or hit her much. It was really frustrating, and now I'm on the fence about how good Holly Holm actually is. Sure, she survived fighting Cristiane Justino, but Justino is getting older and doesn't move like she did before. Justino is probably just skating by virtue of having a lot of punching power, but she's definitely slowed down a lot. Still, she didn't even look close to being in danger at any point during her fight with Holly. Dunno... even against an 'old' Cyborg, Holly looked horribly outmatched. I don't think she's "bad", I just think she's just a very average fighter who happened to beat Ronda Rousey, and that's it. I think a good match for her would be someone like Alexis Davis, but then again, I thought GDR would be a good match-up for Holly, and that turned out poorly.
Also, what was that bullshit GDR punching after the bell? She's supposed to be a professional, for pete's sake.
About UFC 220, i found this french documentary on Ngannou and thought it was interesting to see his upbringing. It's in french but there are english subs:
Finally got to watch the card and now I REALLY want to see Khabib vs Tony. The way Khabib walked him down was really impressive. He might be the goat grappler who ever competed in the UFC. He is really really big though for 155 and his stamina suffers from this. He slowed down pretty hard and if Tony can survive till the 3/4 round it gets really interesting. Khabib should be the favourite though.
On January 04 2018 17:36 Kenpark wrote: Finally got to watch the card and now I REALLY want to see Khabib vs Tony. The way Khabib walked him down was really impressive. He might be the goat grappler who ever competed in the UFC. He is really really big though for 155 and his stamina suffers from this. He slowed down pretty hard and if Tony can survive till the 3/4 round it gets really interesting. Khabib should be the favourite though.
I hope Khabib able stay healthy. Khabib vs Conor would be awesome to see. I want to see how Conor would deal with Khabib. I would think Tony Ferguson would get the first shot at Conor Mcgregor since he is the interim champion.
On January 04 2018 17:36 Kenpark wrote: Finally got to watch the card and now I REALLY want to see Khabib vs Tony. The way Khabib walked him down was really impressive. He might be the goat grappler who ever competed in the UFC. He is really really big though for 155 and his stamina suffers from this. He slowed down pretty hard and if Tony can survive till the 3/4 round it gets really interesting. Khabib should be the favourite though.
I guess Dana was right, you need to pay your fighters like dirt to keep them fighting.
It's always too bad looking at what could have been... Like JBJ failing in life, GSP continuing to fight, McGregor could have had 4 more fights at this point if he kept to the frequency before. It's so easy to aggrandize these fighters, see all potential champ vs champ match ups, but almost nothing comes to fruition.
I've definitely gone from a phase of really wanting to see all these McGregor fighters to kind of being like idgaf, but really I do and I hope that they secretly happen. But it's also a bit unfortunate, because the fighters make fighting and having the belt so important when they're fighting, but then once they have enough money they act like it's whatever now, so even if they do end up fighting, then it means a lot less, because it doesn't mean much to the fighters anymore. They're fighting for the payday, not to prove they're the best.
Anyway, dunno where that came from, but yeah, my little rant.
I think it's the fight to make too. Cyborg is saying stuff like the N1 contender should get it, because otherwise what are the girls working towards at 145 if they don't get the title shot.
But I don't agree, the gap right now is too big, and therefore those Invicta fighters don't deserve to fight for the title yet. Cyborg wants to be making 500k per fight (and maybe PPV), but she's wanting to fight no-name fighters with 8-2 records for a belt, fighters that were getting paid 2k+2k just a year ago. Anyway, I dont think Cyborg is worth much, and I think they're handling the 125 division much better than the 145... Just slowly ease into it, build up the names with time, get fights in. Cyborg makes it difficult, because really 145 should be a division where champs make 60-100k per fight, not be main events, until the names and talents develop. Cyborg should just do super fights with 135's as the ultimate boss, while they bring in the best 20 girls from across the world to grow the 145 division.
Like if Nunes and Cyborg happen, and Nunes wins, what even happens to that division. Also for women's divisions, I really think the naming should be different. Straw weight, Flyweight, Bantamweight, Featherweight.... Men's and women's mma divisions should not use the same weight for the same name.
lighten up, relax, and have fun. that's what watching sports is supposed to be : fun.
award winning MMA journalists like Ariel Helwani and Dave Meltzer make pro wrestling references to lighten the mood. ex UFC champs include "rowdy" ronda rousey and pro wrestling champion brock lesnar.
In this great UFC 220 Preview award winning journalist Ariel Helwani brings up 2 pro wrestling references and has a laugh.
one of the references is Randy "Mach Man" Savage winning the WWF Intercontinental Title in "The Boston Garden". UFC 220 is in Boston.
EPT
