MMA/UFC Thread
 

I noticed there weren't any threads in here for MMA, so I thought I'd create one. Any MMA or UFC fans out there?

Last night was UFC 118 BJ Penn v.s. Frankie Edgar II for the Lightweight Title, but more importantly it was former two-time UFC Heavyweight Champion Randy Couture v.s. current boxing Heavyweight Champion James Toney, a boxer who has been talking shit about MMA for quite some time, calling out Dana White, Brock Lesnar, and any fighter willing to fight him. The night went as everyone predicted with Nate Diaz, Randy Couture, and Frankie Edgar all pulling off victories.

What I'm really excited about right now is the fact that after UFC 117, Sonnen is getting an immediate rematch this December against Silva. Dana White originally said that Vitor Belfort was going to get a title shot before Sonnen got a rematch, but apparently he's changed his mind and this rematch is in the works. I, for one, am very excited about this rematch. Sonnen is going to have a chance to redeem himself after his last-minute loss to Silva in the previous fight. I'm a bit skeptical that he's going to be able to pull it off since Silva will be recovered from his rib injury by the time the fight rolls around.

UFC 121 is confirmed to be Brock Lesnar v.s. Cain Velasquez, though I have little doubt that Lesnar is going to successfully defend his title.

Ugh, Lesner. Never has anyone made me more angry at UFC than him. There's absolutely no reason he should have been thrown into the limelight like he has. Dana White pretty much gave him the title out of the gate just because he was a known name from wrestling. He was simply horrible when he came in. He's gotten better, but I'm still upset about the whole thing.

I didn't get a chance to watch the Silva fight, but heard it was much better than the ones he's had in the past, which makes me happy to hear. However, I don't think a rematch would go the same way. Silva now knows how Sonnen works and will be training specifically for him. I'm still waiting for the GSP vs Silva fight.

Silva got very lucky, and that's all anyone will really say. Sonnen made one little mistake in the final round, and that one mistake was enough to cost him.

I'd have to see Silva get in more than one measly little jab that knocks his opponents out cold before I can say he's impressive, especially after his piss-poor attitude and performance at 112.

As far as Brock goes, I agree. He should have had to climb the ranks just like everyone else has. Lashley's doing it... well, he'll continue doing it when he recovers from his injuries from his last fight.

I noticed on the UFC 121 card that Court McGee is set to make his debut (prelims, I believe). Time to see what abilities he's picked up/worked on since his contract fight.

I'll agree that Lesnar was thrust into the limelight pretty quickly, but honestly it happens all the time in other sports, why not this one? Lesnar has proven himself to be a champion by not dying at the hands of Shane Carwin. He's a champion. More on that in a minute. I don't dislike Lesnar and I'm not really sure why a lot of people do.

You made a statement and then contradicted yourself. Silva didn't get lucky. If you know anything about Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, you should know that it's a very patient sport. Allowing your opponent tire himself out while you wait for him to make a mistake and capitalize on it is pretty much BJJ in a nutshell. Silva didn't get lucky - he's a champion. Even on the worst of days champions find a way to win, even when it's a longshot. They make that hail mary in the final seconds of the game, and that's exactly what Silva did when he defeated Sonen, and that's exactly what Lensar did when he defeated Carwin.

To further disprove your point, Sonnen made lots of mistakes in the 4th and 5th rounds. Remember when Silva almost knocked him out? I'd hardly call that luck. It's called determination and heart.

I'm not sure why you say that you're not impressed by Silva, you must have some ridiculously high standards to not be impressed. Silva hasn't lost a fight since 2006 - that's ridiculous by current standards. He's beaten some of the best in the UFC and some no longer in the UFC (such as Dan Henderson). He's proven himself by dominating his weight division. If you think that GSP would have a snowball's chance in hell then you're horribly mistaken. GSP is much smaller than Silva and has proven that he's susceptible to being knocked out - that's his weakness, as a matter of fact, and Silva's strength happens to be knocking people out.

Dana White will never allow a Silva v.s. GSP fight anyways. They would have to catchweight to even make it work, making a title-fight impossible. Dana has even said it himself, Silva is the best pound for pound fighter out there, whether you like him or not.

Sounds like someone's in love.

Hmm quite a bit to cover here.

Lesner was put into the deep end of things well before he earned purely based off knowing his name would sell but it's hard to argue with the results he's manged to get. I've never seen anyone thrown to the sharks while that green and actually succeed. That should tell you that even if he got cut some breaks a little too early there's not much doubt he would have climbed the ladder the old fashioned way anyway.

Couture vs Toney was sad and predictable and wholly unnecessary on any level. If Toney had manged to punch Randy in the face and end it fast it wouldn't have meant anything other than that he's lucky and hits hard. Couture taking down and choking out a out of shape brain damaged man who had no ground skills whatsoever meant even less.

I'm not sure Silva vs GSP will ever happen but if it does I'd say GSP hasn't better chances than a lot are giving him. As much as it's made for boring fights from him for the last while he's turned into one of the best wrestlers in the sport with maybe Chael Sonnen and Gray Maynard being better. Silva on the other hand has no defensive wrestling skill whatsoever and GSP isn't prone to leaving himself open to submissions in the same way Sonnen is. Add the fact that GSP has shown over the last few years that if he thinks the other person can hurt him on the feet he's not too proud take it top the ground like his life depends on it. Which given Silva's level of power and skill on the feet it pretty much would.

Additional Spam:
If that's all you've seen then you really need to go back and watch his fights right after he came into the UFC. He's gotten bored and complacent with how much he's outclassed his opponents for the last while but he hasn't been the champ for so long do to lack of skill. It would be nice if this close call he just got lit a fire under his ass for the next while though.

Something I wish I would've done before I said that. I did, in fact, go back last night and watch many of his older fights after I said that, and I'm retracting my statement about him not being impressive. I simply judged him based on his last 2 fights, which was a mistake.

And as far as Brock, yes, he's proven through his past couple of fights that he's got the skills of a champion. I just wanted to see him dominate the entire division before getting the title shot. I had no doubts about him defeating Carwin, especially after surviving Round 1.

I think my problem is, as good as they are, their attitudes just kinda didn't favor me. It's a small ordeal that shouldn't even be.

Yeah, Silva's last few fights have been unimpressive because he's gotten bored. He's beaten pretty much everyone in his division and even some of the ones from other divisions, so he tries to do random things in the ring these days to make the fights more entertaining for him, even if they aren't for the audience. I think this is where the fault was for him against sonnen, he wasn't expecting an actual challenge. The rematch will more than likely fly in Silva's favor because of this fact.

Re: Lesner -- Like I said before, I don't like the fact he was thrown into the championship reign immediately. There are three things that bug me about this. One, it plays favortism. I know he sells tickets, but come on, everyone should have to work their way up. Two, he lost his first fight in the UFC, but was STILL given a title shot afterward, I mean seriously? What the fuck is up with that. Three, he carries that WWE style attitude where "There should be bad guys with dick attitudes to counter the good guys with chivalry attitudes." Dana White already got pissed off at Lesner's lack of sportsmanship and here's to hoping he shapes up.

There had been talks about a GSP vs Silva catchweight fight at one time, but there's always talks about it and nothing comes from it. I'd love to see it, but I think it'd take two fights for us to really see the true match come out. GSP has this habit of losing fight #1 vs someone and then learning their style and dominating in fight #2 against them.

Now my question is how long do you think Fedor's managers will hold out before he's signed with the UFC? Every MMA fan is waiting for it, and now that he's been smacked down a bit by Werdum, maybe it'll happen.

In Lesnar's last fight he did show that he was shaping up his attitude, for whatever that's worth to anyone. I've never felt that UFC needed to be a gentlemanly sport. I always thought of it as a cross between the WWF and Mike Tyson era boxing, so I kind of like the bad attitudes and the bad asses. I know that's not what martial arts is about, but let's face it, this isn't tournament style martial arts, this is the UFC. If everyone was just quiet and respectful this would be a very boring sport. But that's just my redneck opinion, mostly.

Lesnar pretty much stated that Carwin gave him an excellent fight and he really had to dig deep not to get knocked out and/or punched out, which everyone saw anyways so it's not like we needed him to confirm it, but he also said that he's a changed person and that's he's saw the light and blah, blah blah...

Another wrestler is already in the process of crossing over - Batista. That's going to make for some interesting fighting, although it's going to be on Strikeforce and not UFC. My thoughts? Well basically he's just a huge ass tough guy, which is pretty much what Lesnar was when he first entered into MMA, but then Lesnar was also an excellent wrestler for many years - Batista has no such luxury. I don't think Batista is going to do as well as Lesnar did, but then I didn't expect Lesnar to do as great as he did so I'll just shut it right now. You can expect that if he does well, a Batista v.s. Lesnar match won't be too far off, which I would find pretty interesting considering that they used to wrestle together in WWF.

As far as the Toney fight, Hamster, yeah, it was a predictable joke, but a very satisfying predictable joke. Did you hear all the pre-fight interviews Toney did? He was talking a lot of smack and not just about his opponent or the fight, but also about MMA as a sport. He went in there cocky as hell, thinking he was going to just sweep this sport with his boxing skills, and he was made to look like a fool in front of everyone. Dana White said it himself, he didn't promote it to be this huge Boxing v.s. MMA thing, he just promoted it as another fight on the card because he didn't expect anything more than what usually happens when a wrestler fights a boxer (read: domination).

Fedor won't come over until either the UFC lightens the restrictions on their contracts and becomes willing to co promote ie never or Fedor gets knocked down enough pegs to not be able to make the most money while having things his way. So probably not until he's sufficiently faded to make it even more frustrating than if he hadn't come over at all. So he'll go all Crocop on us.

To further add to the controversy of the Sonnen vs. Silva fight, Sonnen admitted to juicing before the fight! Anderson Silva is truly a champion of champions.