M-1 Challenge XXVI (7/8/11)

(Written in 2010, never published.Why not now? Seems as good a time as any. No ratings.)

M1! SHOWTIME! FIGHTS! Militech and Ranallo on the mics.

1) Eddie Arizmendi vs. Jason Norwood: Middleweight contest. Norwood is a wrestler and ex Army dude.

FIGHT: Arizmendi TKO Rnd 2. Not the most exciting contest ever. Norwood goes for takedowns and nothing but. Lousy striker. Arizmendi is not a great wrestler and a much better striker - he still gets the back of Norwood briefly in the first and hurts Norwood almost every time he lands. With seconds left in the first, Norwood gets hit with a right hand lead and a left hook and Norwood goes out cold.

2) Beau Baker vs. Daniel Weichel: GERMANY VS. BAKER. Oh man.

FIGHT: Weichel Unanimous Decision. Pretty clear, easy fight to score and watch. Weichel basically throws the 1-2 and lands it every time because Baker's head is straight up and he doesn't learn to give Weichel any sort of different look standing. Baker just going with wild looping bombs as the 3rd round continues on.

3) Josh Bacallao vs. Maribek Taisumov: Taisumov is a wrestler, so I am told on the TV. Bacallao is some nobody. Taisumov KOed Yuri Ivlev, who is a journeyman of some repute.

FIGHT: Taisumov TKO Rnd 1. Bacallao gets an early takedown but ends up in a scramble and loses the position. Back on the feet, Taisumov lands a straight right hand with a little feint and Bacallao goes down and then takes a blasting forearm to the face on the mat.

4) Tyson Jeffries vs. Arthur Guseinov: Guseinov apparently likes headkicks and is the Russian Phil Baroni. Both guys have losses to the middle of the road contenders - Guseinov lost to Luigi Fiorvanti and Jeffries to Sultanmagomedov. Or whatever that guy's name is.

FIGHT: Guseinov TKO Rnd 1. Huge KO with these dudes just going wild with strikes and scrambles. Guseinov ends up landing a spinning backfist and knocks out Jeffries cold. Just ice cold. Ranallo is flipping the fuck out. Guseinov is flipping the fuck out. Jeffries is like "...."

5) Kenny Garner vs. Pat Bennett: Can't believe that Showtime paid anything for this show with this being the main event. Heavyweight fight.

FIGHT: Garner TKO Rnd 2. Garner wins this fight in a rematch of a fight he won the first time. Bennett supposedly has big wrestling credentials but barely uses them, and Garner pushes him all around the ring and punches him to the body and legs just to stay busy. Bennett is totally gassed, ends up eating punches moving straight back and goes down. Fight over.

Shark Fights 17 (7/15/2011)

(Its been almost a year since my last review. Why? I stopped watching shows like this. Luckily, no one read this blog and it was just something I did for my own note taking, so no one cared. But in case you run across this, there's the explanation. Anyhow, I reviewed this show almost entirely but couldn't figure out how to give a proper number score for it or anything, and now that its a year later and clear none of these guys are likely to show up in the UFC again, it doesn't matter anyways. So here it is.)

We're back in Amarillo...wait, no, Frisco, TX (?) for more Shark Fights action. Trigg and Schiavello are announcing. Main event if Jake Rosholt and Matt Horwich.

1) Alan Jouban vs. Andrew Goldthwaithe: Welterweight opener. 1-1 vs. 1-0. 3 minute rounds. Goldthwaithe is HUGE. like 6'4''.

FIGHT: Joubain TKO Rnd 3. Joubain trains at a big time gym in Legends MMA and he fights competently, for sure. Lots of takedowns and control on the mat, nearly ends this in the first with a triangle, and ends up pulling a huge KO in the 3rd round by doing EXACTLY WHAT YOU SHOULD DO - THROW COMBINATIONS. Just kept throwing and just kept landing on a 4 punch combo that followed a body kick that dropped the hands of his opponent. Joubain has a ways to go before being more referenced, but this was a good start. (1)

2) Erik Perez vs. Doug Frey: Down to featherweights for this one. Perez is from Jackson's gym, has a serious kickboxing record from down in Mexico, where that sort of thing actually matters. No, seriously. They watch kickboxing there. It is on TV and shit.

FIGHT: Perez Unanimous Decision. Perez is the more well rounded fighter - he gets many more takedowns compared to Frey (who only gets one in the early portion of the second) and he's the more technically adept striker, so he lands more. Still, Perez's striking doesn't seem to be too fearsome in terms of power. His wrestling is so so.

3) Emanuel Newton vs. Ilir Latifi: Light heavyweight contest. Newton I've seen approximately a million times. Latifi is a young buck looking to make his name. Apparently Newton's favorite band is Strife. Go figure.

FIGHT: Ilir Latifi Unanimous Decision: Terrible, terrible decision. Latifi lost every single round of the bout doing absolutely nothing on offense. Wait, OK, Newton actually won and they couldn't read the cards correctly. OK, that's better. Ridiculous. Newton uses his wrestling to totally block any attempts at shots from Latifi, and by the end of the first round, Latifi is basically just running from Newton's jabs and low kicks.

4) Ricco Rodriguez vs Doug Williams: Super late replacement to fight Rodriguez, who had a pretty nonimpressive opponent before who showed up 30lbs over the catchweight, apparently having thought it was just a heavyweight fight.

FIGHT: Rodriguez Submission Rnd 1. RNC after a KOTC special. I still think Rodriguez looks slow of foot in the ring and his hands are glacial too. I just can't see him having a big impact at this point of his career.

5) Jake Rosholt vs. Matt Horwich: This is actually a rematch of a fight Horwich won. Horwich is still lovably crazy that represents a different, dying era of the sport when it was filled with rejects of society. Rosholt is just sorta another meathead.

FIGHT: Rosholt Unanimous Decision. Boring fight, to be honest. Horwich has his grinding style of unorthodox punishment absorbing, but it doesn't work well as long as the opposition is willing to fight in spots, take what Rosholt gives him, and leave few openings. That was the case here, with Rosholt sorta jabbing and low kicking and punishing Horwich as he came forward. Horwich basically was begging for Rosholt to go to the mat with him and he never complied. Smart guy - good enough to know when he should put the wrestling in the defense column too. Horwich is too past it to be a real contender and Rosholt may be growing again as a fighter, but its a slow march back to the top.

Blackeye Promotions: Rise of the Champions

Okay, another one from Fightzone TV. We've got Jay Adams and Greg Flowers calling this night of fights and I know nothing about it except it looks like it's in a really scummy locale. Okay, so its North Carolina. Greg Flowers just told me so.

1) Wesley Evans vs. Vinny Alberico: Amateur welterweights.

FIGHT: Alberico TKO Rnd 1. Super fast fight. Evans is out from a short right that he walks into and gets pounded out along the cage. Sorta shameful. Looked like he was almost hit with a jab.

2) Matt Tran vs. Shane Tyner: Pro debuts for both at 135. Tran is 5'10''.

FIGHT: Tran Unanimous Decision. Not much of a fight - Tyner gets put on his back over and over, his wrestling being largely ineffective. When it does work in the second, he's still doing nothing but trying to escape kimuras and triangles. Tran's wrestling isn't bad but its not great either. Sorta a decent BJJ guy but not much beyond that. (0)

3) Chris Cain vs. Justin Marks: Bantamweight pro bout. Cain is a guy they want to push, it would seem.

FIGHT: Marks Unanimous Decision. Rashad basically says at the start that he thinks Marks is better than his 4-3 record - he's right. Marks is a submission guy all the way and he's tying up Marks in pretzels. He's not finishing, sure, but he's constantly in dominant positions and putting him in danger. Not much of a wrestler, no striking, Marks is straight BJJ all the way and admits it afterwards; "If that was a jiujitsu tournament, I don't even know how many points that was...if he didn't respect it before, he does now." (0)

4) Dustin Center vs. Jacob Allman: Dudes. Undefeated dudes. Lightweight dudes.

FIGHT: Allman Submission Rnd 1. Allman is a wrestler and that makes him good at guillotines. That's what Joe Rogan told me. Center just gave up the neck in the saddest fashion while inside the guard of Allman after catching a kick and pushing him down. (0)

5) Frank Waszut vs. Johnny Buck: 175lb catchweight main event. Waszut is the GINGER SAMURAI.

FIGHT: Buck TKO Rnd 3. Every round, its the same thing - clinch, Waszut gets taken down/thrown, Buck takes dominant position and punches the shit out of him. This continues until about 2:15 is left in the third and the ref stops it. (0)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Cain/Marks

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Allman/Center

KO OF THE NIGHT: Alberico/Evans

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 2.5 out of 10. Should be renamed "Rise of the Journeymen". Completely skippable.

D&R Rating: 0%

NAAFS Cage Fighting (6/12/2011)

Skipping a couple episodes to come back to eventually.

1) Chandra Engle vs. Rachel Dovidio:Women's Amateur 135lb fight. Engle is from the dutch enclave of East Grand Rapids, MI. Dovidio is from North Carolina. Pretty amazing that NAAFS is attracting lots of out of state fighters for amateur bouts. Apparently Rachel is also a Marine.

FIGHT: Dovidio . Not a bad showing. Again, with the low amount of talent here in women's MMA, Dovidio kinda runs over Engle and forces her on the defensive at all times. You see better women's fighters (Jessica Eye or Rhonda Rousey, who may be announcing here on color) basically pulling KOTC specials on this level of card. Dovidio can't finish, gets flipped, and even gets taken down in the second. She's better in every way but doesn't show a clear difference in physical talents. Maybe Engle is just a tough, seasoned amateur MMA fighter who's gone through the fires of Michigan nightclub fights. But I feel like this is a fight Dovidio should have dominated. (0)

2) Bill Algeo vs. Aaron Bartow: Lightweight bout. Ammy fight.

FIGHT: Algeo Submission Rnd 1. Just ran over Bartow. Lands looping right hands over the lazy striking of Bartow, gets him down, beats him up, KOTC special with the RNC finish. (0)

3) Chris Lozano vs. Gerric Hayes: Bounce back fight for Lozano. Seems to be a catchweight around 175.

FIGHT: Lozano TKO Rnd 1. Still not a great showing from Lozano, who at one point gives his back and has his belly down on the mat defending a RNC about 30 seconds in. But he keeps himself out of big problems, gets on top, gets the fight stood up, hurts Hayes with a rabbit punch (unintentional) caused by Hayes bending over, and as Hayes tries to duck and stumble away he eats a high kick to the head and is out cold. (1)

OVERALL FOR THE SHOW: 4 out of 10. Bounce fight for a mid level guy and some prospect amateur fights that aren't offensively bad. Flat out comical horror response from the Algeo win when the crowd obviously was behind the other guy and went silent.

NAAFS Cage Fighting (5/22/2011)

Missed a couple episodes I think. Oh well. No great loss. Tonight's show is from the 4/16/2011 NAAFS Caged Vengeance 9 card in Cleveland and is headlined by Nick Duell vs. Kevin Knabjian.

1) Curt Lemmon vs. Mark Garcher: Garcher looks all stoked and muscular and Lemmon has fancy trunks with a sorta Spiderman pattern thing going on. Amateur fight among middleweights.

FIGHT: Lemmon TKO Rnd 2. Competitive bout with Garcher being a predictable face forward bruiser and Lemmon being more of a defensive BJJ guy with straighter punches, less of a mean streak, and some cool leg sweeps in the clinch. Garcher's physical strength and gorilla style determination keep him in the fight longer than it probably should have, while Lemmon eventually lands a left hook early on in the second and then follows Garcher to the mat, landing punches until we get a stoppage. Nothing spectacular. (0)

2) Brandon Saling vs. John Fields: Fields is a big lanky black guy and Saling is doing a Chuck Liddell impression in every way imaginable. Middleweight pro bout.

FIGHT: Saling TKO Rnd 1. Both guys suffer eye pokes and there's some sloppy grappling along with lots of power punching. Saling's stuff has more behind it, I would venture to say, and Fields drops like 5 times in this fight from right hands, left hooks, and lots of short uppercuts. He just crumbles time and time again. Eventually he gives his back after one of these crumblings and the RNC is applied with just 2 seconds left. Saling is doing his alpha male thing here and that's OK. Unfortunately he has a lot of defensive liabilities to make it very far in the sport. Fields, who has a .500 record pro and amateur mixed, is clearly going nowhere fast. (0)

3) Nick Duell vs. Kevin Knabjian: Knabjian almost got on TUF. Duell was never invited. Now we have this welterweight attraction.

FIGHT: Duell TKO Rnd 2. Monster KO from a high kick in the second round as Duell times the robotic wrestleboxer Knabjian coming in with a lead right hand. Duell looks much more fluid and competent as a striker - he's going to the body, the head, throwing liver kicks, all that stuff. But he does still pull straight back too often, his chin can be left high, he doesn't have the best balance, and I'm not sure he has anything on his punches. Is he closing his fists fully or just throwing stuff out there to have the handspeed advantage? He didn't dent Knabjian with anything until the kick landed. But land it did. There's a lot of guys I'd like to see Duell in with and some of them are reasonable picks. Meanwhile, there's Knabjian, who is going to be a journeyman or retire. (1)

OVERALL FOR THE SHOW: 6 out of 10. No great fights, but there's some entertainment here, particularly with the main event and some of the sloppy openers.

Fight Time 4 (4/1/2011)

Okay, time for the fourth in of the promotion's events. Main event is Tony Lopez vs. Jeff Monson, which is a pretty good ass fight. Alex Donno and Din Thomas announcing.

1) Harry Holton vs. Jeremie Wilson: Some dudes I know nothing about.

FIGHT: Wilson TKO Rnd 1. Holton gets taken down, laid on in side control, and then gets pounded out with short elbows. Shitty fight. (0)

2) Bruce Bellochi vs. Jesus Rodriguez: Heavyweight bout. Not excited about this either. Rodriguez is an ex-boxer or something with no Boxrec profile.

FIGHT: Bellochi TKO Rnd 1. Early stop I think intended to protect Bellochi, who has some sort of connection to the promoter. He was badly hurt earlier in the first during what was basically a toughman fight. Crap. (0)

3) Jay Ellis vs. Rafael Dias: Dias is a prospect of sorts that I've seen a few times now.

FIGHT: Dias Submission Rnd 1. Another easy, meaningless fight for Dias. He rushes Ellis, slams him, takes the back immediately, and gets a RNC inside of 30 seconds. (1)

4) Roy Bradshaw vs. Mike Bruno: Bradshaw at least has the nickname of "Precious". Sifl N Olly inspired?

FIGHT: Bruno Submission Rnd 1. Headlock or bulldog choke? Who can tell? Point is that it was another non-competitive fight in a fight promotion with lots of them historically. Bruno gets a takedown almost immediately and works to side control. Bradshaw tries to get out and gets grabbed by the head its torqued. (1)

5) Danceton Holcomb vs. Joe Watson: Watson is from ATT. This is really an ATT promotion, so....

FIGHT: Watson TKO Rnd 1. Holcomb throws wild shots and gets countered constantly by the straighter blows of Watson. (1)

6) Jeff Monson vs. Tony Lopez: YOUR MAIN EVENT. A 5 round ISKA MMA title bout. Am I excited to see this? Not really TBH.

FIGHT: Monson Unanimous Decision. Not much to break down in the fight because it was a consistent replay every round of the same thing; Monson shoots, takes down Lopez, gets dominant positions, can't finish, doesn't strike much to set up anything, Lopez breaks loose or changes the position with seconds remaining in the round, bell. The biggest difference was Lopez stopping a shot from Monson in the final couple minutes of the 5th and pancaking him, landing blows while on top of Monson. Did it win him the fight? No. (3)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Holcomb/Watson

KO OF THE NIGHT: Bellochi/Rodriguez

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Dias/Ellis

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 2 out of 10. Lots of meaningless squashes punctuated by a terrifically dull main event. Skippable in its entirety. Show was so bad it was a month to the day that I started this review that I finished it.

Ultimate Glory: 2010-2011 World Series Finals (/2011

Oh man - true story. Did you know that this tape came back with Mike Miller in his checked bag? Its true. I'm posting that story because no one ever reads this blog in spite of it being practically out in the open, and so its worth noting. More about that in a second. This show features the finals of the United Glory welterweight MMA tourney and then SO MUCH MORE. And by so much more, I mean kickboxing. The version on HDNet has Schiavello and Trigg with overdubbed commentary.

1) Igor Jurkovic vs. Pavel Zhuravlev: Heavyweight kickboxing madness. I'm sure it'll suck but whatever.

FIGHT: Jurkovic KO Rnd 2. Not a very action packed round but Zhuravlev seems to be looking to take a seat on the canvas. Jurkovic helps him by popping him hard early in the second and breaking both his nose and will to fight. Well, not that it even existed early on.

2) Denis Stojnic vs. Mlanden Kujundzic: Stojnic kinda sucks and looks like a roided up European guy. Probably because he is. The other guy is some random Croatian coming in on 2 days notice. Who is? I have no idea.

FIGHT: Stojnic Submission Rnd 1. Ugly grappling fight with both guys pursuing takedowns, no one really getting one except for Stojnic early in the round, and otherwise its all about Stojnic stopping Kujundzic's lousy singles, getting on top, and going for things. There's attempts for heel hooks and chokes and stuff and eventually he uses a head crank to get a RNC sinched in and forces a tap. (1)

3) Errol Zimmerman vs. Mourad Bouzidi: Bouzidi is a aging journeyman who is well skilled and Zimmerman is a lazy but talented kickboxer who should be a lot more than what he is.

FIGHT: Zimmerman Unanimous Decision. Lazy fight from Zimmerman who drops Bouzidi twice with hooks as Bouzidi comes forward, but Zimmerman puts in no serious attempt at ending this fight or even throwing punches most of the time. He looks a bit soft - apparently not training much and fucking Thai chicks is his routine these days. Good for him and shit, but man, he could be so much more.

4) Mark Miller vs. Nicolaj Falin: A little bird who told me the story about Miller bringing the show back in his luggage also was the one who booked him for this show. I guess I won't name him in case anyone actually does see this, but you can probably guess who that is. Anyhow, apparently Golden Glory cheap out on airfare, so Miller ended up taking a wild number of connections to get to Moscow and had a bunch of flights cancel on him. Yikes. But he got there and his luggage arrived with him (along with Mighty Mo) - I guess that would be extra important since he needed the bag to bring back footage for airing in the US. Oh, and another BTW: Get on Golden Glory's case about visas that way you don't have to call Brazilian Godfathers up to help make things happen.

FIGHT: Miller TKO Rnd 1. Most everyone knows about this already because it was a big news story in the MMA blogs. Miller came back from heart surgery and won in about 8 seconds landing a overhand right over a lazy right from Falin that he landed with his eyes closed. Can't do that buddy.

5) Mighty Mo vs. Sergei Kharitonov: Sergei had the big win in the SF tourney, but this bout is a kickboxing fight. Why? I have no idea. Would be better as a MMA fight. Less risk. But then I'm not managing these guys careers, am I? Mo is super fat. Sergei is soft too.

FIGHT: Kharitonov TKO Rnd 1. Man, this was sorta shameful. Kharitonov was hit a couple of times, but that's not really the story. The story is that Sergei did a terrible job using his height advantage, kept going inside with the smaller man and nullifying that advantage, and then won with an uppercut that laid Mo out.

6) Zabid Samedov vs. Ali Cenik: Kickboxing bout with Samedov being a guy notorious for being boring.

FIGHT: Draw. Boring as expected. Samedov probably deserved the decision and this would have gone to a sudden death round in K-1. Oh well. Both guys are small heavyweights and threw a lot of leg kicks. Samedov also ran a lot. The end.

7) Jason Jones vs. Shamil Abdulmuslimov: Jones I'm familiar with from a number of fights over the years. He was a favorite of M-1 for a time, actually. Abdulmuslimov probably fought there too but I can't remember him. Similar W-L records in terms of success.

FIGHT: Jones TKO Rnd 3. Not the most exciting fight. Some back and forth positioning battle BS with Jones often getting takedowns and then getting swept or turned over, and on the bottom he doesn't do a whole lot. Then again, Abdulmuslimov doesn't do much from the top position either. This pattern continues on and on until a standup due to inactivity in Round 3 - Abdulmuslimov shoots for the legs and eats a knee in the face from Jones. He's out cold. (0)

8) Nieky Holzken vs. Artur Kyshenko: This is a really good kickboxing fight among people in K-1 Max classes.

FIGHT: Kyshenko Unanimous Decision. Kyshenko outworks Holzken, lands a good mix of techniques, puffs up Holzken's eye, and so on.

9) Tommy Depret vs. Siyar Bahadurzada: And the finals of the welterweight tourney are at hand. AK-47 looks so old. He probably is!

FIGHT: Bahadurzada KO Rnd 2. Honestly, Bahadurzada looked not that great here. He got on top a couple times and actually pounded Depret out on the mat in the second after dropping him, but his mouth was open early in the second and he was getting landed on a bunch from Depret, who's a lousy striker. Doesn't look at that big as a welterweight either. Depret looked better than he often does, giving Siyar a serious run for his money before gassing out entirely. (2)

10) Gohkan Saki vs. Brice Guidon: Finals of the GG Heavyweight tourney in kickboxing. Saki's a legit talent of course.

FIGHT: Saki Unanimous Decision. He outworks Guidon, who still arm punches his way through fights with no real gumption or effort to win. Saki just cruises, drops Guidon early too.

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Bahadurzada/Depret

KO OF THE NIGHT: Jones/Abdulmuslimov

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: As an MMA event, 3 out of 10. Just a couple bad fights. Siyar should have punched his ticket to a big show, but he won't last there.

D&R Rating: 20% (3/15) for the MMA portion.