The world has another Noguiera, except this one is a Luta Livre guy. Luiz Alberto Noguiera's win over Jerod Spoon was a watchable affair, certainly, but not an enthralling one either. Spoon was generally dominated standing because he stayed too far away and didn't move the way he needed to in order to line up Noguiera for his big right. Standup for him was sorta Dan Henderson like, though I suppose Spoon has a better jab and not nearly as good a right hand. Noguiera, meanwhile, sorta pitter pats and didn't do any real damage in the fight, instead cleaning up points with his low kicks and punches.
Christian M'Pumbu was the slight underdog going into this - nearly even odds, actually. He walked this fight against Tim Carpenter instead. Carpenter, at least in my mind, was going to immediately close the distance on the smaller M'Pumbu, clinch, put him on the mat, and grind on him. Instead, he showed zero standup skill by following M'Pumbu around the cage and getting hit with punches until being stopped with a 1-2 combination to the head and an uppercut as Carpenter was falling.
Ronnie Mann's fight against Josh Arocho was basically a waste of time. Already you can see how Mann is outsized here in the US and while he overpowers Arocho with sweeps or takedown defense and murders him with strikes inside the guard, you can't really expect that sort of performance against better fighters. Arocho is a jouneyman at best.
Richard Hale is a much bigger man than DJ Linderman. That I knew. What else did I learn about Richard Hale? Well, he looks a whole lot like Vitali Klitschko and even holds his hands about as high. That means he doesn't. OK, so more info that means something to me - uh, Hale moves straight back with his hands down and has nice kicks. Does this guy have a karate background? He doesn't really keep distance that well and as far as being a grappler is concerned, I feel like he's not a top control sorta guy. He never seems to really overpower people, and he didn't look at any point to purposely get Linderman to the mat. In fact, he's taken down in the second round off a single against a guy who supposedly didn't wrestle at any collegiate level. Possibly not even high school. Linderman is the same brawler sorta guy he's always been but didn't have a guy in front of him who ran out of gas in part because he never really pushed the fight the right way to make it happen. Linderman wins on the color guy's card and not the official judges because, to be honest, the judges did a good job and scored leg kicks for a change instead of jabs and wide right hands that seemed to have very little effect. Linderman spent about 3 minute of the final round on his belly defending the RNC too. Why didn't Hale transition to the armbar? The world shall never know.
BLAHHH ULTIMATE BRAZILIAN FIGHTER THING 13 ICHIBAN
So some stuff happened in the house and I went past all of it because, really, that shit sucks. Mick Bowman and Clay Harvison fought this episode. Harvison I knew nothing about and Bowman will probably win because they wouldn't put a British guy with zero talent on this show. So anyways, the fight: It kinda sucked. Sloppy standup bout in which the ultimate winner (Harvison) gassed out 7 minutes in and yet still won with a largely inactive striking attack. You know how? By fighting a guy who was juking more than jabbing and who wouldn't throw straight punches even when he could land them. Bowman just has no power in his fists and while he's clearly a good grappler on his back, sucks at wrestling and is the sort of guy who probably had success pulling guard against less technically skilled or athletically gifted fighters and tapped them. Internet even says he has three of 7 wins by submission. Maybe that's true? Boxing wise he's not much worse than Harvison if not technically superior, but he lacks mental toughness. But he does, he cries afterwards, and Harvison moves on to the next round.
There's only a couple more fights left for the first round before they do the wild card bout, and Harvison may, thanks to the pure shittiness of the fighters on, get a slot. He can't beat Javier Torres with a gun and probably loses to Len Bentley too based on what I saw here.
PREDICTIONS PREDICTIONS PREDICTIONS
Last week: 0-2
Overall for the year: 25-12
UFC 129:
My heart says Jake Shields. And hey, he is a much bigger guy than a lot of GSP's opposition, and an excellent collegiate wrestler, and a fantastic top control guy willing to stink it out. Doesn't that sound like Jon Fitch? Look how that went. I have to pick GSP like everyone else in the world to take down Shields and grind him out. Or jab him up. Or whatever GSP wants. The big fear for me in GSP losing is that its something like a guillotine that he is caught in shooting.
Speaking of what my heart says - I'll take the bait people have left and say Aldo beats Hominick in spite of me thinking that Aldo's athleticism is hopelessly overrated and that Hominick has the kryptonite to make this interesting in the stand up. Aldo can shoot in and take down Hominick and the fight is over just like that. When you have someone so deficient in an area that you have to hope that the other guy fights stupid, you can't take him unless that person has a long standing history of fighting dumb.
Brilz is younger than V-Mat and wins. Strong wrestling cancels each other out and we get a standup fight that Brilz is unlikely to lose.
Speaking of unlikely to win, Couture isn't winning. Last good counter puncher he faced was Liddell. Sure went well, huh?
Ben Henderson is the guy UFC brass wants to win against Bocek. You can feel it. Why make that fight unless they were looking to build Henderson back up in the UFC over a long period? Size wise, no big advantage for either guy with reach or height. Submission grappling is the big difference here, and Bocek is the best guy Henderson has ever faced. I mean, its him or Saravia, right? I think Bocek loses and it takes the shine off the WEC guys big time.
Nate Diaz/Rory McDonald is a really interesting fight - I feel like McDonald is less skilled but a bigger guy naturally, and size matters. Plus, he went to war with Condit...but Condit does kinda fight to the level of his opposition. So, Diaz by submission.
Can Sean Pierson last long enough against Jake Ellenberger to take advantage of him and win the fight? Answer: No. Ellenberger 29-28. Loses round 3.
Really fast with no descriptions really given: Jason McDonald has been fighting like shit for awhile so he loses to Ryan Jensen and his 7 minute gas tank. Daniel Roberts is in way over his head against Claude Patrick, who they'll get some rub off onto with a stoppage win in front of a Canadian crowd and 7 people watching on Facebook.
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