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.

Superior Challenge 7: Rise of the Champions (

I actually have a half of a written report of Superior Challenge 2 from like 2 years ago that I never finished. Thanks to HDNet, I have this show to actually write about in full. Great production values for this show give that it is squarely a second tier event - Sweden's BAMMA, kinda.

1) Andreas Stahl vs. Johan Vanttinen: Swede vs. Finn. Both 3-0. I know nothing about them.

FIGHT: Stahl TKO Rnd 2. Man, this was a matter of time. Stahl stalks Vanttinen with punches and lands them seemingly at will when throwing because Vanttinen just moves straight back and doesn't tuck his chin. Stahl seems to be an OK grappler but nothing about his performance here jumps out at me. (0)

2) Lina Eklund vs. Kristina Talvosaite: Both are debuting as a pro and I think I'll go do the litter instead of paying sole attention to this. 60KG weight limit.

FIGHT: Eklund Submission Rnd 2. Terrible fight. Lots of clinching against the cage, lousy striking, ends when Eklund pulls the switch on Talvosaite after a failed shot by the Lithuanian fighter, takes the back and a choke. Whatever. (0)

3) James Doolan vs. Sirwan Kakai: Swede against Scottish fighter. Doolan has a record of 11-4-2, Kakai is 5-1. Not terrible.

FIGHT: Kakai Submission Rnd 2. Another second round stoppage - Kakai is super small for the bantamweight division but gets some decent takedowns and swings for the fences. Technically nothing spectacular that I saw, but he seems to be a decent athlete. He pulls a guillotine while Doolan was looking to scramble to his feet and forces the tapout. (0)

4) Mohsen Bahari vs. Farshad Farsiani: Lots of muslim immigrants to Scandic nations fighting for YOUR ENTERTAINMENT. Records are not spectacular.

FIGHT: Bahari TKO Rnd 2. Another fight that ends in the second, though this time it was due to Farsiani not making the bell for the start of the round. Bahari looks to land strikes and does so a lot. Farsiani looks to get the clinch and takedowns. He's not all that successful, instead at best stopping or slowing the assault of Bahari's wide punches and otherwise absorbing them while providing not much in terms of resistance. Not much I can take away from Bahari here other than he seems to be too square to be really mobile and stay away from having the clinch slow his attack. (0)

HELLBOY INTERVIEW~. Don't care at this point. 8 years to late to do so.

5) Bruno Carvalho vs. Kyacey Uscola: Holy shit, for real? MW contest.

FIGHT: Carvalho Submission Rnd 2. Uscola is the poor man's Sonnen and like the real thing, he's awful at defending subs. Here against a BJJ black belt, Uscola tries to keep distance and strike but doesn't do a whole lot of damage that way. When he gets near enough to Carvalho to grab, bad things happen. He's almost tapped in a matter of seconds at the end of the first and manages to stupidly shoot at Carvalho and get put on his back with that. While trying to scramble, he ends up giving his back and Carvalho transitions to an armbar and wrenches the shoulder out of the socket. Yikes. Lots of screaming in pain ensues. (1)

URIJAH FABER INTERVIEW~. Also don't give a shit here.

6) Robert Jocz vs. Tor Troeng: European biggish guys.

FIGHT: Troeng Unanimous Decision. Another fairly dull fight. Regional contenders in a "battle of positioning" where few meaningful strikes are thrown or landed, and there are some takedowns done by Troeng. Jocz goes for some halfassed submission attempts here and there and that's about it. The most forgettable MMA fight I can think of. (1)

7) Assan Njie vs. Beslan Isaev: Njie is supposed to be a prospect or something.

FIGHT: Njie Submission Rnd 1. We see Njie immediately shoot and get a monster double and then he works over Isaev some. I'm not really sold on his ability to escape the guard of his opponent, but he's got some healthy skill level on the mat, is never threatened with submissions, and eventually locks up a guillotine on Isaev that ends the fight as Isaev goes out. Njie needs to show that he can do this to legit wrestlers. (1)

8) Daniel Acacio vs. Diego Gonzalez: SC title belt on the line here in the welterweight division. Acacio is now named "The Viking Hunter". Oh, great.

FIGHT: Acacio Unanimous Decision. Thank god, this was only a three round fight, not five. Gonzalez is a chubby slugger guy and Acacio lands a billion leg kicks and punches on him, and also takes him down in every round of the fight and controls him on top after doing so. Acacio looks good here against limited competition, but then I think back as to how he hasn't won a meaningful fight in years. (1)

9) Reza Madadi vs. Rich Clementi: A Rich Clementi fight! Certainly, this will be a thing.

FIGHT: Madadi Unanimous Decision. The guy who isn't No Love wins a belt. Decent fight actually with Madadi winning by getting takedowns and being on top most of the fight, but Clementi made it a good show by pursuing a lot of submission attempts like knee bars and RNCs and the like, which Madadi skillfully avoided. Really cool rolling at points, like Madadi going for a double and Clementi trying to counter with an inverted triangle. (1)

10) Thales Leites vs. Jeremy Horn: Main event for the middleweight strap.

FIGHT: Leites Unanimous Decision. Basically, two guys jab at each other for 13 minutes, and Leites lands a few more jabs. Then he gets a takedown in the 3rd round and wins it by laying on Horn. Overall - do we learn anything new about either? No. Was it entertaining? No. Do either look like they have new wrinkles that change their career path away from "downward arc"? No. (2)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Madadi/Clementi

KO OF THE NIGHT: Stahl/Vanttinen

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Carvalho/Uscola

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 3.5 out of ten. Some aging names alongside some no name = lousy, lousy show. Watch only the Uscola and Clementi fights if interested in anything here.

D&R Rating: 14% (7/50)

Titan Fighting Championships 18 (3/26/2011)

More Titan FC from Kansas City. Watching this made me realize I forgot to watch the last DREAM show. Ooops! Been busy for months.

1) Sean Wilson vs. Deryck Ripley: Battle of irrelevant fighters with bad records: Wilson is 27-15. Ripley 11-19.

FIGHT: Wilson Submission Rnd 1. Kinda goes like you might expect. Wilson gets taken down early but sweeps and starts looking for various locks. He drops for a toe hold and rolls into the lock getting the submission. (0)

2) Joe Wilk vs. Jesse Zeugin: Wilk comes out to the Degeneration X theme.

FIGHT: Wilk Submission Rnd 1. Grinds on Zeugin, gets him down, beats him up, takes the D'arce when Zeugin gives him the head and neck and finishes it. Not much to really say about this. Crowd is all hyped up. Wilk seems to be a decent wrestler. Can't say anything about his stand up. I don't think he's big for the weight class, which could be a problem. (0)

3) Nick Budig vs. Bobby Cooper: Bobby Cooper I have some familiarity with from prior shows. Budig is 5-1 and I know nothing about him.

FIGHT: Cooper Unanimous Decision. Okay, so Cooper beats the hell out of Budig, who has a lot of heart and is much smaller (this is a 175lb catchweight fight, so I can guess who is coming up). But Budig is very wild coming in, doesn't set stuff up, just throws wild right leads or looping left hooks, and ends up taking a lot of punches and kicks as a result. By round 2, he has an eye closed and he's limping in the 3rd. To Budig's credit, he has guts and keeps on coming. He does land on Cooper too, who doesn't move that well in the early going and only seems to pick up lateral movement as Budig slows. Cooper's hands are slow though, and he holds them low, so I think he probably gets trashed when he moves up another level in talent. (0)

4) Jared Rosholt vs. Kirk Grinlinton: Jared Rosholt is a heavyweight and a big ass wrestler who is young in his MMA career. And he's as good a wrestler as his brother. Grinlinton is 2-2. Both look a little "soft" but that's really a way of saying "natural". Also - he's sponsored by U-Haul! I love it.

FIGHT: Rosholt TKO Rnd 1. Seems like Rosholt takes his time and lets Grinlinton get a moment to test his standup ability. Then he shoots the double, gets the takedown, and beats the hell out of his opponent. Just work and experience. Grinlinton didn't keep his distance or commit to shots and got taken down off a left hook. (1)

5) Darryl Cobb vs. Rudy Bears: Rudy Bears I've seen getting drubbed in second tier shows for a long time. Cobb I don't have familiarity with. He did beat Gary Tapusoa who I know.

FIGHT: Bears Submission Rnd 1. Bears and Cobb stand and trade a little - Both guys have their chin up so its a question of who gets cracked first - Cobb does and he drops from a right hand. Bears almost locks in a RNC from a weird side position, but Cobb wriggles out. He's still buzzed, Bears actually gets the back control again, and gets it with a second attempt. (0)

6) Jake Rosholt vs. John Ott: Ott got this fight because he survived a fight with Bobby Lashley. Rosholt was in the UFC or WEC or something and got dropped because he got his ass beat. Oh well.

FIGHT: Ott DQ Rnd 3. What a joke. Ott is beaten senseless for 14 minutes in a fight that should have been stopped for brutal, brutal cuts all over his face that he clearly could not see through and threatened his career. Rosholt actually lets off the gas after that, but Ott finds his way into a knee when he's got a point down and, oh, big surprise, he can't continue. Rosholt loses by DQ and Ott probably should be seriously looked at before getting licensed again. Rosholt didn't really set up the takedowns at all and in the first, Ott actually put his head down and inside, apparently forgetting that he was about to get dragged down and mounted. Mediocrity all around. (1)

7) Brian Davidson vs. Jens Pulver: Jens against a guy with an above .500 record. I know how this story goes.

FIGHT: Davidson Submission Rnd 1. So the internet will argue that Pulver only got submitted. If you didn't watch the fight, that is your take. He gave up the neck because he was turtling from punches to the face, and he spent most of the short fight on wobbly legs or getting hit. He got a nice takedown early but can't pull the trigger on ANYTHING on the mat. Davidson looks good beating a shot wrestler, but its still a shot wrestler. (2)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Cobb/Bears

KO OF THE NIGHT: Rosholt/Grinlinton

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Wilk/Zeugin

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 4 out of 10. Lots of scrubby fighting, but at least it was short thanks to the stoppages. I feel like there's another Josh Hendricks type heavyweight that made his TV debut here, a failed prospect, and a sad old shot fighter. Not much beyond that.

D&R Rating 11% (4/35)