Fight Time 1 (8/21/2010)

As readers know, I have my favorites out there in terms of great B-Show fighters. One of them is Jeff Monson, and here he headlines against another classic B-Show fighter, Jason Guida. This event was held in Club Cinema on Pompano Beach in South Florida, and is the first effort of Elite Promotions...or Fight Time Promotions. Announcing is Alex Donno as PBP and Din Thomas is the color man. The promotion is an offshoot of ATT through Howard Davis Jr., who is a co promoter here. Jeff Gibson is the other promoter here and he's a former kickboxing champ and "hormone replacement" guy. Uhhhh.

1) Josh Mercado vs. Abraham Estacio: Missed the weight class but it looks like 155. THIS FIGHT IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY BRUS SPORTS BAR.

FIGHT: Mercado Submission Rnd 1. Mercado throws some cool looking kicks and is kinda wild but drops back for a guillotine. Not too much effort expended to win his pro debut. (1)

2) Jimmy Chaikong vs. Mike Benken: Chaikong is 1-5. ONE WIN FIVE LOSSES. Benken is debuting. Solid Gold Dental and Lamborghini Palm Beach are presenting this one.

FIGHT: Chaikong Submission Rnd 1. Incredible start as Chaikong goes into karate forms to start and then breaks from kata to shoot and take down Benken. Never seen anything like it. Chaikong passes to mount, goes for an armbar, and doesn't really do it right. Had bad position and crossed his feet, but Benken probably ends up getting hurt since Chaikong just pulled on the fucking thing till he forced a tap. (0)

3) Patrick Williams vs. Shaughn Koukos: Featherweight fight between a 1-0 guy and a debuting talent.

FIGHT: Williams TKO Rnd 1. Just a beat down. Williams gets a takedown and then just lays in with GNP. He celebrates after his 2:30 long fight with a standing backflip. Athletic dude with wrestling and punching with his wrestling. That's something, right? (1)

4) Dalton Hicks vs. John Chavez: Chavez trained in Thailand for awhile, the announcers say, and is touted by Wilson Gouviea. Sorta a welterweight fight?

FIGHT: Chavez TKO Rnd 2. Horrible mismatch talentwise. Chavez smashes the crap out of Hicks and should have submitted him in the first. He had full extension going for an armbar out of the mount and the arm controlled and isolated and couldn't get the thing straight. Ref should have stopped it before the bell. Instead, he lets Hicks take a ton of shots and then pulls him to his feet after stopping the fight almost immediately. (0)

5) Jerry Blackman vs. Chris Holcomb: Dudes who are big. Not sure how big though. Missed that.

FIGHT: Blackman Unanimous Decision. Blackman is much bigger, from a much bigger camp, and tosses around Holcomb early on. He cuts him over his eyes, he punches him, he goes for submissions, he gets a nice belly to belly to put him on the mat. And then in the second round, he gasses out and Holcomb tries to make a comeback while dodging triangle attempts and the like. Even then, Blackman wins the round by getting himself back on top in the final stages. The third is awful stuff, with two fully expended neophyte fighters staring at each other for the most part. The staring ends with Holcomb shooting for the takedown, pulling guard, and actually sweeping Blackman and being in side control for awhile. Not much happens though. Neither guy looked that good coming out of this. (0)

6) Boumny Somchey vs. Lazar Stojadinovic: Lazar I've seen before and he's really little. And not that great.

FIGHT: Stojadinovic Submission Rnd 1. Lazar drops him with the first punch of the fight, is all over him on the mat, forces him to roll over, and we get an RNC finish inside a minute. (0)

7) Dennis Hernandez vs. Stephen Jenetis: Yeah, no idea.

FIGHT: Hernandez TKO Rnd 1. Jenetis clinches to start, then gets taken down and mounted almost immediately. Just a wild grappling fest for a moment or two, then Hernandez gets the fight down again. Its not long till he gets the crucifix, and then he starts throwing punches and elbows. At some point, Jenetis goes out and then takes a few more elbows a la Orlando Weit. (1)

At this point, there's an intermission, some fat chicks are in the ring, Kimbo stops by and says hello.

8) Jason Guida vs. Jeff Monson: Main event time. Strange undercard for this, TBH.

FIGHT: Monson Submission Rnd 2. Man, this is sorta sad and disheartening. Monson shoots but is so slow at first that Guida actually defends it and takes top position, landing blows. Monson eventually sorta balls up and is able to force his way on top by taking a single on Guida. From then on, its generally all Monson. But he's really slow in this fight and Guida has some moments where he regains top position. Monson is big on leading with his head for the clinch and punching, which I think is probably as much why Guida gets cut as is the strikes he throws. Eventually he has a weird side back control on Guida and goes for a sort of crossface on him that Guida taps to. In the postscript Monson plugs his radio show that goes on back west. (2)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Guida/Monson

KO OF THE NIGHT: Hernandez/Jenetis

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Chaikong/Benken

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 3.5 out of 10. Monson looks muscular but age is definitely a factor now. He's very slow, not that he was ever super fast. Rest of the card features a lot of promising young talents, mostly from ATT, though they face really underwhelming opposition. The card is short and a bit of a throwaway, but its note totally terrible.

D&R Rating: 12.5% (5/40)

Cage Wars 11: Decade (3/29/2009)

So here goes. Another show from Cage Wars via Fightzone.

1) Hugh Brady vs. Michael Reid: This is a welterweight contest. Reid is much taller.

FIGHT: Brady Submission Rnd 3. (0)

Reid: Bigger fighter, appears more athletic looking at him, drops Brady very early, rides his back for a couple of minutes, goes for a number of submissions from his back when he loses the position. Honestly was surprised that Brady made it to the second after nearly getting choked and armbarred. Then in round two, Brady leans he can take him down and push him into the fence, and that's the fight. He was totally worthless in that position, just taking occasional punches and otherwise laying there gassing until giving his back and being submitted.

Brady: Game, some skills on the mat, but nothing obscene. No crazy "jungle jiujitsu" as Rogan once called Matt Serra's style. More like "adequate for survival past the second minute BJJ". As the fight wears on, he gets Reid down with simple takedowns, pushes him into the fence, and puts weight on him. That's enough to gas Reid and he eventually is able to start passing the guard and takes the back for a submission win.

2) Colin McKee vs. Arunus Silcius: Silcius is some Lithuanian plumber with a HORRIBLE stomach scar brought in to probably lose. McKee is on a win streak and seems to be a solid grappler.

FIGHT: McKee TKO 1. Exactly as I anticipated. McKee with a quick takedown to start and he pounds out Silcius from the half guard against the fence. No real resistance. (0)

3) Jordy Peute vs. Gary Morris: "Lightweights". Puete is 138, Morris 144. Puete is said to be dutch, so I expect either Judo or kickboxing.

FIGHT: Jordy submission Rnd 1. Morris tries the "punch when the other guy tries to bang gloves at the start" move. For that, Jordy shoots, pulls guard, gets the armbar, and then injures the arm, leaving Morris screaming in pain. (0)

4) Lee McKibbin vs. Karolis Liukaitis: McKibbin is a regular for the promotion, and Liukaitis could be anything skillwise. Middleweight bout. McKibbin is much bigger.

FIGHT: McKibbin Submission Rnd 1 (0)

Liukaitis: Undersized kickboxing guy who uses his strength to escape an armbar early and leaps backwards in an attempt to shake McKibbin, on but eventually gets trapped in a choke due to the skill of McKibbin overcoming the unorthodox desperation.

McKibbin: Had all the advantages and still went out to try and win. Still nothing notable to be said about his wrestling, as it was Liukaitis who got him down to the mat, even when it was a terrible idea.

5) Daniel Abrol vs. JC Pennington: Pennington has been seen before losing to Javier Vazquez on this blog, and Abrol's last fight with an American ended in an embarassing loss to some dude who looked like a preteen.

FIGHT: Pennington Submission Rnd 2. (0)

Pennington: Pennington is better on the mat, and this being MMA, that's what matters. Abrol is a decent striker and lands some hard right hands, but Pennington is an experienced gatekeeper type and isn't so quickly shook. When the time comes, he takes over and wins.

Abrol: Flatfooted and throwing looping leads, he's caught with Pennington's not so great strikes as he rushes in, eventually being forced to do jumping front kicks and stuff. On the mat he's still not good enough to beat a decently trained grappler. The announcers are basically rooting on Abrol, demanding the ref stop the bout and that Abrol is "good enough to get out of this" as Pennington takes him down and starts rolling for submissions. Daniel is "dominating position wise" as Pennington starts abusing him, taking him down, switching to his back, and choking him out.

6) Peter Duncan vs. Bryan Goldsby: Goldsby is from the US and looks to be in better shape than Duncan. Duncan though is the local guy and the crowd's favorite.

FIGHT: Duncan Submission Rnd 2. (0)

Duncan: Was taken down a few times, but proved to be the better man on the mat, reversing positions and taking dominant stances. Eventually, he ended up in side control and locked up the kimura to win. Duncan looked passable off his back.

Goldsby: Some solid wrestling takedowns, but his follow through with keeping positional control left tons to be desired. Didn't want to strike with Duncan much at all.

7) Jeff Monson vs. Sergej Maslobojev: Another random Lithuanian against a man who never actually lived under communism, but would like to. Main event.

FIGHT: Monson Submission Rnd 2. I'm not gonna break this down much, in that Monson takes down the Lithuanian repeatedly, lays on him, and punches him some while occasionally looking to pass guard. He goes to north/south and gets the anaconda choke. (3)

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Duncan/Goldsby

KO OF THE NIGHT: Silcius/McKee

SUBMISSION OF THE NIGHT: Monson/Maslobojev

OVERALL FOR THE EVENT: 3.5 out of 10. Another piddling fight card. At least we have Monson with an awesome choke against some dude who probably makes 9 USD an hour doing some manual labor for the trouble of watching. Peter Duncan also continues to entertain. He might not be very good, but he could be one of the most interesting to watch journeymen in the fight game.

D&R Rating: 8.5% (3/35)