UFC Fight Night 176 Post-Fight Analysis

Only 7 fight evening with corona chipping away from already short fight card, so this will be a quick write-up.

Main Card

Experience reigned supreme tonight against rising prospects in both Main and Co-Main Event. Overeem and Sakai had a very good, technical scrap on the feet, one which Sakai was largely getting the better off. By 3rd round he started to slightly slow down though, which allowed Overeem to start working on his ground game.

That really exposed a hole in Sakai's game and he wilted in the deep waters, getting promptly finished in the 5th round. Overeem shows the doubts for his chin are unnecessary and that he still has one title run in him. Still needs another high profile win though to be in the title picture again.

In the Co-Main Alonzo Menifield just did not really show up. Having lost last fight due to gassing, he skipped on starting strong and instead just kinda waited the whole fight. When he finally opened up a little at the end of 2nd round, OSP cracked him with a shot that had him faceplant. Bad KO and another prospect that looked amazing earlier in his career is cut down and probably won't be a major figure in the UFC going forward. That kind of bad KO can permanently alter a guy's career trajectory.

Didn't see all of the fight between Pereira and Imadaev, but from the little I saw it seemed Pereira was very comfortable and dominant all through it. He had to ruin the master class performance somehow though, after all that is kind of his style, right? The stupid call out of Masvidal that doesn't really make sense left a sour taste to everyone's mouth. I mean how do you go from Imadaev to big name fighters? Come on, you would have at least needed to stiffen Imadaev before making anything as remotely ambitious callouts.

Bartosz Fabinski could not alter his usual gameplan, his instincts were too strong so he tried to wrestle Andre Muniz and well, predictably got submitted fast. Similarly Ray Rodriguez the very very last minute replacement fighting against Kelleher just dived into a takedown despite Kelleher being famous for his guillotine. He played with fire and got burned, very fast finish with neither guy taking much damage, except the damage to Rodriguez' ego. 

Prelims

Only two prelim fights here to talk about. Viviane Araujo put on a tremendous performance against Montana De La Rosa. She was getting better of the stand-up and especially her leg kicks started to really bother De La Rosa. I think she could have gotten a finish with them if she just invested in them a bit more, but either way she had the fight in control all the way and should be pretty high up the flyweight rankings after this.


I asked in my preview whether Hunter Azure is good enough wrestler to stop the Cole Smith onslaught, and we got answer very fast - he was the better wrestler, not even allowing Cole Smith to come for him but rather imposing his own wrestling on Smith. Cole Smith did rally in the third to threaten a submission, and wasn't a too bad bet in the end as a big underdog, but unanimously lost 28-27.

My Picks

I got 3 out of 7 right, so little under half, definitely not enough for a winning night. Indeed I went 3 bets down again. Best pick was easily Araujo, who looked so dominant that you kinda wished that you would have bet more. As for rest of the picks, I went against the prevailing expert opinion on lot of my picks, and ended up being wrong on a lot of them. Perhaps the Fabinski pick was the worst one, reason being that I originally wrote the preview differently, but ended up changing my mind and completely rewording it.

In the original version, I was recognizing Muniz as a terribly stylistic match-up for him. I essentially talked myself out of another correct pick again. So yeah, that was probably the worst pick of the night but it is a toss-up between that and Menifield, since Menifield was so god-awful and OSP was at his best.

As for lost bets on Sakai and Smith, I can't be too angry at myself, both were underdogs and had their moments in the fights, so I don't regret betting on them really. 

If this weekend's card was weak, then I don't even know what to say about next weekend's card. Well, maybe it won't be too bad. I mean it's just evenly mediocre. There isn't much glorified regional match-ups, but there isn't any stand-out matches either. Those are the kind of cards where I usually pick better, so looking forward to it to brush this event aside. 

Kommentit

Lähetä kommentti

Tämän blogin suosituimmat tekstit

UFC Fight Night 198 Preview & Predictions

Main Event: Ketlen Vieira vs. Miesha Tate Don't know, don't care. Tate looked great last time around, but I don't know how much weight you can put on beating someone who was a career journeyman in her 40s. Vieira is step-up from that, although she isn't top level fighter either, she is at least closer to her prime and should be able to compete. General heuristic for me is that the game has evolved from 2015 days and that you can't come back to compete at elite level in this sport after being out, so let's go by that and pick Vieira. Prediction: Ketlen Vieira Confidence in winner: 1 Co-Main Event: Michael Chiesa vs. Sean Brady Brady is pretty good, but been unspectacular so far, just kinda tightly edging most of his opponents. Chiesa is far more battle-tested of the two and has the grappling edge here. It's gonna be a close fight, but if people are gonna be favoring Brady so heavily here, Chiesa ought to be quite easy pick. I don't really see Chiesa getti...
Lue lisää

UFC Fight Night 172 Preview & Predictions

I am exhausted, wrote almost all of these straight. Main Event: Deiveson Figueiredo vs. Joseph Benavidez Sometimes when two people rematch there is reasons to think it won't go exactly like it went the first time, such as when Conor fought Diaz for the 2nd time, or the recent Volkanovski v Holloway rematch. This is not one of those times though, it's a fight where first time went pretty much how I called it and there is little reason to think anything changes this time around. Benavidez is the more intelligent, technical fighter, I suppose. He is also 35 years old and got KOd by Figueiredo last time around. Figueiredo is very powerful for the weight class and for his size, and his size is barely able to make 125, indeed which is why we are having this rematch, since he missed the weight last time around. So all the physical advantages are with Figueiredo, who also got chance to figure out the timing of Benavidez last time around, so won't need to feel around so much ...
Lue lisää

UFC Fight Night 190 Post-Fight Analysis

Not the most exciting card by any means. About average event for me in terms of results, tiny bit of winnings thanks to main event and co-main event hitting. Main Card Cyril Gane shut out Volkov according to some scorecards. I don't think the decision should have been quite that wide, but it was clear Gane took over during the five rounds of the fight. He doesn't have spectacular wins over anyone, but Gane doesn't make mistakes and is very skilled, tough guy to beat. Volkov couldn't really take full advantage of his reach, but largely shut out any grappling exchanges.  The co-main was largely a forgettable fight even if Boser got the finish there. Boser got the first round with steady volume and OSP doing fuck all, and in the second when OSP started to grapple he had some success but promptly got KOd after that. OSP just isn't very good, all-in all.  Valiev and Barcelos fought to a close decision. Barcelos had Valiev badly hurt in the second, but somehow only one ju...
Lue lisää