UFC Fight Night 189 Post-Fight Analysis

My winning streak just narrowly broke, but I've made poor picks in last three events... don't deserve to be winning. Let's talk about the event.

Main Card

The main event was just as poor of a fight as we expected, with Sakai doing fuck all and Jairzinho staring at him for 4:55 before finishing him right at the end. Not much to say about that, I never rated Sakai but picked him since Jairzinho is so KO or bust, but in this one he showed he ain't good at all.

The co-main was as someone said, the fight that could have been scripted to be the perfect Walt Harris fight. Starts strong, has the opponent hurt, absolutely empties the gas tank only to be taken down and finished in the end. Now to be fair Harris could do cardio until the cows come home and it wouldn't give him a big gas tank because of his powerful build, but he could at least be smart and not barrage it all out in one go. Oh well, that one went as predicted, Tybura's impressive win streak continues.

Roman Dolidze put in an early contender for the worst fight of the year. Realizing he is too slow for Staropoli he did what he had to as the much bigger guy, just hugging him for three rounds for a decision. Weird to have guy who just stalls as winner but to be fair that was all the match was, so you have to award the win to the guy who controls position.

Santiago Ponzinibbio showed that he is nowhere near shot in fight of the year candidate against Miguel Baeza. Baeza looked like he was putting it all together in the first round, fighting like a future champ, just utterly dismantling Ponzinibbio with good mix of strikes, especially the leg kicks accumulating to make Ponz struggle with his balance.

But Ponzinibbio is tough and fought through the leg pain to keep pressuring Baeza in the second, and Baeza simply could not keep up the output. Ponzinibbio won that one with willpower and durability, but also skill. In the end he was a clear winner despite having been trouble in the first.

Barack Obama was too good for my boy Dusko Todorovic, who just keeps blocking shots with his chin. Montana De La Rosa was the pick of the night, shows sharps sometimes are the real sharps, with the ITD prop cashing as well. De La Rosa took Lipski down as expected and then destroyed her with brutal ground and pound.

Prelims

Ilir Latifi's match with Tanner Boser seems to be one that divides opinions. People have really different perceptions on how to score top control time vs. damage. Judges deemed Latifi to have won first and third rounds... and true, in both of those rounds he was on top more than half of the round. But it wasn't really much going on. Just laying down and trying to pass, temporarily passing before Boser gets guard back etc... I don't know, I am on the fence myself about how I would score those rounds, but in first round Boser got up in the end and definitely outstruck him on the feet, so I think he should have got the decision.

Either way Latifi somehow finds a heavyweight win so I guess we have to suffer through another match of his in the UFC.

Muslim Salikhov had a great fight with Francisco Trinaldo. It seemed like Trinaldo's path to victory would have been to grapple, but he did not really pursue that, but was instead content to exhange fire on the feet with Salikhov. That was a bad idea as Salikhov had him hurt in both first and second, but ultimately Trinaldo managed to change the flow of the fight with an ugly eye poke. Salikhov was really messed up from that but showed no quit, willing to fight to the end with a compromised eye, but to be fair he struggled in the last round. 

Kamuela Kirk edged Makwan Amirkhani in a close decision, but it could have really gone either way. Gas tank issues continue for Makwan, figures that hitting the weight room would not have solved that. 

Alan Patrick took the easy way out by quitting after eyepoke for an NC. He was getting trounced up by Mason Jones for whom it was a great showcase, unfortunate that the win was taken from him. It was fortunate for me though since I got bailed out of a bad pick. 

Manon Fiorot destroyed the undersized Tabatha Ricci. We all knew that would happen, but it was unplayable because of odds, but in the end Ricci had no chance of even getting it to the ground. Great performance from Fiorot again.

Sean Woodson and Youssef Zalal had a close fight that Woodson edged in a split. Zalal definitely improved from his last performance, but ultimately isn't good enough wrestler to takedown guy like Woodson enough - it wasn't for lack of trying though, he had a ton of attempts. 

I got the opener competely wrong, it was Puelles who was the more fundamentally sound and Leavitt who was going for low percentage moves. The guy gassed and was too content to be on his back, Puelles with a decent win.

My picks

I got 4 out of 12 right with 1 livebet (Kirk at + money) and 1 prop (Lipski/De La Rosa ITD) hitting. While pre-fight picks didn't really work out this time, the two bets outside of those saved me to take only a marginal half a bet loss. I live to fight another day, in other words.

Worst pick, eh there were many, but Leavitt one probably bothers me the most since I read that one completely wrong. Ricci never had a chance either, but at least it was a play that was justified stylistically and by the odds. Picking against Jones was also terrible, but at least got bailed out from that one. Sakai pick also bothers me a lot, the guy didn't do anything and I expected him to win by just being a little busier than Jairzinho.

All in all a bad night, but next weekend we got the big one and that is a great chance to bounce back.