UFC 200 Aftermath/FAQ for Newbies: Welcome to MMA, Please Mind the Mess

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Stealth Tiger: Nov 14, 2009

I'd argue that Daniel Cormier did settle his score with Jon Jones. I think most fans are going to assume Bones was on drugs the whole time and was too much of a pussy to fight DC mano a mano.

Otherwise, great post and I will add that UFC has an online library called Fightpass that has a free week trial. I recommend new fans check out some classic fights, and come back here and tell me if they ever fixed their player to stop buffering more than goddamned RealPlayer.

e: Since I page sniped, I was going to post some recommended must watch fights, but the OP actually covers a bunch of them.
Some guys who are fun to watch who weren't on UFC 200: Robbie Lawler, Demetrious Johnson, Dominic Cruz, Demian Maia (if grappling is your thing)

Stealth Tiger fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Jul 11, 2016

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:31

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# ? Apr 19, 2024 13:50

BlindSite: Feb 8, 2009

Stealth Tiger posted:

I'd argue that Daniel Cormier did settle his score with Jon Jones. I think most fans are going to assume Bones was on drugs the whole time and was too much of a pussy to fight DC mano a mano.

Otherwise, great post and I will add that UFC has an online library called Fightpass that has a free week trial. I recommend new fans check out some classic fights, and come back here and tell me if they ever fixed their player to stop buffering more than goddamned RealPlayer.

You have a point but to settle the score in the eyes of a lot of fans you need to beat him in the cage and I'm sure despite his protestations DC on some level feels the same way.

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:36

Baron La Croix: Nov 2, 2010; rastah farah
sonnah maddah fah

So who's this Tito Ortiz guy? As a wrestling fan, I only known him as an awkward nodding man with a head like a dang ol' baked potato.

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:42

Dangersim: Sep 4, 2011; He expended too much energy and got tired

I'M NOT SURPRISED MOTHERFUCKERS

DC's definitely the one winning at life right now but the fact remains that Jon jones beat dc up.

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:42

Mean Bean Machine: May 9, 2008; Only when I breathe.

Beeswax posted:

I'm gonna go ahead and predict that having the thread devolve into MMA regulars exchanging injokes and references on page one is not the best way to attract new posters.

who cares about attracting new posters

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:42

Dangersim: Sep 4, 2011; He expended too much energy and got tired

I'M NOT SURPRISED MOTHERFUCKERS

Baron La Croix posted:

So who's this Tito Ortiz guy? As a wrestling fan, I only known him as an awkward nodding man with a head like a dang ol' baked potato.

You pretty much got it

# ? Jul 11, 2016 23:43

Dangersim: Sep 4, 2011; He expended too much energy and got tired

I'M NOT SURPRISED MOTHERFUCKERS

Oh another important axiom: in case of extremely close, controversial fights, it is only acceptable to talk about the closeness of said fight, and to speak positively about the losing fighter in the immediate aftermath.

After a period of time has passed, the official story will change to the winner actually dominated the fight and the loser was outclassed.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:18

Schenck v. U.S.: Sep 8, 2010

Baron La Croix posted:

So who's this Tito Ortiz guy? As a wrestling fan, I only known him as an awkward nodding man with a head like a dang ol' baked potato.

He was a UFC Light Heavyweight Champion a long time ago when the promotion was less competitive. He is notoriously dumb and lame for a myriad of reasons too long to list but I'll jot out the first few that come to mind

lost his first title shot by tapping to strikes against an opponent roughly 1.5 weight classes smaller than him
made up obviously false excuses after every fight whether he won or lost, such as that he was fighting with a fractured skull or a broken back
ducked Chuck Liddell for years, at one point claiming that he was close friends with Chuck and they had a standing agreement not to fight one another, to which Chuck said he was lying and there was no agreement and furthermore they weren't friends at all
lost the Light Heavyweight belt to Randy Couture in a fight where Couture dominated him so utterly that at one point Randy literally spanked his bottom while loudly laughing

I could go on but I've already wasted enough time (2 minutes) thinking about Tito Ortiz

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:20

BlindSite: Feb 8, 2009

EvanSchenck posted:

He was a UFC Light Heavyweight Champion a long time ago when the promotion was less competitive. He is notoriously dumb and lame for a myriad of reasons too long to list but I'll jot out the first few that come to mind

lost his first title shot by tapping to strikes against an opponent roughly 1.5 weight classes smaller than him

made up obviously false excuses after every fight whether he won or lost, such as that he was fighting with a fractured skull or a broken back

ducked Chuck Liddell for years, at one point claiming that he was close friends with Chuck and they had a standing agreement not to fight one another, to which Chuck said he was lying and there was no agreement and furthermore they weren't friends at all

lost the Light Heavyweight belt to Randy Couture in a fight where Couture dominated him so utterly that at one point Randy literally spanked his bottom while loudly laughing

I could go on but I've already wasted enough time (2 minutes) thinking about Tito Ortiz

He also defeated wanderlei silva and vitor belfort when they were murdering dudes.

Tito ortiz was a good fighter in his day, just not the best fighter and stayed in the game way too long but he did have some impressive moments in his career and held the belt in a competitive division for a not insignifcant amount of time.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:36

Zwachro: Mar 7, 2003; C808BEA

EvanSchenck posted:

He was a UFC Light Heavyweight Champion a long time ago when the promotion was less competitive. He is notoriously dumb and lame for a myriad of reasons too long to list but I'll jot out the first few that come to mind

lost his first title shot by tapping to strikes against an opponent roughly 1.5 weight classes smaller than him

made up obviously false excuses after every fight whether he won or lost, such as that he was fighting with a fractured skull or a broken back

ducked Chuck Liddell for years, at one point claiming that he was close friends with Chuck and they had a standing agreement not to fight one another, to which Chuck said he was lying and there was no agreement and furthermore they weren't friends at all

lost the Light Heavyweight belt to Randy Couture in a fight where Couture dominated him so utterly that at one point Randy literally spanked his bottom while loudly laughing

I could go on but I've already wasted enough time (2 minutes) thinking about Tito Ortiz

Just adding to this off the top of my head, he also agreed to fight Dana White in a boxing match, which got serious enough (he apparently had that boxing bout in his UFC contract) that the commission got involved and they staged a weigh-in for the event. Tito no-showed the weigh-in, allegedly on the advice of his then-girlfriend Jenna Jameson, because the whole thing had blown up enough she didn't think he made enough money off it.

He also got hired as Chris Cyborg's manager, and convinced her to not sign a contract with the UFC where they'd pay her to fight in Invicta (all-female fighting org, pretty much a feeder league to the UFC at this point), but instead fight in Invicta on her own for less money.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:39

Bundt Cake: Aug 17, 2003; ;(

BlindSite posted:

He also defeated wanderlei silva and vitor belfort when they were murdering dudes.

Those fights were terrible performances. He lay n prayed Wandy then full on sprinted away the one time he wasn't in top position. And he lost the third round to vitor. he lost a third round TO VITOR

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:42

handsome only face: Apr 22, 2010; Cockroach went out of the room in anger. And roach's go to empty room...

Cockroache's Anarchist

Tito Ortiz vs. Dana White
Joe Rogan vs. Wesley Snipes

the two fights that never happened that hurt UFC the most

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:43

Dangersim: Sep 4, 2011; He expended too much energy and got tired

I'M NOT SURPRISED MOTHERFUCKERS

And when he finally did fight chuck he got thoroughly owned.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:47

fatherdog: Feb 16, 2005

Also a goon who is a fairly well-credentialed muay thai instructor worked with him for a camp and he paid him in Team Punishment t-shirts.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:54

Bluedeanie: Jul 20, 2008; It's no longer a blue world, Max. Where could we go?

Mean Bean Machine posted:

who cares about attracting new posters

Me, which is a large part of this thread.

Prelims writeup is impending.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:54

Shirkelton: Apr 6, 2009; I'm not loyal to anything, General... except the dream.

fatherdog posted:

Also a goon who is a fairly well-credentialed muay thai instructor worked with him for a camp and he paid him in Team Punishment t-shirts.

Haha. That owns.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 00:56

frankenfreak: Feb 16, 2007; I SCORED 85% ON A QUIZ ABOUT MONDAY NIGHT RAW AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY TEXT

#bastionboogerbrigade

EvanSchenck posted:

[*] lost the Light Heavyweight belt to Randy Couture in a fight where Couture dominated him so utterly that at one point Randy literally spanked his bottom while loudly laughing

Hahaha. I need to see that. Anyone got a youtube or gif of that on hand?

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:03

Bluedeanie: Jul 20, 2008; It's no longer a blue world, Max. Where could we go?

Prelim writeup added to post 2!

Bluedeanie posted:

And we're back, to further look into the prelims! There weren't as many super big currently relevant names on these fights, but don't let that fool you: pretty much all of them had some degree of implications for their respective divisions.

Julianna Pe�a def. Cat Zingano, Decision (unanimous)

Who are these girls?
Julianna Pe�a is the first-ever female winner of the Ultimate Fighter, the UFC�s long-running reality-show format fighting tournament where finalists are given an impressive-sounding but ultimately mediocre six-figure UFC contract. On the show, she was coached by friend, training partner and now former Women�s Bantamweight Champion Miesha Tate. The Venezuelan Vixen was put on the injury roster almost immediately after winning the tourney, in an incident which she claimed was a severe case of vicious hazing by a jealous hater in her gym who shredded her knee. In reality it was an accident that she severely overblew. A big chunk of this match was contested on the ground which is at least somewhat unusual for her, as she�s known for a very aggressive high-offense low-defense striking approach where she wades in throwing hooks like they�re rocks at a wooly mammoth she needs to feed her cave family. That incident with the gym injury turns out to be a common problem for her too: she�s kind of an aggressive rear end in a top hat who goes around picking street fights and playing them off like they were someone else�s fault. That all said, she�s not the most likeable person and she�s probably due for a loss sooner rather than later, but she�s undefeated in her UFC tenure and Zingano was a fairly big win for her.

Poor Alpha Cat Zingano. To a degree, she�s a lot like Mark Hunt in that she�s had a rough go of it and you should feel bad she lost. She first got into martial arts as a single mother stood up by her baby daddy, seeing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) as a way to get into shape and lose the baby weight. There she met her future coach and husband, Mauricio Zingano, who went on to adopt her kid and be a critical fixture in their lives. It turns out that Cat naturally took to jiu jitsu, and also picked up some Muay Thai (thai kickboxing) skills, eventually going pro. Cat made a name for herself in Invicta, a smaller Kansas City-based all-women�s MMA organization that operates as a quasi-official feeder league for the UFC�s now three women�s divisions. She�s an exciting fighter known for being a slow starter: after getting handled for a round and a half, she decides she�d rather win instead and kicks the poo poo out of her opponent in a big way. That exact thing happened in her UFC debut fight with Miesha Tate. Then a series of unfortunate events befell her. The winner of the Tate-Zingano fight was intended to coach alongside Pe�a�s season of the Ultimate Fighter, opposite then-dominant and growingly insanely popular champ Ronda Rousey. It�s a tradition on TUF that the coaches fight one another, so this would have been a huge amount of exposure for the opposite coach and an early opportunity at the coveted UFC belt. Then the day before filming was set to begin, Zingano blew out her knee and required surgery. The coaching spot went to Tate, who she straight destroyed in the third round, and she had to sit out on the sidelines to rehab for a year a year and a half. During this injury recovery, her husband committed suicide. After her recovery, Zingano faced now-champ Amanda Nunes. In typical fashion for both women, Nunes beat the tar out of Zingano for a round, then Zingano beat the tar out of Nunes for two and stopped her in the third with strikes. Cat says that first round left her with dizzy spells and light sensitivity for a month and she gained 30 pounds due to her hormones going crazy after taking hard punches to her pituitary gland. With this exciting win, Cat finally re-earned her title shot against Ronda Rousey. Learning from her past mistakes, Zingano said she knew she was a slow starter and if she wanted to beat Ronda � known for winning the majority of her fights in under 60 seconds � Cat would need to change that. As a result, she ran out of the gate and threw a flying knee at Ronda. Unfortunately, Ronda earned an Olympic bronze in judo and her signature technique is throwing her opponent to the ground and making them tap with an armbar submission, so hurdling toward her and sacrificing your center of gravity is perhaps the worst possible mistake you could make. 16 seconds later, she tapped and earned her first loss. She then took another year and a half to move to Thailand to train more intensively in her muay thai, and her return was tragically getting controlled on the ground by Pe�a, and she has to watch the belt be passed from one person she knocked out to another while sitting on the sidelines nursing a two-fight losing streak. It was very sad.

What did this fight mean for the future?
As I noted in the main card section of this thread, the women�s bantamweight title scene is wide open and ripe for the taking right now. Pe�a is still probably a hair too green for that right now, but Zingano was a big win, so if former champ Holly Holm manages to lose or look like complete poo poo in her upcoming fight, Pe�a probably has as strong a case as anyone else for a title shot currently. That said, a top five fight feels likely for her next.

Zingano more than anything deserves a big ol� gimmie fight, Honestly there�s a number of lower-level fighters in that division Zingano can fight in a tuneup, but if Holm crushes Valentina Shevchenko later this month in Chicago, that might be a good candidate for her to name someone specifically.

What are some of their best fights?
Pe�a�s fights as a UFC pro haven�t been the most spectacular, but her wins over Jessica Rakoczy and Milana Dudieva are solidly watchable. If you really want to see her on the Ultimate Fighter, all of her fights there were fun too. Cat�s aforementioned fights against Tate and Nunes are truly fantastic to watch.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
If you want to see a really aggressive idiot go whole ham with hooks like Pe�a but on waaaaaaay more steroids, Wanderlei Silva is your go-to guy. Zingano�s combo of muay thai and BJJ are extremely common in Brazilian fighters so you could almost throw a dart at a list and have a good comparison. Early Aldo actually is a good example a reverse Zingano who comes out extremely aggressively and puts fools away. Shogun Rua�s BJJ is overstated but his early fights when he was still healthy and had a functioning number of brain cells are a great showcase in extremely effective muay thai.

Kelvin Gastelum def. Johny Hendricks, Decision (unanimous)

Who are these guys?
This was an epic showdown between the chunkiest welterweights with the worst dietary discipline. Kelvin became the youngest man to ever win the Ultimate Fighter on the season coached by Jon Jones and Chael Sonnen, coming up strong on Kelvin�s team to defeat teammate and �The Next Anderson Silva� Uriah Hall. I�ve personally been super into Kelvin since that time, where he ate a shitton of hashbrowns before each fight and nearly died making weight, to the point that fellow contestant and UFC washout Jimmy Quinlan sat by his death bed and recounted the story of Star Wars by memory to take his mind off the pain. Though his weight management has lead to more than one failure to make weight for a fight � he was in fact briefly banished to middleweight by the UFC brass, where he ritualistically sacrificed Nate Marquardt to Jenny Craig � Kelvin has looked insanely impressive on good nights. He eventually had his undefeated streak snapped by Tyron Woodley and lost a really fun competitive fight with unlikely goon favorite Neil Magny, but many people around here have him pegged for a future champion of he can continue to improve and pull it all together. Handily beating a former champ like he did at UFC 200 is a strong example of why: Hendricks was a huge win.

If the Ghost of Christmases Yet to Come appeared to Kelvin in a Waffle House bathroom and showed him a morbidly obese, balding version of himself in the mirror, begging him to change his ways before it is too late and his career goes to poo poo, that reflection would be Johny �Bigg Rigg� Hendricks. That�s right, one N and two G�s. The former UFC champion and NCAA wrestling champ has fallen from extremely great heights, and it�s disappointing to see if not actually outright sad. Earlier on in his UFC career he developed monster power in his left hand, putting away some tough people who�d previously never even been knocked out before like Jon Fitch, so a lot of people were hyped up on him. After winning a fight of the year candidate with Carlos Condit, Hendricks earned his title shot against Georges St-Pierre, the longtime welterweight kingpin whose accomplishments, record and recognition as one of the greatest of all time truly rivaled that of Anderson Silva�s. GSP hadn�t had the most exciting title defenses ever, but he was insanely good at wrestling people, striking from the outside and overall completely controlling the pace of the fight and shutting his opponents down. Hendricks had enough of that poo poo and took the fight to Georges, fighting to a razor close split decision loss that many people (including yours truly) sincerely felt he should have won. Despite this, Hendricks lost a lot of fans on here who felt his response to the loss was excessively whiny. But even the UFC higher-ups agreed Hendricks probably could have edged it out, so after Georges effectively retired and vacated his belt following the fight, Hendricks was put in against all-time goon favorite Robbie Lawler for the vacant UFC welterweight belt. And what a fight it was. It�s legitimately one of the best ever. Hendricks walked away with his hand raised, and there the good times ended. He spent time on the shelf recovering from surgery on his bicep, and in the meantime Lawler had two great wins and came back for the belt when Hendricks was better. This fight gets a lot of flak for Hendricks� decision to stall the action in two of the later rounds, but honestly it was still a pretty good fight from bell to bell all things considered. Hendricks probably should have won that fight too in my opinion, but the judges saw it for Lawler, and this was the beginning of the end. I believe forums poster manyak posited that Hendricks has never taken the losses well and at this point just lost his fire for fighting and gave up on it, and that may well be true. Johny has always struggled with his weight and gotten needlessly fat in his camps to make an already difficult weight cut for someone with his stocky frame even harder, but at this point it seemed he started outright ballooning. He even opened a now-failed steakhouse in an attempt to somehow make weight cutting easier, and has most recently attempted a strict diet of �fine Johny get the loving big mac but for the love of Christ don�t get fries, what do I know I�m just your goddamn nutritionist.� He had a boring fight with Matt Brown which should be drat near impossible, got knocked out impressively by rising star Stephen Thompson and then just lost to Kelvin. If he could get it together he should be game for anyone, but here we are.

What did this fight mean for the future?
As I said, despite everything I just said about Hendricks� career trajectory, he was still a huge win for Kelvin; Gastelum is likely knocking on the door of a top five fight and has fairly firmly established himself as a legit top-10 mainstay. Hendricks, however, may have seen his best days besides him unless he gets his head out of his miserable rear end and starts putting it back together. It�s relatively unlikely he�ll be cut for a two-loss streak against top contenders and he only missed weight by a quarter of a pound, but altogether those things are not going to sit well with UFC President Dana White. If he does live to fight another day in the UFC, it won�t be against a very big name, and people are going to stop talking about Hendricks when they discuss the next big things at welterweight if they hadn�t already.

What are some of their best fights?
Kelvin�s got some sweet-rear end fights with Jake Ellenberger and Nate Marquardt. His season of TUF was all around cool to watch as well, and highlights from that are his fights with Bubba McDaniel and Josh Samman.

As for Hendricks, stop reading this thread right now if you have to and go watch the first Lawler fight. Other great showings include Hendricks vs. Condit and Hendricks vs. Kampmann.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
Both guys are both squat strong wrestleboxers, as are the majority of welterweights actually. You could look up prime Ellenberger or career resurgence Lawler and get some reasonably similar fights.

TJ Dillashaw def. Raphael Assuncao, Decision (unanimous)

Who are these guys?
TJ Dillashaw�s had a really fun career. He was a finalist on the Ultimate Fighter who got knocked the gently caress out by John Dodson, a tiny little imp who went on to be arguably the Number 2 Flyweight of All Time before returning to bantamweight after realizing he�ll never beat the flyweight champ, Mighty Mouse Johnson. Dillashaw originally trained at Team Alpha Male, a Sacramento-based ~~frat house~~ MMA gym specializing in working with smaller dude fighters, and it had a reputation � more of a curse, really � of having a lot of the second-best fighters in the division, a bunch of dudes who were extremely dominant but could never quite win the big fights when they count. Dillashaw seemed to fight right in that niche. After losing he went on a four-fight finishing streak of really fun fights, and then was derailed by a split decision loss in his first Fight-of-the-Night winning match with Assuncao. He then had an unnoteworthy decision win over Mike Easton (member of a terrible camp full of rapists and assholes, but we can decry them another time) and he got a phone call most fighters relish � the champ�s opponent is hurt and he�s already beaten everyone else, we need you in there. Dillashaw was now set to fight Renan Barao, a Brazilian standout who at the time was being heralded as a pound-for-pound great. Barao had a crazy 32-fight not-losing streak (he had a No Contest in there) and had already twice beaten Urijah Faber, the Team Alpha Male leader and an all-time great in his own right. No one expected for Dillashaw to have poo poo for him. TAM had a new striking coach, however: former UFC welterweight journeyman Duane �Bang� Ludwig. Dillashaw apparently absolutely flourished under Bang�s leadership, because he waltzed into that cage and made Barao look helpless. He whooped Barao from pillar to post before finally putting him away in the fifth and final round, and everyone went apeshit. TAM finally had a belt, and it was a kid that no one had been paying any meaningful amount of attention to whatsoever. The �no shirt, no shoes, no problem� party raged for weeks, but unfortunately it had to come to an end sometime. Faber and Ludwig apparently didn�t see eye to eye, and Ludwig left to start his own gym in Colorado. For his similarly lopsided rematch with Barao and extreme short-notice fight with confused baby Joe Soto, Dillashaw split his camps between Team Alpha Male and Ludwig�s new camp Elevation Fight Team. It was super dramatic, now Faber hated Dillashaw and accused him of taking PEDs, they wanted to fight, it was childish. It would soon be almost forgotten as Dillashaw took a fight with the long-awaited returning former Bantamweight champ Dominick Cruz. Cruz owns, but his insane footwork and speed apparently came at a cost of his tendons, because he had multiple ACL tears that forced him out repeatedly and forced him to vacate his belt, making then-interim champ Barao the undisputed champ. Cruz showed up against Takaya Mizugaki and destroyed him in under a minute, and then loving pulled his groin and had to sit out for another year. But finally he was back for his belt. He and Dillashaw actually had pretty similar styles, evasive footwork and great use of angles to land shots, so it was a really compelling match that in my opinion proved to be the best fight of the year so far. It was great, and Cruz won a split decision that Dillashaw and I both agreed with: Dillashaw felt he won, and I felt Cruz should have gotten the unanimous nod. Now Dillashaw is ready to get back to the top of the heap.

Raphael Assuncao is a solid fighter but he also sat out for a while, missing all of 2015 due to injury. It got to a point where I was fairly confident he wasn�t real and just a strange figment of our collective imagination to make Dillashaw seem more human. He was knocked out in his UFC debut by the flawed but dangerous Erik Koch and had a choppy 3-2 run in the WEC, but pulled together a pretty impressive seven-fight win streak including Dillashaw and fellow contender Bryan Caraway. Another win over the now much-improved former champ Dillashaw was going to put Assuncao over into clear contendership territory, but alas it was not to be.

What did this fight mean for the future?
This fight was pretty important for the future of the 135-pound men�s division, which is slightly short on contenders at the moment. It would have probably been more interesting for Assuncao to win because it�d be better for Cruz to get new opponents rather than the same two people he�s fought for the past 80 years due to his off time, but we�ll take what we can get. Due to the �controversy� involved in their last fight, Dillashaw feels like the most clear challenger for Cruz at this point, while Assuncao is still poised well enough to take another top 10 fight and remain in the mix within the near future.

What are some of their best fights?
Their first fight against one another was good.

You should absolutely watch both Dillashaw vs. Barao 1 and 2, and even though he lost, Cruz vs. Dillashaw was super good too.

Assuncao vs. Vaughan Lee and Issei Tamura were cool bouts as well.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
As I mentioned, Dominick Cruz is like Final Form TJ Dillashaw. Former TAM teammates Urijah Faber and Chad Mendes are worth checking out too, although their styles all vary from his in some key areas.

Assuncao has sort of the quintessential well-rounded Brazilian style. Rafael dos Anjos is a cool guy to see that in action at the highest levels.

Sage Northcutt def. Enrique Marin, Decision (Unanimous)

Who are these guys?
Super Sage Northcutt is the subject of much goon adoration, and not exclusively because he fulfills our wildest and most gay sexual fantasies. Sage was discovered on Dana White�s web series �Lookin� for a Fight,� where in a format somewhat similar to �Diners, Drive-ins and Dives� he traveled the countryside with former Welterweight champion and trash-eating troll Matt Serra in the quest for an opponent lovely and green enough to face CM Punk. They immediately decided Sage was too good and marketable to waste on Phil Brooks� retirement passion project, and signed him directly into the UFC at just 19 years old. He�s showed a crazy amount of potential and natural talent. His striking is pretty legit, especially for someone with as little MMA experience as he has, though this can be traced to the fact that he�s been trained for competitive karate since he was like 5 by his literal steroid and cocaine dealer father. A devout Christian and proud American, Sage�s twitter is a national treasure, where he chronicles traveling the roads by car to support our nation�s highway and toll systems and learning the fascinating history of the landline telephone. Unfortunately his ground game is virtually nonexistent, which he showcased by getting taken down by the very bad Cody Pfister and later getting taken down and submitted by the likeable but not great Bryan Barbarena, for which he went on to blame strep throat. Sadly his primary coach is still his father, and that is proving to be a very bad influence for him. Upon showcasing his talent, Sage was immediately contacted by Tristar, a world-class Canadian gym and home to the aforementioned welterweight legend Georges St-Pierre. Northcutt trained there temporarily until his father, sensing the impending end of his golden meal ticket, convinced Sage to leave immediately because it was �too much for where he was in his career right now.� Sage�s dad is also notorious for allegedly yelling at fighters from other teams and gyms who work with Sage to help develop his striking game further for �going too hard,� even though they were doing fairly light and reasonable sparring. This guy does have a huge ceiling on a long enough time frame, but he needs to make better choices to reach it.

The UFC has a vested interest in bringing Sage up slowly, so Marin is a prime example. The Spaniard was the runner-up of the not-particularly good The Ultimate Fighter: Latin America 2, dropping a split decision to Erick Monta�o. He really isn�t great and is now 8-4 in MMA, and 0-2 as a UFC professional. That�s exactly the sort of level Sage should be getting matched at in this point of his career, so no huge surprises there.

What did this fight mean for the future?
For the immediate future of their division, pretty much nothing. Sage Northcutt will continue his rise through the UFC, but his pace has already slowed from �potentially meteoric� to �crawl.� The UFC invested a lot of marketing muscle behind Sage and are paying him way better than anyone else at his experience level, so they aren�t going to rush him into more than he can handle, and considering the Barbarena fight and how close Marin came to submitting Sage multiple times that could still possibly be any given unranked lightweight at this point. He�ll get someone else you�ve never heard of, and if Marin doesn�t outright get released from the UFC roster, he�ll fill the undercard against some bum. Meanwhile, any relevant fighter or matchup will never feel the ripple from any of this.

What are some of their best fights?
Sage�s bouts with Francisco Trevino and Cody Pfister are worth a peep. I am not convinced Marin has any worth seeing that are readily available on the internet.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
If you like flashy karate poo poo but want to see someone good do it instead, watch Stephen �Wonderboy� Thompson fights. You can check the b league prelims for your fair share of Enrique Marins, and quite possible Enrique Marin himself within the year.

Joe Lauzon def. Diego Sanchez TKO (rear end-whoopin�) rd. 1

Who are these guys?
Another fight between TUF alums, Joe Lauzon has had some loving amazing fights since coming into the UFC out of TUF 5, probably the most entertaining and talent rich season of all time. Lauzon�s also known as being an early starter who fades as fights go on, but his style is extremely fan friendly. He hits really hard, he�s got great jiu jitsu that leads to flashy scrambles and awesome sub wins, he is all around an insanely cool guy to watch. With his bonus for his performance against Sanchez, Lauzon is currently tied for most UFC post-fight bonus awards with fellow TUF 5 alum and season winner Nate Diaz, at an unfathomable 17. That puts them ahead of GOAT Anderson Silva. He�s getting up there in fight years and unfortunately was never quite good enough to put on a title run, but in his 37 fights, even in his losses Joe usually comes out looking cool as hell. I can�t talk this guy up enough, you�re not getting championship caliber but you should be tuning into every drat fight this guy puts on.

Diego Sanchez is the FIRST TUF winner, beating eventual three-division title challenger Kenny Florian at middleweight to win the inaugural season. Diego Sanchez was long thought to be literally too stupid to be KO�d, but he managed it against Lauzon which goes to show you how much deceptive power Creepy Joe can pack. Diego is a crazy motherfucker. Daniel Bryan admittedly blatantly lifted the �YES! YES! YES!� thing from Sanchez, who chants it before each fight and even does it in his patented �Yes Cartwheel� to harness nature�s positive energy or some insane horseshit. He went undefeated for his first 17 pro fights as a well-rounded guy with big power and solid wrestling, before finally getting wrestled to death in back-to-back fights by the AKA Lay-and-Pray Dream Team Josh Koscheck and Jon Fitch. He�s definitely slowed down, lost a step and let the sport catch up to him though. After an extremely bloody title fight loss to Hall of Famer BJ Penn, Sanchez started bouncing back and forth between lightweight and welterweight pretty consistently, and recently even took a stab at featherweight. He hasn�t been on a winning streak since 2011, and outside of the Jim Miller fight he hasn�t actually won a decision he deserved since 2010. Sanchez� style of coming forward extremely aggressively and not seeming to react to huge bombs landing on and about his face have lead many judges astray from the right decision, so in a way it was really good to see him finally get stopped so there was no risk of that. He�s eaten a fuckton of punishment in the last few years though, so we pretty much all wish he�d actually hang them up.

What did this fight mean for the future?
Creepy Joe proved he�s still got a little left in the tank to be able to put away Sanchez like that, but neither of them were anywhere near the rankings at lightweight and rightfully so. Joe will live to fight another day for sure, and probably get a better level name out of this fight, if he wants it. I am not fool enough to believe Diego�s intelligent and sane enough to realize he should retire at this point, and the UFC probably won�t release him to go make money for Bellator or some other promotion, so it�s hard to say who he gets. He�s in a weird position where his name value demands an opponent who also has a name, but he is not good enough to deservedly beat many people in that category. He could possibly get a rematch against Takanori Gomi, who he robbed a few years ago.

What are some of their best fights?
This is legit the hardest one to list, because it�s drat near impossible not to just post 90% of their careers. For Joe, I have to plug his bout with former WEC champ Jamie Varner and his Melvin Guillard bout.

Diego�s greaest hits include Joe Riggs and a losing effort but awesome fight with Gilbert Melendez.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
You like crazy flawed guys who go in and chase a finish or die trying? Who doesn�t? Check out Stefan Struve and Chris Leben�s fights.

Gegard Mousasi def. Thiago Santos TKO (punches) 1

Who are these guys?
Gegard Mousasi is an Iranian-born fighter of Armenian descent who grew up in Holland. Confused? Me too. Apparently the Dutch thing overrides the Iranian and Armenian thing because Mousasi is noted for being extremely, unflappably chill at all times, including during fights. This has endeared him to many fans on SomethingAwful, despite having a fairly inconsistent career. He�s fought everywhere from heavyweight to middleweight, and made a name for himself in the Japanese circuit before finally getting signed to fight in the UFC with wins over Mark Hunt of all people, the terrifyingly powerful Melvin Manhoef (the first person to ever KO Mark Hunt in MMA) and current middleweight contender Ronaldo �Jacare� Souza. Mousasi has turned in some truly great performances and some snoozers. He hovers right around a narrow skill level between �high level gatekeeper� and �low level contender,� meaning if you can beat him you�re (probably) really good but he can beat people who are fairly good as well. The notoriously iron-chinned Mousasi was recently TKO�d by a beautiful flying knee from the wildly inconsistent Uriah Hall, and Mousasi�s next outing was a pretty boring unremarkable fight with longtime journeyman Thales Leites, so a big performance here at UFC 200 was pretty important for him to remain a potential contender in people�s eyes, and he really delivered.

Mousasi himself said Thiago Santos was a guy who didn�t have a name but was a dangerous fight he needed to take seriously, and he was right. Santos has a name so generically Brazilian he has to be listed on wikipedia as �Thiago Santos (middleweight fighter)� but don�t let that fool you, he�s been on a drat tear lately. His start in the UFC was a rocky win-one-lose-one affair for a bit, but Mousasi snapped a four-fight streak including a massive head kick KO over durable hockey goon Steve Bosse and an impressive KO victory over Nate Marquardt. Santos is a really dangerous, powerful striker with a very crafty submission game, so this was a good win for Mousasi.

What did this fight mean for the future?
Mousasi gets to remain on the fringe of the mix at middleweight, which is also an incredibly interesting division with a lot of interesting matchups in the three years since Anderson reigned. A ranked fighter for him next is not entirely out of the question. It wasn�t a terrible loss for Santos, though � a win over Mousasi would have been a big step up and his ticket to another name opponent on a higher-profile spot on the card, but a loss to a guy like him isn�t super shameful and he�ll get another chance to amass a nice big impressive win streak against middling fighters. While Santos winning would have been a shot of fresh blood into a fun division, was not the worst thing that could have happened by any means.

What are some of their best fights?
Mousasi turned in some big wins over beloved UFC fighter and elderly grandfather Dan Henderson, a good showing over B-league staple Sokoudjou a really sweet KO over Jacare that was eventually avenged in the UFC.

As I mentioned, check out Santos� wins over Bosse and Marquardt.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
It�s hard to name another fighter who fights exactly like Mousasi, but he does use a lot of judo, and if you�re into that you should for sure be looking at Ronda Rousey, Karo Parisyan and Yoshihiro Akyiama.

Jim Miller def. Takanori Gomi TKO (punches) 1

Who are these guys?
Jim Miller is another long-time goon favorite who never quite cracked a title shot, but for the majority of his career his only losses were to UFC champions or title challengers. He�s probably over the hill but this was another opportunity where a fighter had a chance to prove they still had some gas in the tank and he delivered. Miller is a BJJ black belt and is incredibly dangerous on the ground. He�s had some amazing fights as well, and walks out to CCR for the majority of his fights which is also cool. It was really good to see him win, especially knowing some of that money was probably going to help his brother, former UFC fighter Dan Miller, take care of his ailing kid who has a rare kidney disease.

Takanori Gomi is one of the very few remaining fighters from the Pride era, where he was the only lightweight champion. The Fireball Kid had a lot of really fun fights and is a longtime favorite of regular poster david charmichael, but he hasn�t exactly done well for himself in the UFC, going 4-7 now with the promotion. There are a lot of reasons for this. In part he�s just older and more beat up. In part he�s fighting much better fighters than the cans he faced in Pride. In part he is by all accounts a raging alcoholic who shows up to his training camp with a backpack full of beer and cigarettes. Either way, the guy�s a Japanese legend but he�s far past it.

What did this fight mean for the future?
Not a lot either. Jim Miller proved he�s got some of the old magic and will get another fight. Gomi�s on a three-fight losing streak and that kind of territory is where the UFC starts releasing you from your contract, but he�s just enough of a name that it�s possible he�ll be kept on board for another fight with an aging fan favorite to pump a bit more interest out of the east.

What are some of their best fights?
Definitely watch Millers� fight with Joe Lauzon (see a trend here?) Another good one is his bout with Yancy Medeiros.

Takanori Gomi has good fights with Tyson Griffin and a very Pride fight with Mitsuhiro Ishida.

I like them. Who are some similar fighters?
If you like a scrappy guys with great jiu jitsu, check out the Diaz brothers, Nick and Nate.
If you like a brawler like Gomi who does very well under Japanes rules, check out Daron Cruikshank.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:24

team overhead smash: Sep 2, 2006; Team-Forest-Tree-Dog:
Smashing your way into our hearts one skylight at a time

What was with Mark Hunt's plan of slowly walking towards Brock and then not punching him? I mean I get he has to be wary of a takedown and keeping his distance allows Mark to block or avoid some takedown attempts, but that doesn't really seem to matter if he has no offence and Brock was still managing to take him down and then pound on him a good percent of the time. Brock was almost never committing to anything more than little jabs or an occasional leg kick so that doesn't seem to leave an opportunity for effective counter punching. Hunt just seemed to be staying outside of punching range but within Brock's takedown range which seems to be to be a bad plan. Maybe punching would have been a better plan?

team overhead smash fucked around with this message at 01:37 on Jul 12, 2016

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:24

fatherdog: Feb 16, 2005

team overhead smash posted:

What was with Mark Hunt's plan of slowly walking towards Brock and then not punching him? I mean I get he has to be wary of a takedown and keeping his distance allows Mark to block or avoid some takedown attempts, but that doesn't really seem to matter if he has no offence and Brock was still managing to take him down and then pound on him a good percent of the time. Brock was almost never committing to anything more than little jabs or an occasional leg kick so that doesn't seem to leave an opportunity for effective counter punching. Hunt just seemed to be staying outside of punching range but within Brock's takedown range which seems to be to be a bad plan. Maybe punching would have been a better plan?

Only Mark Hunt and/or his coaches really know what his plan was, but it looked to me like the idea was to slowly move forward without throwing strikes with the idea that either Brock would get backed into the cage where Hunt could unload, or he'd have to shoot while Mark had both hands ready to clip him with something. Which is more or less what Brock did, but it turns out that he's still impossibly fast for a guy his size so Mark didn't manage to hit him with anything cleanly enough off the shots.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:48

Mr. Nice!: Oct 13, 2005; c-spam cannot afford

Hunt is extremely picky with his punches most of the time, but he spent a non-trivial portion of round 1 with 290 lbs of muscle on top of him. Hunt was exhausted and I would be surprised if that slam at the end of round 1 either broke or dislocated one of his ribs.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:50

LobsterMobster: Oct 29, 2009; "I was being quiet and trying to be a good boy but he dialed the right combination to open the throw-down vault and it was on."

"Walter Foxx is ten times brighter than your bulb at the bottom of the tree merry xmas"

Awesome job from BlueDeanie, as usual.

Just wanted to throw in, as a long-time Diego fan, that 2 of my most fave Nightmare fights are:

vs Karo Parisyan

vs Nick Diaz (Side note, Nick threw a shoe at Diego backstage)

# ? Jul 12, 2016 01:53

BlindSite: Feb 8, 2009

Bundt Cake posted:

Those fights were terrible performances. He lay n prayed Wandy then full on sprinted away the one time he wasn't in top position. And he lost the third round to vitor. he lost a third round TO VITOR

Lay n pray is what hendricks did at the end of the lawler fight. Tito sold out for takedowns but he was actually active passing and striking.

Dont bring this poo poo back into prominence where anyone who scores a takedown is now just a lay n pray fighter. It took years for retards to stop saying it.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 02:46

afatwhiteloaf: Oct 19, 2012

Remember when Tito almost triangled Machida? And then Machida got a bonus check from Dana for beating Tito (not one of the post-fight bonus's, a personal check from Dana White) and said it made him feel like a hitman. MMA is weird.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 02:53

Shirkelton: Apr 6, 2009; I'm not loyal to anything, General... except the dream.

Remember when Ryan Bader was set up to crush and retire Tito by Dana and instead Tito won.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 02:54

turntabler: Sep 10, 2011

New posters who are interested in what fighters do when not fighting should check out Alistair Overeem's vanity documentary The Reem: http://www.alistairovereem.com/docu

I find it to be an awesome more-or-less honest look at what a high level fighter goes through. The good and bad of training, psychology, media, and common pitfalls and mistakes fighters made are pretty much all featured in some way.

There is definitely some ignoring hard questions but less than you'd expect in a self funded series, particularly in newer episodes. If anything this series has made me like Alistair for being such a giant douchebag.

Watching the Reem taking his elderly white mother (who I am pretty sure was on the golden girls) to get checked for breast cancer is as great as reality mma tv gets.

turntabler fucked around with this message at 03:11 on Jul 12, 2016

# ? Jul 12, 2016 03:01

team overhead smash: Sep 2, 2006; Team-Forest-Tree-Dog:
Smashing your way into our hearts one skylight at a time

fatherdog posted:

Only Mark Hunt and/or his coaches really know what his plan was, but it looked to me like the idea was to slowly move forward without throwing strikes with the idea that either Brock would get backed into the cage where Hunt could unload, or he'd have to shoot while Mark had both hands ready to clip him with something. Which is more or less what Brock did, but it turns out that he's still impossibly fast for a guy his size so Mark didn't manage to hit him with anything cleanly enough off the shots.

What shots thought? From what I can see although Brock sometimes managed to counter a swing by going under it with the takedown (basically the reverse of what we're assuming Hunt was trying), when this didn't happen and Brock tried to take when Mark had his hands ready Mark didn't even try to counter punch and dropped them to defend against the takedown. He "didn't manage to hit him with anything cleanly enough off the shots" because there were no shots in terms of counter punches to takedowns.

Also if he wanted to back Brock into the cage, wouldn't he have needed more movement and aggression? That slow forward pace might walk Brock down a bit and wear him down as he circles around and covers more distance, but it obviously didn't work in terms of pressing Brock against the cage and as long as Brock was able to walk slightly faster in a circular direction I can't see how it was meant to. Hunt's meant to be a geek, surely he's aware of circle strafing.

Edited after rechecking a couple of bits.

team overhead smash fucked around with this message at 03:20 on Jul 12, 2016

# ? Jul 12, 2016 03:11

TheUltimateDoofus: May 21, 2016

Tito Ortiz has mouth dyslexia but that didn't stop him from being on the Affliction MMA commentary team. unfortunately, the highlight video from that isn't online anymore. BUT the other infamous case of his disastrous public speaking, the press conference that spawned :ortiz:

is up, hopefully forever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnrI1l6qvO4

# ? Jul 12, 2016 03:19

CommonShore: Jun 6, 2014; A true renaissance man

team overhead smash posted:

What shots thought? From what I can see although Brock sometimes managed to counter a swing by going under it with the takedown (basically the reverse of what we're assuming Hunt was trying), when this didn't happen and Brock tried to take when Mark had his hands ready Mark didn't even try to counter punch and dropped them to defend against the takedown. He "didn't manage to hit him with anything cleanly enough off the shots" because there were no shots in terms of counter punches to takedowns.

Also if he wanted to back Brock into the cage, wouldn't he have needed more movement and aggression? That slow forward pace might walk Brock down a bit and wear him down as he circles around and covers more distance, but it obviously didn't work in terms of pressing Brock against the cage and as long as Brock was able to walk slightly faster in a circular direction I can't see how it was meant to. Hunt's meant to be a geek, surely he's aware of circle strafing.

Edited after rechecking a couple of bits.

In short, it's a distance and timing game, and Hunt had the shorter reach by a wide margin.

When a fighter is out-reached, he has two options

1) Leap in, guns a-blazing, relying on head movement to stay alive
2) Wait for the opponent to commit to some kind of forward movement.

The problem with #1 in MMA is that it leaves the attacker open to a reactive double-leg takedown, which Brock absolutely, positively wanted: Hunt couldn't provide too much forward movement because then his feet would likely be out of position for a good counter when Brock's inevitable shot would come.

So Hunt was waiting either for Brock to shoot and provide a counter, or for Brock to make a range error, probably (as Fatherdog said) by incrementally moving Brock close to the cage.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 04:21

Ty1990: Apr 22, 2011

Someone make an effort post about mobn

# ? Jul 12, 2016 05:52

Chris James 2: Aug 9, 2012

I'd say someone should make an effortpost about the glorious clusterfuck that is the heavyweight division and its history but that could honestly be its own thread

# ? Jul 12, 2016 05:54

Memento: Aug 25, 2009; Bleak Gremlin

Chris James 2 posted:

I'd say someone should make an effortpost about the glorious clusterfuck that is the heavyweight division and its history but that could honestly be its own thread

There was one! I distinctly remember someone made a thread called The Ballad of the Trashweights or something similar. I've tried a couple of times to find it to no avail, but it would be perfect to be linked in here.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 06:08

Looten Plunder: Jul 11, 2006; Grimey Drawer

Ty1990 posted:

Someone make an effort post about mobn

Agreed. Those wedding photos were Top 5 on the "Hardest I've Ever Laughed" list of things of seen on SA.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 06:17

Bundt Cake: Aug 17, 2003; ;(

BlindSite posted:

Lay n pray is what hendricks did at the end of the lawler fight. Tito sold out for takedowns but he was actually active passing and striking.

no he wasnt

# ? Jul 12, 2016 06:28

Bundt Cake: Aug 17, 2003; ;(

Remember how many years Joe Rogan would say Tito Ortiz is ONe of the few guys who can do a lot of damage from inside someone's guard? that always lacked evidence

# ? Jul 12, 2016 06:31

CarlCX: Dec 14, 2003

Memento posted:

There was one! I distinctly remember someone made a thread called The Ballad of the Trashweights or something similar. I've tried a couple of times to find it to no avail, but it would be perfect to be linked in here.

Yeah, I did that forever ago, think you need archives to get to it: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3529080

# ? Jul 12, 2016 06:36

STING 64: Oct 20, 2006

CarlCX posted:

Yeah, I did that forever ago, think you need archives to get to it: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3529080

could you do one for Light Heavyweight soon? That was such a good thread to read.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 07:06

Memento: Aug 25, 2009; Bleak Gremlin

CarlCX posted:

Yeah, I did that forever ago, think you need archives to get to it: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3529080

That's it, thanks a whole bunch for putting that together.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 07:31

VagueRant: May 24, 2012

Stealth Tiger posted:

I'd argue that Daniel Cormier did settle his score with Jon Jones. I think most fans are going to assume Bones was on drugs the whole time and was too much of a pussy to fight DC mano a mano.

I strongly feel that DC is a roider/doper too. I think if he was clean, he would've verbally HAMMERED Jones for this. But between his complete silence on the matter and his immediate desire to fight him anyway really had me wondering.

Dude still seems like a nice guy and I respect that he agreed to fight anyone and everyone, but yeah. Like Nate says.

# ? Jul 12, 2016 09:18

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# ? Apr 19, 2024 13:50

Marching Powder: Mar 8, 2008; stop the fucking fight, cornerman, your dude is fucking done and is about to be killed.

Thanks Bluedeanie for reminding me that I want to see TJ / Dodson 2 so bad

# ? Jul 12, 2016 09:30

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Sports Argument Stadium > The Hammer House: Stinger Splash Zone > UFC 200 Aftermath/FAQ for Newbies: Welcome to MMA, Please Mind the Mess

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