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MMA/UFC thread

Kinda the same. I dont see how anyone could beat JJ in lhvw or hvw. He is in a very confortable spot. He can easily outwrestle all the strikers and outstrike all the wrestlers that could potentially give him a run for his money. Basically he can dictate where the fight takes place, pretty much at will.
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I mean, someoine like Ngannou probably had a shot but he's off the table now. Stipe? Could be, but i do not see it. I always have this feeling that Jon Jones is a bit like Salvador Sanchez in boxing. The kind of fighter that faces a 5, beats him performing like a 6 etc. You watch the fight and think ' he's not that good, XYZ could probably take him'. But then you see him face a 10 and see how he puts on an 11 (!) performance and realize he is just regulating his effort, so to speak. The level of the opponent he faces determines, way more than for others, what he does.

That's one of the things i kinda 'hate' about some of my favourite fighters, namely GSP, Khabib and JJ. It's as if we'll never be able to see their true peak because in order to do so you would need to see them fail. Friend of mine did some amateur rally back in the day. He told me something i'll never forget: ' in some curves order to know how fast i can take a curve i need to be willing to pass that limit and that means crashing the car at least once. In order to know the limit i need to cross the limit first (in training/under controller circumstances, whatever). Otherwise i would never know. I could guess, but i wouldnt know. Passing the limit and failing is precisely what determines the limit'. Not always, but i thought the argument had a lot of merit in many situations.
kinda the same principle applies here.

All of them (AV, GSP, JJ) dominated their weightclass but could have jumped up categories. And did not. Let me repeat that. They could have done that and chose not to. At their peak, they chose not to.
They wanted their legacy things. Please dont mention Bisping and GSP. Please, dont.

You couldnt say the same about, dunno, Volk, Anderson Silva, BJ Penn or Fedor (Fedor was already at hw, but he never showed any signs of having issues facing bigger/heavier opponents). These guys looked for challanges that seemed somewhat ridiculous and they faced them head on.
They all faced defeat, went back to the drawing board and came back. They were not afraid to lose, they took chances. I have to give them credit for that.

Basically the difference between the first group and the second group is the question 'what could have been'. The ones in the second group made a geniune and sincere effort, AT THEIR PEAKS, to answer that question. GSP could have tried to face Anderson. Khabib could have tried to face Usman. Jones could have gone after dos Santos or Velasquez.
They didnt. Not saying there is anythign wrong with their legacy. The problem is the guys in the second list actually tried to do that. If there is some worth in that then they deserve credit.

I always wondered why journos never cornered them with that question. When a fighter says 'who is gonna beat me? I've cleared the division' reply, quickly and loudly 'if you are that dominant and want a challenge move up a weight class'. Pound that until it hurts. Relentlessly.
And again, there are precedents. Tons. And it's not as if i am asking mighty mouse to fight Ngannou. One weightclass champ to move up on division, ffs.
Just picture it for a second, the fights: usman vs khabib, gsp vs anderson, etc. Could have been the best fights ever. That's why, in my book, going for the starts like Anderson or AV has to be credited, even when they fail.

And again, Khabib and GSP are arguably two of my fav fighters ever, but people like anderson and alex have this, which they don't. It'd be disingenuous for me to say otherwise

Not sure where would i put Islam in this respect. Part of me wants to put him in the second group but he needs to move up a weight class to earn that. At least in my book.
 
Did you see gaethje vs fiziev? Bloody hell, what a fight. I really, really wanna see Fiziev vs volkanovski now.




 
Yeah, absolutely nuts!
First round I thought Fiziev was going to swamp him, the speed difference was crazy, but Gaethje eventually started intelligently brawling rather than just brawling brawling and turned Fizievs face into mincemeat
 
This is really going to tank the UFCs already shaky legitimacy as a sport
Gonna see WWE actors calling out UFC fighters and vice versa, cross promoted shows etc.

Endeavour are massively greedy and massively miserly, too - WWE salaries and benefits are going to go down the toilet
 
The writing was on the wall.... I mean, when Dana spends considerable time promoting a slapping competition...
 
Wow, Israel Adesanya created one of the most memorable momments in the sport.
That was some crazy ****, I cant stop watching it. We have seen fighters act hurt before and its always a joke and never actually amounts to anything.
backing against the cage and drawing him in by shelling up and then brutally kocking Pereira out cold when he is in perfect range and not defending... Completely insane.
 
Zuck would toy with him tbh,
He's been doing BJJ for years and has very good MMA coaches and genuinely loves the sport, there's a video of him hitting pads with a UFC fighter (can't remember who) and he looked not half bad (obviously not pro standard but considering he's a 40yr old tech nerd)
 
I hate to say this, but i feel i have to: volkanovski is the greatest of all time. Period. Already. Accolades are already there and this latest thing is priceless imo.

Never dodged anyone, fought whoever was placed in front of him, and won. Again and again. Fought the best and won. But they doubted him, so he fought again. And won again. People still doubted him so he fought yet again even though he had objectively nothing to win and everything to lose. He won. Clearly, convincingly and definitively. Then when he literally destroyed all the competition available in his division and after dodging NO-ONE, he did what logic dictates: he went hunting elsewhere. He moved up a cat and he went straight for the top. He saw the division, identified the bully and said "mind if i have a go at that?". He wasn't just the shorter and smaller fighter; style-wise, on paper, it was a terrible fight for him. He lost by a whisker. He wants an immediate rematch but he doesnt get it.
They call him 2 weeks before the event and he doesn't even blink.

Many, MANY say 'anyone, anyplace'. This guy actually means it. Sure, there are others, but i cant think of a single one that has that attitude, a belt and that W/L record. He doesn't trash talk, he doesn't back down and he comes across as a nice guy (irrelevant in terms of fihting, i know).
Best, ever.
 
Completely agree, I absolutely love Volk

Didn't at first, because he kept clobbering my favourite fighters, but I very much grew to appreciate him 😅
 
Sheeeesh, Poatan has insane power - his left hook was a bit of meme when came across from kickboxing because he was just murking everyone with it but that was a clean strike, didn't land clean, and one shot KOd Hill, you could see on the replay he was out on the way down


Incredible card, Aljo's fight the only stinker, but you know what you get when he fights so it's whatever
 
Very entertaining fights but i dont get Gaethje. He has no plan B. I get his plan A: He can use his wrestling to avoid takedowns and can outstrike most (if not all) the guys with grappling backgrounds. The problem is that that is too one-dimensional and predictable. When he faces someone who can outstrike him why not try to take the fight to the ground or something? I get the 'you don't need many tools when you ones you have are powerful' Think Khabib. But the difference is Khabib's style gets to dictate the tempo of the fight, Gaethje's doesn't. Khabib's takedowns created such a threat that made it very difficult for others to feel comfortable exchanging blows. Gaethje doesn't bring that to the table.
Kinda of a shame because the guy is amazing. He goes all in every time all the time, but i guess that is not enough.
I wish Holloway could have fought Connor again at some point. Now it's too late.

Biggest winner imo, Makhachev. He now gets Poirier and/or Holloway. He'll run over both of them. He could probably do so on the same card. I don't see any of them knocking him out cold, which is what they'd need to win, nor being able to stop Makhachev from taking them down, which is what they'd need to avoid losing.
Tsarukyan after that? He's good, but I don't think he is Makhachev good.
I want him to demolish the division and go up.

Looking forward I just wanna see Rakhmonov, Khamzat and Bo face each other.
 
Apparently Gaethje said he doesn't wrestle because it tires him out, he's looked straight up amateurish on the ground in BJJ terms before - I don't know much about wrestling but I've seen people say his collegiate style isn't one that would translate to MMA well,

He's basically an early-days-of-the-UFC sprawl and brawler, just uses his wrestling to stay on the feet

What did surprise me with Gaethje was he didn't look like the composed killer we've seen the previous few fights, and didn't look like the balls to the wall brawler of his earlier career - though maybe that was the speed and accuracy of Max throwing him off
 
I wish Holloway could have fought Connor again at some point. Now it's too late.
I also thought about it! Maybe a stupid question but why it's too late now?
 
Tbh I think it's more likely now
If Conor beats Chandler I could see them doing Holloway vs Conor at 155 - no way Conor makes 145 these days, 155 will probably be a push tbh

That said the Chandler fight isn't a walkover for Conor, and if he loses who knows - he'll probably go box Jake Paul in Saudi Arabia

I'm guessing the "too late" refers to prime vs prime - Conor looks to be on a significant downward slump. Age, injury and substance abuse, he looks haggard these days
 

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