Verbal Submission: UFC 128 Review

Time to recap UFC 128

 

Music to listen to:  Muerte Inoxia by De Facto

When UFC 94 took place in Janaury 1, 2009, I was at a viewing party in Nashville, Tenn. waiting to see the second fight between B.J. Penn and Georges St. Pierre.

One of the other fights on the main card was between UFC veteran Stephan Bonner and a newcomer to MMA named Jon Jones.  None of us really knew much about him accept for the fact that he has a large frame for a light heavyweight and had the look of a wrestler.

After Jones dominated Bonner for three rounds showing strong throws, I declared that he would be a UFC champion in three years or at least be a contender for the title.

I was off by a year…Jones is the UFC light heavyweight champion right now in 2011.

His dominating performance in earning the title from Shogun Rua last night has been a culmination of a movement in MMA towards well rounded fighters who have the ability to fight in multiple forms.

Look at the current UFC champions.  Frankie Edgar came into MMA as a wrestler but now has been the better standup fighter in his last three fights.  Georges St. Pierre has gone from a novice wrestler and ground practicioner to arguably being the best in the world in those techniques.  I remember seeing Anderson Silva having an average standup game and now can win fights against elite competition with just strikes.  Cain Velasquez has learned boxing in only a few years and outside of Alistar Overeem, is the top striker in the heavyweight division.

Which finally brings us to Jones.

What we saw in the Bonner fight was just the start of the evolution.

As I stated in my preview of UFC 128 on Friday, each of Jones fights brings another point of improvement to his fighting.

Against Rua, I was impressed with his attacking of the body, especially with the knees.  This may not have looked overwhelming to many who allow their interpretation of an excellent striker to be swayed easily by wild punches to the head, but for a seasoned fight viewer, this was exemplary to see.

Furthermore, you saw interesting actions by Jones.

I don’t recommend starting your fight with a flying knee but I believe that it threw Rua off and at least gave him something to think about during the fight.

The spinning elbow was also nice, but we’ve seen that by Jones.  However, that shouldn’t take anything away from the move.

I was happy to see Jones patience, particularly in the second round.  It would have been easy for Jones to use up his energy going in for the kill in an ill-advised attempt to end the fight early.

Honestly, I thought that scenereo was going to happen.

I picked Rua to win by decision because I thought Jones would get excited early in the fight, win the first round or two, get tired and than Rua would grind out the victory.

However, Jones paced himself and was finally able to earn the TKO victory in the third round.

Other thoughts:

-Rashad Evans is not coming off well.  This hasn’t been the best month of Evans’ professional career.

First, he suffers an injury preparing to fight Rua for the title and has to pull out of the fight.  Than his “teammate” Jones comes in and earns the victory.

To make matters worse, Evans vowed to anyone that would listen that he won’t fight against Jones only to be forced to do it.  Now he goes to the media and says that he’s done with Greg Jackson, the trainer that took him from an average fighter to a world champion.

When Evans came into the ring after the Jones fight, he was greeted with disapproval from the fans in attendance and that’s the most important judges of all.

We all know that Evans and Jones train together and share a friendship.  However, Evans’ disrespectful to the two biggest aspects of MMA had fans and the top officials in the UFC disappointed in him.

First, mixed martial arts is about competition.  We all want to see who the best fighter is in the world.  The only way that you’re going to see that is if the top fighters in the world face each other.  Fighters should want to compete against the best to see if their skills are at the highest level possible.  The best way to do this is to fight the person who owns the championship in your division.  Evans’ not wanting to participate in this reality has been a negative.  You don’t have to hate your opponent but

Second, mixed martial arts is a business.  You fight to win and earn benefits.  Those benefits may be pride, respect, money, etc.  All MMA fighters have a family to provide for, whether its a wife, husband, children, parents, siblings, friends, even themselves.  The fight with Jones will not only give Evans a chance to be a world champion, it will allow you to take further steps towards being a better provider.

When you add all of this together, Evans doesn’t come off well.

-I’m interested in the second chapter of Urijah Faber’s MMA career as a bantamweight.

The weight class fits him better and the UFC has another super fight on its hands when Faber eventually fights Dominick Cruz for the UFC title.

-Seeing Cro Cop lose was sad.

And those are my thoughts.  I’m going to do a post about Pride tomorrow b/c with the natural disaster taking place in Japan as well and Shogun and Cro Cop losing, it made me think about the fight promotion.

Those are my thoughts.  What are yours?