Free MMA is Great MMA!

Let me start off by welcoming everyone to my MMA Addict blog! I hope you get some sort of entertainment for this whether it be that you’re an MMA fan like me and want to see another person’s point of view on the sport or your just bored at work sitting at your desk and trying to kill some time…whatever the case may be I appreciate that your taking the time to read my blog and I hope you enjoy it!

I choose to title this post as “Free MMA is great MMA!” because I thought I’d share some thoughts with my fellow MMA fanatics. First off let me say that the recent WEC 41 event with the main event of Mike Brown & Urijah Faber for the WEC featherweight title and the most recent Ultimate Fighter finale with the main event of Diego Sanchez & Clay Guida were both amazing!! Couldn’t ask for a better night of fights, you know what else made them better?? They were F-R-E-E!! It seems like we have 2 or three MMA pay per views a month and it’s nice when they throw us a bone and give us a quality, free MMA event. I don’t know about you but the way things are right now with us being in an economic crisis, it’s hard for me to shell out $50.00 every month for a pay per view! Most of the time I’m forced to go to a local sports bar and watch it with a bunch of drunk wanna be fighters, who spend the whole night talking about how they can kick this fighter’s ass or that fighter’s ass all while I stare at their enormous beer belly! However that is a topic for another post.

Lets start off with the WEC event, the main fight was good…I think it may have been better if Urijah hadn’t broken his hand. I think the California Kid could have pushed the pace a little more if he hadn’t busted his hand. However! I don’t think that should be an excuse for not winning the fight, broken hands are a really common injury in MMA. At the Strikeforce event on Showtime on June 6th there was a matchup between “The New York Badass” Phil Baroni & Joe “Diesel” Riggs. Joe Riggs ended up winning the fight by decision but broke both of his hands during the contest and had the flu!! Riggs definitely earned some respect from me that night, I always knew he was tough but damn!! As far as Urijah goes, he did land some very effective elbows but without the use of his hand seemed to be lost. Urijah was like greased lightning, much, much faster than Brown and Urijah and the end of round five took Brown down and had him locked up tight in a guillotine choke but because of his broken hand could not put the required pressure on Brown’s Neck to tap him out. Not taking anything away from Brown, he is a monster in the featherweight division and Urijah really had his hands full because he was just out muscled by Brown…Urijah also had to be careful of Brown’s big right hand! Brown has a sledgehammer for a right hand and has the knockout power…ask Leonard Garcia haha! Brown won a hard fought decision victory but I have a feeling that Urijah will fight his way back to another title shot in the near future. My girlfriend loves Urijah, he definitely gets the award for the most pretty MMA fighter….it seems like every girl is a bandwagon California Kid fan, hopefully he can bounce back and impress his horde of groupies. With Jose Aldo a possibility for next contender for Mike Brown’s title the WEC is getting hot!! Jose Aldo scored a very quick knockout victory that same night with a flying knee to Cub Swanson’s head!! Under a minute in the first round! The flying knee opened up a huge gash on Swanson’s head that might have been one of the nastiest cuts I’ve seen in a MMA fight in awhile!! Swanson’s forehead looked like it was peeled back. A fight between Aldo& Brown for the featherweight belt would be very interesting! It would be a good test for Brown to see what he is made of, especially since he has beaten Leonard Garcia so easily and now Urijah twice! We’ll see if this fight happens until then I’m very much enjoying the WEC and being able to watch it for free, there are so many talented fighters in the WEC and its cool being able to watch them progress and turn into better fighters

Now let me give my thoughts on the Ultimate Fighter, team UK VS team USA finale. This was an incredible fight, I think that the free fight nights on Spike TV are just as good, sometimes better than the pay per views. Hopefully Spike continues to do this but I fear that as the sport becomes more and more popular that there will only be pay per views and no more free fights on television. The first fight of the night was Joe “Daddy” Stevenson & Nate Diaz. This was a hell of a matchup to start off the night! Very fast paced matchup and technical fight. Stevenson put on a wrestling clinic and just over powered Nate Diaz….I thought it was funny watching Nate Diaz try to lock Stevenson up in a triangle choke and Stevenson just posturing up and powering out of everything. I think the key to beating the Diaz brothers is to have a great wrestling game, Nate & Nick Diaz both have trouble when someone is stuffing their ground game down their throats. Joe Stevenson looked really good in this fight, I think training with Greg Jackson is doing him a world of good. He doesn’t try to just stand and bang anymore. Greg Jackson has given him confidence in his ground game, I expect Stevenson to be back in the title hunt before too long….maybe a possible rematch with Diego Sanchez?? That would be interesting!

The next fight was the Ultimate Fighter Lightweight finale between Ross Pearson & Andre Winner. This fight was pretty decent with both guys trading some leather, I believe that it could have been better but both guys have trained together and know each other well…it was a stalemate. It didn’t stop them from landing some vicious strikes! They stayed busy for the most part with Ross Pearson winning by unanimous decision. Look out for Ross Pearson! With some more fights under his belt and some more training, he is going to be dangerous.

Chris Lytle & Kevin Burns was a slugfest!! I really enjoy watching Chris Lytle fight, just because he is one tough, son of a gun! Whether you want to stand up and bang or not, Lytle is going to keep coming at you like the terminator and make you trade shots with him! Lytle has a cast iron chin, Burns connected with a solid shot in the first round that buckled Lytle’s knees but he kept his composure and fought through it. I must say that Lylte definitely wins the award for most ball shots taken in a fight! Wow! I think he got rocked in the jewels like three times! Hurt me just watching! It was totally accidental, Burns didn’t mean it. When your going for those inside leg kicks sometimes you accidentally hit someone in the pills…it happens haha! Chris Lylte wins a war by unanimous decision.

The following fight was the Ultimate Fighter welterweight final between Demarques Johnson & James Wilks. I enjoyed this fight! I’ll have to say that I was rooting for Johnson, just because he is an American boy but Wilks he impressed me with his ability and definitely showed that he has improved! They traded some heavy shots and Wilks was really working Johnson over in the clinch with some nasty knees. Johnson escaped a triangle choke then got caught in a rear naked choke and was submitted in the first round. Two brits win in the ultimate fighter! What’s next?? An all UK fight night or Ultimate Fighter?? I wouldn’t be surprised…those brits love to fight!!

The main event was what everyone was waiting for! I knew this one was going to be ugly…I’ve followed both Clay Guida and Diego Sanchez since they started in the UFC. Both fighters are tremendous athletes and their cardio is off the charts! Both fighters were intense! Guida never standing still jumping around and bouncing like the tazmanian devil that he is. Sanchez entered the cage intense as ever! When he got to the cage, where the cut man applies the Vaseline to their face, he just gave Guida the most crazy death stare I have ever seen. He entered the cage, immediately ran up to Guida and started yelling “Let’s get it on homie!”, “Let’s do this!”. Guida replied with “This is my house!”, Sanchez was so worked up, that when he started yelling again he spit his mouth piece have way across the octagon haha! Even Guida had to laugh at that! The fight started with both Sanchez and Guida charging at each other, letting their fists go in a blur of violence. Sanchez lands a flying knee that bloodies Guida, Sanchez has Guida’s back against the cage and is punishing him with strikes. Guida takes Sanchez down but both fighters stall with no action for 30 or 40 seconds. Sanchez gets back to his feet and they start trading punches again, Guida loses his mouthpiece and the fight is stopped. Upon the restart, Sanchez lands a beautiful kick that connects flush on Guida’s jaw. I thought the fight was over as Guida goes down but Guida gets back to his feet! Guida I swear is superhuman! Round two had Sanchez on his back with Guida landing some strikes but Sanchez appeared to be getting the upper hand with some vicious elbows from the bottom, Sanchez nearly locks on an arm bar but Guida escapes…this fight is getting good! At the start of the third and final round, Guida is bleeding from a cut on the top of his head…no dought from the elbow strikes Sanchez was landing. They counter punch each other for a bit in the beginning of round three, then it goes to the ground. Sanchez tries to score the kimura but Guida breaks free. Sanchez wins this fight by decision but it was very close, I would love to see a rematch some time down the road…I was laughing when Joe Rogan was trying to interview Guida after the fight! Guida has just taken a beating for three rounds and was still jumping up and down…this dude has crazy cardio! I don’t think you can tire him out! I also think you can hit him in the face with a shovel and it wouldn’t knock him out! Guida will be back, had he approached this fight differently I think he could have won.

Like I said these free MMA fights on television are good for the sport, I look forward to many more on Spike or the Versus channel. Maybe the UFC will actually have a regular UFC event on Spike?? As of right now, I’m pumped for UFC 100!! My next post will be my predictions for the UFC 100 fights. Hope you enjoyed my first post as much as I did writing it!!