Realizing the hull of Tito Ortiz's skull could not be damaged Brazilian Sumo Wrestler Machido adapts

It was definitely a solid, if not great win. Tito wasn't among the very elite anymore but he was good enough to beat Forrest Griffin and draw with Rashad Evans prior to this; he also had beaten Vitor, Cote and Ken Shamrock in a nice 5 win streak before Chuck beat him in their second fight.

More importantly, though, it was how Machida won this fight. It's been a while since i've seen it, but I think he only got hit a handful of times and never cleanly. He used beautiful lateral movement and had Tito following him into every left hand counter. He did a beautiful job with his kicking game, too. I remember him using a question mark kick to Tito's head, as well as that beautiful lead leg kick then instantaneously switching to a right head kick combo.

This was Machida at his prime and he was a formidable fighter, if somewhat one dimensional. I think he just ran into a bad match up with Shogun's leg kick heavy muay thai style and got robbed a few times with Rampage and Phil Davis. Still, he was a damn good fighter at his best and had a very unique style. I love those sniper karate/kick boxing (like Cro cop and Stephen Thompson) kind of fighters with very low output but then lulls guys to sleep and takes them out with a single perfectly timed head kick or counter punch.

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^ Great summary above. Tito's name value exceeded his abilities at the time of this fight and he was in the middle of a major slump.

The post-fight press conference for this fight had some all time great unintentional comedy with Tito and Dana throwing shade back and forth at each other. It's easy to forget how much they hated each. Every time Tito opened he mouth you could see Dana smouldering at the podium.

 

It was Tito's fear of Lyoto's devastating sumo that allowed him to land that painfully painful knee to the soft belly of Tito