What fights have you watched today?

My thought is, up until 2005 he was alright. He's lost 3 early fights when he was young and then the two elimination fights to two of the greatest LHW fighters in history. After losing to Rua he moved up to HW against Kharitonov, he should have stayed at HW at that point for me.

The Rogerio and Rua rematches plus the fight with Arona didn't help his career at all.

After the second loss to Rua he's 24-10, returns to HW and goes on an absolute tear.

Let's say when he makes the first fight with Sergey, he stays there I think his career progresses at a better rate. He probably gets a rubber with Sergey and a title shot when every man and his dog pulled out of the Fedor fight in 2006.

I get the first half of his career. He gets battered against Hoffman at HW and loses to close fights at LHW, no issues there. The Rogerio loss is close and competitive and the losses to Lidell and Rua are because they're legit better than him.

But when he has a successful fight at HW he has no need to return back down again and I still think the stats back me up there.

 

UFC 63

A very lacklustre card, maybe the worst I've seen so far in MMA, might be worse but I can't remember from top of my head.

However it was saved by an epic main event which saw two of the greatest MMA fighters of all time in a rematch.

The first round was pretty close but Penn had the better aggression and better defence.

Second round I couldn't believe Penn didn't finish him. He had a triangle and an arm bar at the same time with 22 seconds to do but Hughes held on.

Third round Hughes finally passed guard, gets a crucifix and forces the stoppage.

Hughes, with this victory becomes the best MMA fighter I have ever watched (September 2006 at this point)

 

Pride 32

Lawler wins by flying knee but he can't decide whether he's a MW or a WW right now.

Henderson put in a career best performance dominating Belfort on the mat and in striking above his natural weight. Given the bromance between Silva and Rua this effectively make Hendo the number 1 contender at LHW. Wandy must have been hoping for a chance to avenge the loss to Belfort especially given he's already dominated Hendo once.

Barnett proves why he's one of the most dangerous men in the planet tonight. He is battered from pillar to post by Nastula and is also out grappled. Nastula gets him in side control and during a transition Barnett grabs his ankle and gets in a toe hold and it's over. What a comeback.

Rua shows there's more to his game than striking as he out grappled Randleman and locks in a knee bar which he holds for over 2 minutes before Kev finally taps.

One of the most underrated HW fighters imo is Coleman. So much is made of his losses but when you look at the context of them we have his first two losses to Smith and Williams where his cardio let him down. He showed a huge improvement in the Rizzo fight which really should have gone his way. It wasn't a robbery but I think the wrong man for the W. Either way, that Coleman who can fight hard for the duration would beat both Smith and Williams. The Takada loss is a farce and everyone knows it.

So really once he's improved his cardio the only men who could beat him where Fedor, Nog and Cro Cop. He's a tremendous wrestler with a very determined gameplan, he took down Fedor which is no mean feat. A lot of times I here people say his style is outdated, but then Lesnar comes along with the exact same style and dominated UFC till Cain got to him. If we look at today and take the best version of Coleman (Pride GP) would he beat Miocic? Probably not as he would sprawl and brawl like Cro Cop did. I could see him beating Reem is he can shoot quick enough, Werdum catches him in something but then who else do we have? A shot JDS? A rejuvenated but old Hunt, a potentially returning Velasquez. Coleman has a shot against all of these men imo. Too often people down talk these early champions saying the sport has moved on, but for me there's nothing Brock brings to the table that Coleman doesn't. And even today Coleman would comfortably be top 5 imo.

In this fight tonight he does take down Fedor eventually and lays on the Ground&Pound but as he senses victory Fedor shows just how great he is and lands an arm bar from open guard.

Very good card. It was fought in UFC rules as it was in America and also pretty much every man and his dog failed the PED testing which says a lot about Pride and what it's like over in Japan.

 

Cheers man! Surprised they havent stickied it tbh

 

Pride Bushido 13

This is a very stacked card talent wise.

We have great fighters like Aoki and Gomi on the undercard both emerging victorious. Gomi actually avenges a defeat with his victory and I think at this point, for me, Penn and Gomi are quite clearly the 1 and 2 LW fighters in history.

Aoki looked brilliant and we all know I love the Jits stylists and he will go on to win some great fights but right now he isn't there.

Mousasi wins his reserve fight against Lombard. Amazing to think how highly this man will be recognised in 11 years time.

In the MW bracket we have Filho dominating Misaki but then pulling out of the final which Misaki goes on to win.

You probably have to say at this point Filho is the best MW in Pride. Well no probably about it, he was the best in the tournament. Now I know Filho had a lot of hype about him, but I personally can't see ranking him above Franklin of Silva (who's just beaten Franklin). Better than Henderson? On merit at this point I'll say yes he was.

 

UFC 64 and 65

Sherk establishes himself as LW champ of the UFC, but there's no way he's as good as Penn or Gomi so can't really rank him above them. He does have a very nice looking record but with him not facing the likes of Ribeiro, Kawajiri, Hansen it's hard ranking him. He looks brilliant though so there's an argument putting him above those 3.

Silva by this points has loads of hype about him.he was tapped by Takase and Chonan but that was in 2004 and he's improved his ground game a lot since then. He came to UFC and destroyed the number one contender and tonight he destroyed the greatest MW ever. Brutal efficiency and the best use of the MT guard since Silva.

Nick Diaz beats another WW contender as he starts building a decent resume.

Silvia shuts out Monson and this is important as it shows he's learnt from the Mir loss and worked in his ground game. At this point now Silvia is worthy of some hype as he's held the belt twice, destroyed the contenders UFC have thrown at him and some matchups with the impending Pride purchase can be considered.

GSP becomes the greatest fighter to date by dominating and beating up Hughes avenging his only defeat. What a performance.

 

Shockwave 2006.

Aoki finally gets his big win in dominating and tapping Hansen.

On the same card Melendez beats Kawajiri.

The LW division is hotting up now.

For me the ATG LAW rankings as of tonight are

Penn
Gomi
Sherk
Melendez
Aoki
Kawajiri

6 fighters who look like greats so far. Obviously Pulev and Uno looked like they would be great but their careers didn't quite pan out that way.

Elsewhere in Shockwave Gomi and Rua pick up routine victories.

Big Nog defeats Burnett to establish his position as the 2nd best HW in history.

In the main event Fedor comes very close to losing to Hunt. If Hunt had a better ground game he'd have tapped Fedor. Twice he had the figure lock ready for the Americana but he didn't torque the right way. I was screaming at him to finish the sub. I prefer the Americana to the Kimura as it's easier to finish imo because the leverage is more natural. But Hunt obvs doesn't know BJJ too well. Even when Fedor gets out of side, he gives Hunt his back but Hunt steps off him. Shocking ground work by Mark here tbh. Fedor gets him in side and shows how to finish an arm lock. But even here Hunt still shows his inexperience on the mat, Fedor gets the figure 4 in(reversed hands to Hunt) now realistically you can only finish the Kimura behind the back, depending on pain threshold, so what does Hunt do? Bridges up so Fedor can finish it.

Big win for Fedor but Hunt on that display looks like he'll lose to any half decent submission fighter.

 

These are my ATG rankings as of December 2006 btw

1 George St Pierre
2 Matt Hughes
3 Fedor Emelianenko
4 Kazushi Sakuraba
5 Rodrigo Nogueira
6 B.J. Penn
7 Wanderlei Silva
8 Chuck Lidell
9 Mauricio Rua
10 Takanori Gomi
11 Anderson Silva
12 Rich Franklin
13 Mirko Filipovic
14 Quinton Jackson
15 Josh Barnett
16 Randy Couture
17 Tito Ortiz
18 Paulo Filho
19 Dan Henderson
20 Ricardo Arona
21 Frank Shamrock
22 Royce Gacie
23 Mark Coleman
24 Renzo Gracie
25 Carlos Newton
26 Sean Sherk
27 Rogerio Nogueira
28 Fabricio Werdum
29 Pat Miletich
30 Tim Sylvia
31 Ken Shamrock
32 Jake Shields
33 Gilbert Melendez
34 Alistair Overeem
35 Vitor Belfort
36 Hayato Sakurai
37 Shinya Aoki
38 Lyoto Machida
39 Tatsuya Kawajiri
40 Urijah Faber
41 Evan Tanner
42 Cole Escovedo
43 Eddie Wineland

 

UFC 66.

Some decent fights on this card.

Bisping makes his UFC debut (PPV) with a very impressive first round stoppage. Crazy to think he's here 11 years ago making his big fight debut and today he's a champ.

Forrest Griffin has a heart breaking loss to Jardine. Griffin has one of the best personalities I've seen so far, he is a proper blue collar working class fighter. Doesn't claim to be the best, just says he works the hardest. Tonight he got smashed with a big uppercut hook combo and ultimately got took down and pounded.

The main event was obviously Lidell Vs Ortiz 2. This was a great war and probably the best we'll ever see of these two. Lidell dominated the first, Ortiz took him down to take the second. In the third Ortiz looked brilliant until he went for a hard low kick, Lidell checked it and hurt him which threw Ortiz off his game and he got caught in an exchange which he came off worst and we saw him dropped and finished.

As a side note Rampage Jackson has been signed by the UFC. Bearing in mind Jackson is the only man who can claim to be the master of Lidell at this point. Resume wise he has an excellent resume. He lost a HW fight early in his career. Lost to Sakuraba when he was at his best. Lost to Silva and Rua who are two of the best ever.

To compliment that he has wins over Lindland, Arona, Lidell, Bustamante, Randleman, Vovanchyn and Ninja Rua. He's also about to avenge his loss to Hoffman.

So Rampage is the best of the rest in Pride. A level below Silva and Rua but better than everyone else. Lidell is the best of the UFC and talked about as good as the two pride champs. This is an epic fight in the making. If Lidell wins this he can probably claim to be the greatest LHW of all time. If he loses this suddenly you have to wonder whether he was ever the best LHW in the world.

We're almost at the point where UFC become the biggest promotion in MMA, it's December 2006 and Pride only has one notable event left (33). Over the next couple of years we'll see Strikeforce and WEC bought out as well. We'll see UFC sign everyone apart from Fedor.

At this point two things happen, one is UFC eliminate all their rivals one by one and the other is we begin to see UFC events featuring none title fights and some woeful cards.

I own the first 70 UFC events, after UFC 70 I won't be watching every card, I'm gonna start watching the best of series and the odd fight from Strikeforce, WEC and any UFC fights left off the DVD's.

 

I have all the DVD's now lol

 

UFC 67.

Quite a stacked card this. Machida and Edgar made their debuts in the octagon.

Machida dominated his opponent with an excellent standing game.

Edgar won a very competitive fight. The knee bar at the end of the third came so close to ending stuff. I've been in kneebars myself and I hate them. No idea how anyone can take that pain for 37 seconds.

Rampage made his debut as well avenging a previous defeat he suffered at the start of his career. The only losses hanging over him now are Sakuraba, Rua and Silva, a fight against Chuck is inevitable.

Silva was in the main event. At times it's easy to forget how good his ground game actually was. Yes he lost two early fights by submission, but in response to that he trained his ground game and gained a black belt in BJJ. He dominated lutter. There was a point when Lutter got full mount but couldn't really pound effectively so he went for an arm bar, got reversed and next time he was in the guard he got caught in a triangle.

Excellent showing by Silva.

 

Pride 33

The last meaningful pride event, a bit sad saying that as there's been some terrific fights throughout pride history and I do prefer their scoring of a fight rather than rounds.

Rogerio suffers a damaging loss to journeyman Sokoudjo in under a round.

Sakurai is fighting at the actual WW limit, it just isn't recognised in Pride but he's as good a WW as they have in there. A way off the talent in UFC for my money though.

Rua crushes Reem again. There was talk of Rua and Silva finally fighting but with the Pride collapse and the result of the main event it looks like we won't ever see it now. A bit like the Klitschko situation we've had a number 1 and 2 for 2 years now refusing to fight each other out of friendship. With the decline of Silva and it is noticeable compared to his earlier days you'd have to favour Rua now.

Nick Diaz scores a great victory over Gomi. This has been debated on the other thread but for me it is a great victory, he boiled down to LW and beat up the best in Pride. The fight started well for Gomi but Diaz overwhelmed him and tapped him. Great victory.

Henderson Vs Silva was the rematch. Henderson is on the form of his life now and barring bad loss to Rogerio, he's arguably beaten everyone he's fought so far. He looks incredible here, so much stronger than Silva and the finish itself was brutal as he outstruck him in the third round.

And that's that for Pride. What a ride it's been.