Author: Steven Rondina

UFC on Fuel 6 Results: Is It Time for Rich Franklin to Retire?

Chael Sonnen has said it in the past. When you are a professional mixed martial artist, your eyes should always be locked on winning the belt. That is a notion Rich Franklin subscribes to, and while he may be 38 years old and six years separated from t…

Chael Sonnen has said it in the past. When you are a professional mixed martial artist, your eyes should always be locked on winning the belt. That is a notion Rich Franklin subscribes to, and while he may be 38 years old and six years separated from the middleweight belt, his goal has always been about getting the UFC gold.

Earlier today, Franklin squared off with former Strikeforce middleweight champion Cung Le and now finds himself impossibly far from that goal.

The UFC’s matchmaking, whether intentional or not, has been a huge thorn in the side of any title aspirations Franklin may have had through the years. Since being pressured by UFC brass to leave behind the middleweight division in 2008, Franklin has been bouncing between weights and between fighting other title contenders and gimmicky opponents. During that stretch, he’s gone 3-3.

His losses, for the most part, come with asterisks next to them. He lost to Dan Henderson in 2009 via split decision in a very close fight. His 2011 bout with Forrest Griffin really should never have happened, given Griffin’s absurd size advantage. Vitor Belfort knocked him out in 2009, but Franklin looked uncharacteristically tentative and was caught with a glancing shot behind the ear, which led to a signature “Belfort Blitz”.

His wins, meanwhile, have all come from him stepping in on varying levels of short notice to fight other veterans, beating Chuck Liddell and twice out-pointing Wanderlei Silva. His bout with Cung Le was in this same niche.

While Franklin has not been fighting amazing opponents, he has shown that he remains a very formidable fighter. His second fight with Wanderlei Silva was a five-round war in which he showed very, very strong cardio for a middleweight (never even mind a 38-year-old middleweight). He has shown amazing heart, gutting out a badly-broken arm against Chuck Liddell en route to a knockout victory.

Cung Le, though, is a world-class kickboxer. He is not a heavy-handed wrestler like Cain Velasquez or Dan Henderson. He is not a “solid striker” like Michael Bisping or Brian Stann. He is not a “knockout artist” like Vitor Belfort.

Cung Le is a world-class kickboxer, and when he identified that Rich Franklin was not moving his head as he kicked, he capitalized with a perfect punch, knocking him out cold.

Now, the loser of the day’s main event is waiting for his plane back to Ohio, still without a winning streak since he beat Matt Hamill and Travis Lutter in 2008. He will be returning to the United States as a mid-tier fighter in a division that is, at this time, more competitive than ever, with its longtime top two fighters (Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen) both otherwise occupied.

Franklin’s next opponent? Unclear. However, there are few other wily 185-lb. veterans that would benefit from fighting him. Established middleweights Vitor Belfort, Yushin Okami, Alan Belcher, Tim Boetsch and Michael Bisping all have fights booked. Jake Shields, who would be a great opponent on paper, is suspended at this time.

Fighting an up-and-comer like Tom Lawlor or Chris Camozzi just plain cannot sound appealing for the man who is the clear-cut No. 2 middleweight of all time, and who has fought the likes of Chuck Liddell, Dan Henderson, Lyoto Machida, Anderson Silva, Wanderlei Silva and Ken Shamrock. So what is Rich Franklin to do?

Unfortunately, the best answer for Franklin is to retire. It pains me to say this, as Franklin is likely in my top five favorite fighters.

The thing is, Franklin has always been a competitor with his eyes set on the top. Tragically for him, at age 38, with one of the longest injury histories imaginable, and in a hyper-competitive division, the summit is unquestionably out of reach at this point.

It would take at least a year-and-a-half for Franklin to return to title contention, and another year for him to actually get on a streak to warrant a title shot. Considering Franklin had just one bout each year in 2010 and 2011, it would be a tall order at this point to fight more than twice in that stretch of time, never mind win against top opponents.

Franklin still has the tools to win fights in the UFC, and is undeniably one of the best the promotion has ever put front and center. He would be favored over most of the promotion’s middleweights and many of its light heavyweights.

The thing is, winning fights has always been a means to the end of being a UFC champion for him. That isn’t going to happen now. Because of that, it’s time for Rich to hang up those brown and pink shorts and know that he is ending his career as one of the greatest to ever enter the Octagon, both as a person and as a fighter.

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Rousey Joins UFC, Strikeforce to Close: Twitter Reactions

News hit last night that Strikeforce’s run was officially going to end in January and that the UFC was already in position to start adding fighters to their roster, including Ronda Rousey and Miesha Tate. Naturally, Twitter reacted in force to this hug…

News hit last night that Strikeforce’s run was officially going to end in January and that the UFC was already in position to start adding fighters to their roster, including Ronda Rousey and Miesha Tate. Naturally, Twitter reacted in force to this huge news.

Dana White gave us his usual Twitter reaction to positive news for the UFC (and negative news for his competition):

Brian Stann was his usual classy self, and wished everyone well:

Cesar Gracie poured a proverbial 40 oz. on Strikeforce’s curb in honor of the time spent there by proteges Gilbert Melendez, Nick Diaz and Jake Shields:

Miesha Tate, unsurprisingly, was quite pleased to still have a job, considering how close women’s MMA came to dying:

Sarah Kaufman congratulated her competition and then gave a polite nudge to Dana White to send her a contract, too:

Kenny Florian was his now-typical journalist self and plugged the news itself, rather than giving a real reaction:

Josh Thomson, one of the lesser-known but still good, lightweights in Strikeforce spent his night tweeting Dana White to ensure he has his chance in the UFC:

MMA veteran but relative UFC newcomer Cristiano Marcello gave a big shout-out to the female fighters:

Cris “Cyborg” Santos stayed quiet but did retweet well-wishers, just to keep some fuel on the fire that is her rivalry with Ronda Rousey:

Lightweight champion Benson Henderson said the likely addition of Strikeforce’s top lightweights had him “fired up”:

Last but not least, we’ll leave you with some Paul Kelly wise-cracking:

Perhaps tellingly, the vast majority of actual Strikeforce fighters have been silent on the subject. The incredibly outspoken Josh Barnett, who is usually one of the first to react to big news, has been on Twitter but has not mentioned the fact that he might already be unemployed.

Other fighters who are typically active on Twitter, such as Luke Rockhold and Tim Kennedy, have been quiet in regard to their long-time promotion closing up.

Keep an eye on Bleacher Report and Twitter for more reactions and news on these developments.

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Miesha Tate Joins Ronda Rousey, Signs with UFC

This just in from Twitter: Miesha Tate, rival of Strikeforce women’s champion Ronda Rousey, will be joining the UFC.
So Stoked to be fighting for the @ufc it’s been a dream of mine for along time! SO happy it’s finally come true:-D
— Miesha Tate …

This just in from Twitter: Miesha Tate, rival of Strikeforce women’s champion Ronda Rousey, will be joining the UFC.

So Stoked to be fighting for the @ufc it’s been a dream of mine for along time! SO happy it’s finally come true:-D

— Miesha Tate (@MieshaTate) November 9, 2012

News broke earlier tonight that the UFC was adding popular female fighter Ronda Rousey, and apparently, she will not be alone.

Tate became the Strikeforce women’s bantamweight champion in 2011 by beating Dutch grappler Marloes Coenen. However, she would hold the belt for just a few months, as Rousey forced Tate to tap by snapping her arm at the elbow.

Tate came back five months later, submitting Julie Kedzie in the third round after a brutal back-and-forth fight.

While news is still breaking about Strikeforce closing its doors, watch the Bleacher/Report MMA section closely to see if more fighters announce that they will be joining the UFC.

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Miesha Tate Joins Ronda Rousey, Signs with UFC

This just in from Twitter: Miesha Tate, rival of Strikeforce women’s champion Ronda Rousey, will be joining the UFC.
So Stoked to be fighting for the @ufc it’s been a dream of mine for along time! SO happy it’s finally come true:-D — Miesha Tate …

This just in from Twitter: Miesha Tate, rival of Strikeforce women’s champion Ronda Rousey, will be joining the UFC.

So Stoked to be fighting for the @ufc it’s been a dream of mine for along time! SO happy it’s finally come true:-D

— Miesha Tate (@MieshaTate) November 9, 2012

News broke earlier tonight that the UFC was adding popular female fighter Ronda Rousey, and apparently, she will not be alone.

Tate became the Strikeforce women’s bantamweight champion in 2011 by beating Dutch grappler Marloes Coenen. However, she would hold the belt for just a few months, as Rousey forced Tate to tap by dislocating her arm at the elbow.

Tate came back five months later, submitting Julie Kedzie in the third round after a brutal back-and-forth fight.

While news is still breaking about Strikeforce closing its doors, watch the Bleacher/Report MMA section closely to see if more fighters announce that they will be joining the UFC.

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Strikeforce Set to Shut Down After January Card

Shortly after news broke that Ronda Rousey would be joining the UFC, a story of perhaps greater importance also came down the wire. MMAFighting.com confirmed that an earlier TMZ.com report was accurate and that Strikeforce, the California-based promoti…

Shortly after news broke that Ronda Rousey would be joining the UFC, a story of perhaps greater importance also came down the wire. MMAFighting.com confirmed that an earlier TMZ.com report was accurate and that Strikeforce, the California-based promotion that has been home to many top mixed martial artists over the years, will be closing its doors in January.

The promotion was bought out by Zuffa LLC, the UFC’s parent company, in March 2011. Zuffa has acquired and disbanded numerous promotions in the past, including the WFA, WEC and Pride FC, which led most fans and journalists to speculate that Strikeforce’s days were numbered.

A complicated deal with premium cable channel Showtime, for better or worse, delayed its liquidation, but with terms set to expire in the next few months, Zuffa is now mobilizing plans to dismantle what, for a time, was one of the biggest promotions in the world.

Strikeforce remains home to many highly-ranked fighters, but was forced to cancel recent events due to injuries to headliners Frank Mir, Luke Rockhold and Gilbert Melendez. The promotion is now planning to have a final hurrah in January with a stacked card featuring three title fights: Gilbert Melendez vs. Pat Healy, Luke Rockhold vs. Lorenz Larkin and Nate Marquardt vs. Tarec Saffiedine. The card will also feature a bout between Heavyweight Grand Prix winner Daniel Cormier and Dutch kickboxer Dion Staring.

After this, the promotion will close its doors. Showtime and Strikeforce officials are refusing to comment at this time.

Keep an eye on Bleacher/Report’s MMA section for more developments as news continues to break.

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Chael Sonnen Is the Most Deserving Contender for Jon Jones, Like It or Not

Dearest MMA fans, you know this to be true. You may not like it. You may not be happy about it. You may prefer alternative choices. This, however, does not change the facts. Chael P. Sonnen (and the “P” stands for “perfection”) …

Dearest MMA fans, you know this to be true. You may not like it. You may not be happy about it. You may prefer alternative choices. This, however, does not change the facts.

Chael P. Sonnen (and the “P” stands for “perfection”) is the most deserving fighter to face Jon Jones.

Again, whether or not you like the fight, and whether or not you like Chael Sonnen, this is irrefutable. In a perfect world, this would not be the case.

However, as you have probably noticed, this world is far from perfect.

This is a world where the UFC has a terribly shallow light heavyweight division. This is a world where Jon Jones handily beat Mauricio Rua, Quinton Jackson, Lyoto Machida and Rashad Evans in a 13-month span. This is a world that fans always claimed they wanted, where their champions fight as frequently as possible against anyone who could reasonably put up a fight.

Is this an unforeseen situation? Is this even new ground for the UFC?

Not at all.

The UFC has been putting circular pegs into square holes when it comes to title fights since its inception. Fights like Erik Koch vs. Jose Aldo, Urijah Faber vs. Dominick Cruz III and Dan Hardy vs. Georges St-Pierre made less sense on paper—and did not even have half the intrigue of Sonnen vs. Jones—but generated essentially no uproar.

Yet here we are, where Sonnen, who should be regarded as the clear-cut No. 2 middleweight in the world, is supposedly undeserving of a title shot.

The problems people have found with this bout are numerous, but are all equally arbitrary.

 

“Oh, this is Chael Sonnen‘s first fight at light heavyweight in five years!”

So?

This makes very, very little difference when you actually sit back and think on it. Sonnen fighting at light heavyweight does not suddenly make him something other than one of the best grapplers in MMA. It does not abate his victories over Nate Marquardt, Brian Stann, Yushin Okami and Michael Bisping.

More importantly, a change in weight class has not stopped fans and writers from declaring Frankie Edgar vs. Jose Aldo a must-see bout. It has not kept Anderson Silva vs. Rashad Evans from being one of the most intriguing matchups available among UFC fighters.

Those, by the way, are bouts that involve fighters dropping weight.

Remember, cutting weight is substantially more trying than adding weight (just keep in mind Jake Shields vs. Martin Kampmann).

Sonnen was a big middleweight at UFC 148. Nine months’ worth of dedicated weight training will make him even bigger.

In all likelihood, he will be more closely-matched in the size department against Jones than Evans or Rua would be.

 

“There were other fighters more deserving of a title shot.”

Like who?

Lyoto Machida?

The “Karate Guy” who is one fight separated from being choked unconscious by Jon Jones? The same one who, let’s be honest, should be 2-4 in his last six fights?

What about Mauricio “Shogun” Rua?

You know, the one who got even more thoroughly dominated by Jones than Machida did? The one who has not had an official winning streak since he beat the “old” versions of Mark Coleman and Chuck Liddell in 2009? The same guy who wheezed and struggled his way over Brandon Vera, who he most avidly stated had no place in the same cage with him?

Dan Henderson, though, totally had a chance, right?

The guy who has wilted after two rounds in every fight since he beat Rousimar Palhares at UFC 88? The same Dan Henderson who earned that title shot after one less-than-clear win over Rua almost a year ago? Who, given that Jones vs. Sonnen is scheduled for late April, would be looking at 16 months between fights?

Phil Davis and Alexander Gustafsson?

Both supremely talented, for sure. But the two have combined for precisely zero wins against top-ten opponents and are the only true prospects in the division. Rushing them into a fight with Jones (and make no mistake, fighting Jones at this point would be rushing it for either one of them) would yield nothing positive for any involved party.

 

“Oh, but Chael Sonnen talked his way into a title shot!”

Nonsense. Utter nonsense.

Sonnen fought his way to being regarded as one of the UFC’s best.

He talked his way into being more famous than the likes of Tim Boetsch, Alan Belcher and Mark Munoz, for sure. That, however, does not take away from his actual skills.

Was Sonnen‘s fan-friendly irreverence a huge factor in why he was offered the fight? No question.

Nevertheless, it is not like other, more worthy opponents were passed over to give Sonnen a chance.

 

“Jon Jones vs. Chael Sonnen is non-competitive.”

I have absolutely no idea where people are getting the idea that this is a viable argument, or that a fighter’s odds are an especially important factor in choosing title contenders. The UFC, for a very long time, has had absolutely dominant champions.

If who is the most likely to beat the champion was the determining factor in picking title contenders, Sonnen would have been booked for an immediate rematch against Anderson Silva after UFC 148, because he had a vastly greater chance at beating Silva than Michael Bisping, Mark Munoz, Vitor Belfort or any other potential contender.

Jones, meanwhile, would be exclusively matched against Rashad Evans for the foreseeable future.

On top of all that, no other light heavyweight but Sonnen—short of Machida and Evans—has a better chance of beating Jones. He has almost all of the wrestling skills of Evans, but none of the fear that marred the UFC 145 main event. There are few fighters that have Sonnen‘s quickness while shooting for a takedown, and that neutralizes a great deal of Jones’ reach-focused striking game.

This is not to say that Sonnen should be favored against Jones, by any means.

It’s just that this fight is not as lopsided as many seem to believe. The same cannot be said for Jones vs. Henderson, Jones vs. Davis or Jones vs. Gustafsson.

 

“Jones fighting Sonnen cheapens the belt.”

The hilarious thing is that many of the people saying this are the ones who criticize Renan Barao and Carlos Condit for not hustling to fight any available, random guy.

But there are two sides to every argument.

Sonnen, once again, is a very good fighter.

Jon Jones fighting him does not detract from his role as the light heavyweight division’s top dog. It simply shows what we already knew: the light heavyweight division is incredibly shallow right now.

Jones has already beaten the best light heavyweights available (and Vitor Belfort). The problem with him fighting Sonnen is that the division is so weak that Sonnen is the best fighter available.

That, in a way, is what cheapens the belt.

In a perfect world, this would not be a problem. In a perfect world, Showtime would not have mishandled Strikeforce so badly and a semi-compelling, title unification match against Mo Lawal, Gegard Mousasi or Rafael Cavalcante would fit into that April slot perfectly. Perhaps Jones would not have motored through his opposition so quickly, thereby allowing another contender to surface.

This, however, is not a perfect world.

This is just a world where, through a combination of luck and timing, Chael Sonnen is the best choice to fight Jon Jones.

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