Saturday night saw the two biggest mixed martial arts promotions, the Ultimate Fighting Championship and Strikeforce, go head-to-head with free shows on television. There will always be those out there who will ask, “Well, who won?”
Well of course, you the fans won.
That was a no brainer, anytime either promotion puts a show on television it’s always the fans who come out on top. But lets take a closer look and examine both cards.
The Ultimate Fighter 12 Finale brings with it all of the promotion power and slick advertising the UFC can muster. To a casual fan it might be easy to pick the TUF show as the winner as it brings many fans who followed the entire Spike TV reality series with it. Most UFC events can only be viewed by pay-per-view so this is a great chance to see some favorite fighters for free. It’s also in tune with UFC president Dana White’s policy of giving back to the fans by providing free shows.
Let’s look at the TUF 12 Finale card.
The card had several notable fighters in Stephan Bonnar, Demian Maia, Kendall Grove, and Leonard Garcia but none of the big names fans pay to see on pay-per-view. None of the fighters moved that much closer to a title shot, other than Demian Maia but there is a long list of challengers before him.
Fans got to watch some exciting fights with five bouts on the main card, but failed to see any finishes. In fact fans got a reminder of why the scoring system needs a review with the awarding of a split decision to Leonard Garcia over Nam Phan, in a fight that practically everyone scored for Phan.
Now the Strikeforce: Henderson vs. Babalu II event.
On paper the Strikeforce card was much superior than the TUF card with several former champions in Dan Henderson, Renato “Bablu” Sobral, and Antonio “Bigfoot Silva. Wins for several fighters have moved them closer to title contention, notably Dan Henderson and Paul Daley.
If your not a subscriber to Showtime, or were unable to find a suitable video feed on the internet, then you likely missed out. This is still one of the biggest drawbacks to the promotion being unable to reach more homes like the UFC’s deal with Spike TV.
Fans who caught Saturdays show were treated to some exciting knockouts with four of five fights ending in knockouts. Three of those knockouts ended spectacularly with Henderson, Daley, and Robbie Lawler finishing their fights in the first round. The event wasn’t without it’s own controversy as Ovince St. Preux thought the referee should have stopped his fight with Benji Radach in the first round.
If you’ve watched both events, which show did you prefer?