Injuries are the crooked tax collectors of MMA. They sure do take their share, don’t they?
UFC 163 slouched into Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Saturday night with a pocket full of holes, courtesy of that remorseless absolutist.
Strewn somewhere back along the roadside was the shiny promise of Anthony Pettis and a featherweight superfight with Jose Aldo, an excellent welterweight bout between Josh Koscheck and Demian Maia, and several other interesting fights and fighters besides, all cut down by some injury or another.
As such, interest remained at a low simmer in the run up to UFC 163. And yet, because MMA might enjoy the highest rate of “anything-can-happenness” on the modern sports landscape, for many, the card remained appointment television. There’s no Wizards-Bobcats in MMA.
That’s especially true whenever someone like Aldo, the UFC featherweight champ and pan-divisional top-fiver, is involved. The 26-year-old with the 15-fight winning streak was in his home country to defend his belt for the fifth time and would do so against the electrifying Chan Sung Jung, familiar to many fans (and billed on the official event) as “The Korean Zombie.”
That was the undisputed main attraction, but lightning (or a highlight-reel head kick) can strike anywhere. Did it strike at UFC 163? The final stat lines only tell part of the story. Here to help you round things out is a list of the real winners and losers from Rio de Janeiro. (And yes, we’ll also list the official results at the end.)
Programming note: Your friend and mine, Jonathan Snowden, is on travel this weekend. Filling in behind the screen will be me, Scott Harris, “The Nightfly,” locked and loaded and taking you allllllll the way through to the morning. So sit back, relax, fire up the colortinis and watch these funny, funny pictures as they fly through they air.