Tag: Andre Winner

Fighter vs. Writer: UFC 122 Predictions With Gerald Harris

Filed under: UFCWhen last we left the Fighter vs. Writer series, I came to what I choose to think of as a very respectable draw against Jason “Mayhem” Miller. You could point out that if I hadn’t felt the need to be contrary and pick Martin Kampmann ov…

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When last we left the Fighter vs. Writer series, I came to what I choose to think of as a very respectable draw against Jason “Mayhem” Miller. You could point out that if I hadn’t felt the need to be contrary and pick Martin Kampmann over Jake Shields, I would have won. To that I’d say, ‘You’re right, you jerk. I guess you just know everything, don’t you?’

But rather than dwell on hypothetical conversations that exist only in my head, we move forward to UFC 122 and a fight-picking showdown with former “Ultimate Fighter” contestant and recent Sportscenter highlight-maker Gerald Harris, who took some time out from training for his fight at UFC 123 next weekend to match wits with me.

Unlike Gerald, I haven’t slammed my way on to ESPN (yet), but I feel pretty good about my prognosticating powers this week. That is why I now turn awkwardly toward the “Hurricane” and utter the four most important words in the English language: You wanna do it?

Dennis Siver, Andre Winner Aim to Put on a Show for German Fans at UFC 122

Filed under: UFCEuropean MMA fighters like Dennis Siver don’t often get the chance to fight in front of a home crowd. The UFC made its first trip to continental Europe just last year, and this is only the organization’s second event in Germany, where t…

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European MMA fighters like Dennis Siver don’t often get the chance to fight in front of a home crowd. The UFC made its first trip to continental Europe just last year, and this is only the organization’s second event in Germany, where the reception to the sport has been mixed.

That’s why when Siver, a German-Russian lightweight who’s been with the UFC on and off (though mostly on) since 2007, takes on British “Ultimate Fighter” finalist Andre Winner at UFC 122 on Saturday, it’s a fight that comes with a special kind of pressure. When your countrymen rarely get to see you ply your trade, you certainly don’t want to have them pack an arena just to see you get beat up by a citizen from one of your nation’s soccer rivals.

But despite all that added pressure, as Siver told MMA Fighting through a translator this week, the irony is that he’s far less famous as a fighter when he’s in his own country.

Dan Hardy Thinks There’s Too Much Wrestling in MMA, Wants Rule Changes

Filed under: UFCI love the fact that Dan Hardy writes a column for his local media outlet, This Is Nottingham. I wish more fighters would sit down at a computer and give us a look inside their mind, though, as Hardy demonstrated with his latest effort,…

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I love the fact that Dan Hardy writes a column for his local media outlet, This Is Nottingham. I wish more fighters would sit down at a computer and give us a look inside their mind, though, as Hardy demonstrated with his latest effort, sometimes it doesn’t work the way you think it’s going to.

The title of today’s piece is “Lentz went into hiding for the big fight.” It ostensibly deals with Nik Lentz‘s grappling-centric win over Andre Winner in a slow-paced fight at UFC 118, but a more accurate description of the column might have been: “Too much wrestling in MMA, says guy whose friends keep losing to superior wrestlers.”

Hardy’s thesis, more or less, is that there are too many wrestlers in the UFC who just want to take opponents down and hold them there, and this is a problem the sport needs to address via rule changes. As Hardy writes in his attempt to preemptively counter the argument that he and many of his fellow Brits simply need to become better wrestlers: