The UFC returns to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Saturday night for UFC 142: Aldo vs. Mendes.While there is quite a buzz in and around Rio de Janeiro for the event, anticipation has been somewhat lackluster here in the states.On paper, this fight c…
The UFC returns to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Saturday night for UFC 142: Aldo vs. Mendes.
While there is quite a buzz in and around Rio de Janeiro for the event, anticipation has been somewhat lackluster here in the states.
On paper, this fight card looks to be one that the casual MMA fan will not shell out 50 to 60 dollars for, but historically the most exciting night of fights come from cards such as this one.
The diehard MMA fan will always find a way to watch a PPV. Whether it is by ordering it, going to a friend’s house, or paying a cover at a sports bar.
If you are on the fence about throwing down your hard earned cash, let me give you five reasons you should order the event.
If you missed the premiere of the UFC 142 countdown show yesterday, not to worry brohams. We got you covered.
In perhaps the most interesting segment on the show, we get to know undefeated Team Alpha Male featherweight Chad Mendes, who is set to challenge Jose Aldoon Saturday. “Money” has a decent shot at taking the belt from Aldo. Mendes’ doppelganger Urijah Faber has nothing but good things to say about his teammate and points out that he can roll with anybody and submit BJJ black belts and that “no one can match his wrestling.”
(Video courtesy of Sapo/IFI)
If you missed the premiere of the UFC 142 countdown show yesterday, not to worry brohams. We got you covered.
In perhaps the most interesting segment on the show, we get to know undefeated Team Alpha Male featherweight Chad Mendes, who is set to challenge Jose Aldoon Saturday. “Money” has a decent shot at taking the belt from Aldo. Mendes’ doppelganger Urijah Faber has nothing but good things to say about his teammate and points out that he can roll with anybody and submit BJJ black belts and that “no one can match his wrestling.”
“Urijah’s like a brother to me. If I ever see my brother get beat up, I want to kick the crap out of that guy that did it.”
People are already calling this one, “The featherweight Anderson Silva versus the featherweight Chael Sonnen.” When did Mendes lose by triangle?
(Video courtesy of Sapo/IFI)
It’s also cool to see GSP training with Vitor Belfort, who Anthony Johnson guarantees he’s going to beat to become a legend. “Rumble” says he’s planning a longterm stay in the division, so a win is a good way to announce it.
We get to see a more personal side of Johnson as well. We can always see who the UFC is trying to push by howe much play they get on the show. Hearing AJ explain that he was cutting 61 pounds to fight at 170 because of his bad diet and partying habits was crazy.
Quote of the show goes to Johnson.
“I’m not intimidated by nobody but my grandmother.”
We believe it. She seems like she’s given him a few whoopings in his day.
Jose Aldo will be making his third UFC title defense this Saturday when he takes on Chad “Money” Mendes in Brazil.Against Aldo, Mendes will have to fight the most dangerous striker in the division.Against Mendes, Aldo will have to fight the most danger…
Jose Aldo will be making his third UFC title defense this Saturday when he takes on Chad “Money” Mendes in Brazil.
Against Aldo, Mendes will have to fight the most dangerous striker in the division.
Against Mendes, Aldo will have to fight the most dangerous wrestler in the division.
Each will be fighting the biggest test of their UFC careers, but only one can walk away holding the featherweight belt.
UFC 142 will be the first major event that kicks off the most important year in the history of Mixed Martial Arts. This show is also a big deal because it is the first time that a featherweight championship fight will headline a UFC pay-per-view with J…
UFC 142 will be the first major event that kicks off the most important year in the history of Mixed Martial Arts. This show is also a big deal because it is the first time that a featherweight championship fight will headline a UFC pay-per-view with Jose Aldo taking on Chad Mendes.
Aldo looks to continue his climb to the top of the pound-for-pound mountain. He has made a smooth transition from WEC to UFC with two successful title defenses against Mark Hominick and Kenny Florian last year.
Mendes is making quite a name for himself in the 145-pound division. He has compiled a perfect 11-0 record thanks to his strong wrestling and efficient striking ability. He is not an exciting fighter, but at the end of the fight, he always finds a way to get his hand raised.
Where: HSBC Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
When: Saturday, Jan. 14 at 10:00 p.m. EDT
Watch: Preliminary fights at 8 p.m. ET on FX, main card fights at 10 p.m. ET on pay-per-view; online pay-per-view streaming (must pay $44.99) at UFC.tv, Yahoo! Sports, UStream, Android or iPhone.
FIGHT CARD
Main Card
Featherweight Championship: Jose Aldo (c) vs. Chad Mendes
Middleweight Bout: Vitor Belfort vs. Anthony Johnson
Middleweight Bout: Rousimar Palhares vs. Mike Massenzio
Welterweight Bout: Erick Silva vs. Carlo Prater
Lightweight Bout: Edson Barboza vs. Terry Etim
Preliminary Bout
Lightweight Bout: Thiago Tavares vs. Sam Stout
Heavyweight Bout: Gabriel Gonzaga vs. Ednaldo Oliveira
Featherweight Bout: Yuri Alcantara vs. Michihiro Omigawa
Welterweight Bout: Ricardo Funch vs. Mike Pyle
Featherweight Bout: Felipe Arantes vs. Antonio Carvalho
Aldo’s Keys To Victory
Use speed and power in the stand-up, and avoid going to the ground.
Aldo has not shown the same explosiveness he did when he was in WEC. Perhaps it is a product of lingering injuries, or perhaps he is starting to lose a step or two.
He will have to get back to being the feared striker he was when he was defeating Cub Swanson, Mike Brown and Urijah Faber in order to keep up with Mendes for a five-round fight.
Mendes’ Keys To Victory
Avoid getting hit early, and work the fight to the ground.
Mendes does not have enough power nor is he strong enough standing to keep up with Aldo for 25 minutes. He has to fight the way he always does: He has to prevent big strikes and grind his opponent down until he can take him to the ground.
He is one of the best wrestlers in UFC and has shown he is not afraid to just work an opponent over for five rounds before letting the judges decide the outcome. He is going to have to do that again to walk away as featherweight champion.
What They Are Saying
You would think that fighting in your home country in front of thousands of fans who are there to see you headline a show would add more pressure, but Jose Aldo is doing his best to remain cool.
“There’s more attention and it is a great pleasure to defend my title in my home country. It means everything for me to come back fighting in my country as a champion,” Aldo said recently.
“This is where I started, just with dreams and hopes, and now I am back as a champion. It is a great feeling, but I will try to think about it after the fight. I still have to train hard and win this fight.”
Chad Mendes sounds like he has all the confidence in the world heading into this fight. He told the Las Vegas Sun that he does something better than any of Aldo’s recent opponents.
“I don’t think any of the guys that have fought him have had the wrestling credentials or wrestling abilities to be able to get a hold of him, get him down and keep him down,” Mendes said. “So I think my skills, the things I’m good at, are key to beating a guy like Jose Aldo.”
Undercard Fight To Watch: Thiago Tavares vs. Sam Stout
I am going to go out on a limb and call this the fight of the night. Granted, there is some precedent here.
Tavares has been given the bonus three times in his career—interestingly enough, they all came in losses.
Stout has also won three Fight of the Night bonuses and a Knockout of the Night in his last fight at UFC 131.
These two will never be more than gatekeepers in UFC, but they also seem to put on exciting fights that more often than not end with someone on their back.
Main-Event Prediction
Mendes is going to be the biggest test of Aldo’s UFC career so far. He is a great wrestler who knows how to work an opponent into fighting his kind of match. He has what it takes to get Aldo down to the ground and hold him there for five rounds.
However, Aldo is a more complete fighter than Mendes. He has the ability to hit as hard and fast as anyone in the sport, and he will catch Mendes with a punch as he is coming in for a takedown to end the fight.
The UFC returns to Rio for its first pay-per-view event of the year, and they are bringing a featherweight championship fight between top pound-for-pound fighter and reigning champion Jose Aldo, who will be facing an undefeated opponent in Chad Me…
The UFC returns to Rio for its first pay-per-view event of the year, and they are bringing a featherweight championship fight between top pound-for-pound fighter and reigning champion Jose Aldo, who will be facing an undefeated opponent in Chad Mendes.
Mendes, a former NCAA Division I wrestler, is 11-0 in MMA and 3-0 in the UFC. Aldo has won his last 13 bouts with UFC title defenses against Kenny Florian and Mark Hominick.
In the co-main event, Anthony Johnson fights Vitor Belfort in a middleweight bout that guarantees excitement throughout. Johnson is coming off a first-round knockout victory over Charlie Brenneman while Belfort was last seen knocking out Yoshihiro Akiyama.
These are predictions for Knockout, Submission and Fight of the Night.
Knockout of the Night: Edson Barboza
Lightweight prospect Edson Barboza (9-0) will make his fourth appearance in the UFC against Terry Etim (15-3) to open the pay-per-view main card.
Both enter with the reputation to provide exciting fights, and they have the bonus money to show for it. Etim won three bonuses in his past four bouts while Barboza earned Fight of the Night bonuses in his last two bouts.
At 6’1″, Etim is one of the taller fights in the division, but it might be bad news for him if Barboza decides to utilize his lethal leg kicks throughout the three-round bout. Before entering the UFC, Barboza won the Ring of Combat lightweight championship after knocking out his opponent with leg kicks.
For however long this lasts, this should be one of the best fights on the card, and with neither guy having never been stopped with strikes, it will give them both a chance to prove that they can do what nobody else has been able to.
Both will be trading, and with Barboza possessing the better KO power, should be able to catch Etim sometime in the fight and finish him off.
Submission of the Night: Rousimar Palhares
In the third bout on the pay-per-view, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt Rousimar Palhares (12-3) fights for the first time since UFC 134 in Brazil. He will take on Mike Massenzio (13-5), who is coming off a close decision victory over Steven Cantwell.
Palhares is considered to be one of the more dangerous submission artists in the division, and his kneebars and heel-hooks are nasty. Four of his six UFC victories have ended with him making his opponent tap.
Massenzio is a BJJ black belt as well, but Palhares is no stranger to submitting them. In past bouts, Palhares was able to submit Lucio Linhares and Dave Branch, both of whom are black belts. It was the first time both had been submitted in MMA.
Massenzio has been stopped before, and he has been submitted twice to fighters like Brian Stann and Danillo Villefort. Villefort actually submitted Massenzio with a kneebar.
This is Palhares’ fight to win, and he has the chance to showcase his skills in front of his home country.
Fight of the Night: Jose Aldo vs. Chad Mendes
The main-event matchup between UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo (20-1) and Chad Mendes (11-0) is intriguing for a lot of reasons, and one is that Mendes is Aldo’s most dangerous opponent.
To add to the threat, Mendes is walking into hostile territory in front of the Brazilian’s home country. Aldo will not only be fighting the best wrestler in the division, but the pressure to perform and put on a main-event showcase for the Brazilian crowd.
Going into the bout, backers of Mendes say he only needs one takedown in each round to secure himself a victory. Aldo is at his best early on and will always be at a distinct advantage standing.
For Mendes to win, he will need to go through the vicious knees and strikes of Aldo to get those takedowns, and they won’t come easy or without having taken damage.
Expect to see both fighters trying to implement their styles into the fight, and both should find success throughout the early rounds of the bout. Round 3 may be the most important round if it goes that far, and it could be the turning point for the eventual winner.
With both prepared to go five rounds, expect to see a war.
UFC 142 will be a bloodbath in the pay-per-view market, and not just because of “Tebowmania” and the NFL playoffs.UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo has historically failed to be a draw as have fighters from the lighter weight classes in general (per…
UFC 142 will be a bloodbath in the pay-per-view market, and not just because of “Tebowmania” and the NFL playoffs.
UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo has historically failed to be a draw as have fighters from the lighter weight classes in general (perhaps casual fans are less inclined to pay to watch fighters that they can supposedly bench press).
And it’s not like the co-main event—Vitor Belfort vs. Anthony Johnson—is a fight that will produce the stuff of legends.
The card just doesn’t have the power to wow the casual fans.
But is this lack of “wow factor” just coincidental or part of a larger, worrying trend?
The year 2011 wasn’t the best for the UFC in terms of PPV buys and the organization is set to have even more events in 2012.
The UFC only has a finite amount of star power to spread out over the calendar year. Their marquee stars such as UFC welterweight champion Georges St.Pierre and UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones won’t be able to headline each card.
That will mean that many cards will be headlined by fighters who just don’t have the ability to draw a large amount of buys.
The UFC’s PPV numbers will continue to underperform while they will still oversaturate the market in defiance.
Why should fans have to shell out so much money for pay-per-views that just aren’t worth the price tag?
They shouldn’t and fans are starting to realize this; the UFC brand name doesn’t warrant the steep and numerous price tags anymore.
Fans will watch UFC programming when it’s on for free on FOX (or Fuel or FX) and will only break into their precious (and ever-shrinking) pile of disposable income when they feel it’s warranted.
There have simply been too many PPV’s of a quality that don’t warrant the steep price. The fans voted with their wallets in 2011; they will no longer be bled dry.
