UFC 136 from Houston is in the books and it lived up to all the hype heading into Saturday night.It is usually hard for an event with such hype surrounding it to live up to the expectations and leave fans fully satisfied with the $44.95 they spent to o…
UFC 136 from Houston is in the books and it lived up to all the hype heading into Saturday night.
It is usually hard for an event with such hype surrounding it to live up to the expectations and leave fans fully satisfied with the $44.95 they spent to order it. But it seems to be one of the rare events that has people buzzing long into the next week.
What made this event so entertaining was the unexpected. There were several questions fight fans had coming into this event. How was Chael going to look? Could Florian get over the hump? Was Guillard the next big thing at lightweight? How would the Edgar-Maynad trilogy end? Would Anthony Pettis bounce back? Some of these questions were answered as expected and some were not. There were plenty of surprises on this card in the octagon, but what has people talking the most may be the action outside the cage.
What follows is a list of the five biggest surprises coming out of UFC 136.
Forty-eight hours ago, two men entered, and later left a sold-out Toyota Center in Houston, Texas with championship gold around their waists. UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar and UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo successfully defended their co…
Forty-eight hours ago, two men entered, and later left a sold-out Toyota Center in Houston, Texas with championship gold around their waists.
UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar and UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo successfully defended their coveted belts against dangerous challengers—Gray Maynard and Kenny Florian—in the UFC 136 double headliner.
Aldo neutralized Florian in a technical five-round affair, and Edgar shocked the world with a fourth-round stoppage in his trilogy with Maynard.
Of course, anytime you have two champions who aren’t too far off in weight, you can’t help but fantasize about a dream matchup between the two.
This is exactly why fans desperately crave a fight between middleweight kingpin Anderson Silva and welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre, or a battle between Jon Jones and Cain Velasquez. There’s just something about two champions colliding that draws in anticipation like no other.
Such is the same with Edgar and Aldo. Even UFC President Dana White admitted in the post-fight press conference that he’d like to see this fight come to fruition in the near future.
It probably won’t be the next fight on the horizon, though. Edgar will likely defend against Ben Henderson/Clay Guida, and Aldo will challenge the unbeaten Chad Mendes.
Nevertheless, if these two champions continue their winning ways, a dream bout between the two is inevitable.
Everyone is bound to have different opinions on this fantasy bout, but here’s my take on why Edgar would clown Aldo.
Frankie Edgar has overcome tougher competition
Before I explain, let me just state that I am not by any means attempting to discredit Aldo. The Brazilian is a true phenom with a ferocious skill set, but he is not untouchable, Mark Hominick proved that in their UFC 129 slugfest.
As a standup fighter, Aldo possesses a yin-yang blend of flawless technique/timing and destructive knockout power. He is also a highly-decorated Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt under the Nogueira brothers, but it is a skill that still had yet to be seen in the Octagon.
Simply put, Aldo is every bit as good as the media makes him out to be, but he hasn’t beaten the type of opposition that Edgar has dealt with since becoming champion.
Aldo has demolished many formidable contenders, but none compare to B.J Penn and Gray Maynard. Edgar beat Penn twice and just became the first man to not only defeat, but knock out Maynard in an official MMA bout.
Aldo has more title defenses under his belt, if you count his WEC title defenses. He has destroyed Mike Thomas Brown and Manny Gamburyan, picked apart a very game Urijah Faber, and outpointed dangerous foes in Hominick and Florian.
Good wins, but nothing to be overly impressed with as they were all matchups that Aldo was supposed to win.
Edgar was not supposed to beat Penn for the title at UFC 112, and he certainly wasn’t supposed to do the exact same thing in the rematch at UFC 118.
In his second fight with a then-unbeaten Maynard, Edgar was expected to lose to “The Bully” once again. Maynard swarmed all over Edgar in the first round with powerful boxing, but Edgar survived and arguably won the rest of the rounds.
Leading up to the trilogy fight, Edgar was actually the favorite for once, but nobody expected the New Jersey native to finish Maynard, much less knock him out.
Edgar has overcome adversity against elite contenders and rose to the occasion—Aldo has yet to do that.
Frankie Edgar is a nightmare matchup for Aldo
Aldo is a far superior striker than Maynard, but Maynard is a much more powerful human being. If Maynard, with all of his power, connected on Edgar’s chin multiple times and could not put him away, Aldo will fail in that department as well.
Even if Aldo has the technique and the speed behind his punches that Maynard lacked, Edgar can take it and keep moving.
Edgar isn’t on Aldo’s level when it comes to striking, but the lightweight champ is one of the best boxers for MMA. Edgar’s slick head movement and tricky footwork will keep Aldo guessing, and once “The Answer” decides to mix in some takedowns, Edgar will take complete control of the fight.
I mentioned before that Aldo is an extremely crafty BJJ black belt, but Edgar is no slouch when it comes to rolling. Trained by elite Jiu-Jitsu practitioners, Renzo Gracie and Ricardo Almeida, Edgar has one of the best ground games in the division.
Edgar would be able to maintain top control and pummel Aldo with a relentless ground-and-pound assault. This would be Edgar’s smartest route to victory, but with his well-rounded arsenal he could find a way to win in just about any position.
Aldo is very talented, but one mistake that many fans seem to make is comparing the featherweight champion to Anderson Silva.
Sure, there are similarities in style and they are on the same team, but Aldo isn’t quite there yet. The featherweight division itself is still developing.
Aldo is undeniably the best at 145 pounds, but Florian was his biggest test and he did not dominate. No disrespect to Florian, but Edgar is a different, better beast.
Mitch Ciccarelli is the sexiest featured columnist on B/R MMA and a United States Airman. Follow Ciccarelli on Twitter @mitchciccarelli
(Rashad gets booed. Forrest gets giddy.GIF courtesy of ZombieProphet)
We figured you could all use a little entertainment to help you through another case of the Mondays, so we’ve compiled a few of the weekend’s GIF-worthy moments for your viewing pleasure.
Enjoy more animated goodness after the jump.
(Rashad gets booed. Forrest gets giddy.GIF courtesy of ZombieProphet)
We figured you could all use a little entertainment to help you through another case of the Mondays, so we’ve compiled a few of the weekend’s GIF-worthy moments for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy.
(Douglas Lima emphatically secures a slot in the Bellator welterweight tourney finals)
(Sokoudjou lands an illegal knee on Jimmo that was missed by the ref)
(Andre Pederneiras gives little Jose a sip of water)
(If Jesse Ventura ever sees this, someone out there is going to get sued. / Props to MMAFighting.)
As a long time UFC fan, I’ve recently noticed that their marketing team has seemingly taken a break from using corny phrases to label their events. In fact, the last UFC pay-per-view to not be named after the fighters in the main event was back at UFC 125: Resolution, which featured the eventual draw between, you guessed it, Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard. You just don’t see that kind of irony everyday.
UFC 136 was actually able to provide us with closure, however — more closure in fact than any card in quite a while. Not only did Edgar vindicate himself in triumphant fashion, but Jose Aldo proved to many of his critics that his gas tank is not an issue, Kenny Florian proved that he will never, ever, win a title fight, and Chael Sonnen proved that ring rust is for the weak. But now, we look to the future, and more importantly, try to predict it for the weekend’s big winners. So if you think our future match-ups are garbage, be sure to let us know in the comments section below.
(If Jesse Ventura ever sees this, someone out there is going to get sued. / Props to MMAFighting.)
As a long time UFC fan, I’ve recently noticed that their marketing team has seemingly taken a break from using corny phrases to label their events. In fact, the last UFC pay-per-view to not be named after the fighters in the main event was back at UFC 125: Resolution, which featured the eventual draw between, you guessed it, Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard. You just don’t see that kind of irony everyday.
UFC 136 was actually able to provide us with closure, however — more closure in fact than any card in quite a while. Not only did Edgar vindicate himself in triumphant fashion, but Jose Aldo proved to many of his critics that his gas tank is not an issue, Kenny Florian proved that he will never, ever, win a title fight, and Chael Sonnen proved that ring rust is for the weak. But now, we look to the future, and more importantly, try to predict it for the weekend’s big winners. So if you think our future match-ups are garbage, be sure to let us know in the comments section below.
Frankie Edgar: There weren’t many of us out there who picked Edgar to finish Maynard in such decisive fashion, let alone with strikes. But with his brilliant come from behind win, Edgar showcased yet another ever improving aspect of his game, and has emphatically earned his spot in the pound-for-pound rankings, though maybe not as high up as Dana would think. Though it seems Gilbert Melendez is destined for the next shot, we think the winner of the Ben Henderson/Clay Guida match deserves it just as much, if not more. Henderson presents many of the same challenges to Edgar as Maynard did, so it would be interesting to see if he would fare any better. And the thought of seeing Edgar and Guida bounce around like they had just tasted sugar for the first time is enough to give us an epileptic seizure.
Jose Aldo: I may be in the minority here, but I wasn’t exactly blown away by Aldo’s performance against “Kenflo” this past weekend. Yes, his takedown defense looked great, but let’s not forget that wrestling has never been Florian’s strong suit. Chad Mendes, on the other hand, has absolutely dominated past opponents with his wrestling, and his stand up is improving by the day. If he can get inside on Aldo, we could be seeing a very different kind of riddle for Aldo to solve. But outside of Mendes and a possible future rematch with Mark Hominick, there don’t seem to be many featherweight match-ups at the moment that spark a lot of interest. Lightweight however, is an entirely different story…
Chael Sonnen: You have to be one arrogant son of a bitch to think that you cannot only hand pick your future opponent’s, but pick the day on which you will fight them as well. Luckily, Chael Sonnen’s arrogance is beginning to take on it’s own persona, and it’s getting harder and harder to disagree with the guy. He dominated a game Brian Stann despite being away from the octagon for over a year, and he made it look easy. Dana White has admitted it would be foolish not to book this rematch, and for once we’re in agreement with “The Baldfather.” Some people are arguing for a Dan Henderson rematch, given he gets past Shogun, but considering that fight is being held at light heavyweight, we don’t really see why the winner would necessarily deserve it over Sonnen, especially since Shogun clearly has no middleweight aspirations. Book it Dana…book it and they will come.
Joe Lauzon: It took “J-Lau” less than a minute to end Melvin Guillard’s hopes of getting the next lightweight title shot and remind us of why he is one of the most dangerous guys in the division. Though his cardio has long been questionable, there’s no doubting the kid’s killer instinct, and it would be nice to see him put together a nice win streak for once. Giving him a crack at the winner of Siver/Cerrone or Dos Anjos/Tibau would really help thin the herd of potential contenders, and that is one thing the lightweight division could use. Another option, and perhaps the one with the biggest potential for fireworks, would be Nate Diaz. This is of course based on the assumption that Nate Diaz decides to hang out at lightweight for a while, and who knows with that guy.
Demian Maia: Maia’s victory over Jorge Santiago was about as typical as could be expected. It showcased his well known ability to control a fighter on the ground while highlighting the fact that his stand up still has a ways to go. Matching him up against someone like Alan Belcher would really let us know where exactly he stands in the middleweight division, but the grappling fanatic in me would really like to see how he’d fare against someone like Rousimar Palhares, who’s striking is quickly becoming as tenacious as his ground game.
Anthony Pettis: After being wrestlefucked by Clay Guida in his UFC debut, the final WEC lightweight champion seemed eager to prove that he is constantly improving upon his weaknesses with a takedown oriented victory over Jeremy Stephens. A fight against someone equally well rounded, like Jim Miller, would be a nice measuring stick for Pettis, as would a match against the resurgent Sam Stout. Or if we really wanted to see how far his wrestling is coming, we could wake Gray Maynard up and throw him in “Showtime’s” direction.
Oh, and can someone throw Jorge Santiago a fricken bone? The poor guy has had about the worst run of luck in the UFC that I can remember, and I’d really just love to see him pull off one of these again.
We’ll let you decide the loser’s fates in the comment section…choose wisely.
Filed under: UFCTrainer Firas Zahabi was encouraged by what he saw out of Kenny Florian early on in his UFC featherweight title fight against Jose Aldo on Saturday night. But ultimately, Zahabi told Ariel Helwani on Monday’s MMA Hour, their team just c…
Trainer Firas Zahabi was encouraged by what he saw out of Kenny Florian early on in his UFC featherweight title fight against Jose Aldo on Saturday night. But ultimately, Zahabi told Ariel Helwani on Monday’s MMA Hour, their team just couldn’t keep up with Aldo down the stretch.
“Aldo did a beautiful job of adjusting in the second, and I feel that our side had to adjust as well to keep the match going in our favor, but we weren’t able to adjust,” said Zahabi, who works with Florian at the Tristar gym in Montreal. “Aldo’s a brilliant fighter and he had a brilliant counter to our attacks and he just did a great job.”
The unanimous decision loss to Aldo was the third failed bid for a UFC title in Florian’s nearly nine-year MMA career, and now the 35-year-old fighter faces some difficult questions about his future. As for how he’ll decide to answer those questions, Zahabi said he doubts even Florian knows just yet.
“I feel we did everything we could to prepare him for Aldo and Kenny’s going to have to let his mind take some time off, clear his mind, then make that decision for himself afterwards,” Zahabi said, adding, “I don’t think he’s decided yet.”
As for Zahabi, he must quickly turn his focus to his most celebrated fighter, long-time friend Georges St-Pierre, who puts his UFC welterweight title on the line against Carlos Condit at UFC 137 on October 29.
St-Pierre, who Zahabi still considers to be the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter (“Of course I’m biased, like all coaches,” he admitted), was originally slated to take on former Strikeforce welterweight champion Nick Diaz before Diaz angered the UFC by no-showing a couple press conferences, which led to Condit replacing him in the main event.
The GSP-Diaz bout’s champion-versus-champion angle might have been more interesting “from a marketing perspective,” Zahabi said, “but in terms of skill, I think it’s even harder with Carlos.”
“He has good knees and good kicks. He’s more of a diverse fighter standing up. And if you look at his record, he’s very good at finishing. He’s just got a few more threats. Diaz has a different style of boxing, which made him more of a threat with the hands, but I find that in terms of Muay Thai, we have to adjust for more of a Muay Thai fighter and less of a boxer.”
Of course for St-Pierre, who has defended his title with four straight decision victories, the most common criticism concerns his perceived inability or unwillingness to look for the finish. Many fans and pundits accuse him of playing it too safe, but Zahabi said he encourages his fighter to put those matters out of his mind altogether.
“I think he has to focus on the process, not worry about the outcome, and let that part take care of itself. If he starts trying to finish him I think he’ll have a harder time finishing him. He’s just got to let it happen. I think that’s the secret to finishing.
“When you’re looking to knock the guy out, you telegraph more. You come out of your game plan. You start taking more risks and you start skipping steps. If you want to finish a guy, in my opinion, you have to go through all the steps, just keep adding more pressure, adding more attacks, tying your moves together until you get that finish. You don’t have to jump to the end. You have to take every step along the way to get to that end.”
Whether GSP can get to that end against Condit, who hasn’t been finished since 2006, remains to be seen. If the bout ends with another decision win for the current champ, however, don’t be surprised if many fans focus exclusively on the result, no matter what the process might have entailed.
At UFC 136, UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar finally got the monkey named “Gray Maynard” off of his back.Maynard was the only fighter that Edgar had not been able to defeat in his professional fighting career. But that all changed in the fourth r…
At UFC 136, UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar finally got the monkey named “Gray Maynard” off of his back.
Maynard was the only fighter that Edgar had not been able to defeat in his professional fighting career. But that all changed in the fourth round of their title fight when Edgar scored a TKO victory.
Also, featherweight champion Jose Aldo made the second successful defense of his title when he outpointed perennial contender Kenny Florian over the course of five rounds.
In other action, Chael Sonnen earned another chance at middleweight kingpin Anderson Silva when he scored a second round submission victory over Brian Stann, Joe Lauzon was able to submit potential lightweight contender Melvin Guillard in a mere 47 seconds and Nam Phan outpointed Leonard Garcia after a 15 minute war.
So despite whether each fighter won or loss, how did they perform?
It is once again time to hand out grades to the fighters on the main card portion of UFC 136.
Forty-eight hours ago, two men entered, and later left a sold-out Toyota Center in Houston, Texas with championship gold around their waists.
Trainer Firas Zahabi was encouraged by what he saw out of