UFC 189 is just days away.
Hopefully you’ve accepted Jose Aldo’s injury as fate, as an opportunity for the UFC to finally test Conor McGregor against the sort of competitor MMA fans have been calling for.
Last time out, Conor McGregor was busy showcasi…
UFC 189 is just days away.
Hopefully you’ve accepted Jose Aldo’s injury as fate, as an opportunity for the UFC to finally test Conor McGregor against the sort of competitor MMA fans have been calling for.
Last time out, Conor McGregor was busy showcasing his skills in front of thousands of Irish faithful at the TD Garden in Boston. He said he’d finish Dennis Siver in two minutes. It ended up taking him two rounds, but most of us were pretty content with his performance anyway. He brought all his tools with him, showing us that, at the very least, he was ready for a step up in competition—”competition” in the form of UFC featherweight champion.
But, as we all know by now, one swift spinning back kick to the ribs would be that title fight’s undoing.
In steps Chad Mendes to save the day.
Mendes is only one fight removed from his second loss to Aldo—albeit a much closer title fight than the first. He brings abilities into the cage that none of McGregor’s previous opponents have ever brought. Most of us expect this to be McGregor’s biggest test in the UFC—although it may not say much, considering how swiftly he’s run through most of his opponents in the Octagon.
In what will likely end up being the latest platform for McGregor’s fanatics and detractors to voice their opinions, let us break down this main event.
Now that Jose Aldo has gone down with a rib injury, Conor McGregor will face Chad Mendes in the main event of UFC 189, and as such, the UFC has scrambled to release their traditional Countdown episodes to hype up the match. It’s about time if you ask me, because I had barely heard of the chatty Irishman with the fancy suits and funky tattoos prior to this.
Check out the full McGregor vs. Mendes Countdown special above, then head after the jump to see what welterweight champion Robbie Lawler and Rory MacDonald have planned for their second go-around in Saturday’s co-main event.
Now that Jose Aldo has gone down with a rib injury, Conor McGregor will face Chad Mendes in the main event of UFC 189, and as such, the UFC has scrambled to release their traditional Countdown episodes to hype up the match. It’s about time if you ask me, because I had barely heard of the chatty Irishman with the fancy suits and funky tattoos prior to this.
Check out the full McGregor vs. Mendes Countdown special above, then head after the jump to see what welterweight champion Robbie Lawler and Rory MacDonald have planned for their second go-around in Saturday’s co-main event.
After months of endless anticipation, the biggest fight card of the year is almost here.
Kind of.
It’s hard to imagine this card being worth your while, especially considering how invested we all were in what was poised to be the biggest mixed martial …
After months of endless anticipation, the biggest fight card of the year is almost here.
Kind of.
It’s hard to imagine this card being worth your while, especially considering how invested we all were in what was poised to be the biggest mixed martial arts bout in featherweight history—and arguably the biggest fight of the year.
Jose Aldo was supposed to walk in, bearing the black and gold colors UFC champions wear in this modern Reebok era. ConorMcGregor was supposed to come in draped in a cloak of green, white and orange. At the end of it all, an undisputed featherweight champion would emerge; in his shadow would follow a small island’s worth of people ready to take to their keyboards to dispute that “undisputed” part.
It would have been beautiful, really.
Now, UFC 189 certainly doesn’t have the main event most of us were dying to see, but believe it or not, there are plenty of other really, really good fights scheduled to take place Saturday night. Here are five reasons you should still buy in to UFC 189: Mendes vs. McGregor.
In mixed martial arts, there is little personal discovery to be found until the limits of a comfort zone are left behind. Adversity comes in many forms, and once the pressure is applied, the reality of what a fighter can and can’t handle comes front an…
In mixed martial arts, there is little personal discovery to be found until the limits of a comfort zone are left behind. Adversity comes in many forms, and once the pressure is applied, the reality of what a fighter can and can’t handle comes front and center. And while every man will eventually stumble under the bright lights, the refusal to break forges something unique that can be used when needed.
The Rust Belt is a place where luxuries come few and far between, and Matt Brown is no stranger to fighting for more out of life. Industry forgotten and sustained despite hardship served as the backdrop to his humble upbringing in Central Ohio, and those conditions provided an early education to the Columbus native.
Nothing was given to him—only earned—and The Immortal has spent the past decade constantly pressing to evolve from the foundation those tough times provided.
You can see glimpses of his hard-scrabble past in his hard-charging style inside the Octagon, as the 34-year-old welterweight’s aggressive attack and relentless pursuit of victory have made him a staple in one of the most talent-stacked divisions in the UFC.
Just as it takes going through dark times to make great jazz music, you don’t fight the way Brown fights unless putting everything on the line has been a common practice.
Yet, his personal search revolves around more than being a successful fighter. He’s willing to push himself to great lengths because he knows that’s where he’ll learn more about what he’s capable of. And therein lies the greatest source of motivation for the scrappy knockout artist.
It’s not about money, fame or the thrills of competing at the highest level of MMA; it’s about the test and finding what exists each time he crosses the battle lines.
“There is no question you are what your habits are,” Brown told Bleacher Report. “You are a product of what you do on a daily basis. When you go through a lot of adversity as a youth or a young adult, overcoming that adversity becomes a habit. It becomes familiar to you.
“On the flip side, some people take a different path and spend their lives making excuses for not overcoming it and making their lives better. One of my favorite lyrics is from a Hatebreed song that says, ‘It’s our struggles that define us.’ I say it all the time. It’s a perfect quote and the perfect way to say it because how you deal with adversity makes you who you are.
“Everybody can be a happy and wonderful person every day of their life when things are going great. Now let’s take some of that away and see what kind of person you are. I try to define myself every single day by not allowing the down side of things bring me down and get to me.”
While some people need additional incentive to face life’s challenges, Brown’s determination to push forward is farmed from within. His growth requires no outside catalyst for his drive because he knows tests and trials will come every day.
For Brown, the quest for personal definition is always the primary driving force. He also believes answers can only be found after the truly difficult questions are asked.
“I’m a self-motivated individual,” Brown said. “I’m not exactly sure why it is that way, but I never have a hard time finding motivation. I talk to a lot of people about what they want out of this sport. What are you doing every day and what motivates you? What brings you to this sport? Why do you want to this and not go out and get a college degree and be an accountant or something?
“For me personally, the thing I want out of the sport is what motivates me. The answer to this question is all I need for motivation. If your motivation is money, women or fame, that’s where people find a lack of motivation because those aren’t real authentic things that can inspire you every day.”
Brown has spent the majority of the past three years riding a wave of momentum, but his next showing inside the Octagon will come with different circumstances attached. He rose to contention in the 170-pound ranks on the strength of a seven-fight winning streak but will enter his showdown with Tim Means at UFC 189 on Saturday, July 11 having lost back-to-back fights.
The amount of talent in the upper tier of the welterweight fold creates an environment where there is little room for error, and a third consecutive setback would likely cost Brown his place in the coveted Top 10 of the divisional rankings. He’s well-aware of the situation, but at the same time, he’s approaching it with his signature tenacity on full blast.
He knows Dirty Bird will come to throw down at UFC 189, but he also sees the Arizona native threatening to undo all the work he invested to climb back from the brink of obscurity and surge up the welterweight ladder to become a certified threat to the 170-pound title.
“If I don’t walk out of this fight with my hand raised, I’ve dropped a lot of what I’ve worked for over the past few years,” Brown said. “I’m not saying that is going to happen, but it’s the fight game and that is a real possibility. That said, I’m not going to focus on making that happen. I’m going to focus on what I need to do today to make that happen. I’m going to focus on being the best I can be, and let’s hope that is enough to beat Tim Means. I truly believe it will be.
“[Tim Means] is a scrappy dude. I think he’s a little underrated, and I really don’t know exactly what he’s capable of. I don’t think he’s shown the best he can be yet, and I’m probably going to bring the best out of him. This is a huge opportunity for him, and I think we are going to see the best Tim Means, and I’m going to bring the best Matt Brown, so we’ll see what happens.
“Every time I fight, I’m motivated to go out there and do what I gotta do, but when you lose, it puts a little more kick in your ass and tells you there’s something you aren’t doing right,” he added. “You have to go after it a little harder, and what really defines a person is how they deal with struggles and adversity. I want to go out there and define myself next weekend.”
Duane Finley is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report. All quotes are obtained firsthand unless noted otherwise.
To borrow a phrase from former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar, UFC 189 has been in “chicken salad” mode for more than a week now.
From the moment reports surfaced that featherweight champion Jose Aldo had broken a rib during the fina…
From the moment reports surfaced that featherweight champion Jose Aldo had broken a rib during the final stages of his training camp, our hopes for an epic clash with Conor McGregor on July 11 began to dim. On Tuesday, we learned for sure that Aldo was out and Chad Mendes was in against McGregor, with an interim title on the line.
Considering the regrettable circumstances, this was about as good as matchmakers were going to do. And hey, it’s still pretty good.
Better, in fact, than seeing McGregor take on some lesser, hobbled version of Aldo.
Mendes will at least give the 26-year-old Irish phenom a taste of what competition is like at the elite levels of the UFC 145-pound division. Once this bout is over, we’ll likely have a much better idea if McGregor is anywhere near as good as he says he is. That’s something critics have been calling for since his UFC career began during the spring of 2013.
For his part, McGregor is not impressed, either by the current titlist’s decision to pull out or by his new opponent.
“I think Chad Mendes is a substitute, the B level,” he said, during a hastily organized conference call on Wednesday afternoon, via Bleacher Report’s Scott Harris. “He’s a wrestler with an overhand…It’s the McGregor division now.”
At the very least, you have to admire his optimism.
From early in his Octagon tenure, McGregor has been a special case. His natural charisma, effortless gift of gab and strong Irish following have made him nothing short of a revelation in the new UFC landscape, where bankable stars are suddenly few and far between.
Make no mistake, he hasn’t been too shabby inside the cage either. McGregor has done everything UFC brass has asked him to do so far—streaking to a 5-0 promotional record with four TKO finishes.
Yet his competition hasn’t exactly been championship level. At best, McGregor has jetted past a group of tough but unremarkable featherweight journeymen. At worst, he’s beaten up a bunch of carefully selected opponents, who all got the call because Zuffa executives believed they would make him look good.
How you feel about the work he’s done in the Octagon probably says more about how you feel about that matchmaking strategy and UFC ownership in general than what we actually know about McGregor as a fighter.
Fact is, we have no idea what he’s capable of just yet.
Obviously, it was McGregor’s marketability that truly paved the way to his title shot. The UFC looked at him in his designer suits, looked at Aldo’s six-year reign of terror at featherweight and saw dollar signs at the prospect of putting them together. Once the bout was on the docket, the two fighters did their part, engaging in a contentious feud painstakingly chronicled in what felt like a dozen UFC-produced documentaries.
Even as we thoroughly came to know McGregor’s penchant for getting under Aldo’s skin, however, his overall fitness as No. 1 contender remained a mystery. There was simply no way to look at him pummeling Dustin Poirier or getting taken down by Denis Siver and know how he was going to do against the greatest 145-pounder the world has ever known.
Now we’re going to have to wait a little longer to find out.
As far as litmus tests go, though, they don’t get much tougher than Mendes. The Team Alpha Male product comes into this fight on short notice but also as a fully known, universally accepted member of the featherweight elite. He’s 17-2 and his own UFC/WEC resume dates back more than five years. Both of his career losses are to Aldo, and he enters this fight just three months removed from stomping through former top contender Ricardo Lamas in two minutes, 45 seconds.
Mendes also arguably represents a tougher matchup of styles for McGregor than even Aldo. The champion was going to be a colossal leap up in quality of competition for McGregor, but at least his standup-oriented skill set would play to the challenger’s strengths.
Mendes is the exact opposite. He’s a lifelong grappler with typically impeccable cardio, explosive takedowns and the ability to end a fight once he gets it to the mat. McGregor has never fought anyone even remotely like him during his UFC run, either in terms of physical attributes or overall ability.
I see myself beating this guy three ways. I’m either going to knock him unconscious because he drops his hands a ton and gets lazy in there. I’m going to take him down and submit him because he gives up. Or I’m going to have him on his back crying for his mama for five five-minute rounds, beating the crap out of him. I’m good with all three of them.
As of this writing, Mendes is going off as a slight underdog, according to Odds Shark. Hard not to believe that stems partly from his status as a late-notice replacement and partly from the hype surrounding McGregor. If you stripped away the Irishman’s instant celebrity, surely Mendes would be the favorite, perhaps even by a prohibitive margin.
If McGregor can pass this test, there will be very little to nitpick about him. He’ll have fully made his bones in the 145-pound division and proved he hasn’t just been blowing smoke throughout his UFC career. That alone might be the most surprising outcome of all.
If Mendes beats him? It wouldn’t be a career-ending disaster, but for the time being it would validate critics who said he’d been prematurely boosted into a title shot. It would mean he’d have to win another fight or two before we even started to take him seriously again.
Either way, this weekend figures to provide some definitive answers on how to feel about McGregor moving forward.
That’s likely a lot better than we would’ve done had an injured Aldo stayed in the fight.
Conor McGregor—Nothing Compares 2 U.
The Irish MMA star has secured quite the guest to sing him into the Octagon for his UFC 189 fight with Chad Mendes on July 11.
None other than compatriot Sinead O’Connor.
O’Connor is of course best …
In mixed martial arts, there is little personal discovery to be found until the limits of a comfort zone are left behind. Adversity comes in many forms, and once the pressure is applied, the reality of what a fighter can and can’t handle comes front and center. And while every man will eventually stumble under the bright lights, the refusal to break forges something unique that can be used when needed.