UFC 189 delivered what could be considered the greatest main card in UFC history.
All five fights were special in their own way, and on another night any of them could have won Fight of the Night. We were treated to a special night all the way around. …
UFC 189 delivered what could be considered the greatest main card in UFC history.
All five fights were special in their own way, and on another night any of them could have won Fight of the Night. We were treated to a special night all the way around. The UFC updated its presentation and had live walk-out music for the main event, and every main card athlete brought it.
It was a great night.
Las Vegas was buzzing with Irish pride throughout the evening, and the raucous crowd elevated the special feeling of the crowd.
How can one possibly put a grade on their performances? Well, I am here to try. It is a difficult task to break down these performances and reduce them to a single letter.
Regardless, here are the grades for every fighter on the main card.
Ladies and gentleman, give it up for Conor McGregor. His victory against Chad Mendes on Saturday has ensured big business for the UFC in the future.
At UFC 189, McGregor answered questions about how he would fare against a wrestler by blitzing Men…
Ladies and gentleman, give it up for Conor McGregor. His victory against Chad Mendes on Saturday has ensured big business for the UFC in the future.
At UFC 189, McGregor answered questions about how he would fare against a wrestler by blitzing Mendes with a late second-round stoppage from strikes. It earned the Irishman, who fought in front of a Las Vegas crowd filled with feisty Irish fans, the interim featherweight title and seemingly brings him to the biggest fight of his career.
It may also be the biggest fight in the history of the UFC, let alone McGregor’s career.
Yes, you read that correctly. Aldo versus McGregor is the biggest fight in the history of the UFC. You take arguably the most dominant champion in the UFC in Aldo, who has not really been a great box office draw, and put him up against McGregor, a box office attraction with tons of heat behind him, mainstream appeal and the personality to make extra pay-per-view sales.
You may be disputing that this will be the biggest fight in UFC history, but take this walk with me. There are plenty of reasons why this will be.
First off, the UFC has already invested heavily into this match in terms of monetary output. The build up to this fight saw no expense spared, from a world tour to massive amounts of advertising.
The UFC knows this is an easy fight to promote because of the animosity and power of McGregor’s words. The Irishman is a star that is rapidly ascending into the mainstream.
Not only that, but Aldo’s exit from UFC 189 and his consequent replacement, Mendes, should have seen UFC take a major hit in terms of traffic and buys. However, live attendance was still incredible, and you can guarantee the number of buys on this card will be impressive.
And that is with Mendes, who is not as marketable as Aldo, especially when combined with McGregor.
That’s where the Aldo injury debacle comes in. It deprived us of the main event we truly desired and will undoubtedly be used in the buildup to the eventual throwdown.
There have been questions on the validity of the injury and whether Aldo could have fought. As negative as that can be perceived, it does add interest to the fight, which will obviously be used to build up the pay-per-view.
Then, there’s the issue of two belts right now. Aldo is the champion; McGregor is the interim champion. That makes this an even easier sell to the public.
Add to the insane fanbase in each man’s corner. McGregor has his Irish contingent, who we have seen are a rowdy bunch of people reminiscent of old-school soccer hooligans. It’s refreshing yet rambunctious.
Then you have Aldo, backed by the emotional and passionate Brazilian fans who are just as nuts as the Irish. The dueling chants, national anticipation and sheer insanity will make the main event even more successful.
This will be in Las Vegas. People will fly in from all over the world to spectate this matchup.
It will be built up, talked about and speculated on from now until it finally happens. That will lead to a massive gate, huge pay-per-view numbers and a spot in the history book as the biggest fight in UFC history.
Conor McGregor put his money where his mouth is, backing up his characteristic trash talk and showboating by knocking out Chad Mendes Saturday night late in the second round of UFC 189 to win the interim featherweight title.
Despite spending most of th…
ConorMcGregor put his money where his mouth is, backing up his characteristic trash talk and showboating by knocking out Chad Mendes Saturday night late in the second round of UFC 189 to win the interim featherweight title.
Despite spending most of the second and final round on his back, the swift-moving Irishman slipped out of a submission attempt with just seconds left in the round. The accumulation of blows that Mendes sustained throughout the opening nine minutes inevitably wore him down, as he left himself open for a brutal left hook.
Referee Herb Dean stepped in to end the fight as McGregor pounced on his back, finally setting into motion a long-awaited reign of the 26-year-old phenom atop the featherweight division. He obviously still has titleholder Jose Aldo to face, but his hype was validated Saturday in a way it never has been before.
Let’s take a look at the biggest talking points and storylines brewing from the end of UFC 189.
Wrestler? No Problem, Sort of
For all of the dominance of McGregor over the years that now includes 14 straight victories and 16 of 18 wins by knockout, he’s maintained one blemish on his resume—he’s virtually never taken down a fighter who can truly punish McGregor on the ground.
And for the majority of Saturday’s bout, there remained reason to question the Irishman. McGregor landed well in the opening round, but he got taken down early in Round 2 and spent almost the whole round fighting off Mendes‘ powerful strikes and elbows off his back.
When standing, McGregor utilized his reach advantage to punish Mendes with body shots and head kicks. On the ground was more of a survival test, but he inevitably proved himself in the end, as MMAFighting.com noted:
It ended in triumph, but Saturday was expected to be McGregor‘s toughest test of his career in fighting a brutally powerful striker with innate ground ability. It turned out to be just that, as Mendes landed big hits on McGregor in ground-and-pound and made it look like the Irishman would have to sweat out a Round 2 bell.
Although he got back on his feet to end the fight, worrying signs cropped up in his ground game as MMAFighting.com’s Luke Thomas noted:
That being said, getting into tough situations on the ground is all about minimizing the damage and escaping the position. When it comes down to it, McGregor did that, eating Mendes‘ elbows and finding the ability to wear down his opponent at the same time.
When they got back on their feet after minutes of ground work, somehow McGregor emerged as the one capable of ending the fight despite spending the entire round on his back. Regardless of how it got there, that’s a tribute to his greatness.
Mendes Running on Fumes
Take a star-studded bout between one fighter with an eight-inch reach advantage and pair him up against a much shorter, muscular wrestling type, and stamina would figure to make a big impact—especially as the fight wears along. After that, take the second fighter and give him just two weeks of preparation time.
Then, throw in the crazy demeanor and style of McGregor as his opponent. Suffice to say, Mendes had his hands full (literally) dealing with the accumulation of those disadvantages.
The American attacked well on the front foot early, but his defense struggled from the onset as he left himself susceptible to strong body blows and occasional jabs. McGregor found the area where he could punish Mendes without much retaliation, and it ended up wearing down the opponent rather quickly.
After Mendes jostled with him on the ground for four minutes and had a submission attempt stuffed, he got on his feet visibly gassed. And it may have been in no small part due to the short turnaround, as Bill Barnwell of Grantland noted:
Of course, the lack of preparation time wasn’t the only thing holding Mendes back from taking down McGregor. His exhaustion didn’t come by accident, as McGregor constantly attacked his body and got better at preventing the takedowns, as MMATorch.com noted:
Mendes‘ ability to put his best foot forward against the very best fighters in the featherweight division has undoubtedly proven his place near the top, but lately that conversation has also started with McGregor‘s name.
He may have nearly taken McGregor down throughout stretches of Saturday’s fight, but by the end of the night, the distance between the two fighters seemed much larger than that.
Who’s Next?
When the headline act of UFC 189 took on a major change just two weeks before the fight, it became apparent that the fight that everyone had been waiting for would have to wait. But after Saturday’s result, it appears to be back on.
While the match between McGregor and current titleholder Aldo was canceled due to a rib injury that the champion picked up in sparring, Mendes filled in to keep the fight going, still with great anticipation. But the wrestling expert couldn’t make it happen on short rest, and McGregor defended his win streak.
That means arguably the biggest event in UFC history will be on the cards very soon, as MMAFighting.com noted:
As tends to be the case in marketable fights, the media had no issue asking McGregor over and over about the impending matchup with Aldo. He made his opinion clear that Aldo should have still stepped into the Octagon, and he left no doubt that it was his night, per Ariel Helwani of Fox Sports:
Of course, there also remain dangerous featherweight contenders more than hungry to have a shot at McGregor and the title. A bout with Aldo is no sure thing due to his injury issues, which prompted the thought of a bout between McGregor and Frankie Edgar.
The No. 2-ranked featherweight fighter is the only one not named Aldo and Mendes whom McGregor trails in the rankings, and he got up close and personal with McGregor in the minutes after the fight, per USA Today:
There are options out there for McGregor to prove his worth next in the featherweight class, but it’s no secret that Aldo will be the guy if he’s able. After all, he’s the only featherweight champion that the UFC has ever seen, at least if you don’t count McGregor‘s interim tag.
But now that McGregor has at least a share of the title and virtually all of the hype in the division, one can bet he’ll get his chance to hoist the real belt.
On Saturday night, one of the biggest pay-per-views in UFC history went down in Las Vegas and featured one of the biggest stars in the UFC. That man is Conor McGregor.
McGregor, a showman with a penchant for pre-fight trash talk, in-cage antics and foc…
On Saturday night, one of the biggest pay-per-views in UFC history went down in Las Vegas and featured one of the biggest stars in the UFC. That man is ConorMcGregor.
McGregor, a showman with a penchant for pre-fight trash talk, in-cage antics and focused intensity, took on the biggest challenge of his career. That challenge came in the form of Chad Mendes.
Mendes, who filled in for UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo, represented the one thing McGregor had not been tested by in the UFC: a wrestler.
Fans criticized the “tailor-made” matchups the UFC gave to McGregor by only having him take on strikers. After all, McGregor is a striker himself and a cash cow that the UFC wants to milk for all the money it can. So, what we got in UFC 189‘s main event was not only an interim featherweight belt up for grabs but a test of McGregor vs. his supposed weakness of wrestling.
What ensued was a mix that has left us even more confused, but one thing is certain: McGregor‘s body striking made the difference in taking home the victory and interim UFC Featherweight Championship.
Coming into this fight, Mendes—who only had about two weeks’ notice for the bout—held the perceived advantage because of his wrestling. Everyone knew, though, that if McGregor could weather the storm, Mendes could gas out.
Instead of going into deep waters, McGregor gassed out Mendes with force.
Throughout the two-round affair, McGregor constantly went to the body with kicks and punches. After a few shots to the ribs, chest and stomach in the first round, Mendes was visibly uncomfortable with what was transpiring.
That’s when he started looking for the takedown more often.
However, if he got McGregor down, the Irishman would eventually get back up and continue his body assault. The more he nailed Mendes with body shots, the slower and more plodding Mendes became.
Then came the end of the fight. Once McGregor escaped the mat war with Mendes, he got up. Mendes, exhausted from the excessive body work that McGregor put in, looked as if he just ran a marathon. That allowed McGregor to stun him with a punch and finish the gassed American before the bell could sound for Round 3.
Body shots have become a lost art, especially in MMA. Fighters who do utilize body work oftentimes are successful, as body shots undoubtedly mount punishment and start moving the opponent’s needle more toward the empty side of the gas tank.
BasRutten was a master of this. There was a gigantic target on his opponent’s liver and he had no problem gunning for it whenever he pleased.
If I have said this once, I have said it a thousand times in conversing about fights: I would rather get punched in the head than take a socking to the liver or stomach. It’s that simple. It simply hurts so much more to have your body rattled.
And that’s what happened to Mendes. He was constantly punched and kicked in the body, which brought pain and fatigue.
Body work was quite possibly the difference between McGregor finishing the bout in Round 2 or potentially taking more punishment on the ground for the rest of the fight.
On a UFC 189 fight card that at times felt like a flying leap into MMA’s future, Robbie Lawler served up an old-school slugfest in the evening’s co-main event.
It turns out you can drape Lawler in his brand new Reebok “champion’…
On a UFC 189 fight card that at times felt like a flying leap into MMA’s future, Robbie Lawler served up an old-school slugfest in the evening’s co-main event.
It turns out you can drape Lawler in his brand new Reebok “champion’s kit,” overhaul the pay-per-view broadcast with fancy retooled graphics and summon some technological wizardry to project hype videos on the actual floor of the Octagon, but the UFC welterweight champion is still going to do what he’s been doing since he was 19 years old.
Now 33, he just does it better than ever.
Lawler shifted through a number of familiar gears during the 21 minutes he spent in the cage with Rory MacDonald on Saturday night. He went from laid back to deadly serious and back again as the two put on a brawl that lifted an already stellar PPV.
In the middle, Lawler almost—but not quite—gave it away, before recovering and scoring a TKO victory early in the final round.
When it was over, he left MacDonald crumpled and defeated from a badly broken nose. Lawler stood in the center of the cage, spattered in blood and screaming from the ecstasy of successfully defending his 170-pound title for the first time.
So, pretty much vintage Lawler.
“That was the accumulation of a beatdown!” he hollered about the fight’s final sequence, when UFC color commentator Joe Rogan asked him about it immediately afterward. “That wasn’t one punch, that was years of fighting coming to fruition. I’m the champ! I’m here to stay!”
It was a modus operandi that should be well-known to hardcore MMA fans by now. They’ve only been watching Lawler do it since about 2002.
His turnaround from a rough stretch during 2010 to 2011 where he went 1-3 in the Strikeforce middleweight division has been nothing short of remarkable. Lawler’s drop to welterweight, his move to Florida’s American Top Team and a revamped training regimen have all conspired to give us one of the more miraculous late-career resurgences in UFC history.
There is an old adage in the fight game that says you’re not really a champion until you successfully defend your title. By that measure—or any—Lawler is now the new standard bearer in a weight class that unexpectedly lost dominant champion Georges St-Pierre to retirement near the end of 2013.
It was both exhilarating and sobering to watch what Lawler and MacDonald did to each other in this fight. Both men turned in inspired performances, but as MMAFighting.com’s Chuck Mindenhall succinctly noted, it was the sort of bloody slobberknocker that served as a stark reminder of their own mortality:
Like their first fight at UFC 167, Lawler started slowly. He came out of his corner stalking MacDonald around the cage like a man who knew full well he’d see the championship rounds. MacDonald scored early with a series of body kicks, though for the most part Lawler appeared to steer clear of his more dangerous combinations and easily sprawled out of the challenger’s takedown attempts.
Lawler didn’t visibly loosen up until late in the second round, but when he did, he firmly took control. His jabs started to snap the 25-year-old Canadian’s head back. His fluid punching combinations methodically turned MacDonald’s face to hamburger, and down the stretch in the stanza Lawler may have broken the Red King’s nose.
That momentum built into the third round, but just when it seemed as though the champion would tuck this bout into his back pocket, MacDonald stunned him with a high kick. He followed up with a flurry of punches and knees that had Lawler badly wobbled. Even as he assured referee John McCarthy he was OK and gestured defiantly to the crowd, Lawler could be seen stumbling back to his corner.
MacDonald turned up the volume on the head kicks in the fourth and again seemed to have the champion on the ropes. Lawler’s lip was gashed on the right side, and blood trickled under one eye. Somehow, though, he survived, stuffing MacDonald’s takedown attempts and returning fire, even though his strikes now lacked the snap of earlier in the fight.
The fourth round ended with both men battered, standing in the center of the cage and staring into each other’s eyes until the referee and one of Lawler’s cutmen dragged them both away. Early boos from the largely Irish crowd—which had come to cheer Conor McGregor to victory in the main event—had turned to cheers.
The fight looked up for grabs heading into the final round. Early in the stanza, however, Lawler landed a straight left flush to the middle of MacDonald’s face. If his nose was already broken, that punch completely smashed it. The Canadian immediately clutched his face and fell to the canvas, as McCarthy moved in to halt the action.
When the scorecards were revealed after the fact, it turned out MacDonald was leading 39-37 on all three. But for the fifth time in Lawler’s last 10 fights, he did not need the judges.
“I feel great,” a battered Lawler told UFC interviewer Megan Olivi backstage a few minutes after the fight ended. “I’m just glad the crowd could enjoy the true warrior spirit that I imposed on him and I’m just glad I got a knockout.”
For obvious reasons, neither he nor MacDonald made it to the post-fight press conference, though they did have time for a candid, “no hard feelings” photo op at the hospital:
Lawler continues to be one of the UFC’s more enduring puzzles. He has now won four fights in a row and is 7-1 since returning to the UFC in 2013. Yet his uncanny ability to get himself into these sorts of close, hotly contested slugfests makes it unclear how long he’ll hold onto the belt St. Pierre vacated nearly two years ago.
Lawler has now beaten MacDonald—ranked No. 2 in the division and a guy who was pushed as GSP’s heir apparent for years—twice, and he defeated No. 5 Matt Brown less than a year ago.
Yet the champ sits 1-1 against former titlist and No. 1 contender Johny Hendricks. Both of their previous bouts were crowd-pleasing, back-and-forth battles, and a third fight between them is likely not far away.
Fourth-ranked Carlos Condit also returned from a long injury sabbatical and defeated Thiago Alves in May. Tyron Woodley (No. 3) hasn’t fought since January but is still waiting in the wings.
Clearly, there will be no shortage of competition for Lawler’s title moving forward.
On this night, though, he proved that a better-than-ever Lawler can still turn back the clock on a new-look UFC.
If you watched the build-up to UFC 189, you would have thought the only fight on the card was Conor McGregor vs. Chad Mendes. It was undoubtedly, the biggest fight on the card, and it attracted droves of fans.
The co-main event was a welterweight title…
If you watched the build-up to UFC 189, you would have thought the only fight on the card was ConorMcGregor vs. Chad Mendes. It was undoubtedly, the biggest fight on the card, and it attracted droves of fans.
The co-main event was a welterweight title defense. Despite the magnitude of the title fight, it still played second fiddle to McGregor-Mendes.
When it came to excitement and the quality of the fight, though, Robbie Lawler vs. Rory MacDonald was second to none.
Lawler and MacDonald went to war in their five-round affair, taking home a $50,000 bonus for putting on the Fight of the Night. In a night filled with great affairs, Lawler and MacDonald’s efforts earned them a paycheck for being the best.
In fact, one could assert that the co-main event of UFC 189 was the Fight of the Year.
Not only was it a five-round fight, but the finish came in the final round. The judges were not needed to decide the paper-thin decision, Lawler took the bout with a pinpoint punch that exploded the nose of a dazed MacDonald, ending the bloody affair as violently as it started.
What’s funny about the fight is that it started off in mild fashion. The first round was nothing to write home about, but once both men came out for the second round, things changed drastically.
Over the next four rounds, it turned into a Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots fight that saw blood, sweat and tears aplenty.
MacDonald rocked Lawler. Lawler rocked MacDonald.
Both men were dropped. When all was said and done, both looked like the survivors of a slasher film and wore it proudly on their faces.
What’s even more impressive about it being the best fight of the year thus far is that the bout that preceded it, Jeremy Stephens vs. Dennis Bermudez, looked like a lock for Fight of the Night and a contender for Fight of the Year.
That’s how impressive Lawler-MacDonald was.
Consider the other top contenders for Fight of the Year right now, and Lawler-MacDonald blows all of them out of the water.
Andrei Arlovski-Travis Browne was amazing and highly entertaining, but it only lasted one round before Arlovski ended it. It will easily win Round of the Year.
Then there’s Brian Ortega-Thiago Tavares, which was also an absolute gem. However, as good as it was, it can’t hold a candle to MacDonald-Lawler.
An amazing UFC 189 was made 100 times better by this incredible showing from two warriors. Although MacDonald was the loser in the record books, nobody really lost in retrospect.
Ladies and gentleman, give it up for Conor McGregor. His victory against Chad Mendes on Saturday has ensured big business for the UFC in the future.