MMA Thread

Chanur said:

Its got nothing to do with that and everything to do with having 2 hours to fill.

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Right, why would there be any reason to make sure someone is 100% mentally and physically dialed before they lock themselves into a cage with a person trying to kill them for a paycheck? What possible performance benefit could there be to having a strict schedule for these fighters to prepare for?

Maybe there's too much of a break in between fights, but then I'd ask how much of that is mandatory or prep for worst-case scenario. Judges need a break, commissionfolk need a break, last minute t's need crossing and i's need dotting. Just like boxing, sports that are rule-restricted violence shouldn't be too hasty.

Chanur said:

It would not be fair to change on the fly for sure. I think it has more to do with filling 2 hours though.

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Chanur said:

I edited while you were quoting i guess. I felt I was being a bit harsh. There are other violent sports where you have to be ready to go at any time once it starts though.

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Ya, the post I saw wasn't your final opinion.

I don't disagree that it's a complex formula that takes into account advertising/marketing dollars to a large degree. I'd make the same remark about every big American professional sports league (especially the NFL). There's a lot of attention given to what the media partner wants, rather than what's most exciting for fans.

MMA getting sanctioned by states includes a lot of safety protocols which are often times redundant and bureaucratic that might have more to do with insurance and lawyers than fighting, the sport, or what's best for the fan experience. If NJSAC were to get into the, say, Thai Kickboxing market, do you think fighters making millions of dollars as part of a billions-dollar company would fight "maybe at 4:30, maybe at 6:30, maybe at midnight, depending on knockouts?"

I'd like shorter breaks in between fights, but when there's a quick finish to a fight I prefer a long break to keep everyone on schedule because it gives fighters the best opportunity to be 100% ready which is what we all should want. The cost of 15 minutes of placating FSN is one that I've accepted.

Frankie Edgar v. Cub Swanson was much more dull than I expected. Didn't look like either guy was fighting for that title shot. Guys looked fit but older guys on short turnarounds, oh well.

Kudos for Barboza – he responded just like he did in the Khabib fight and kept trying, but Lee was able to exploit his weakness and mitigate the chance of getting knocked out himself. Barboza is an elite striker but, just like the Khabib fight, he could neither defend the take down nor help himself on the ground. Not sure he can make something out of his career beyond being a super dangerous #5 guy, but there's a lot of money in remaining who he is.

Lee looked good. Would not be upset seeing Lee vs. Alvarez for rights to fight Khabib. Kid is on the right track and is super young.

Gaethje needs to watch film on how Lee responded to getting rocked.

Edson just took way to hard of beating in the first round and never recovered. Was basically zombie mode the whole fight after that. Also am I the only one crazy enough to think that Lee could actually beat Khabib? I don't think his wrestling is as good as Khabib but I'd say it's pretty damn close, he would def make Khabib work, but Lee's stand up is way better.

To comment on the debate about Tony Ferguson weight from earlier.. I really don't see why it's a stretch to think he could be pushing 200lbs or even close. I'm pretty sure Dustin Poirier showed a picture of him on the scale when he was fighting at FW and moving back up to LW and he was almost 190 lbs. Same with Cub Swanson, posted a pic a few days after a fight he had and scale said 180 something. Hell even Max Holloway was supposedly 185 lbs when he flew in to fight Khabib. These guys cut insane amount of weight and I have no idea how they do it much less put a lot of that weight back on the night of fight, it's crazy.

It's also one of the things that really impresses me with McGregor tbh. It's obvious he barely walks around about 170 considering he didn't even hit the 170 mark on both Diaz fights. He even accidently slipped and said it on their first fight that he was eating and eating and still wasn't on weight. Probably explains why he looked like absolute death at 145 even though there is clearly bigger guys at 145 that don't look nearly as bad when they cut there. Dude just has practically no body fat and all lean muscle so he was literally sucking every last bit of water out of him to make 145.

from last year, tony said he gets up to 205 on one of chael's podcasts
and this from Luke Thomas show came out guess around the same time.
remember there was almost a 50/50 split of people thinking it was bs.

to me sounds like he is talking about 10+ weeks out from a fight

=

missed most of the early part card last night, but they used to repeat pre-lims fights
when they had a lot of dead time.
guess they just want to cram most ads in now.

Aren't fighers who didn't make weight like 10-1 in the last 11 fights? Seems to be an obvious advantage

edit:
They might just be on a good run as of recently. Someone did a breakdown in March. Looks like if you take the current streak out of the equation, it's usually a bit of a wash

How Do UFC Fighters Who Miss Weight Perform?

Its 5-0 for fighters who didn't make weight in 2018. That data set is incomplete as well. Why was the reason for the missed weight, by how much, and who was fighting? Yoel Romero very likely had an advantage over Luke Rockhold for missing weight, but missing weight is much less relevant out of the top 10 where skill can be a bigger factor in the equation ( 25 yo rising star vs 35 yo can). People are also cutting more weight in recent years, so the last little bit can affect performance. Frankie was a 3x defending LW champion, and he looked like a midget against Ortega at featherweight. I'm not saying there must have been a definite advantage with Lee, and we will never know, so fighters need to punish other fighters who don't make weight. This is to level the playing field.

Some guys are just better, regardless if they miss weight or not. I don't see Rockhold beating Romero on any planet. I didn't really see Barboza beating Lee either. I guess the better guy sometimes weighs more than he's suppose to. If it's only a pound or 2 and the other opponent is good with it then that should be the end of the story. It didn't work out so well for Al Iaquinta. Issues with weight when it's that close don't really make much difference at the very top level and I'm not sure how much of a difference 2-3 pounds makes in the grand scheme of things.

Hoss said:

The prelim where they called it a KO after time expired was bullshit (can't remember the names). Dude was getting up and the doctors shoved him back to the mat. How do you call that a KO? Even if he did go out after the fight was over (which is the only thing that makes any sense) it was probably because of the doctors shoving him back to the mat. I mean, he was probably losing the decision either way, but that was horeshit.

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I am with you on the controversial ruling. The ref was as well-positioned as he could have been an made the judgment call to let the fight continue. I don't know what rules allow commission to declare a fighter knocked out only after the bell has been rung. It was a thrilling end to a fight that Simon was losing until he pulled off that win after the bell and doctor's evaluation.

I don't understand the rule that allows them to do that and I don't like the precedent. The ref made a judgment call to allow the fight to continue and understood the fighter to still be conscious. Perhaps the ref was wrong and made a bad call, but I'm ok with that. A 15:00 submission declared by doctors after the fact. When there's that much grey area, respect to the fighter for sticking in there and he deserved the benefit of the doubt.

calhoonjugganaut said:

Some guys are just better, regardless if they miss weight or not. I don't see Rockhold beating Romero on any planet. I didn't really see Barboza beating Lee either. I guess the better guy sometimes weighs more than he's suppose to. If it's only a pound or 2 and the other opponent is good with it then that should be the end of the story. It didn't work out so well for Al Iaquinta. Issues with weight when it's that close don't really make much difference at the very top level and I'm not sure how much of a difference 2-3 pounds makes in the grand scheme of things.

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Agree. A "catchweight" that's a few pounds over the advertised weight, when commissions already give these guys a pound, whatever. Punish them financially, because the guy who made weight has the right to walk away and both fighters (and the UFC and the commission) lose a lot of money. If the two people locking themselves into that cage agree on terms (with the blessing of commission and UFC), then that's that.

Bellator trying to step up their promo game. I kind of like it. Not same caliber as UFC but still pretty good and worth watching.

Shano said:

Edson just took way to hard of beating in the first round and never recovered. Was basically zombie mode the whole fight after that. Also am I the only one crazy enough to think that Lee could actually beat Khabib? I don't think his wrestling is as good as Khabib but I'd say it's pretty damn close, he would def make Khabib work, but Lee's stand up is way better.

To comment on the debate about Tony Ferguson weight from earlier.. I really don't see why it's a stretch to think he could be pushing 200lbs or even close. I'm pretty sure Dustin Poirier showed a picture of him on the scale when he was fighting at FW and moving back up to LW and he was almost 190 lbs. Same with Cub Swanson, posted a pic a few days after a fight he had and scale said 180 something. Hell even Max Holloway was supposedly 185 lbs when he flew in to fight Khabib. These guys cut insane amount of weight and I have no idea how they do it much less put a lot of that weight back on the night of fight, it's crazy.

It's also one of the things that really impresses me with McGregor tbh. It's obvious he barely walks around about 170 considering he didn't even hit the 170 mark on both Diaz fights. He even accidently slipped and said it on their first fight that he was eating and eating and still wasn't on weight. Probably explains why he looked like absolute death at 145 even though there is clearly bigger guys at 145 that don't look nearly as bad when they cut there. Dude just has practically no body fat and all lean muscle so he was literally sucking every last bit of water out of him to make 145.

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Tony's so much bigger than Max, and Max walking around at 185 isn't far-fetched.

Lee hasn't displayed wrestling skills in the same league as Khabib. Lee is good enough to dominate guys in a similar fashion as Khabib, but that's more telling about how little wrestling defense guys have where the difference in skill is not apparent. If the average person were to roll with a black belt in BJJ and then a purple belt, they'd get clowned all the same. Same shit here. Lee is an excellent all-around fighter, but he's not the all-world indefensible bear mauler that Khabib is.

Conor was also much younger (and smaller) for Diaz 1. His body has changed a lot since then.

The Dauntless One said:

Its 5-0 for fighters who didn't make weight in 2018. That data set is incomplete as well. Why was the reason for the missed weight, by how much, and who was fighting? Yoel Romero very likely had an advantage over Luke Rockhold for missing weight, but missing weight is much less relevant out of the top 10 where skill can be a bigger factor in the equation ( 25 yo rising star vs 35 yo can). People are also cutting more weight in recent years, so the last little bit can affect performance. Frankie was a 3x defending LW champion, and he looked like a midget against Ortega at featherweight. I'm not saying there must have been a definite advantage with Lee, and we will never know, so fighters need to punish other fighters who don't make weight. This is to level the playing field.

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Why do you think lighter fighters (who make weight) keep accepting these bouts if their odds are so poor? These guys know how they feel after these massive weight cuts much more than we do arm-chair discussing it.

I think it's a combination of fear of losing their paycheck (fight camps aren't cheap and aren't fun), worry about if they could recover for a quick turnaround even if one could be scheduled (can they extend their camp for 2-3 weeks and still get paid just as much, so it's only an added cost?), superman complex (I could beat that guy no matter how much he weighs), and the additional compensation for additional risk (guaranteeing an extra 20% payday even if you lose is hard to turn down).

Depending on why you think these fights go on and how significant you deem the advantage to be – would you propose any solution that isn't already in place?

Hoss said:

You thought he was winning if he didn't get KOd after the fact? IIRC my personal score card had him winning 1 round. I wouldn't have been surprised if he'd won, but the other guy seemed more likely to get the decision.

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Yeah I thought Simon saved himself when he got that "finish." I had it 2-1. As Dana likes to say, never leave it up to an opinion because you never know what's on those score cards.

calhoonjugganaut said:

Some guys are just better, regardless if they miss weight or not. I don't see Rockhold beating Romero on any planet. I didn't really see Barboza beating Lee either. I guess the better guy sometimes weighs more than he's suppose to. If it's only a pound or 2 and the other opponent is good with it then that should be the end of the story. It didn't work out so well for Al Iaquinta. Issues with weight when it's that close don't really make much difference at the very top level and I'm not sure how much of a difference 2-3 pounds makes in the grand scheme of things.

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Weren't you also the one that said Jon Jones would have been just as good without steroids? You're out of your mind if you don't think a few pounds make a difference. That's few pounds of water weight, which translate to 500-1000+ ml of water. And on the contrary, it matters more on the top level than lower level where the skill gap becomes much smaller. Severe dehydration can cause a lot of symptoms that would affect a fighter. It's real, and can kill you. Just ask Uriah Hall (he's never missed weight in any fight other than that time he went to the hospital and almost died). Also, Iaquinta made weight for his own fight. It was also 0.2 pounds, not 2-3 pounds.

That was me. I definitely said that and a lot of the guys that Jon has faced has said the same thing. I was mainly referring to skill level but the topic was weight cutting and I said what I said and stand by it. Really it seems like a way to kind of get around the system if you do feel a lot better not shedding 2-3 pounds and sacrificing 20% of your check. The amount of money these guys make though doesn't make me think that's what's going on. The Uriah Hall reference is cool and all but he doesn't win many fights when his opponent is on weight either. I know my opinion may not be popular but it's really not that big of a deal to me.