UFC 101: Declaration

[Built Ford Tough]

http://www.irishvillage.ca/uploads/ufc%20101%20poster.jpg

 

Anybody else plan on watching this on Saturday? The card is (my winners in bold):

 

Main Card:

 

BJ Penn vs. Kenny Florian - 3rd round TKO

Anderson Silva vs. Forrest Griffin - 2nd round KO

Amir Sadolah vs. Johny Hedricks - Unanimous Decision

Kendall Grove vs. Ricardo Almeida - 3rd round Sub

Josh Neer vs. Kurt Pellegrino - Split Decision[/]

 

Under Card:

 

Shane Nelson Vs. Aaron Riley

Tamdan McCrory Vs. John Howard

Thales Leites Vs. Alessio Sakara

Matthew Riddle Vs. Dan Cramer

George Sotiropoulos Vs. George Roop

Jesse Lennox Vs. Danillo Villefort

 

(No predictions for the Under Card because I only know Leites and Sakara, haven't even heard of any of the others lol)

 

I want Griffin to beat Silva, but I just don't see it happening. Silva is just too technical, accurate, percise and dangerous on the feet for Forrest and I don't think that he has a good enough ground game to do any serious damage to Silva. His only real hope is to grind out a decision or catch Silva on the feet, which I find highly unlikely. If Forrest decides to try and stand with Silva I think that we are going to see a brilliant striking display and a KO from Silva. Griffin is a brawler and can take a punch, but Silva is elite on the feet. Hopefully it proves to be an exciting fight and Griffin is able to score an upset.

 

I expect Penn to come out and absolutely dominate Florian. If all of the stuff I have been hearing about how Penn is training his [expletive] off, is in the best shape of his life and all of the other stuff like that, is true I expect a very dominant performance from Penn. Kenny is a good fighter and very dangerous, but I don't think that he is on BJ's level. BJ is the better wrestler, grappler, boxer, BJJ and has more big fight experience while Kenny has better kicks, elbows and Muay Thai. If Penn comes out fired up and looking to bounce back after that devestating lose to GSP, Ken-Flo is in for a long night.

 

Aside from the Main Event and Co-Main Event, this card is terrible. I wouldn't even consider it to be Ultimate Fight Night worthy. This is definitely a very underwhelming card in my opinion and aside from the two main events, I couldn't care less about it.

 

I'll still be watching regardless though.

Edited August 6, 2009 by Built Ford Tough

[Real Deal]

Griffin is going to taste a hell of a knee. For some reason, I see it happening, first or second round.

 

Forrest has been doubted before, big underdog, and came out on top...but man, I just don't see him taking out Silva.

 

As for BJ Penn, never liked him, and I'll be rooting for Florian. I just don't know about that fight, either, because Penn is out for blood, and I do believe he'll come out ready to tear Kenny apart. Hope not, but it's very possible it won't even be a contest.

[La Bomba]

Some MMA blogers I've been looking at say a Griffin upset is unlikely, but possible. Personally I don't think Griffin will win but I think he is the one fighter who has the biggest possiblity of beating Silva.

[Built Ford Tough]

Some MMA blogers I've been looking at say a Griffin upset is unlikely, but possible. Personally I don't think Griffin will win but I think he is the one fighter who has the biggest possiblity of beating Silva.

 

Well anything is possible in an MMA fight. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, was giving Matt Serra a shot in hell at beating Georges St. Pierre in their first fight but he managed to stop GSP in the first round. That just goes to show that anything can happen.

 

Honestly though, I don't think that Griffin has much of a shot at all at beating Silva. I think that if he does manage to beat Silva it will be from a lucky punch (and Forrest doesn't have real dangerous KO power in his hands) or he will catch him in a submission or something. Or if Silva comes unmotivated and just [expletive]s around like he has done in his last 2 fights against Cote and Leites. If Silva is on his game and focused, as much as I hate to say it, I don't think Forrest stands much of a chance at all.

 

Forrest has been the heavy underdog against Shogun and Rampage, but he managed to beat both of them (although I still think that Rampage won that decision, but that is neither here nor there) and who knows, he might just rise to the occasion again.

 

The person that I think stands the best chance at beating Silva is Dan Henderson. Yes, I know they have already fought and Silva beat Hendo in the second round by a Rear Naked Choke, but what a lot of people forget is that Hendo definitively won the first round of that fight and looked really, really good against Silva. The problem was that Hendo had a really bad weight cut going into that fight and he gassed badly in the second round and Silva capatilized. When Hendo gets his rematch, I think that he has a very good shot at knocking off the 185 king as long as he just continously takes Silva down and uses his Olympic level wrestling. Hendo is a world class wrestler and has dynamite in his hands and if he is able to control Silva up against the catch and get dominant position on him, I think that he would have a terrific chance at either finishing him, or grinding out a decision.

 

Stylistically, I think that Hendo is the best bet to knock off Silva and looked really great in the first round of their last fight. Since their fight, Hendo has not had any trouble cutting weight prior to his fights and as a result his cardio is up to the level where it needs to be. A fully healthy, full gas tank Hendo is my best bet to knock of Silva.

Edited August 6, 2009 by Built Ford Tough

[Built Ford Tough]

BJ Penn still apperantly has GSP on his mind and is not focusing on Kenny Florian heading into their fight on Saturday. Apperantly BJ thinks that GSP used roids in their fight.

 

Penn said he believes St. Pierre uses steroids, though he concedes he has no proof. St. Pierre is arguably the sport’s most popular fighter and Penn knows that making such allegations isn’t going to win him any friends.

 

Penn, though, isn’t the type to be shy about offering his opinion though it may be unpopular.

 

"It’s just my opinion that he uses steroids," Penn said. "That’s it. My opinion. I do believe it. I can’t hand you any proof, but that’s my opinion."

 

Source

 

Its things like these that make me lose respect for BJ. I mean the fight happened a nearly a year ago and you are still obsessing over it? The guy has all of the talent in the world and may be the most natrually talented fighter ever, but he is mentally weak. It is obvious that GSP is still inside of Penn's head.

 

As you can tell from my post above, I thought that Penn would walk right through Kenny, but if Penn doesn't focus on Florian, we just may see an upset. He needs to stop worrying about what GSP is doing and worry about defending his LW belt this Saturday or we will see a new Champion.

 

Hopefully this is just media fabricated or something because I want to see a fully trained and mentally prepared Penn fight because he is such a talented fighter, but I just don't see the media making something like this up or even twisting Penn's words around because it would be very dangerous on their behalf.

Edited August 6, 2009 by Built Ford Tough

[bigdog17k]

Don't like Penn. I'd like to see him lose. Silva/Griffin is going to be interesting, I can't pick either.

[Force]

Griffin was pathetic...Silva<3 rocked his [expletive].

 

Is if true that Griffin was having some problems hearing and might go deaf on one ear? sucks if its true

[Karl Malone]

Griffin was pathetic...Silva<3 rocked his [expletive].

 

Is if true that Griffin was having some problems hearing and might go deaf on one ear? sucks if its true

 

Idk, but his ears are [expletive]ed up so it could be true. Thats what happens when you're an MMA fighter.

 

But Silva was toying with Griffin the last minute of the fight, he was dominant.

[Built Ford Tough]

Griffin was pathetic...Silva<3 rocked his [expletive].

 

Is if true that Griffin was having some problems hearing and might go deaf on one ear? sucks if its true

 

No thats not true. There were some rumors going around that Forrest had a dislocated jaw and lost hearing in one of his ears and that is why he ran out of the octagon like that, but they were denied and reported as false.

 

And I knew that Griffin would get worked over, but I didn't expect it to be that bad. I mean Silva looked like he was fighting an amutear out there. I mean just look at some of these gifs:

 

http://i87.photobucket.com/albums/k128/Zombles/2hgcns8.gif

 

This is probably the slickest display of boxing that I have ever seen in an MMA fight. He is just dancing around with his hands at his hips and dodging everything Forrest threw at him.

 

http://i30.tinypic.com/s5ixp0.gif

 

Then he does it yet again here and knocks Griffin down for the third time in the fight and Griffin was just done at this point.

 

Honestly though, the UFC was throwing Forrest into the slaughter house last night. The guy has tons of heart and balls, but stylistically, Forrest had no chance in hell. He is not a technical fighter, is an in your face brawler type of striker, has a suspect chin and has poor recovery time after being rocked. This is tailor made for a counter striker like Anderson Silva and it came as no surprise when Forrest got absolutely wrecked.

 

I wouldn't say that he is pathetic either because Griffin is a very good fighter. Its just guys like Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, Georges St. Pierre, Fedor Emelianenko and BJ Penn all make their opponents look pathetic because they are such dominating Champions (Lesnar needs one or two more dominant performances like he had at 100 before I throw him in that list, but most likely he will be there too). I mean Silva completely embarassed Rich Franklin two times and he is one of the best Middleweights the UFC has ever had and was considered almost unbeatable heading into their first fight. Lyoto has completely destroyed everybody he has fought and made Rashad Evans look like he was fighting a damn ghost (albeit one that hits really, really hard lol). Jon Fitch and Thiago Alves are two of the top 3 Welterweights in the world but GSP laid an [expletive] kicking of epic proportions against both of these two in their fights. Fedor has made Antonio Rodrigo Nogueria look foolish two times now, dominated Mirko Cro Cop when he was in his prime and completely destroyed Tim Syliva and Andrei Arlovski. Lastly, BJ Penn destroys the competition when fighting at 155 as well. Guys like Kenny Florian and Sean Sherk are no jokes but BJ completely dominated both of them as well.

 

The best of the best in MMA are just so damn good that they make everybody they fight (and they are legit fighters) look terrible.

 

Anyways, apperantly there is talk about having Anderson Silva vacate his MW title and fight at 205 for the rest of his contract (3 fights left I think). This would be great to see because he really doesn't have anything left to prove at MW besides maybe a rematch with Hendo or a fight with Maia (both of which I think he would win) and having him at 205 sets up possible fights with Rampage, Rashad, Shogun, Tito and maybe even Machida (although they have said they will never fight each other).

 

As for the card as a whole last night, it was as I expected it to be which was below average. Not bad by any means, but not great either. I will say that Amir Sodalloh was absolutely robbed by that sorry excuse of a ref Dan Mirgliotta. That was a terrible stoppage, but Dan is by far the worst ref I have ever seen in MMA.

[Force]

I agree with everything you said..I wasnt saying that Griffin is pathetic, just that he looked pathetic in that match because Silva is obv. the superior fighter.

 

And yeah..the first gif is amazing..Silva is the [expletive], lol.

[Karl Malone]

Forrest is a good fighter but silva is a beast. I give props to Forrest for fighting him.