My parlay did not work out as I had planned.
If not for Joe Lauzon I would currently be £100 richer at the time of typing this. However the quality of violence displayed this evening (or for us UK fans, this morning) was exceptional and so any grudge towards a fighter shall have to flounder and wait until I start betting serious money. In all seriousness alongside the good fight card it also served to answer some nagging questions.
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| Courtesy of UFC.tv |
Primarily that Jose Aldo is not ready to move up to 155 lbs. Started by Aldo himself these rumours were fairly convicing at first. He has beaten all previous 145 lbs contendors convincingly, and the idea of champions moving up weight classes still generates a tingling sensation for fight fans. When Kenny Florian was announced as the next title contedor the betting lines alone were an accurate representation of the fans and pundits mentality to the fight. Aldo would not only win, but likely by knock out.
Of course the result (Aldo by decision) shocked the majority of the fight world. Florians plan to clinch Aldo against the cage in a vain attempt to tire him out (didn't work against BJ Penn, why now?) consumed the majority of Florian's offense and Aldo expertly took advantage to unload straights and hooks from the ensuing scrambles. Yet his inability to finish Florian, who admittedly got on his bike for the fight, shows a fighter in need of maturity. As such, any talk of an ascension to 155 lbs should be dismissed for the time being until he is not only cleaning out the division, but cleaning it out with pure, unmitigated violence.
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| Courtesy of UFC.tv |
The other big result is the main event itself. After the first round I was expecting to see Keanu Reeves pop up on screen and declare he had a sudden feeling of 'deja vu'. Frankie Edgar got rocked repeatively again? From watching their footwork I find it hard to fault either man (either Edgar for poor defense or Maynard for an inability to generate power). I guess it simply takes Edgar an entire 5 minutes to find his range. But when he does find his range...Why Maynard seemed content to strike with Edgar after what happened in the first fight is mind boggling. His strength, as Randy Couture has mentioned numerous times, should be focussed on taking Edgar down. It's not enough to say Maynard should not headhunt, but he can't put his strikes together in a meaningful fashion altogether. Maynard knows he would lose in a boxing match to BJ Penn and to then strike with the guy who outboxed BJ?
And then it happened.
I predicted Edgar to beat Maynard...but not like that! I'll be honest, maybe I wasn't watching his previous fights with enough attention, but his scrambling his expert. Stuff the takedown followed by uppercuts is in itself a textbook manouvre but something still under-utilised in MMA (along with the jab). And when he had Maynard rocked Edgar showed amazing killer instinct (take note Simpson) and looked to finish Maynard.
The beautiful thing about Edgar winning is not simply the fashion he did it in but what it means for the rest of the lightweight division. Primarily it now officially has a (somewhat) defined hierachy. Don't get me wrong, prior Jon Jones the 205 lbs division was fun, but a constantly shifting champion only served to undermine the value of the belt in casual fans eyes. They recognised each fighter was elite, but without a consistent champ to test against it was hard to judge where a fighter ranked in the division. With this punctuating stoppage over Maynard it makes the anticipation for the next slew of contendors that much greater. When Edgar faces Clay Guida, Ben Henderson or Gilbert Melendez, it will be easier for the fans to expect a serious competitive fight (and so worth the money) rather than being left in the lurch, not knowing whether the fight will be a first round KO stormer or a five round tentative foot work display (I'm talking to you Anderson!).
This was one of the best cards the UFC has put on and alongside of delivering fantastic fights it helped to highlight the exciting nature of the 145 and 155 lbs divsions and continue to move their respective storylines along in anticipation of future match ups.
