MMA Fanatics

Well, as evidenced by last nights bouts, fight prediction is a fickle science. An excellent UFC event overall with some really good fights, needless to say I was suprised at some of the outcomes.

First Griffin and Ortiz... What a great fight, 2 fierce and determined guys leaving it all in the ring. Round 1 I found myself thinking the worst while Tito had Forrest down on the mat applying his patented ground an pound and landing elbow after elbow. Those elbows eventually opened up a couple nice cuts on Griffin's forehead and near his eye that bled like crazy.

Right near the end of round one Forrest breaks away from Tito and gets back to his feet with a quick flurry of punches to let Tito know he was still in the fight. Right about here I'm comming up out of my chair cause this fight is about to get really exciting.

Round 2 was dominated by Forrest who seemed to get into his "groove" and was landing alot of nice punches. I was struck by difference in Tito from round 1, Forrest was able to negate all of Tito's takedown attempts with an excellent sprawl and enforced his will the entire round.

Come to find out after the fight that Tito was fighting with a knee injury and disc problem with his back. I think he gave up a lot of gas that first round after dishing out almost a full 5 mins of on the ground punishment, probably with the thought of putting Forrest away in round 1.

Round 3 started much the same as round 2 with Forrest pressing the action and Tito being stiffled with his takedown attempts. Round 3 could have gone to Forrest were it not for a successfull takedown by Ortiz.

Tito was finally able to get Forrest to the ground about two thirds of the way thru the round. Although Forrest was able defend himself well from his guard this ultimately tipped the scales in Tito's favor with the judges and he got the decision.

Kick Ass fight overall, I love Forrest Griffin he really makes every fight as exciting as it can be.

On to Arlovski vs. Sylvia. Wow! What can you say about this fight, I was all for Arlovski so this was a dissaponting one for me to watch. First 90 seconds or so both fighters are trading and landing some punches. Then Arlovski catches Sylvia with a sweet right hand right on the button and drops Sylvia. Arlovski moves in to capitalize and 5 seconds later Sylvia catches Arlovski with a sweet right and drops him. Sylvia jumps in for the kill and lays a half dozen punches to Arlovski's head at which point the ref calls the fight.... bummer.

I am happy for Sylvia he did bust his ass with a single minded determination and you gotta respect him for that.

Thats it for today, keep checking back for more ramblings and amateur MMA analysis.

Mike
(MMA Fanatic)