C-Objectively

UPDATE: Thanks for reading my post about UFC 68. I’ve started a new blog where I can post regularly about the UFC and MMA in general. Check out Fight Critic.

UFC 68 went down last Saturday evening in Ohio. I wasn’t very excited about this card and did not end up ordering the PPV for myself. I can’t put my finger on what it is exactly that makes me so much more excited about PRIDE events than UFC ones. Maybe it’s because there are so many more UFC events that there aren’t as many exciting fights? In general I think it has to do with the fighters’ efforts to finish the fight and stay aggressive. I think not being able to clinch and stand against the cage helps keep PRIDE fights more interesting. Anyway, I did end up catching most of the fights later thanks to a friend’s recording.

I’m not going to recap the events of the fights themselves, like I did for PRIDE 33, as there are plenty of good write-ups already posted that do that. Instead you’re going to get my commentary and opinion on some of the fights and their outcomes.

Randy Couture vs Tim Sylvia
UFC 68 has given me a reason to celebrate; for the simple reason that Tim Sylvia was exposed to the masses as what many MMA fans have known for some time: Tim Sylvia is an unoriginal, lumbering, zombie-like freak of nature that has won most of his fights due to a tremendous reach/height advantage or mistakes on the part of his opponents. I have mixed feelings about the outcome though, since I think Sylvia could have been dismantled in even more dramatic fashion by Mirko Cro Cop, aka The Terminator.

As it is, Sylvia was out-wrestled, out-grappled, and out-boxed by 43 year-old Light Heavyweight Randy Couture. Captain America dominated The Maine-iac in every facet of the fight. And his game plan to fight the 6′8″ behemoth was a thing of beauty to watch as it was put into action. Sylvia on the other hand seemed like a broken record; constantly lumbering forward awkwardly and throwing the same two slow-motion punches for five rounds. I think this fight showed more than anything, that Randy is one of the most intelligent fighters in the game; and it’s extremely dangerous to underestimate what he is capable of, even at this age.

However, Randy’s victory does have me worried about something. According to recent interviews with Dana White, President of the UFC, the winner of this fight is going to fight the winner of the Mirko Cro Cop / Gabriel Gonzaga match at UFC 70 in the UK. Barring some freak accident, the winner of that fight will be Cro Cop. I don’t know of another MMA fighter who deals as much striking damage per minute than Cro Cop. He employs an unrelenting and devastating move-forward offense and couples that with exceedingly good takedown defense. I would hate to see Randy be completely dismantled by Cro Cop right after winning the belt from Sylvia. In fact, despite Sylvia’s loss here, I’d still love to see him fight Cro Cop and put his money where his mouth is on his previous claims of being able to match up with the best in the world at Heavyweight.

Oh and Tim, copying Chuck Lidell’s hairstyle is not going to help make you anywhere near as liked by fans as he is.

Chris Lytle vs Matt Hughes
Chris was expected to lose this fight and he did. Hughes was in control but not as dominant as many of his fans would have liked. I’m not sure we saw anything from Hughes in this fight to indicate he’s somehow improved enough to get a different outcome at Hughes vs GSP 3 than Hughes vs GSP 2. I can’t say I’m disappointed though. Any fighter that says he lost a fight because it was God’s plan and not the other fighter’s superior skill is a jerk. I’m looking forward to George St. Pierre dismantling Hughes for a second time.

Jason Lambert vs Renato “Babalu” Sobral
With the exception of Babalu’s extremely stupid approach to beating Chuck Lidell in their most recent encounter (running after him throwing wild punches and leaving himself wide open for the counter-punch KO), he has fought, and often beaten, many of the top fighters in the 205-lbs division. That makes Jason Lambert’s knock-out win over Babalu all-the-more interesting. Jason’s win has also placed him at #10 in MMAWeekly’s latest Top 10 Fighter rankings. That doesn’t make much sense though since he recently lost to Rashad Evans, a fighter who has been on a tear recently in the UFC’s Light Heavyweight division. Rashad is nowhere to be found in the rankings. Jason’s a better fighter than the guy he lost to six months ago? Maybe the MMAWeekly editors could explain that one for us.

Jason MacDonald vs Rich Franklin
Franklin beat MacDonald by tap-out due to strikes. No surprises here. MacDonald is a good fighter but not on Rich’s level yet. Again, like the Hughes match, the caliber of Rich’s opponent does not allow for much analysis on any changes Rich may have made to get a different result out of the forthcoming Franklin/Silva rematch. That is a match I am definitely looking forward to. I doubt that Franklin will let Silva dominate him in the clinch again.

UFC 68 Wrap-Up
The results from this event dictate three upcoming title fight match-ups we will probably see very soon:

1. Rich Franklin vs Anderson Silva 2
2. Matt Hughes vs George St. Pierre 3
3. Mirko Cro Cop vs Randy Couture (Most Likely)

Some other fights I think we should see based on the results of UFC 68 are:

1. Quinton Jackson vs Jason Lambert - since the Ortiz/Jardine fight isn’t happening until the end of May, and neither of those guys would be ready to fight again for at least a couple of months, this is a fight I wouldn’t mind seeing in the mean time.
2. Quinton Jackson vs Winner of Tito Ortiz / Keith Jardine fight
3. Rashad Evans vs Loser of the Tito/Keith match
4. Jon Fitch vs Karo Parisyan - I would love to see Karo back in action against another tough opponent. Why is the UFC putting him up against Josh Burkman, who lost to Fitch last year?

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 6th, 2007 at 3:42 am and is filed under Entertainment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.