Wednesday, July 25, 2012

My UFC On Fox Predictions

UFC on Fox looks more stacked than UFC 149.  It has Shogun, Machida, and Bader all fighting on the same night.  The UFC matchmakers would have probably been better off putting those matches on the PPV card and the UFC 149 matches on Fox.  However, they did what they did and that's that.  So hear are my predictions:

Rua vs. Vera: While I have lost some respect for Shogun after he ducked Glover Texiera, he is still one of my favorite fighters and among the best strikers in the light heavyweight division.  I see him winning this by KO late in the second round.

Machida vs. Bader: After losing to Jon Jones and Tito Ortiz, Bader seems to have lost a lot of momentum.  He is coming off a win, but that victory was over an overweight, out-of-shape, and injured Rampage who really seems to have lost his passion for fighting completely.  Machida, on the other hand, managed to win a round against Jon Jones in his last fight.  Although Machida got caught later on and choked out by Jones, Bader doesn't have the champ's reach or speed.  It is highly doubtful that he will be able to catch the Dragon, so I see Machida winning by KO early in the second round.

Browne vs. Rothwell: I saw "Big Ben" Rothwell smash Brendan Schaub after he was being pummeled against the cage in the last bout he fought and I see him doing something similar this time in the first round.

Lauzon vs. Varner: I haven't seen either of these men fight, so I'm just going to shoot from the hip and pick Lauzon to win by decision.

Be sure to tune in to see if I was right.

Sunday, July 22, 2012

My Thoughts On UFC 149

While the event was better than many of my fellow fight fans at Duffy's thought it was, I wasn't impressed by UFC 149.  The only good fight was Riddle vs. Clements.  Faber vs. Barao was decent, but didn't blow me away.  Ebersole vs. Head had a couple of fun moments, like Ebersole's thumbs up while he was in the guillotine and his capoeira-style kick, but again, it was average.  Here are my views on each fight.

Riddle vs. Clements: Hands down the best fight of the night.  Riddle dominated most of the match and brought an exciting end to it by countering Clements' spinning backfist with an arm-triangle.  I am definitely a Riddle believer now.

Ebersole vs. Head:  I think this should have been a unanimous decision instead of a split decision, since Ebersole never had the upper hand in this bout.  He simply survived.  However, that is really a nitpick.

Kongo vs. Jordan: I am a Cheick Kongo fan, but he really failed to impress in this bout.  He said in the promo that he wanted to prove that he was a contender, not a gatekeeper.  Well, it's kind of hard to be a contender if you are so gassed after three rounds that you can't pick yourself up off the canvas.  That being said, I do admire him for being man enough to keep going after taking what appeared to be a very deliberate elbow to the groin.

Lombard vs. Boetsch: I never thought that I would see two grapplers who were afraid to grapple.  Lombard did manage a takedown in the last round, so I thought the decision should have gone to him.  That being said, Boetsch was the main aggressor during the bout, even though his attacks were shrugged off like bee stings.  In light of that, I understand why the judges ruled in favor of him, even though I don't agree with it.  At any rate, it was the most disappointing bout of the night.

Faber vs. Barao: I was highly impressed by Barao, who used leg kicks to keep the shorter Faber at bay.  That being said, I don't think Faber played to his strengths in this fight.  Yeah, he landed a couple of hard shots, but his grappling will always be better than his stand-up.  He should have used a game plan which involved taking Barao down and either going for the submission or ground-and-pound.  He relied too much on his strength and speed and not enough on strategy, costing him what will likely be his last title shot.

On a side note, is it really necessary to hug your opponent DURING the match?!  Can't it wait until afterwards?  I think Riddle, Clements, Faber, and Barao briefly forgot that the whole point of fighting is to defeat your opponent, not to love them to death.  There is plenty of time for bromances after the bell rings.  After all, this is UFC, not the Hugs Not Drugs Club.  At any rate, while the event wasn't completely terrible, it was still the worst UFC Pay-Per-View that I have seen so far.



Saturday, July 21, 2012

Can Urijah Break The Faber Curse?

I am totally stoked for UFC 149.  Although I am disappointed that Michael Bisping and Minotauro Noguiera are injured and can't fight, I am glad that I will still get to see Tim Boetsch and Cheick Kongo in action.  However, the Faber vs. Barao fight is what I am really looking forward to.  I am rooting for Faber, but when it comes to title fights, he just can't seem to get over the hump and take the gold.  Although he was WEC champion, he has lost his past four title fights against Mike Brown (twice), Jose Aldo, and his nemesis, Dominick Cruz.  For that reason, I think Faber is the underdog in this fight and has to overcome the curse he seems to be under.  It is doubtful that he will get another title shot anytime soon if he doesn't win this time.  I think that "The California Kid" has what it takes to get a UFC title.  Tonight, we will see if he succeeds.     

Monday, July 9, 2012

Hitting The Pause Button

Due to a freelance assignment which I need to complete for a friend, I am temporarily putting aside all work on "Black Swan Origins: Nineveh" for two weeks.  It's a shame, but the money is too good to refuse and the work will require all of my focus. 

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Tito Got Robbed!

I saw UFC 148 and as it turns out, I was right about the winners of the final four matches.  While they didn't play out as I expected, I am very happy about my prediction skills.  Not to mention that I am ecstatic that Chael Sonnen had to eat a whole humble pie at once.  His loss was due more to his own clumsiness than Anderson's skill.  Slipping and falling after that spinning backfist sealed his fate and I laughed my butt off when Anderson threw Sonnen's trash talk back about Brazilians having no manners in his face by facetiously saying that Sonnen could come to barbecues at his house whenever he wanted.

That being said, this card reinforced my dislike for bad decisions.  Tito clearly dominated his match with Griffin.  The emotional fit that Griffin threw afterwards by storming out of the ring shows that Griffin knew he lost, too.  Dana had to chase after him and Griffin had to be coaxed back into the ring.  So I was shocked that the judges felt differently.  Sure, Griffin landed more strikes, but Tito shrugged them off like they were bee stings.  However, Tito's blows and takedowns totally rocked Griffin.  It was an even worse decision than Machida vs. Shogun I.  I still don't believe it.  Oh well, this just goes to show that if you ever choose to become a professional fighter, finish your opponent at all costs.  Otherwise, the subjective opinions of those who really don't know what they are doing will lead to you GETTING ROBBED!   

Saturday, July 7, 2012

My UFC 148 Predictions

This is going to be short, because I need to run to catch the fight at Applebee's.  However, these are my predictions.

Demian Mia will pull an upset and submit Dong Hyun Kim in the first round.

Cung Le will knock out Patrick Cote in the third round.

Forrest Griffin will beat Tito Ortiz via unanimous decision.

Anderson Silva will knock out Chael Sonnen in the fourth round.

Let's see if I'm right!

(Tires squealing)

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

More Research Required

To add a sense of realism to my novel, I'm going to need to do some research into how long it takes fighters to recover in between bouts.  I know that when it comes to UFC, the guys usually fight only twice a year.  Jon Jones had four fights last year and that was considered grueling.  As much fun as it would be to explain everything away with magical potions, I don't want to cheat.  I really want to make it somewhat realistic, especially since these are twelve-year-olds fighting.  So I am going to do the research necessary to make it happen. 

Sunday, July 1, 2012

Evolve Or Die

As my novel grows and evolves, I have discovered just how deep some revisions need to be.  I had to completely change the persepective of one event to improve the story.  It was originally told from the perspective of Character B, but now I am telling it from the perspective of their rival, Character A.  It was tough, but necessary.  The fact is, to succeed, sometimes you have to make serious changes.  This happens in UFC all the time, where a collegiate wrestler has to learn how to box, a kung fu specialist has to learn brazilian jiu-jitsu, and other fighters need to incorporate moves outside of their specialty to improve their style.  To survive in that sport, you must evolve and be strong in multiple disciplines, and this may mean discarding techniques which no longer work, or changing the way that you perform them.  Writing is very similar.  Like the constantly evolving sport of mixed martial arts, the story often grows so much that certain scenes, certain characters, or sometimes, certain plots, simply must be discarded because they no longer work.  At other times, I simply need to change the way that I wrote them, either by moving scenes later in the timeline, writing from a different character's perspective, or, in extreme situations, moving characters and subplots to other stories.  When I reach these moments of truth, I have to make a choice: evolve or die.  You can guess which one I make for the sake of my readers.