UFC 144 Thoughts
By Eduardo Martinez on February 27, 2012
- Frankie Edgar vs Benson Henderon was so awesome. Henderson trying an enziguri in the first round was insane! Edgar catching Henderson’s leg, and Henderson landing hard punches while hopping on one leg was great. The upkick that Henderson used to knock Edgar down, and then referencing that he got the upkick from Cerrone courtesy of their five round classic was a great callback. Honestly thought Henderson was going to get the guillotine in the fourth round. Just an awesome fight all around, one in which I thought Henderson was the clear winner. Nothing but respect for Edgar, great fighter with so much heart but I want to see Henderson move on to fight Pettis next. I don’t think it’s fair to Pettis to have him wait once again. Great event, I hope the fans there in Japan loved the show as much as I did.
- Rampage coming out to the PRIDE song and hitting that slam against Bader was nice. But I do believe him in saying he was injured since I don’t think Bader would take him down so easily. Probably the biggest win in Bader’s career, okay fight.
- Seeing Mark Hunt cream Cheick Kongo liked that was incredible. It wasn’t long ago that Hunt was thought to be completely done, I honestly thought he had no shot against Kongo. Nice to be proven wrong, Hunt’s career resurgence has been a pleasure. I am personally hoping to see Hunt vs Struve in the near future.
- Akiyama-Shields was just an odd fight to watch, but Akiyama’s judo throws were beautiful. I honestly don’t know how I would score this fight.
- Boetsch’s comeback on Okami was pretty insane. Never thought he had a chance in this fight, Okami just dominated him via striking and grappling. It was impressive to see Boetsch rally back and be able to finish Okami. Great stuff.
- The scramble between Hioki-Palaszewski was awesome in that first round. Hioki is so dangerous and comfortable on the ground. I thought Hioki should have gone for the takedown much earlier in the second round but that’s Hioki for you. Still a clear controlling win for Hioki, he did a good job.
- Pettis looked amazing here, the way in which he knocked out a dangerous fighter like Joe Lauzon was phenomenal. Pettis’ striking and style is as exciting as MMA gets. Just spectacular, Pettis needs to get the next title shot as soon as possible.
- Totally thought that Mitsuoka was going to finish Gomi off in the first round. Mitsuoka totally beat him badly in the first round, I thought Gomi was done. Nice comeback from Gomi made this a pretty entertaining fight.
- Yamamoto is done, can’t believe Lee tapped him out like that. It was an exciting action packed fight. Some cool highs and lows, fun to watch. Yamamoto should have gone to the body when Lee was hurt against the cage.
- Cantwell’s a weird guy that could do good for a few minutes in a fight but look not very good in the rest. Riki Fukuda looked awesome destroying him with a large volume of strikes. Just totally overwhelmed him, good win for Fukuda and Cantwell might get his walking papers.
- I felt bad for Mizugaki. He’s been someone that instantly won me over in his classic against Miguel Angel Torres back at WEC in 2009. I thought he clearly beat Cariaso, but it was upsetting to see Cariaso get the win. At least Mizugaki got his win bonus, but it’s a shame he has this loss on his record and that it happened in his home country.
- I wonder how long Zuffa is going to keep the Zhang Tiequan experiment going. He is clearly not a UFC caliber fighter, and he didn’t look like he belonged in the promotion. Tamura knocked him out badly at UFC 144, and Elkins easily dominated him at UFC 136. I know UFC is hoping to have a Chinese fighter in their roster, but he just doesn’t seem to belong here at all.
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