One cannot complain about that card last night, unless you are a huge Kampmann fan. What a great night of fights put on for a free card. Every fight was entertaining as hell, besides the 3rd round in the Cantwell/Diabate.
Let me start with the main event. What a fucking war put on by Sanchez and Kampmann. By the end of the fight and during his post fight interview with Joe Rogan, Diego's face looked like he was in a remake, standing in for Sly Stallone in Rocky 1. There is so much arguing going on everywhere from Rogan's, Forrest's, Dana's twitter, and various other outlets about who actually one the fight. I thought initially Diego won the fight, having re-watched it I still felt the same way, so I went a step further and actually looked up the rules on judging just to see the fine print on it, here is what I took out of the long list,
E. Judging Criteria
1. Judges are required to determine the winner of a bout that goes to it's full time limit based upon the following criteria:
-Clean Strikes
-Effective Grappling
-Octagon Control
-Effective Aggressiveness
F. Clean Strikes
1. The fighter who is landing both effective and efficient clean strikes.
2. There are two ways of measuring strikes:
-the total number of clean strikes landed (more efficient) -the total number of heavy strikes landed (more effective)
G. The heavier striker who lands with efficiency, deserves more credit from the Judges than total number landed.
1. If the striking power between the fighters was equal, then the total number landed would be used as the criteria.
2. The total number of strikes landed, should be of sufficient quantity favoring a fighter, to earn a winning round.
H. Strikes thrown from the top position of the guard, are generally heavier and more effective than those thrown from the back.
1. Thus a Judge shall recognize that effective strikes thrown from the top guard position are of "higher quality", than thrown from the bottom.
2. The Judge shall recognize that this is not always the case.
However, the vast majority of fighters prefer the top guard position to strike from. This is a strong indication of positional dominance for striking.
I. Effective Grappling
1. The Judge shall recognize the value of both the clean takedown and active guard position.
2. The Judge shall recognize that a fighter who is able to cleanly takedown his opponent, is effectively grappling.
3. A Judge shall recognize that a fighter on his back in an active guard position, can effectively grapple, through execution of repeated threatening attempts at submission and reversal resulting in continuous defense from the top fighter.
4. A Judge shall recognize that a fighter who maneuvers from guard to mount is effectively grappling.
5. A Judge shall recognize that the guard position alone shall be scored neutral or even, if none of the preceding situations were met.(items 2-4) 6. A Judge shall recognize that if the fighters remain in guard the majority of a round with neither fighter having an edge in clean striking or effective grappling, (items 2-4), the fighter who scored the clean takedown deserves the round.
7. A clean reversal is equal to a clean takedown in effective grappling
J. Octagon Control
1. The fighter who is dictating the pace, place and position of the fight.
2. A striker who fends off a grappler's takedown attempt to remain standing and effectively strike is octagon control.
3. A grappler who can takedown an effective standing striker to ground fight is octagon control.
4. The fighter on the ground who creates submission, mount or clean striking opportunities
K. Effective Aggressiveness
1. This simply means who is moving forward and finding success.(scoring) 2. Throwing a strike moving backwards is not as effective as a strike thrown moving forward.
3. Throwing strikes and not landing is not effective aggressiveness.
4. Moving forward and getting struck is not effective aggressiveness.
5. Shooting takedowns and getting countered and fended off is not effective aggressiveness.
Now going by that, I would have to give the fight to Kampmann then. What I put in bold is what Diego was doing throughout the last two rounds. So you would have to score the rounds for Kampmann then, you would think. This is coming from a huge Diego fan in myself. I could see the judges still giving Diego the fight though, because he looked like he was landing a lot of strikes and for his aggressiveness at the end of rounds 2 and 3, and we know that if you finish the round like that in a close fight, the judges always look at that. So yeah, I'm happy Diego got the win, sucks for Kampmann as he is faulted for lack of the judges doing their job, but still another solid performance by him in a losing effort. Diego is just a machine plain and simple, the guy can take one hell of a beating and will not slow down.
Munoz looked like the contender I was talking about in my original post. Dollaway fucked up by letting him up though and paid for it by getting knocked out even if it was only for a split second. Jon feels the fight was stopped early, but if you look at the replay at the end of the fight, the overhead view you see C.B. clearly go out for a split second. Like I said in the LD it was just like when Koscheck was put out for that split second in his fight with Paulo Thiago. Mario stepped in at the right time. Just look for that part in the replay and I guarantee you change your mind.
What a debut for Chris Weidman. This kid could clearly be the future of the Middleweight division. He is still relatively new to the game, with that fight being only his 5th pro fight. I hope the UFC let's him develop before throwing him into bigger names. I think he's only 26, so no need to rush him into anything. With some more work on his striking, he will certainly go far in the division. His wrestling was top notch, continually looking for a better position when he had Sakara on the ground. Had this not been Sakara's first fight in a year, things might have gone a little different, but still an awesome performance by Weidman.
Bowles looked great in his first fight back from breaking his hand. Page came out strong, looking to end the fight early, but Bowles played it safe and didn't commit, until he saw an opening, then dropped Page and choked him out cold. Performances like that is why he doesn't make it to the 3rd round. I agree with with JMT, if Faber wins against Wineland, book Faber/Bowles.
Igor definitely looked like gold in his fight. Looks like Tito is becoming the Wandy of the LHW division, everyone wants a piece now as Igor called him out.
Joe Stevenson is probably done in the UFC, he just isn't the same anymore. Sucks because he is still fairly young, but has a ton of mileage on him. Good performance by Castillo. Joe didn't look terrible throughout the whole fight, he had a few bright spots. But Castillo dominated for the most part. If Joe does get cut, someone will sign him up fast for the name value alone. I think a little tour with the lower leagues could do him some justice before he goes to Strikeforce or Bellator if he gets cut by the UFC.
Diabate/Cantwell looked just like a sparing session for Diabate. Cantwell is tough, for taking that beating throughout the fight. This fight was much like the Falcao/Harris fight where Falcao was dominating the fight and took the third round off, same thing Diabate did. Cantwell was to battered to do anything in the 3rd. Diabate needed to finish that fight. I'd say let Tito fight Diabate next, definitely a winnable fight for Tito. Ortiz would not only eat those strikes by Diabate, he would at least take him down and put a hurting on him.
