A Few Good Title Shots
Posted by RB, 20 Sep 2007
As much talent as the UFC has, and as often as their cards roll out these days, it is still uncommon for the last two main events to have both stolen the show from their under-cards. That is exactly what can be said of the last two title fights headlining UFC 74: Respect and UFC 75: Champion vs Champion however.
The victories of Randy Couture and Rampage Jackson were both important outcomes for the UFC Light Heavyweight and Heavyweight divisions, but more importantly they were exciting fights that lived up to the expectations of a hyped up marquee fight.
In the world of MMA it is all too common for the undercard to be found providing the thrills, stoppages and knockouts that the headline fight falls short of -- the nature of the game makes this an unavoidable fact. Big fights can often be built up only to turn into long distance snoozefests or unsatisfying stoppages.
The last few UFC’s have formed something of an opposite pattern -- while GSP looked unspectacular in his decision win over Josh Koscheck on the undercard of ‘74, and Cro Cop barely landed a strike in his entire dismal offering against Cheick Kongo at ‘75, the main eventers really gave fans of the sport something to sink their teeth into. Both bouts were memorable and exciting affairs, displaying a tremendous amount of heart and world class fighting skills.
It has become one of the biggest clichés in the sport, but for as much respect is shown to Randy Couture from everyone in the game (they named the card “Respect” after him for christ sake, making it the second UFC card named in his honour), he seems to walk into all of his fights the underdog these days. At 44 years of age, and fighting as one of the smaller heavyweights in the UFC, it seems everyone is tricked into thinking the part of them predicting a Captain America victory is “the heart”, and the rest of them must be “the brain”.
Sure enough Couture can’t go on winning forever. His return to heavyweight has so far been triumphant to the nth degree, but with all the world’s most talented +205 lbers being drawn to the UFC’s division like metal shavings to a magnet, no one is likely to maintain a clean record at the weight.
But what has perhaps been overlooked repeatedly throughout Randy’s career is that, aside from Fedor, no-one remotely approaches him when it comes to gameplanning and enforcing that gameplan in the cage. He breaks the will of even his toughest competition in this manner, and Sylvia and Gonzaga are just the latest opponents to find out how fight-changing this strength is in a five round fight.
In fact it was only two minutes into the first round that Couture had outworked and outmuscled Gonzaga to the point of making him want to take a break when tied up against the fence. This moment of complacency, when Gonzaga effectively stopped actively defending, allowed Couture to rip him up off his feet and slam him hard against the canvas -- something he was unable to do before. Gonzaga broke his nose against his own knee on impact, and the fight's outcome was decided.
From this moment on 'Napao' was a spiritually and physically broken fighter, and aside from a few dangerous high kicks that Couture managed to absorb he was dominated until Randy got the ground and pound stoppage in the third round.
Although it has been over one and a half years since Quinton Jackson was in the Pride ring, and longer before that when he could be considered one of their poster boys, the Jackson vs Henderson headliner of UFC 75 felt like a Pride main event at the end of a UFC undercard (which did itself featured former Pride star Cro Cop).
Inside the 02 Arena the spirit of Pride was further summoned with both Pride and UFC flags flying next to one another on the big screens throughout the event -- although such graphics were conspicuously absent from the pay-per-view broadcast.
Jackson vs Henderson is the kind of fight Pride might have put together for the sheer spectacular thrill of it, an exciting 205er against an established 185 lb star with a dangerous right hand. Henderson’s previous Pride bouts against Vitor Belfort and Wandelei Silva amounted to as much.
The UFC doesn’t tend to operate as frivolously when it comes to matchmaking, but happily the circumstance of both men’s careers allowed them to come together in the organisation under the most justified of scenarios: unifying the UFC and Pride belts at the 205 lb weight class.
Unlike Couture vs Gonzaga this fight went the full five rounds, but remained highly competitive, conducted at an excellent pace. At the fight’s start Henderson was able to utilise his wrestling advantage effectively, controlling Rampage well in the clinch and getting side control position after a take down midway through the first round, but as the fight progressed Henderson’s edge faded and Rampage emerged as the more dominant fighter.
By the late rounds Henderson had visibly tired from tackling his larger opponent, and Rampage began to look the stronger fighter in standup exchanges and in the clinch. Despite this, and although only the first round was definitively won by Henderson, all the rounds were closely fought and Henderson was always able to give some kind of reply to Jackson -- landing a few solid right hands that didn’t look much different than the one that put Wanderlei’s lights out earlier in the year.
In the end Rampage proved to be too much for Henderson to overcome, but after giving such an account of himself against the champion of a weight class above his natural weight -- and for the second time running --, he is all but guaranteed a good place in the ranks of either the UFC’s 205 lb or 185 lb divisions. There are few in MMA who have shown the kind of heart Henderson has displayed in his last few fights.
Rampage on the other hand has now begun to achieve in the UFC what he looked to be on the way to achieving three or four years ago in Pride -- superstar status, along with recognition as the division’s number one fighter. One more win against top competition will assure this position.
Not every card the UFC puts on has a main event to look forward to, and even well anticipated matchups can turn out to be duds on the night. When the main events deliver like the last two, however, it brings a magnificent energy to the sport and a sheen of quality to the UFC.
This weekend’s UFC 76, headlined by Liddell vs Jardine, marks a return to the “B” level headliner we still do see on occasion: let’s hope the pay-per-view figures reflect this. And more than anything, let's hope there is not long to wait before we see more marquee fights that entertain to the extent of Couture vs Gonzaga and Rampage vs Henderson.
