| 16 January 2010
Ok - so the main question is – how many fights did she pick correctly?
Finally, my wrap up of UFN20 and WEC46! What a week, not only was it busy in MMA Land, Hayley Land was very stacked too.
Ok - so the main question is – how many fights did I pick correctly?
I picked 7 out of the 11 fights for UFN20,
13 out of 21 for the whole weekend.
Not so bad....
Firstly, CONGRATULATIONS to Ben Henderson on becoming the Lightweight Champion! It’s a shame Jamie Varner could not be more gracious in defeat....
Ben Henderson head kick to Jamie Varner WEC 46
both photos from smoothben.com
So, how did I do in my original WEC picks?
I got 6 out of 10, and out of those 6, I predicted 4 of the winning methods!
Winning picks:
- Ben Henderson defeating Jamie Varner via submission in Round 3. I did predict that he would win by submission, but I did not predict it would be standing up
- Urijah Faber defeating Raphael Assuncao via RNC in Round 3.
- Mike Brown defeating Anthony Morrison via RNC in Round 1.
- Kamal Shalorus defeating Dave Jansen via unanimous decision.
- Wagnney Fabiano defeating Clint Godfrey via unanimous decision.
- Eddie Wineland defeating George Roop via unanimous decision.
Other picks:
- Deividas Taurosevicius defeating Mackens Semerzier via unanimous decision.
- Charlie Valencia defeating Akitoshi Tamura via split decision.
- Mark Hominick defeating Bryan Caraway via submission in Round 1.
- Will Campuzano defeating Coty Wheeler via unanimous decision.
Now on to UFN 20
All of the main card bouts went into the third round so we did not get to see any of the undercard fights, but thanks to the internet I have read the results! Overall, I picked 7 out of 11 for the whole night and I picked 5 out of the 7 prelims, with 4 of those predicting the correct method. Not too bad for a girl eh?
Hayley's original UFN 20 picks
I incorrectly picked Jay Silva over Chris Leben – I should have gone with the more experienced guy as Cheryl did! Daym!
Leben had a dominating performance both on the ground and on the feet and went on to win a unanimous decision, pocketing the biggest fee of the night despite being on the undercard ($60,000). Lucky boy....
The full undercard results:
Chris Leben v Jay Silva: Unanimous decision
Rick Story v Jesse Lennox: Unanimous decision
Thiago Tavares v Nik Lentz: Draw
Mike Guymon v Rory McDonald: Submission (armbar) in Round 1
Kyle Bradley v Rafael Dos Anjos: Unanimous decision
Gerald Harris v John Salter: TKO in Round 3 (KO of the night)
Nick Catone v Jesse Forbes: Split Decision
Main card
Well...I picked 2 of the 4 fights! Oh dear, moving swiftly on.....
Amir Sadollah v Brad Blackburn
As Mike Goldberg said in the broadcast – Sadollah is the toughest nurse you will ever meet – this is most likely to be true based of what we saw on Monday night!
Sadollah put in an all round solid performance and had an incredible amount of support from the crowd. He demonstrated much improved striking and it was obvious that his trip to Holland to work on his Muay Thai had been worth it – he was putting some great combos together and his technique was incredible. Brad Blackburn struggled to keep up with Sadollah, not surprising considering he kept switching his stance and mixing it up!
Sadollah kept up this performance in all three rounds and ended up winning by unanimous decision (30-27 across the board). Good job Amir – and I apologise for doubting you....
Tom Lawlor v Aaron Simpson
I will be honest and say that I expected this fight to be a little more one sided than it was, but Lawlor surprised me by coming out all guns blazing and both guys were banging!
Lawlor looked the best he ever has, with fast and on point striking. He was throwing relentless, well timed strikes to Simpson who looked wobbly in the first round. However, he did end up surviving as Lawlor backed off a little in the final 2 minutes of the round, and surprisingly allowed him to recover. Once we entered round 2 and 3, Aaron Simpson's superior cardio came into play as Lawlor became tired and basically, allowed Simpson to control the pace of the fight.
I thought this was an awesome fight and the decision could have gone either way. (IMHO - Lawlor took the first round, Simpson the third and the second was very close.)
Both of these guys were undefeated but unfortunately one guy had to lose! The final outcome was Simpson by split decision.
The crowd clearly did not agree with this as they booed Simpson throughout his interview with Rogan..... Oh well, I enjoyed it and was very impressed by Lawlor’s performance! As was Simpson, "He surprised me a little bit. He hit a little harder than I thought he was going to. My hat's off to Tom Lawlor".
Just shows – never underestimate your opponent!
Efrain Escudero v Evan Dunham
Efrain Escudero came out in the first round and exploded on Dunham, pushing the pace with a flurry of strikes and rocked him. However, Dunham turned this around in round 2 with improved distance and timing. He took Escudero down and controlled the fight from there on. In the third and final round, Dunham got an armbar from triangle position and submitted Escudero earning him $30,000 and submission of the night.
Escudero tried to fight through the armbar, but in my honest opinion he tapped too late and may have caused himself some unnecessary damage. Just tap next time, ok??? Doesn’t make you less of a man....
Main Event
Gray Maynard v Nate Diaz
Now this is another fight that surprised me. I predicted Gray would win by decision; however I did not expect that the fight would play out as it did. Being the superior wrestler, Gray could basically decide where this fight would take place, and he chose (despite Diaz's 6” reach advantage) to keep the fight standing. I couldn’t decide if he did this out of respect for Diaz's BJJ or because he had a lot more confidence in his hands, shown by his constant hand hanging. Maynard even knocked Diaz down at one point and then let him stand up again. Instead of being a fast paced ground game it ended up being a boxing match. Most of the interesting moments came from the colourful language and constant heckling/trash talking that they did to each other.
Anyway, as Gray said in his pre-fight video, 'he was going to make the wrong, right' and he did just that by winning a split decision.
Ok so to sum it up: two nights of great fights, some surprising moments, a somewhat disappointing main event for UFN and a fair performance on my fight picks.
Till next time folks....
Hayley Forster, a long-time female fight fan, lives in the North of England with her husband, Pete. Both have deep love for the sport of MMA. Follow Hayley on www.twitter.com/fairly_normal
If you would like to submit a guest post on the subject of mixed martial arts, please forward it to Cheryl Ragsdale email: mmafightfans at thatgirlisfunny.com
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