#yosuff

[thesportssoundoff]

“It’s all about the Eraser vs the SOG, dudes” UFC 241 Preview

Joey

August 12th, 2019

So this card is great! Seriously I lack a greater word to describe this card besides great. In many ways, this card is an old school style UFC card. You have a tremendous title fight (arguably the GOAT if not a top 5 fighter of all time) and the best UFC HW ever in terms of resume with a co-main event that isn't a title fight but pits two superstars against one another in a strikers delight. Paulo Costa vs Yoel Romero is legit a main event anywhere else in the world sans PPV and Ian Heinisch vs Derek Brunson would be a solid co-main event on any ESPN card they could put on. Throw in a really great FW fight between kickboxer Benito Lopez and super well rounded Sodiq Yusuff. The prelims aren't quite as name heavy and are hurt by the loss of John Makdessi BUT it's hard to knock a slate that features two really good bantamweight fights in Cory Sandhagen vs Raphael Assuncao and Manny Bermudez vs Casey Kenney. Even the return of prospect Devonte Smith is worth keeping an eye on despite the opponent change. The ESPN+ portion of the prelims are okay I suppose as Sabino Mazo vs Shana Dobson and Brandon Davis vs Kyung Ho Kang figures to be a fun as hell action fight. After the poor on paper UFC 240, it's hard to not get a bit excited for what is a damn good return to PPV before the fun stuff with UFC 242 and 243 hit us in September and October.

Fights: 12

Debuts: Clay Collard

Fight Changes/Injury Cancellations: 2 (Poliana Botelho vs Maryna Moroz CANCELLED, John Makdessi OUT, Clay Collard IN vs Devonte Smith)

Headliners (fighters who have either main evented or co-main evented shows in the UFC): 7 (Daniel Cormier, Stipe Miocic, Yoel Romero, Nate Diaz, Anthony Pettis, Derek Brunson, Raphael Assuncao)

Fighters On Losing Streaks in the UFC: 1 (Jodie Esquibel)

Fighters On Winning Streaks in the UFC: 10 (Daniel Cormier, Paulo Costa, Soqid Yusuff, Manny Bermudez, Ian Heinisch, Devonte Smith, Cory Sandhagen, Manny Bermudez, Drakkar Klose, Christos Giagos)

Main Card Record Since Jan 1st 2017 (in the UFC):  23-9

Daniel Cormier- 4-0 (1 NC) Stipe Miocic- 2-1 Nate Diaz- 0-0 Anthony Pettis- 3-2 Yoel Romero- 1-2 Paulo Costa- 4-0 Gabriel Benitez- 2-1 Sodiq Yusuff- 2-0 Derek Brunson- 3-3 Ian Heinisch- 2-0

Fights By Weight Class (yearly number here):

Bantamweight- 3 (43) Middleweight- 2 (28) Lightweight- 2 (51) Featherweight-  1 (40) Women’s Flyweight- 1 (27) Women’s Strawweight- 1 (21) Heavyweight- 1 (24) Welterweight- 1 (47)

Light Heavyweight-  (31) Flyweight-  (11) Women’s Featherweight- (7) Women’s Bantamweight- (13)

2019 Number Tracker

Debuting Fighters (22-46)- Clay Collard

Short Notice Fighters (22-30)- Clay Collard

Second Fight (44-22)- Sabina Mazo, Casey Kenney

Cage Corrosion (Fighters who have not fought within a year of the date of the fight) (17-29)-  Nate Diaz, Stipe Miocic, Yoel Romero, Gabriel Benitez, Paulo Costa, Shana Dobson

Undefeated Fighters (28-30)- Paulo Costa, Manny Bermudez

Fighters with at least four fights in the UFC with 0 wins over competition still in the organization (9-8)- Kyung Ho Kang

Weight Class Jumpers (Fighters competing outside of the weight class of their last fight even if they’re returning BACK to their “normal weight class”) (25-17)-

Twelve Precarious Ponderings

1- So is Daniel Cormier going to mentally get up for this fight? Cormier knocked out Miocic in July of 2018 and basically cemented his legacy as one of the best fighters ever by winning titles in two weight classes Conor McGregor style. He also became the first champion to defend a belt while being double champion, doing so when he finished Derrick Lewis in the third round of their fight. Cormier was hoping to retire in March of 2019 after a fight with Brock Lesnar BUT the Lesnar fight fell apart and Brock retired before DC ever could. Having lost the Brock fight, DC put off his retirement to take a fight against Stipe Miocic and potentially Jon Jones. This was clearly Cormier's back up option as he admitted that him vs Miocic was more about him fulfilling his promise to Stipe that he'd give him a rematch. Cormier has talked about a Jones fight as well but seems like that would just be a big cash out for him. DC is in that "I've proven myself, now I'm going to get my money" phase of his life. I wonder if he's viewing this fight and a potential Jones fight as high level big check cash out fights and if it's fair to be concerned about DC showing up just to show up.

2- How quickly does the winner of Miocic vs DC get the turnaround fight? Ngannou vs DC/Miocic in November in MSG? December in Vegas? Gotta be options out there I'm assuming.

3- I literally have no idea what to expect from Anthony Pettis vs Nate Diaz. Let's set the scene/stage first; Anthony Pettis is really a case of combat sports fans just not giving a shit about reality because what you did five years ago still counts for something. So long as you win JUST enough, you can never truly dip out of the public view. Pettis lost three straight fights in 2015 and 2016, had a really ill fitted decision to drop to 145 lbs, barely scraped by another ill fitted 145 lbers then got smoked by Max Holloway. From there he'd beat the fighters he should (Michael Chiesa was particularly impressive) and lose to the dudes who replaced him at the top of the 155 lb ladder. Pettis campaigned for a fight at 170 lbs vs Stephen Thompson and got it in large part due to Santiago Ponzinibbio turning down the fight. He got boxed up by Thompson for two rounds, landed a sizable chunk of his own offense but then closed the show in emphatic fashion with a superman punch that put Wonderboy to sleep. One win made a lot of folks forget a lot of things en route to earning Pettis a co-main event spot on this very great card. His opponent is Nate Diaz, another fighter who made a lot of folks forget a lot of things on the back of one big win. Nate went from being the Diaz brother the UFC could deal with to a guy who has caused more noise for them than Nick ever did. Nate looked like he was going to disappear from the scene after the Bendo and Josh Thomson losses, beating the corpse of Gray Maynard before RDA just casually shut him down in a fight Nate was Nate missed weight, pulled out of his press obligations and just seemed not all there from a fighter standpoint. Everything changed with the McGregor fight where he upset Conor McGregor on short notice at 170 lbs. With some leverage, Nate put himself in position to earn a big payday and snagged it for a rematch. Since then he and the UFC have had a bit of a square dance in trying to get him fights vs Nate trying to maximize his leverage. A rumored fight with Tyron Woodley fell apart for December of 2017, Nate vs Dustin Poirier was on the books for November of 2018 and then the "official" ending to that was Dustin Poirier pulling out with a hip injury even if Dustin claims that Nate had pulled out weeks ahead of time and so he was the fall guy of sorts. All of this creates a situation where there's no way to know what is or isn't real here. Is Pettis better suited at 170 lbs where he, like Masvidal, feels more comfortable letting his hands go and fighting at a more unforgiving pace? Is Nate Diaz the dude who nearly toppled the UFC's apple cart vs Conor McGregor or the guy who went 1-3 and pretty much quit on the sport? To be honest does it even matter either? These two from a stylistic matchup create a compelling fight and even if we never see Nate again or Pettis eventually reverts back to being the dude Max Holloway made quit or Edson Barboza kickboxed up, we'll always have this one, right?

4- Really curious to see how Nate Diaz does in terms of his conditioning. Yes, he hasn't fought in three years BUT the counter to that is that Nate was training for fights during that time period that just never saw the light of day for various reasons. Also Nate has a style that's cardio friendly for the most part, taking steam off of his punches to throw combinations early on and then pouring it on late when his opponent is more tired than he is. As puts it, Nate Diaz just knows how to fight tired better than most guys.

5- You guys, we are absolutely about to get Yoel Romero vs Paolo Costa.

6- So we talk about Robert Whittaker being shop worn and it's true BUT conversely, what about Yoel Romero? Romero was in those five rounds wars with Whittaker, is old as hell, has years of high level wear and tear on his body and at some point he's simply going to fall off. Paulo Costa's body work is something that Yoel Romero has never had to tend to before. Most guys are terrified of getting in tight with Romero because unless you're an insane wrestler, chances are he's going to put the burners on you with an overhand right/flying knee or clinch you and get you on the mat if he's uncomfortable with the space and range. Costa though is an all pressure march ahead and throw caution to the wind striker who just overwhelms you with his intensity and his mental toughness. We've seen Yoel Romero just casually beat up on those grit and toughness dudes before and so this is a fine enough test for what remains of Romero and what Costa can bring differently compared to most guys.

7- If Costa wins, is there a chance that the UFC will do Paulo Costa vs the winner of Adesanya/Whittaker?  Or is the winner of Hermansson vs Cannonier a lock for the title shot?

8- Bruson vs Heinisch is going to be bowling shoe ugly, am I right dudes?

9- While Moggly/Sodiq Yusuff is a great fight and there's plenty of solid WMMA action, the biggest fight outside of the top 3 is Cory Sandhagen vs Raphael Assuncao. Assuncao is back in that spot he's found himself in before; needing to pull off an extensive winning streak to put himself in #1 contender contention again. He had another impressive streak snapped by Marlon Moraes in February and now we're left to figure out if Assuncao is in the Jon Fitch portion of his career where he's more a Top 5 tester/professional MMA hitman. His opponent is the sort of dude who Assuncao has historically found ways to check at the high level; the very young, very athletic yet somewhat flawed Cory  Sandhagen.  Sandhagen's UFC resume are two fights on short notice vs guys you'd expect him to blow out (Mario Bautista and Austin Arnett), a statement war over Iuri Alcantara and then the fight that solidified him as a top 10 guy when he took a split decision over John Lineker in a back and forth fight on the feet. Sandhagen has proven himself to be well worthy of his spot in the top 10 but Assuncao has only lost to two dudes at 135 lbs; TJ Dillashaw and Marlon Moraes. Long story short, this would be a massive insane win for Cory Sandhagen.

10- So the UFC thinks they might've found something in Devonte Smith and I'm not entirely sure if they're right or wrong either way. Including his DWCS performance, Smith has three wins in under a round under the watchful eye of the UFC. He ran through undefeated Joseph Lowry on the Contenders Series and then ended 2018 blasting out Julian Erosa in about thirty seconds. He opened up 2019 by KOing Dong Hyun Ma in Australia, again in short order and so we're left to try and figure out what Smith really has to offer. He has one pro loss (available on youtube) against Jon Gunther where he beat the fuck out of Gunther early, got worn down, tuckered out and then finished in the third round. He's only been out of the first round one other time recently-ish and that was a five round title fight where he looked perfectly fine going into the championship rounds. Thus far all we have is Smith running through folks in quite and easy order and you'd assume AT SOME POINT he's going to get tested. I'm just not sure that short notice Clay Collard is "the guy" to test him.

11- Christos Giagos made the UFC in 2014 and after a 1-2 run, he was sent away. He returned in 2018 on short notice vs Charles Oliveira in September and after losing (impressively I'd add), he's won two in a row. He's got the very solid Drakkar Klose up to face him and if he wins, we're looking at three in a row to solidify himself as an actual long term member of the roster.

12- If Brandon Davis and Kyung Ho Kang isn't the FOTN then something went wrong OR something went really right.