Danny "Boy" Downes had nothing to lose tonight stepping in for Johnthan Brookins on short notice...or so he thought (nearly lost his arm!). Jeremy Stephens caught Downes in a deep and nasty kimura, nearly breaking the arm right out of the shoulder. Downes had a ton of heart to survive three rounds with Stephens but he was just out matched. Stephens wins by dominating fashion and that's four wins in his last five fights with the only loss coming by way of split decision to recently surging Melvin Guillard.
Chris Cope dominated Chuck O'Neil on the feet working his way to a decision victory. I was never really impressed by Chuck on the show. He just came across to me as an average fighter who thought he was tough stuff. However, Cope was not all that impressive himself either. However, he did look improved tonight, mixing up his striking and adding some flashy attacks. I side with Joe Rogan on the "Woos," at times it seems a little too much, other times its well timed and hilarious! Only thing is, it's not original, we all know who made the "Woo" famous and that's former pro-wrestler Ric Flair as Joe gave gave surprising credit to during the broadcast. Spencer Fisher is also known to "Woo" frequently, but only because he's a big fan of Flair. Regardless, I don't see Cope ever quitting the "Woo" any time soon and he'll be sticking around a bit longer following tonight's win.
Great slugfest between Kyle Kingsbury and Fabio Maldonado. Took home the fight of the night honors and bonus. Close fight but I agreed with the Kingsbury decision, I had him winning the fight.
I feel really disappointed for Anthony Pettis. I just hate the whole "promised title shot" thing Dana does. More often than not it never works out. Usually fighters are granted these promised shots because they either truly deserve it or it's a match up fans really want to see. I really wanted to see the WEC vs UFC Lightweight Title merger fight! Champion vs Champion! Unfortunately, that won't be happening. Unless you hypothetically follow the WEC title with Guida and where it goes from there, but that's pointless. I predicted Pettis to win this fight, I thought with his active guard he could catch Guida in submission (which he almost did). Not the most entertaining effort from Guida but it won him the fight. Pettis's jumping spinning heel kick off the cage was awesome, something I had never seen before. I'm still a huge fan of Pettis, but looks like he may struggle against tough wrestlers and there a lot of them in the lightweight division.
So what's next for Clay Guida? Well the other current stand out contender is Jim Miller who will be fighting Ben Henderson at UFC on Versus 5 in August. I think Guida needs one more win before he is deserving of a shot and since the lightweight title fight has been postponed there is time to get him another match up. I think if Miller beats Henderson he deserves the title shot 100% (that would be eight wins in a row in the UFC...an eight fight winning streak! Give the man what he deserves if he beats Bendo). However, if Henderson pulls out the win I think a fight between him and Guida makes sense. Melvin Guillard would also make for a solid match up for Guida. I know they both are fighting out of Greg Jackson's camp but I don't see this preventing the potential match up from happening.
Not much to say about the TUF 13 Finale. Tony Ferguson packs power in his punches, but I think he has a long way to go before he makes any kind of impact in the welterweight division. The same can be said for a lot of the recent TUF champions, there hasen't been many stand out winners in lately. Ramsey needs to work on his stand up, the bull rush all out style is not smart. I'm not a fan of Tony, but he finishes fights and tonight's knock out was a good one.
Great day/night of fights (nice having all the prelims on Facebook!). As always, thanks for following, and check back for UFC 131 predictions. PEACE!
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