TheVileOne Posted May 27, 2017 Share Posted May 27, 2017 6 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said: You would think the guy who had a back and forth title fight with the last guy to beat Demetrious would be the one. That's why you would want someone like Dillashaw. Sure, it can be one of those Andre Ward vs. Chad Dawson situations where the heavier weight champ destroys his body to fight the lighter weight champ in the latter's division and gets clowned in the fight. However, you run that risk with people who actually fight in that division. If he can make it safely and feels like he can, I'm all for it. The thing is...DJ gets all that flack for not drawing (which I'm not sure really matter anymore because hardly anyone else does either) but he doesn't want to fight any superfights despite people always bringing that up. I have to agree with what Meltzer said on Observer earlier this week. If you don't want to market yourself or take any notable fights, how can you expect to be a draw? The annoying questions from the media are going to keep coming especially if you're fighting people who have no shot at beating you , everyone knows that, and hardly anyone tunes in. DJ could easily go on a run where he could fight Dillashaw, Garbrandt, Cruz, and any fighter they could line up and easily cement himself as one of the top 5 PBP ever at any weight. If you beat those dudes in a relatively close vicinity of each other, people are going to take notice. That's how you make money. That doesn't mean he's ready for him. And it doesn't mean he can make 125 pounds either. Also he still walked away from that fight with Cruz with a loss. So the MMA math argument doesn't really work there. A Dillashaw vs. Johnson fight isn't going to draw big numbers either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 27, 2017 Author Share Posted May 27, 2017 20 minutes ago, TheVileOne said: That doesn't mean he's ready for him. There would be vastly more intrigue than any of the flyweight fights. Demetrious is clearly the best flyweight ever, but the guys he is competing against don't have records that hold a candle anyone competing in divisions above 125. Everyone besides maybe Benavidez is hovering around being slightly relevant in terms of having a meaningful resume. So it isn't matter if Dillashaw is ready for DJ but the inverse since Dillashaw is competing in a division where he isn't the only historical relevant and proven fighter. When the division orbits around you as the only achieved fighter by leaps and bounds, yeah you're going to look like Jesus Christ. Going tit-for-tat in a fight with someone who decisively beat DJ is pretty incontrovertible in proving that you're ready. 20 minutes ago, TheVileOne said: And it doesn't mean he can make 125 pounds either. You can do test cuts and Dillashaw isn't that big of a 135er anyway. They were going to give a title shot to someone who had missed weight several times at 125. Cejudo and Borg have a history of not making weight. One already got a title shot and the other is on the brink of getting one. Beggars can't be choosers. 20 minutes ago, TheVileOne said: A Dillashaw vs. Johnson fight isn't going to draw big numbers either. That's no indictment against it. Nobody is drawing big numbers this year. 250 to 300K is still a much bigger number 115-120K and that's why the UFC wants to make that fight. They can get it to that level based on curiosity. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 27, 2017 Share Posted May 27, 2017 There's not even a high likelihood that fight can draw 250K-300K. If it doesn't matter that Dillashaw isn't ready, then it doesn't matter that someone like Pettis or Moreno aren't ready either. Pettis is at least established in the UFC and has fought a bunch, and if he were to win, he'd be on a considerable winning streak at flyweight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 27, 2017 Author Share Posted May 27, 2017 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: There's not even a high likelihood that fight can draw 250K-300K. You put a concentrated effort into marketing the fight, you can make it. DJ isn't 100% at fault for the numbers he has drawn. He was never against a murderer's row of established names. When you're the A side and not a draw, you have no idea what is the ceiling for when you're fighting someone on a comparable level. Cruz-Dillashaw did a good number on Fox and had pretty solid build. You market it as the best fighter in the world against a former bantamweight champion in a fight where history is contingent on DJ winning, you can do business comparable to most of what these PPVs are landing at right now. There are different ways to make it work. If you're lazy and market it as just another PPV, yeah it's not going to do business. However, the enthusiasm the UFC has for making this fight kinda tells you they're not going to put it on autopilot and at least make a concerted effort in spite of DJ's lack of marketability and Dillashaw kinda being bland jock bro-ish. 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: If it doesn't matter that Dillashaw isn't ready, then it doesn't matter that someone like Pettis or Moreno aren't ready either. No, I'm saying quite clearly Dillashaw is ready for Mighty Mouse. It's Mighty Mouse to prove he is ready for Dillashaw. Dillashaw has competed in a division where you have at least 3 or 4 quality fighters other himself and you have 3 or 4 guys on the way up where they could be the future of the bantamweight division. There is no one I feel could be a top 7 bantamweight who currently competes at flyweight. I love Louis Smolka's fighting style, but he got beat by a very green Brandon Moreno (mind you, the FIFTEENTH ranked guy on that season of TUF). Elliott is a hell of a scrapper, but he's not really on the level of a top 5 bantamweight. Wilson Reis has always been a solid fighter, but that's his ceiling really. He would get smoked by a somewhat decent bantamweight. His time in Bellator pretty much proved that. Horiguchi was a good fighter, but he's only a banger for 125. He would have significant trouble at bantamweight. Bagautinov just got smoked outside of the UFC by perennial journeyman Tyson Nam. Pettis and Borg aren't really polished enough yet and they're on the verge of getting a title shot. Moreno is green as hell and had trouble in his last fight against Dustin Ortiz, who is solid but at this point he is there to test people. Moreno is probably 1-2 years away from being close to his prime legitimately. Benavidez could become a top 10 bantamweight but he is tremendously undersized. He could beat an Eddie Wineland, John Dodson, or Johnny Eduardo. That's kinda it. I wouldn't be confident he can beat people higher than that. Ian McCall hasn't had a fight in forever. Formiga is a solid fighter, but he isn't even close to the expectations people had for him coming out of Brazil and Shooto. If Montague didn't flop and McCall wasn't cursed w/ some really bad juju, Formiga would be the biggest disappointment at flyweight even with his wins outweighing the losses. Cejudo is very good but he really didn't have that breakout win prior to fighting DJ. How impressive is it beating Chico Camus? The less said about Chris Cariaso getting a title shot, the better. That's the flyweight division that DJ has dominated. They are good relative to a young division where a former, undersized bantamweight who was already a great fighter came down and utterly dominated. This division has improved, but it's still going exactly how everyone thought it would go post tournament. If DJ goes to up to 135 or someone like TJ or Cruz goes to 125, it's no longer a man among boys. DJ is automatically a top 3-5 bantamweight but the tradeoff is either of those guys is automatically no worse than the second best flyweight with zero flyweight fights. If someone like Tom Duquesnoy could make 125, it would be sheer ugliness because very few of those guys matchup that well with him and he is a bantamweight prospect who probably isn't in his prime yet. Because there isn't a strong core nucleus of fighters like 135 or 145, extremely young fighters like Moreno, Pettis, and Borg in addition to people who already fought DJ like Cejudo and Horiguchi are rushed to the title way before they should be challenging for it. If these guys can't get multiple wins over an established fighter (Benavidez hasn't lost to anyone but DJ at 125), how the hell is anyone going to believe they can beat DJ let alone be interested in watching that fight? DJ-Dillashaw would be pick em odds in most places. That's way more enticing than, "Hey, should we watch this -425 underdog face a guy who is outrageously more talented in every facet of MMA than said underdog? Naw, I will just catch the highlights." You want to break up that monotony and also put history on the line, the clear best bet (and the bet UFC is willing to make) is Johnson-Dillashaw. The responses I've seen on social media have been nothing but positive (not counting Ray Borg of course). Everything else is more of the same, and that would be undercutting the importance of someone defending their title that many times. If DJ had two or three legit contenders ready to go, I would feel much differently. However, that's far from the case. So the worst case scenario in making the Dillashaw fight is you give three really good prospects who need ALL the experience in the world before fighting Mighty Mouse a temporary stay of execution. Best case scenario, you get a half decent to good buyrate if you market it effectively and you get easily the most notable flyweight fight in MMA history. In addition, you can probably leverage that into getting Demetrious fights at 135 and opening flyweight up for a new king on the throne. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 27, 2017 Share Posted May 27, 2017 Kyoji Horiguchi's only loss in the UFC was to Johnson, and he was still a legit top five contender when he left. Also Benavidez was legit top 5 at bantamweight when he dropped down to 125 pounds. He fought for the title twice, and his only losses were to the champion in Cruz. Also, if Dillashaw moves down and wins the title, is he really going to stay there? If he decides to move back up, that's going to create chaos in the whole division. The fights he wants are people like Cruz and Garbrandt. Or if he doesn't, you risk losing a Dillashaw/Garbrandt match for the foreseeable future. So are you really going to murder Garbrandt vs. Dillashaw just to get a short-term fix at flyweight? It's not worth it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 27, 2017 Author Share Posted May 27, 2017 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: Kyoji Horiguchi's only loss in the UFC was to Johnson, and he was still a legit top five contender when he left. I don't know if legit is the right way to describe it since nobody he beat is still in the UFC except Neil Seery who is about to retire. He beat some decent dudes and looked like he had made some strides joining ATT when he fought Bagautinov. He never had a performance then that made you feel like "oh shit, this dude is the future of 125". He didn't fight Dodson when he was still at FLW, didn't fight Formiga, didn't fight Benavidez, or anyone else of that caliber in that small group of known guys. He was still very much a prospect in the making who decided to leave in free agency. The problem with being a prospect in a very thin division is you challenge for the belt when you shouldn't. That's what happened to him. 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: Also Benavidez was legit top 5 at bantamweight when he dropped down to 125 pounds He was a top bantamweight when bantamweight was as shallow as flyweight. There was no Cody Garbrandt, TJ Dillashaw, Jimmie Rivera, Raphael Assuncao, Thomas Almeida, Aljamain Sterling, Tom Duquesnoy, etc. He can beat the old guard of bantamweights as I said above that never moved past a certain level (Wineland, Eduardo, Gamburyan, and probably Dodson) because he has quickness, but the division has gotten so much better since WEC. 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: Also, if Dillashaw moves down and wins the title, is he really going to stay there? If he decides to move back up, that's going to create chaos in the whole division. Yeah, you can't create chaos in a division where there is one legitimate contender in Joseph Benavidez. You just have DJ fight for the title again because he is clearly better than everyone else. Everything else will fall into place because those guys who shouldn't have been fighting DJ get a chance to gain more experience and perhaps turn the corner as a contender in the interim. That solves that. You can also do Cody vs. Cruz again or Cody vs. DJ or Cody vs. any bantamweight who earned a title shot if DJ wins. Dillashaw is still talented enough to win his way back to the title shot. He isn't going to forget how to fight overnight. Plus, that fight wasn't a really big money fight either. You can always remake it down the line. It's two really young fighters. So saying it's not worth it is very questionable at best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 27, 2017 Share Posted May 27, 2017 53 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said: I don't know if legit is the right way to describe it since nobody he beat is still in the UFC except Neil Seery who is about to retire. He beat some decent dudes and looked like he had made some strides joining ATT when he fought Bagautinov. He never had a performance then that made you feel like "oh shit, this dude is the future of 125". He didn't fight Dodson when he was still at FLW, didn't fight Formiga, didn't fight Benavidez, or anyone else of that caliber in that small group of known guys. He was still very much a prospect in the making who decided to leave in free agency. The problem with being a prospect in a very thin division is you challenge for the belt when you shouldn't. That's what happened to him. He was a top bantamweight when bantamweight was as shallow as flyweight. There was no Cody Garbrandt, TJ Dillashaw, Jimmie Rivera, Raphael Assuncao, Thomas Almeida, Aljamain Sterling, Tom Duquesnoy, etc. He can beat the old guard of bantamweights as I said above that never moved past a certain level (Wineland, Eduardo, Gamburyan, and probably Dodson) because he has quickness, but the division has gotten so much better since WEC. Yeah, you can't create chaos in a division where there is one legitimate contender in Joseph Benavidez. You just have DJ fight for the title again because he is clearly better than everyone else. Everything else will fall into place because those guys who shouldn't have been fighting DJ get a chance to gain more experience and perhaps turn the corner as a contender in the interim. That solves that. You can also do Cody vs. Cruz again or Cody vs. DJ or Cody vs. any bantamweight who earned a title shot if DJ wins. Dillashaw is still talented enough to win his way back to the title shot. He isn't going to forget how to fight overnight. Plus, that fight wasn't a really big money fight either. You can always remake it down the line. It's two really young fighters. So saying it's not worth it is very questionable at best. That's bullshit on Benavidez. Bantamweight was plenty competitive when he was there and there were a lot of tough and highly touted guys. Assuncao was there. He dropped to bantamweight the same year the division was brought into the UFC. You may not have had Rivera, Dillashaw or Garbrandt, but you had the likes of Urijah Faber, Brian Bowles, Miguel Torres, Dominick Cruz, Demetrious Johnson, Brad Pickett, Michael McDonald, Scott Jorgensen, Takeya Mizugaki, and Renan Barao. That's a great competitive set of fighters in 2011. No one really expected the careers of Torres and Bowles' careers to just drop like a rock like they did. It's like people forget the WEC existed and how competitive bantamweight was back then. There were good fighters at bantamweight in the WEC. Cruz and Faber didn't create the division on their own. The best course is to stick with Garbrandt vs. Dillashaw. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 27, 2017 Author Share Posted May 27, 2017 12 minutes ago, TheVileOne said: You may not have had Rivera, Dillashaw or Garbrandt, but you had the likes of Urijah Faber, Brian Bowles, Miguel Torres, Dominick Cruz, Demetrious Johnson, Brad Pickett, Michael McDonald, Scott Jorgensen, Takeya Mizugaki, and Renan Barao. That's a great competitive set of fighters in 2011. Yes, when you're starting off a division those are some good fighters but we're more than half a decade removed from that. An undersized guy like Benavidez is going to have success in a division that's in its infancy. That's the case in every division. You do not have a slew of 5'9" middleweights or 5'5" welterweights just killing the game like you did in 2001-2007. Things hit a natural evolution in MMA. Someone like Benavidez can be a top 9-15 bantamweight just due to speed, toughness, and youth. However, he isn't breaking that ceiling in the same way Renan Barao couldn't break that ceiling at 145. At 125, Joseph can guard the door for a title shot because he has traits that allow him to continue to be the #2 guy. At 135, he doesn't have that luxury because he is facing other established fighters with many relatively new and coming up fighters. There is nothing wrong with being a top 10 fighter up a weight class where you are very small, but that's not an great indictment for the legitimacy of the division you just came from. Also, that's not a good indictment of why you should just do Garbrandt vs. Dillashaw. That was just saying WEC was entertaining, which everyone knows. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 27, 2017 Share Posted May 27, 2017 And yet Benavidez was still a legitimate top five bantamweight and a two time title contender. Not only that he fought the former champion, Dominick Cruz, to a close split decision and delivered a good deal of damage on him. So he went toe to toe with him, just like Dillashaw, the guy you say is ready to face Johnson now because he went toe to toe with Cruz. His only losses at bantamweight were to the champion Dominick Cruz, and one of those was a pretty close fight where he busted up Cruz's face. So for you to postulate that he'd never be a legit top 10 or 15 guy today is hot garbage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 27, 2017 Author Share Posted May 27, 2017 3 minutes ago, TheVileOne said: he'd never be a legit top 10 or 15 guy today I said he would be a top 10-15 fighter. That's not what I'm disputing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 28, 2017 Share Posted May 28, 2017 Moving on from that, Germaine de Randamie is refusing to defend her title against Cyborg. So what do you do? Nuke the division or strip her of the belt and book Cyborg vs. Megan Anderson? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 28, 2017 Author Share Posted May 28, 2017 1 hour ago, TheVileOne said: Moving on from that, Germaine de Randamie is refusing to defend her title against Cyborg. So what do you do? Nuke the division or strip her of the belt and book Cyborg vs. Megan Anderson? If you want Cyborg as a UFC fighter, you have to keep it. As far as the future, it depends on the UFC's faith in Megan Anderson and more importantly her faith in herself. It seems like she isn't too focused on fighting Cyborg right now. Personally, I say that's very justified because nothing I see from her gives me any feeling she has a decent shot at beating her. Unless the move to Missouri elevates her to an entirely different level of skill, she is going to be just another opponent for Cyborg. I think as is, she is a prototypical work(wo)man fighter like a Tonya Evinger and very tough with some skills like decent power and good movement that would allow her to be probably the best fighter at 145 not named Cristiane Justino (if she isn't already) until someone comes around to usurp her as best non-Cyborg featherweight fighter. I am never the strip the title person, but Germaine pretty much gives the UFC very little choice especially since the division wasn't going to be built around her. First, it was the hand injury, then some bizarre bullshit about a police academy, possible personal problems, and potential retirement. All that to get to she just didn't want to fight Cyborg. They only made that GdR vs. Holm fight so that the winner could fight Cyborg. The title was just a necessary evil to get to that. Despite winning the belt, Germaine found a way to ghost the entire division. If people don't want to catch a fade that bad, they have no other choice but to make it the "Feed Cyborg" division. Make Cyborg vs. someone who is willing to catch that L for the vacant belt at UFC 214. Get that exposure from Cormier vs. JBJ II and go from there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVileOne Posted May 28, 2017 Share Posted May 28, 2017 I don't get it because even if Cyborg beat her up, she'd make a ton of money off that fight as champion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hail Sabin Posted May 28, 2017 Share Posted May 28, 2017 Sounds like she is more worried about getting knocked out then the money. Happens on the B-Ball court as well some guys will talk a bunch then when they see they might eat their words they are magically hurt, have to work or to tired to play anymore. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 28, 2017 Author Share Posted May 28, 2017 Maybe it's because it's not my body, but I say take any fight that allows you to put yourself on the map when very few fighters stand out. I don't understand how you could be that confident on the way up and as you get to a certain level at the top and be so willing to take 15 steps backwards on a PR. That was what this whole charade was. I've been watching Germaine fight since she was just a kickboxer, and this is the first move inside or outside the cage besides taking a fight with Vanessa Porto with three weeks of BJJ training that had me completely befuddled. Just a complete PR nightmare. I was willing to give her a pass on the strikes after the bell at 208 because she doesn't have a history of being a dirty fighter in the ten years I've seen her fight. I will even give her the same pass on the interview after that fight just because post fight interviews usually don't occur in the most settings. People are trying to formulate coherent and cogent thoughts after just being concussed, semi-concussed, injured in some sort of way, and/or massive adrenalines dumps and highs. I'm not expecting the best you on the mic. However, post 208, it has been all downhill. It's like she has no idea what the circumstances are around her being champ. If someone is that willing to get stripped of a title even when in these times it comes off a prop, that's a completely different form of being shook. And to show I'm not just bashing Germaine, I will say Holm and Nunes have been similarly disappointing. I get people are alarmed about the possibility of a contemporary athlete cheating. That's not something that is hard to sympathize with in combat sports. That's why UFC 199 is special in my mind just because someone like Michael Bisping who spent his career going against repeat offenders got his moment in the sun. However, I am still disappointed on two fronts. First off, does the knowledge of USADA testing or the lack thereof inform either Holly Holm and Amanda Nunes of Cyborg's ability to pass and/or beat these tests? By that, I mean do they know for a fact that these tests are bad enough or unreliable enough that they feel confident that Cyborg is getting away with something. Like...can Amanda Nunes give me a legitimate argument against Carbon Isotope Ratio testing? Can Holly Holm tell me about the failings of using an Athlete Biological Passport in sport drug testing? If they can't, they're merely just going off a hunch and what Cyborg did previously (which I grant has to be taken into account). Using that as an excuse (or any other excuse) to not fight Cyborg now makes it look incredibly bad from a PR standpoint because these are the women who should be first in line to fight her. Moreover, very few people who spend money on tickets, PPVs, or to go to a sports bar to watch the fights gives a damn about who is cheating or not. The UFC is just going above and beyond for competition sake, which leads me into the second front. If you want to make the optimum level of money in the sport, you're going to have to take fights where the risk outweighs the reward. Combat sports isn't the place to take the safest fights possible most of the time unless it has been established that you are that person who stands all the way out. However, in that same vain, that's what makes it great that someone like McGregor was willing to fight an Eddie Alvarez. That is what makes the average PPV buyer respect that level of business acumen (even if they don't like McGregor on some weird personal level) more consciously or unconsciously because that is what he or she wants to see truthfully. It's as simple as that. If you use excuse #73 to say you won't fight someone like Cyborg, just because a select few random people on the internet agree with that assessment doesn't mean that's a good business idea as far marketing yourself. Most of the time it's a bad idea unless it's something like Bisping cutting a promo on Yoel Romero because that makes people want to see the fight. Otherwise, don't give a random excuse because you will never convince the people of that like you were when you legitimized that rationale to yourself. Five years of Mayweather/Pacquiao idiocy taught me that it doesn't matter why a fight didn't occur to fans because people will find someone to be at fault no matter if that reason makes sense or not. In the end, both of those parties were able to make exorbitant amounts of money. Amanda Nunes, Germaine de Randamie, and Holly Holm don't have that luxury. They need to be taking all the notable fights they can...the bigger, the better. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 30, 2017 Author Share Posted May 30, 2017 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted May 31, 2017 Author Share Posted May 31, 2017 This was the fight to make with Manuwa serving as the backup for the main event. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twiztor Posted May 31, 2017 Share Posted May 31, 2017 good chance for Oez to prove he deserves his spot. looking forward to this one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 Sara McMann vs. Ketlen Vieira has been added to UFC 214. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hail Sabin Posted June 1, 2017 Share Posted June 1, 2017 UFC tonight said GDR is planning to go back to 135 and not defend her belt against anyone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ace Posted June 1, 2017 Share Posted June 1, 2017 Between that and Cyborg threatening to leave, you might as well shutter the division. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 55 minutes ago, Ace said: Between that and Cyborg threatening to leave, you might as well shutter the division. Cyborg isn't going anywhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elsalvajeloco Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Natural Posted June 2, 2017 Share Posted June 2, 2017 11 hours ago, Ace said: Between that and Cyborg threatening to leave, you might as well shutter the division. Right mess. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Natural Posted June 4, 2017 Share Posted June 4, 2017 Great stuff. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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