GSP Wins, Couture KO'd at UFC 129

Georges St. Pierre defended his Welterweight title with a 5-round unanimous decision victory over Jake Shields. The fight stayed on the feet for almost the entire 25 minutes. Shields hit GSP with what looked like a knuckle to his open left eye, St. Pierre said he could not see out of it. Not completely dominate, but there was no doubt when the horn sounded that GSP was the winner. After the fight he was noncommittal about moving up to middleweight and fighting Anderson Silva.

Couture done like that? Randy "The Natural" Couture said prior to the fight with Lyoto Machida, that he would retire. The 47 year old former champion was knocked out in the 1st round by something out of The Karate Kid. Machida landed a devastating kick to the face that sent Captain America to the ground. That was it... or will he be back?

Jose Aldo (boring) Vladimir Matyushenko (20 seconds TKO punches), and Ben Henderson (decision) were all winners on the night's main card.

-Keefe

Who is Shinya Aoki?

Following B.J. Penn’s unanimous decision loss to Frankie Edgar for the UFC Lightweight title, who is the best 155 pound fighter in the world? I nominate this man, Shinya Aoki. He makes his United States debut this Saturday night in Nashville, Tennessee fighting for the Strikeforce Lightweight Championship against Gilbert Melendez. But what do we really know about this Japanese submission specialist.

Aoki’s MMA Record (23-4) (4-0 Pride, 7-2 DREAM)

Notable wins: Mizuto Hirota, Joachim Hansen (2), Vitor Ribeiro, Eddie Alverez, Caol Uno, JZ Cavalcante, George Sotiropoulos

Notable losses: Hayato “Mach” Sakurai (2), Joachim Hansen

Titles: DREAM Lightweight Champion, Shooto Middleweight Champion, WAMMA* Lightweight Champion

*WAMMA = World Alliance of Mixed Martial Arts, they currently have only 2 champions as Dana White and the UFC are not on board with WAMMA’s goal of having just 1 champion per weight class regardless of organization. Therefore Fedor (Heavyweight) and Aoki (Lightweight) are the only WAMMA champs at this time.

Aoki may be best known as the guy wearing pants who pulls off crazy submissions like gogoplatas and such. He is not imposing and at 5’11-155 often looks much weaker than his opponent. However strength is not a big part of Aoki’s game. Positioning, a crazy rubber guard, and of course submissions (14 of his 23 wins are by submission) are what make him great.

This past December, Aoki showed fight fans a different side of himself. He was scheduled to fight Kawajiri, but a short notice switch had him battle Mizuto Hirota. Aoki caught Hirota in a submission (jump to the 2:55 mark), pulling his arm behind his back until it broke, then immediately after, the normally calm, reserved fighter gave his fallen opponent the finger a la Brock Lesnar. The guy has fire.

On Saturday many American MMA fans will be introduced to Aoki, who will not be allowed to wear his signature pants. Die hard fans are well aware of Aoki’s significance in the sports, pointing to wins over JZ Cavalcante, Bellator Lightweight Champ Eddie Alverez, Sengoku Lightweight Champ Mizuto Hirota, and DREAM Lightweight Grand Prix Champ Joachim Hansen.

Perhaps if those wins were over Kenny Florian, Sean Sherk, Diego Sanchez, or even Joe Stevenson, Aoki would be a bigger name for the casual fan. Not participating in the UFC can be seen as not fighting the best fighters in the world, but not in the Lightweight division.

The 155 pound class, to me, is the only division (of the 5 UFC divisions) that if you did a competition pitting the UFC vs. The Field (Strikeforce, DREAM, WEC, Bellator, Sengoku, etc.) The Field would win. In many divisions, Light Heavyweight and Welterweight it wouldn’t even be close in favor of the UFC.

In a hypothetical 16 man Lightweight Tournament (something Dana White would never sign off on) the 8 best UFC Lightweights take on the 8 Best Non-UFC Lightweights. I will pick the teams right now off the top of my head.

UFC: B.J. Penn, Frankie Edgar, Kenny Florian, Gray Maynard, George Sotiropoulos, Diego Sanchez, Sean Sherk, Clay Guida. (For argument sake Diego stays at 155)

The Field: Shinya Aoki, Eddie Alverez, Joachim Hansen, Tatsuya Kawajiri, Josh Thomson, JZ Cavalcante, Gilbert Melendez, Benson Henderson

How great would that be? Who do you think wins? I still say Penn wins the tournament, but I like The Field to send more guys to the 2^nd and the 3^rd rounds.

I guess my point is, the Lightweight division is a little bit different. Fighters like Aoki, who have not been in UFC, still get to face some of the toughest challenges that their division has to offer. That is why I am really looking forward to the Aoki vs. Melendez fight on CBS this Saturday.

And who knows, Aoki turns just 27 next month, he could fight in the UFC after all, but I don’t think he has to.

Strikeforce is putting on a potential “Card of the Year” with Saturday night’s event that boasts a ridiculous 3 title fights…

Light Heavyweight Championship: Gegard Mousasi vs. Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal

Middleweight Championship: Jake Shields vs. Dan Henderson

Lightweight Championship: Gilbert Melendez vs. Shinya Aoki

And did I mention that these fights are completely free? No pay-per-view here, just CBS this Saturday night. Enjoy the fights!

(Article courtesy of BostonThrowdown.com)

10 Fights to Watch in June

Welcome MMA fans to an action packed month of fights. The UFC, WEC, and Strikeforce are all on display. Despite just 1 title fight and just 1 actual pay-per-view there are some intriguing match ups out there. Let's take a look at my Top 10 for June. (These aren't in order of importance rather by date.)

1. Robbie Lawler vs. Jake Shields (at middleweight); June 6th, Strikeforce
Lawler is a Top 10 maybe Top 5 middleweight in the world. Jake Shields is a Top 10 maybe Top 5 welterweight in the world. Neither guy is signed by the UFC. Neither guy has a worthy opponent out there. Maybe Lawler could fight one of the DREAM 185 pound guys, but the fact of the matter is Shields has no one he can fight, when 9 of the top 10 welterweights are in the UFC and he's the other, who does he fight? He goes up to 185 apparently. What's next for him if he wins?

2. Nick Diaz vs. Scott Smith; June 6th, Strikeforce
Diaz just ran through Frank Shamrock in his last fight, not he gets in the cage with a very exciting fighter and fellow UFC alum Scott Smith. Diaz changes weights more than Anna Nicole (too soon?), so he is a prime candidate for tough fights outside the UFC. Perhaps if he and Shields both win that would be a match up in the future.

3. Andrei Arlovski vs. Brett Rogers; June 6th, Strikeforce
The former UFC Heavyweight Champ and current Affliction star Andrei Arlovski steps in for the injured Strikeforce Heavyweight Champ Alistair Overeem... 2 quick things here. Overeem (one of my favorites) is the champ after beating Paul Buentello forever ago for the vacant title, and he hasn't defended it once. He's been fighting in DREAM and K-1. What the hell? How can a title be taken seriously like that? And 2, Overeem is hurt because of a bar fight where he and his brother, former Pride fighter Valentin, put 5 bouncers in the hospital. Crazy. I do like how Affliction and Strikeforce will work together, because they have to. Rogers is a big dude, could be a solid fight.

4. Kevin Randleman vs. Mike Whitehead; June 6th, Strikeforce
We all know the best 205 pounders are in the UFC. Babalu is the best not under contract by Dana White and the Ferrettas. He already beat Whitehead in Affliction. But these two guys are very experienced and have fought in the very best organizations in the world. Nice work out of Strikeforce to put together a card like this. They have 4 fights I want to see.

5. Mike Brown vs. Urijah Faber; June 7th, WEC 41
The lone Championship bout in the month, we can see the 2 best Featherweights in the world on free tv. Thanks Versus. Brown shocked most of the MMA world when he beat Faber for the title back in November of 2008. In his last 3 fights, Brown beat the 3 of the best at 145, Jeff Curran, Faber, and Leonard Garcia. The WEC is praying (much like Hughes did against Serra in a laying fashion) that Faber wins so they can set up a Faber/Brown III. But if Brown wins? Who's left? They better hope a lightweight drops down and challenges him. Should be the best fight of the month right here.

6. Wanderlei Silva vs. Rich Franklin (catch-weight 195); June 13, UFC 99
I don't know what to make of this one. Besse and I tried to figure this out and we got nothin. Silva was the 205 champ of Pride and really the world for a 4-5 year period. Franklin was the best middleweight around until Anderson Silva showed up. So you got one guy moving up and another moving down and they catch (pun!) each other in the middle. Wow. Both guys though are can't miss fighters.

7. Mike Swick vs. Ben Saunders; June 13, UFC 99
Two exciting alums of The Ultimate Fighter reality show. Swick was a good middleweight, but made the move after losing to a huge 185er in Okami. He's 3-0 as a welterweight and is already a top 10 guy. Saunders meanwhile is 3-0 in the UFC. The winner of this fight should be taking on the likes of Josh Koscheck, Karo Parisya, Paulo Thiago, huge fight for both guys.

8. Mirko Cro Cop vs. Mustapha Al-Turk; June 13, UFC 99
Crop returns to the UFC where he posted just a 1-2 record after being regarded as a top 3 heavyweight in the world when he was in Pride. Both Cro Cop and Al-Turk share losses to Cheick Kongo. This is a big fight to me, because I want to see if Cro Cop has anything left in him. He was in the ring with Overeem and was getting whooped before it was rules a no contest cause he got his junk kneed in by Alistair, I hope he's recovered from that, not sure you can though.

9. Diego Sanchez vs. Clay Guida; June 20, Ultimate Fighter Finale
Like oh so many fighters who lose in the UFC Diego moved down a weight class. Fighting at 155 now Diego has to be a threat at the title. He was a top 10 welterweight, if he can handle the cut, and he certainly did in his win over Joe Stevenson, I say look out. Remember he beat Kenny Florian in TUF 1 (both out of their weight classes), but I think Diego is just a couple fights away from the title. Guida always pushes the pace and makes for exciting fights. Goldberg is going to be nuts in this one.

10. Joe Stevenson vs. Nate Diaz; June 20, Ultimate Fighter Finale
Big fight for both guys here. If Diaz wins he proves he should be fighting Top 5 UFC Lightweights until he loses. Stevenson on the other hand, needs to W. He's lost 3 of his last 4 fights. Nothing to be ashamed of in the losses as they were to B.J. Penn, Kenny Florian, and Diego Sanchez, but if he can't beat those guys he's not winning any titles. A loss to Diaz would be devastating. You won't want to miss either Lightweight bout, this and Diego vs. Guida, both for free on Spike TV.


-Keefe