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TV Reviews
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The Ultimate Fighter
THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER REPORT 11/12: Hyden's rundown of all the fights, all the drama on Spike TV By Frank Hyden, MMATorch contributor
Nov 12, 2008 - 9:13:31 PM
The Ultimate Fighter review
November 12, 2008
By Frank Hyden
After last week's destruction of David Kaplan; Phillipe Nover is confident of his chances to win this season. This week's fight is between the only 2 Light Heavyweights who haven't fought yet, Krzysztof Soszynski and Kyle Kingsbury. Krzy's thumb is hurt, he think it's possibly fractured. Frank Mir has a hand expert brought in to examine Krzy's thumb. Krzy should be able to work through the pain.
David Kaplan and Tom Lawlor are drinking. Kaplan is getting drunk and starts trashtalking everyone. Shane Nelson comments about Kaplan loving to wear a speedo. Kaplan says he's never been knocked out and that no one in that house can knock him out. Kaplan starts asking for Lawlor to hit him. He wants to prove that he can't be knocked out. Lawlor refuses to hit him so Kaplan starts slapping around on Lawlor. Finally, Lawlor agrees to hit Kaplan and nails him flush on the chin. Kaplan goes down like a sack and is out like a light. Lawlor lays him flat and rouses him. Later, Kaplan claims that he never lost consciousness. That's about as believable as when Gray Maynard whined that he wasn't knocked out at the end of his fight with Rob Emerson.
Many of the fighters in the house think that Krzy is overlooking Kyle. If he is that could come back to haunt him. Vinny Magalhaes says that Krzy is a good striker but has no takedown defense or ability and has no ground game. While Team Mir is training Team Nogueira decides to prank Krzy. They all move a huge amount of stuff into Krzy's room. They put tables and chairs and water and a lot of other stuff in there. They then put a sign on the door saying the room is now UFC storage.
Dan Henderson comes in to be a guest coach for Team Mir. Henderson has coached Krzy for the past year or so. Krzy approves of Team Nog's prank but wants to get them back in a good way. Before he can do that, though, we move to the Coaches' Challenge. The Coaches' Challenge this year is goalkeeping on a soccer field. Mir immediately claims bias because Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira is from Brazil, where soccer is life. However, Nogueira has never played soccer before. Neither guy is very good at this but Nog does better because of his effort. Mir stands like a statue and won't dive for any of the balls. Team Nog is cheering their coach and Kyle is shouting "GOAL!" at the top of his lungs like the soccer announcers do sometimes. This irritates Mir, especially after he does it as Mir is walking past. Mir sounds like a whiny little baby. In a sitdown Mir claims to be a superior athlete. I was never a huge fan of Frank Mir but I can say that I have a strong dislike of Mir now. That kind of arrogance is so unbecoming. Mir sounds like such a tool. He even takes a shot at the fighters cheering by saying that they're losers and that's why they're cheering. What a prick. Honestly, I hope he gets his face smashed in by Nogueira. This is the reverse of what happened with Tito Ortiz. I personally had always thought that Tito was a big jerk but when he coached Season 3 of TUF he showed himself to be a great guy. I has always thought that Mir was an okay guy, but now he's shown himself to be a total a-hole. Nogueira won the shootout.
Kyle and Krzy and both training hard for this fight. Both guys are strikers. Kyle promises an exciting fight. For his revenge prank Krzy takes all of the plates and utensils and sets the table out on the basketball court. He's got quite an elaborate setting going on. He also explains that his family moved to Canada for a chance at a better life. Krzy is feeling a little pressure but is very confident. He's way overconfident when he says he can beat Kyle with one arm tied behind his back. Kyle seems relaxed and ready to go.
FIGHT- Krzysztof Soszynski vs. Kyle Kingsbury
Kyle is 3 inches taller and has a0.5 inch reach advantage. Herb Dean is the ref.
ROUND 1- The clinch early. Kyle lands some knees, but they're low. Herb Dean warns him about them. Krzy lands some good punches. They clinch again and both throw some knees. Kyle has Krzy's arms pinned under his arms. Krzy jumps backwards to the mat and drags Kyle down with him. Krzy spins and grabs Kyle's arm. Krzy works for, and gets, an armbar to finish.
WINNER- Krzysztof Soszynski by Armbar
This episode was basically a version of "Can You Top This?" in terms of douchiness. Kaplan started things off strong by claiming to have not been knocked out despite clear visual evidence to the contrary. He gets points for sticking to his story, though. Frank Mir then comes and obliterates that with his behavior on the soccer field. His actions have set a new record for worst behavior on a TUF episode. A lot of guys have acted like a punk on this show, but Mir is the undisputed champ now. Krzysztof tried to drive to the hoop with some crazy claims involving beating Kyle with one arm but he got rejected by Mir's idiocy.
Once again, the fight this week was short. Krzy showed some good skills on the ground, but I think Kyle's lack of jiu-jitsu made him look better than he is. He might be the favorite, it's still hard to tell. Ryan Bader looked really good also.
NEXT WEEK- The hard-hugging John Polakowski vs. George Roop
