Hyden's Take
HYDEN BLOG: Quick Hits on Ronda Rousey, Rampage, Frankie Edgar, and Sudden Victory
Mar 7, 2012 - 9:30:47 AM HYDEN BLOG: Quick Hits on Ronda Rousey, Rampage, Frankie Edgar, and Sudden Victory

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By: Frank Hyden, MMATorch cntributor

Ronda Rousey almost tore Meisha Tate's arm off in their fight for Tate's Strikeforce Women's Bantamweight title last week. Rousey got the armbar submission win and is now a champion after only five fights. There's no question that Rousey is a beast on the ground. It seems that the best way to try to beat her is to keep the fight standing and go for the knockout or stoppage. Easier said than done, but that's what makes the fight game so interesting.

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Quinton "Rampage" Jackson has said that his next UFC fight will be his last, but that he would continue fighting. This is probably just a case of Rampage venting, but it's not like he has a lot of fighting left in his career anyway. Don't get me wrong, I've always enjoyed Rampage, both as a fighter and a personality, it's just that he has other interests in his life. I wouldn't expect Rampage to keep hanging around. It would be cool to see Rampage and Mauricio "Shogun" Rua fight one final time, maybe the next time the UFC travels to Japan? That'd be a really cool capper to Rampage's career. Of course, I wouldn't be surprised if Rampage took the occasional fight here and there, though, even after a fight with Rua. Rampage wouldn't be retiring so much as scaling back. I guess it just depends on how he wants to handle things.

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Nate Diaz fights Jim Miller at UFC on FOX 3 on May 5, 2012. The winner receives a shot at the UFC Lightweight Title. Dana White had said that he was trying to talk Frankie Edgar into dropping to featherweight - where he'd have gotten an immediate title shot against Jose Aldo - before finally acquiescing and giving him his rematch with Ben Henderson. I don't think it's right for Dana or anyone else to try to tell a guy what weight class he should fight at. Edgar has done pretty well for himself at lightweight. Dropping weight isn't going to change his fighting style, he's still going to take a beating in whatever weight class he's in. That'd just the way Edgar fights, and it's not going to change.

I think the real reason Dana wanted Edgar to drop to featherweight is to strengthen that division. Aldo doesn't have a lot of challengers. You can't give Chad Mendes another title shot, not after the way he lost to Aldo at UFC 142, so there's not a lot of guys to choose from. The UFC Lightweight division is jammed up with a lot of potential challengers. Dropping to featherweight might be a good thing for Edgar eventually, although I don't think a 10lb. weight difference is going to make that big a deal for Edgar; the lack of potential challengers probably would.

Ultimately, I think Frankie Edgar should drop to featherweight when and if that's what he wants. That's the only thing he should take into account. He shouldn't worry about what Dana White or anyone else wants. If Edgar wants to go to featherweight, he should. If he wants to stay at lightweight, he should.

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Ian McCall was announced as having lost a majority decision to Demetrious Johnson at UFC on FX 2 last week. However, there was a major mix-up and the fight should have been ruled a draw. Joseph Benavidez won his fight with Yasuhiro Urushitani to advance to the finals of the UFC Flyweight Tournament. Now McCall and Johnson are expected to rematch in April, with the winner facing Benavidez to crown the first UFC Flyweight champion.

The first McCall vs. Johnson fight should have gone to a 4th round, a "sudden victory" round. However, the confusion over the scorecards shot that plan to hell. It's really unfortunate because that would have been pretty damn exciting. McCall had staged a furious comeback and had momentum. However, Johnson had probably won the first two rounds. It was a very, very close fight, and exactly the reason sudden victory rounds were put into place. Hopefully in the future, problems like this don't occur too often.


Comments and suggestions can be e-mailed to me at hydenfrank@gmail.com