Hyden's Take
HYDEN BLOG: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly from UFC on Fox 14
Jan 28, 2015 - 12:45:57 PM HYDEN BLOG: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly from UFC on Fox 14

DISCUSS ALL THIS IN OUR NEW MMATORCH FORUM

...OH, ONE MORE THING - PLEASE BOOKMARK US & VISIT DAILY!

By: Frank Hyden, MMATorch contributor

UFC on Fox 14 hit Stockholm last Saturday night. Let's get to the breakdown!

GOOD: Sam Sicilia stops Akira Corassani

Sicilia showed his power here with some nice punches. This was a nice fight, though I'm sure the Swedish crowd didn't care much for seeing a guy who lived there for quite a while get plastered like that. Corassani has implied that he's going to retire, and good for him on that. I hope he enjoys life after the cage.

BAD: Phil Davis vs. Ryan Bader

I expected this fight to be dull and lifeless, and it was. Not that that's a bold prediction or anything, I'm sure most everyone else thought the same thing. Phil Davis is a boring fighter to watch, and Bader can be at times as well. This went all three rounds and Bader won the split decision. The only entertaining parts of the fight were when Joe Rogan tried to talk up the striking of Davis and said it was much-improved. He was saying this as Davis was stumbling around like he had never thrown a punch before in his life. If someone fed Joe that line, he needs to put them on mute. If Joe thought of that himself, he needs to watch more boxing to see what it's supposed to look like. The only thing that was almost as bad was earlier in the night when Curt Menefee said that Davis was "one of the best athletes in the UFC." That's just code for "You're never going to want to watch this guy fight again."

Anytime an announcer brings up that the guy is a great athlete, it means that he's struggling to find something positive to say about the guy. The only thing missing was talk of how Davis can dunk a basketball off of two feet, or had an 80 mile-per-hour fastball in college baseball, or could kick a field goal from 50 yards, or other such meaningless minutiae. That stuff would be great if we were watching Battle of the Network Stars: UFC edition, but we're watching a fight, so no one cares. Anyhow, rant over (for now).


GOOD: Gegard Mousasi stops Dan Henderson

First things first, this was not a bad stoppage. The only thing the referee did was stop Henderson from taking unneeded shots to the head. Mousasi was starting to tee off on Henderson before the ref dove in to stop it. You could argue that it was a tad early, but anyone with eyes could see that Mousasi was going to lay it on Henderson and get the stoppage anyway. The only difference would have been that the fight would have lasted five more seconds, maybe ten at most. The result would be the same in all other areas. It would have still been another first-round stoppage win for Mousasi, and it would have still been another loss for Henderson. This was what we expected it to be, and it's time for Henderson to go. I have respect for what Henderson has done in his career, but he would struggle to beat Joe Tomato Can at this point. Unless the UFC plans on bringing in that homeless guy who took a dive for Mickey Rourke, it's over. Henderson should enjoy retirement.


GREAT: Anthony "Rumble" Johnson stops Alexander Gustafsson

I'm going GREAT for this instead of GOOD because Rumble made it look incredibly easy, even though it wasn't. Gustafsson is a tough guy, and Rumble took him out like it was nothing. He dropped Gustafsson and put it on him until the ref stepped in. This was a late stoppage, no doubt, and it was fueled by a few things. One, the fight was in Gustafsson's home country and the crowd was rabid for him. Two, the crowd had just thrown a fit about a supposed "early" stoppage in the previous fight, so I'm sure the ref wasn't wanting any piece of that. Neither of these reasons justify it, but I can't give the ref too much grief. He does need to be pulled aside and told to not let that happen again, though. Not in a jerk way, just let him know that he can't be swayed by such things.

Looking ahead, it's hard to not see Rumble as the toughest challenge for UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones. He just walked through the guy who was the toughest test Jones has ever faced, and made it look easy. I lean towards Jones in his fight with Johnson, but that might be me not wanting to be a prisoner of the moment. There's a part of me that says that Johnson will stop Jones in the first or second round. I'm a huge Rumble fan, though, so I'm biased. I'll be rooting for him, and either way I think we'll see an explosive finish in this fight. I could easily see Johnson knocking Jones out, but I could also easily see Jones knocking Johnson out. I just want to see this fight.

All the people who were complaining about the Henderson stoppage should be quieted by this stoppage. This is what happens when a ref doesn't jump in. This is exactly what would have happened if the ref hadn't stopped Mousasi. To think otherwise is absurd. When you have a grown man raining punches down on you, it's not likely that you're going to come back and win. Sure, there might be a five percent chance or something that it happens, but that's nowhere near worth it. When one punch can give you a concussion, why should anyone ever want to see someone take several unanswered? Speaking of...

UGLY: Joe Rogan is a hypocrite

I'm disgusted with Rogan and his actions throughout the night. I missed the prelims live but was able to watch them on replay, and there was a fight between Makwan Amirkhani and Andy Ogle where Amirkhani dropped Ogle and finished him in eight seconds. Rogan proceeded to interview Amirkhani and showed a serious lack of knowledge as he called the stoppage controversial and dug in on that line of questioning.

Apparently Joe missed it live, but it was pretty obvious that he knocked him out with that uppercut and woke him up with the follow-up. He also apparently missed the replay that clearly showed this to be the case. I can give Rogan a pass for missing it live as he might have had a bad angle or something, but you can't stand there in the face of replay and act like it was a bad stoppage.

Then, during the Mousasi-Henderson fight, Rogan again puts his foot in his mouth talking about an early stoppage. It wasn't early, but that didn't stop Rogan from saying it was. He basically repeated the same junk he said earlier about how the stoppage was controversial and all that. How does that make Rogan a hypocrite, though?

Last December, Rogan joined Brendan Schaub and Bryan Callen on the "Fighter and The Kid" podcast, and proceeded to tear Schaub down by talking about brain damage from the brutal losses Schaub has had. This was live, and Schaub was at a loss for words throughout the interview. It was powerful stuff. My question is, what happened to Rogan between then and now? How do you reconcile tearing Schaub down over brain trauma but then turn around and advocate the ref not jumping in when a fighter is in clear distress? There's a huge disconnect there.

Rogan had an awful night, and this was the worst of it. I'd rather listen to him and Mike Goldberg try to talk up bad striking all night than listen to either of them advocate late stoppages even once. It's sad to see some of these old boxers and what has happened to them as a result of taking too many shots to the head. I don't want to see this happen in MMA. You can't stop all head trauma, but early stoppages go a long way towards preventing it from happening as much.


Comments and suggestions can be emailed to me at hydenfrank@gmail.com and you can follow on Twitter at @hydenfrank