Penick's Take
PENICK: UFC 141 Notebook - Brock Lesnar mea culpa; is Nate Diaz for real?; Fitch out of the mix; Gustafsson on the rise, and more
Dec 31, 2011 - 10:30:03 AM PENICK: UFC 141 Notebook - Brock Lesnar mea culpa; is Nate Diaz for real?; Fitch out of the mix; Gustafsson on the rise, and more

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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

The UFC finished out their 2011 schedule with a huge heavyweight fight between Brock Lesnar and Alistair Overeem. In a year where they already had one of their biggest pay-per-view draws taken out for a significant amount of time in Georges St-Pierre, they've now lost another with Brock Lesnar announcing his retirement in the cage. The pay-per-view card was certainly action-packed, even if the preliminary card was not, but here are a number of other thoughts on the final UFC event of 2011:

-Well, I was wrong about Brock Lesnar. I honestly didn't believe that this fight with Overeem would be his last win or lose, and then he retired in the cage. Alistair looked very good and implemented a very smart gameplan in attacking Lesnar's body. Lesnar had battled back from a really rough disease, and taking the shots he took to the body would be hard for anyone to handle. The final kick that sent him to the ground was brutal, and Lesnar's delayed reaction to it made for a memorable visual. He tried to cover up as he had against both Shane Carwin and Cain Velasquez, but the body punch from Overeem was too much. It's very similar to the body shots Tito Ortiz took in his last two fights, and it's something that's not always utilized. This was a great performance by Overeem that may get overshadowed a bit, but he's going to have one hell of a UFC Heavyweight Championship fight with Junior dos Santos next year.

-It's hard to tell if Nate Diaz is for real or not at this point. He's simply been too inconsistent throughout his career to put a ton of faith in what you see from him from fight to fight, but he has looked as good in his last two fights as at any other point in his career. When he moved up to the welterweight division after losses in three of four fights, he looked very good against Rory Markham and Marcus Davis, but then dropped decisions to Rory MacDonald and Dong Hyun Kim. A lot of his setbacks have been self-inflicted, and if he can keep himself on track he really can make a title run in the lightweight division. Will we see it out of him? Time will tell, but this was a surprising performance, especially considering what we've seen from Cerrone this year. It's a definite setback for Cerrone, and takes him out of the mix for the time being, but he's a guy that the UFC can consistently put on cards to entertain.

-Jon Fitch has campaigned for another shot at the Welterweight Championship for some time, but his 12 second loss to Johny Hendricks is going to take him out of the mix indefinitely. At first glance, it looked like it might have been a quick stoppage, but upon replay it was clear that Hendricks landed flush twice, and it was a good stoppage. Hendricks really has a lot of power in his hands, and he continues to show that off. I had the Rick Story fight in my head coming into this, but Fitch wasn't even given a chance to turn it into a drag-out fight as Hendricks made sure it was over quickly.

-Alexander Gustafsson has had an excellent 2011, and in some ways he's mirroring the rise of UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones from March 2010-February 2011. Jones got his title shot after rebounding from his DQ loss to Matt Hamill and winning consecutive fights over Brandon Vera, Vladimir Matyushenko, and Ryan Bader. Gustafsson rebounded from a loss to Phil Davis in 2010 with wins over Cyrille Diabate and James Te-Huna before stepping up and stopping Matt Hamill and Matyushenko in succession. He's got a huge future in the UFC, and very well could be a challenger for that title by 2013.

-Jim Hettes had a breakout performance against Nam Phan, and he absolutely has a future in the featherweight division. His striking game standing isn't at the level of the rest of his game, but he showed off some smart striking on the ground, and completely out-worked and out-classed a tough fighter on the ground with his grappling. I'm very interested to see what he can do in his next fight, and I know I'm not alone in that feeling.

-I was a little surprised that Ross Pearson took the decision over Junior Assuncao, but it was definitely a pleasant surprise. Assuncao's takedowns and grappling were exactly the type of thing we've seen earn nods on judges scorecards time and time again, but Pearson was the only one in the fight actually doing damage or trying to win the fight. Assuncao's gameplan was to score points, and it simply didn't work for him. Pearson definitely can be a force in the featherweight division; he's a solid striker, his grappling is improving, and he's very durable.

-Anthony Njokuani lost to Danny Castillo because he let Castillo control the pace. When he took over in the striking battle in the second, he was the better fighter in the cage, but come round three he let Castillo dictate the pace. He had a chance to win that fight, but spending time on your back in the Octagon will not get your hand raised in 2011.

-Dong Hyun Kim had a really nice performance in his first fight since losing to Carlos Condit this summer. He opened up his striking a bit more with a flashier approach than he's shown in the past, and landed a couple of really nice front kicks in the bout. A more exciting striking approach will definitely get him better placement on cards in future fights.

-Referee Herb Dean is often considered one of the best in his profession, but he made one very poor call in the Jacob Volkmann vs. Efrain Escudero fight that really did nearly cost Volkmann the fight. As Volkmann was working in half guard, landing strikes against the cage and working towards taking Escudero's back, Dean inexplicably stood the fight up. This came with just half a round left in the third, and as Volkmann attempted to bring the fight to the ground again, that's when Escudero snatched a near-submission of his own. Had the fight been allowed to continue as it should have been on the cage, Volkmann could have again threatened with another choke of his own, as it's what he was working towards. Ultimately, Volkmann pulled off the win, but that was a bad call on Dean's part.

-Diego Nunes had a solid performance against Manny Gamburyan, but still has some issues in his offensive game. He was doing well with his kicks, and landed some solid strikes, but there's never a sense in his fights in the WEC and UFC thus far that he's close to doing fight-ending damage. He'll continue to do well in the featherweight division, but at the highest level of the division the fighters are going to be able to finish, and he hasn't shown that thus far in his Zuffa career.