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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
The World Series of Fighting 10 card on Saturday night was essentially a placeholder event for the organization, coming in the midst of a busy MMA schedule and overshadowed by their NBC debut in three weeks. That said, they put some entertaining action on NBC Sports Network, particularly in the night's top two fights. Here's what's sticking with me out of the event.
-It's been a long time since we saw something that exciting out of Dave Branch. The new WSOF Middleweight Champion pulled off an excellent D'Arce choke over Jesse Taylor in transition, and even fought of the escape attempt to get it on even tighter for the tap. He's had trouble in the finishing department on the ground despite having a lot of skills in that area, and it's led to his fights being less than anticipated more often than not. This may have been an anomaly, but it was absolutely welcome.
-25-year-old Rick Glenn is really starting to come into his own. Georgi Karakhanyan tried to steam roll him with an early takedown and some submission attempts, but Glenn showed off a veteran poise and never panicked. Even as Karakhanyan locked on what could have been a nasty armbar, Glenn patiently worked his way free, and from there started taking control. It's hard to tell where exactly the rib injury occurred for Karakhanyan, but regardless, Glenn put out a relentless assault, giving the defending Champion little breathing room. It was a great performance from a young fighter who seems to have a really promising future.
-Jessica Aguilar was in one of those fights where the outcome was clear about a minute into the fight. Unfortunately, the fight went 25. Aguilar did everything she could through the first three rounds to put Emi Fujino away, and when she realized the too-tough-for-her-own-good challenger wasn't going to go out, she coasted the final ten minutes. Hard to blame her there, as there's just not much more she could have done without undue risk.
-On the production side of things, Todd Harris continues to be an embarrassment. In the fifth round of Aguilar-Fujino, he was positing that people might want to see a rematch if Aguilar couldn't finish the fight. In the Luiz Firmino-Tyson Griffin fight, while talking about Firmino's last win, said it came against "Yacob" Volkmann; not Jacob, "Yacob." And he said it as if he thought that was the correct pronunciation for some foreign opponent that Firmino had beaten, perhaps not even realizing he had called that fight himself. If it were an isolated incident it wouldn't be an issue, but it happens each and every event; and combined with Bas Rutten's occasionally incoherent ramblings, it makes for a poor viewing experience.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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