Considering what it was, I thought 109 was a pretty decent card. The biggest surprise of the night definitely had to be Chaell Sonnen's total dominance over Nate Marquardt. Many, including myself and Anderson Silva, thought that Marquardt was going to be the air apparent to Anderson Silva. However, I think my opinion may have changed after seeing how Sonnen dominated Marquardt for about 13 and a half minutes. Now I have absolutely no idea who will be able to beat Silva.
Serra-Trigg and Thiago-Swick weren't anything special, but they weren't horrible fights by any means.
Worst fight of the night, hands down, was Maia-Miller. It was just an eyesore to watch. It was bad. I really don't have anything else to say about it.
Best fight of the night goes to Couture-Coleman. I don't think that the fight itself was the best of the night, but if you combine the fight walk-in's and the post fight interviews, it wins hands down. From Randy pulling a Babe Ruth by walking out to "Stranglehold," to Randy's complete ownage of Coleman, to Coleman's post-fight comments directed to Tito Ortiz (if you say you've never wanted to call Tito what Coleman called him, you're a liar); this fight goes down as an instant classic to me.
And on a side note, I can't wait to see Phil Davis fight again. He's still rough around the edges, but Davis looked pretty good against a very game opponent. With only five fights under his belt, Dana has another potential star in his lineup in Phil Davis if he is matched up correctly.
With that said, I would give this card a 6.5 on the "ordering the replay" scale. I was one of the people who really wanted to see the Couture-Coleman fight, even if it happened 10 or so years too late, and I wasn't disappointed at all. Also, I can't emphasize enough how damn impressive Sonnen was against Marquardt. It's something you just have to see to believe.
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JASON AMADI, MMATORCH COLUMNIST (7.5)
Best Fight: Chael Sonnen vs. Nate Marquardt. Worst Fight: Rolles Gracie vs. Joey Beltran. Good night of fights for sure. The only real dip in the flow of the fights was the Demian Maia-Dan Miller fight, and that was mostly because the fight didn’t hit the ground too much, and that is their strength as fighters.
But for certain, Chael Sonnen turned in the best performance of his career after a seemingly never ending tour of controversial comments in the media. He talked himself up, and then beat Marquardt down for three rounds. Going in to the fight, no one gave him a chance, and he absolutely dominated Nate Marquardt. Nate was so highly touted and looked all set for his rematch for Anderson Silva, but Sonnen played spoiler to perfection.
Matt Serra’s KO of Frank Trigg was something to see, and is probably the end of Trigg’s career. Paulo Thiago really owns the American Kickboxing Academy (sans Jon Fitch) and another big story coming out tonight was the debut of Phil Davis. This guy is enormous for 205 lbs, and an amazing athlete, with unlimited potential.
Randy Couture vs. Mark Coleman was interesting. It showed just how amazing Randy Couture is. If you put a fighter of similar age against Randy Couture, it’s completely unfair. He performed like he was twenty years the junior of Mark Coleman. Coleman, had nothing to offer Couture, clearly isn’t on his level and made Couture look even better. Couture belongs with the youngest and the best, and he showed that tonight. Overall amazing night of fights.
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ANWAR PEREZ, MMATORCH COLUMNIST (5.0)
It certainly wasn't the worst PPV, but as far as fight quality it wasn't the greatest either. It reminded me a lot of last years PPV with Dan Henderson facing against Rich Franklin. It was just a so-so PPV that just seemed to come and go.
The preliminary fights on Spike were nothing to write home about, as both Guilard and Danzig did enough to win their fights. The PPV did start out good though, with Serra taking Trigg out via TKO and at the time, setting the tone for the night. The Maia-Miller fight was rather boring and Maia looked very tentative, as well as frustrated since he couldn't take Miller down at will. A very disappointing fight. I thought the Swick-Thiago fight was great, as it showed two guys ready to just let loose and let the gloves fly, and when they did, they connected and it paid off, more so for Thiago. Thiago looked like a fighter that is more than a "lucky punch" against Josh Koscheck, and hopefully we will get to see him climb closer to the title.
The Sonnen and Marquardt fight was the most surprising of the night. Not many people in the room though Sonnen was going to take it to Marquardt like he did, but he did, and came out the victor. He showed tremendous wrestling and didn't let up one bit. A good fight for Sonnen that will get him his shot at the champ, Anderson Silva.
The main event played out like everyone had thought, with the only surprise being that Couture got Coleman on the ground and choked him out, as opposed to displaying a ground-and-pound session. Couture obviously looked like the better fighter this night and it's only a matter of time before Couture is knocking on the door of being the number one contender in the light-heavyweight division.
After the fight was still interesting, as Coleman gave Tito Ortiz a piece of his mind and threw some profanity laced comments at the former champ. Who knows? Later in the year, we could see Ortiz vs Coleman.
The other prelim fights that were on the PPV, such as the Stann/Davis and Gracie-Beltran fights, were good. Davis had a true showcase fight as he was able to showcase his skill in his UFC debut against former WEC champ Stann. The Gracie fight was quite embarrassing for the Gracie family member. Beltran had less than a week to prepare for the fight, yet was able to beat Gracie, as it seemed that Gracie had gassed very early in the fight.
Not sure if there was other extenuating circumstances to him gassing early, but one would suspect that this does not bode well for his UFC career. Overall, the card was alright. I would give it a 5 out of 10 rating. Not really worth buying, but if you truly want to see it, it did have its moments.
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WADE KELLER, MMATORCH SUPERVISING EDITOR (6.5)
If you ordered this show expecting more than this, you don't really have a good case to be upset. This delivered about what it looked like it'd deliver on paper. It had a memorable KO (Serra over Trigg), some memorable submissions, a stunning upset (Gracie losing), a boost for the 46 year old Randy Couture's case for another title fight, a couple stars on the rise (Sonnen especially, plus Davis), and some other good strikes and near submissions mixed in throughout the card.
On the downside, there were some boring rounds, no title fights, and nothing close to a true classic. We did have some comedy relief with the spilled ice (and Joe Rogan's verbal thrashing of the poor job of clean-up the crew did) and another pro wrestling style angle with Tito Ortiz prodding the easily-prodded Mark Coleman to set up a their "feud."
I'd recommend the replay tentatively, but Gracie's borderline disgraceful debut, Davis and Sonnen giving wrestlers everywhere reason to celebrate, Serra's case that he's still relevant, and yet another amazing performance from a 46 year old Couture make this a thumbs up show overall. Just fast-forward past Maia-Miller.
I would have given Marquardt the third round. I think he was the only fighter who had a chance to finish that fight and who did any damage. Sonnen deserved to win the fight, but 29-28 sounds better. And it wouldn't have been a total outrage if the judges gave Marquardt the fight 28-29 just because he actually seemed capable of finishing it and causing damage. That all said, Sonnen was damn impressive neutralizing Marquardt as much as he did.
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