Sarah Kaufman earns inaugural Strikeforce women’s 135-pound title

Sarah Kaufman is the newly crowned Strikeforce women’s 135-pound champion. No surprise there. Anything but a win would have been considered a huge upset. Kaufman seriously out-struck the challenger, Japanese grappling phenom Takayo Hashi, for five full rounds en route to the unanimous decision win at Friday’s Strikeforce Challengers event.

She shrugged off Hashi’s few (and feeble) takedown attempts, and while Kaufman is no slouch on the ground, she had no interest in swimming with the shark, preferring to let Hashi get back up every time she was knocked down (which was often). The result was, well, it was a smart gameplan perfectly executed by Kaufman, although watching from home it reminded me of Anderson Silva vs. Thales Leites. It was a little on the dull side.

Hashi was clearly powerless on her feet yet Kaufman seemed reluctant to go in for the kill. She played it safe. Safe doesn’t mean exciting but it is smart, especially when there’s a title on the line. I don’t blame Kaufman at all. She showed cage intelligence, never allowed Hashi an opening to mount any sort of serious assault.

Yes, it’s her third straight decision win after eight consecutive KO or TKO victories. As a fan, I want to see knockouts and submissions, especially from a fighter like Kaufman, who’s fully capable of pulling off both. What I got was a striking clinic – stiff, head-snapping jabs, sharp rights and inside leg kids as she stalked Hashi for 25 minutes.

After the fight she apologized to fans for not being able to finish Hashi as she’d hoped. This morning, she went for her traditional day-after-battle run. Think about that – she goes five dominating rounds (that didn’t exactly leave her unbloodied) and less than twelve hours later she’s hitting the pavement. Nothing to apologize for if you ask me.

There were a couple of other notable fights on the rather lackluster card. Rolles Gracie look-alike Luke Rockhold scored an impressive first-round TKO over Paul Bradley in their middleweight tilt. Right hooks and kicks did all the damage to the seriously outclassed Bradley. Meanwhile, the co-main event between wrestler Trevor Prangley and striker Karl Amoussou ended with a poke in Amoussou’s eye and a technical draw due to doctor’s stoppage. Too bad, too, because Amoussou looks like one dangerous cat.