musings on mixed martial arts, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai and all things mano-a-mano

UFC 142 delivered the most satisfying win since Mauricio “Shogun” Rua defeated Lyoto Machida. Vitor Belfort, the fighter who made weight as per his contract, tapped out Anthony Johnson, the fighter who did not. Johnson, who moved up from 170 pounds to 185 pounds precisely because he twice couldn’t handle the weight cut, hit the scales at 11 pounds over and hit the mat at 4:49 of the first round, when Belfort ended Johnson’s night — and possibly his UFC career — via rear-naked choke.

Sure, Johnson will have his excuses. The bad weight cut, the medical “condition” (i.e. his body couldn’t handle the weight cut), the three restarts by referee Dan Miragliotta (once when they were pressed against the cage and twice when Johnson lay flopped inside Belfort’s guard gasping for breath). No matter. He lost and lost decisively and he lost fairly. His stand-up looked horrible and his ground game was invisible.

A monster whose size demands he fight at light heavyweight, Johnson came out fast and strong with kicks and charged in — head down, stupidly — with wild punches before gassing like a fat man at a chili festival. Now, hopefully, UFC boss Dana White will show him the door. He’s never beaten anyone of significance, Dan Hardy included, and he’s shown he lacks the professionalism required of the job (where rule number one is make weight).

Belfort, meanwhile, picks up his second consecutive win since eating an Anderson Silva crane kick at UFC 126, and he could make an argument for another title shot. Or at least a number-one contender match-up.

How scary is Rousimar Palhares? Eating a punch to get the takedown, he then proceeds to tear Mike Massenzio’s leg apart with a heel hook from hell that his him tapping at the 1:03 mark of the opening frame at Saturday’s UFC 142. I think the fighter with the best shot of beating Palhares is that limbless MMA fighter.

Referee Mario Yamasaki made one of the biggest officiating errors in UFC history at UFC 142 on Saturday. Erick Silva blasted fellow Brazilian welterweight Carlo Prater with a knee and followed up with punches on the ground before Yamasaki stepped in to halt the bout after just 29 seconds of the first round. A spectacular, dominant finish, right? Silva’s 10th straight victory, right?

That’s what everyone thought until Yamasaki ruled that some of the blows had been to the back of the head and Silva was disqualified. That’s when things got even weirder. Commentator Joe Rogan corralled Yamasaki and forced him to watch the replay and explain his decision, something which I don’t recall ever happening in any sport ever. Obviously, Yamasaki said the only things he could say, that he had to make his call in the heat of the moment and that he saw illegal blows to the back of the head, although from the look on his face you could tell he knew he’d screwed up. The whole exchange was about as comfortable as an erection in tight jeans.

Now, I’m the first person to complain about illegal blows to the back of the head. Dan Henderson’s skull crushers against Fedor Emelianenko, for example. But watching the replay, as Rogan made Yamasaki do, I counted only one punch to the back of the head, and it wasn’t even among the first half-dozen punches thrown and it had no impact on Prater’s ability to defend himself. It was only after Yamasaki had already moved to stop the fight that this one insignificant illegal blow was thrown. The rest of the strikes clearly hit the side of Prater’s head or his hands and arms. If the illegal blow had come during a stand-up exchange, or if Prater hadn’t  already been dazed and defenseless and had instead been able to keep fighting, the most that would’ve happened is Yamasaki gives Silva a warning to watch the back of the head. Instead, because Prater has already curled up and died, Silva gets disqualified.

Something needs to be done about this decision. It needs to be appealed and reversed. And something needs to be done about Yamasaki, who clearly made a mistake that cost one fighter and big win while saving another from a huge loss. But having the commentator, a supposedly objective observer, intervene to confront the referee in the cage is wrong on so many levels. This isn’t baseball, where a manager can kick dirt at the umpire when he doesn’t like the call. It’s not Rogan’s job to cross-examine the referee when there’s a questionable decision, as much as we might all enjoy seeing him do that. It’s inappropriate and unprofessional and makes the entire sport look like amateur hour.

Edson Barbosa delivered the knockout of the year (it is only January 14, after all) at Saturday’s UFC 142 in Brazil. Like an episode of Ax Men, he felled Terry Etim like a BC redwood with a spectacular spinning heel kick to the head. It was a thing of beauty and kicked off the main card in amazing fashion. The next fight also ended in spectacular fashion, at least until ref Mario Yamasaki got involved…

Watching Vitor Belfort chew through a towel to get at some ice cubes in order to make weight for tonight’s UFC 142 makes me hate Anthony Johnson’s smug, smiling, excuse-making face even more.

Belfort is in serious discomfort, obviously, and he could have taken the easier path and opted to miss weight, as well, to rehydrate and eat and face Johnson at whatever they weighed in at. Instead, he behaved like a professional, he suffered and made weight — as he was contractually required to do. Johnson, meanwhile, trots out a bad physical reaction to the cut as his excuse, as if he couldn’t have or shouldn’t have known and done a better job of fulfilling his professional obligation. He makes excuses to Dana White (“You know what happened, right?”) as though it was out of his control, and he’s got that big grin on his face. I hope Belfort makes him look like Wanderlei Silva circa UFC Brazil 1998.

Anthony Johnson has made the newly adjusted and imposed 205-pound weight limit for tonight’s UFC 142 bout with legitimate middleweight Vitor Belfort, ESPN is reporting. Johnson missed the 185-pound mark at Friday’s weigh-ins by 12 pounds, hitting the scale at 197, forcing the second weigh-in that saw Johnson make 204.2.

The official story for the disastrous weight cut was that Johnson was on target and within a couple of pounds of 185 when he lost feeling in his legs and had other symptoms. A doctor was called and he was rehydrated. On his Facebook page, he wrote about this medical “condition” and how it makes you look at life differently.

Memo to Anthony Johnson: your medical “condition” was the result of you trying to cut too much weight too quickly and failing miserably. You don’t have cancer. It’s not like you were diagnosed with a disease. You fucked up. Take some responsibility, be embarrassed (as you should be).

You’ve missed weight before, like when you fought Yoshiyuki Yoshida at a catch-weight of 176 pounds at UFC 104. You couldn’t make welterweight, where you were an over-sized bully anyway. Now you can’t make middleweight. “Unprofessional” is only one of many words that come to mind to describe you. “Unemployed” is one I’d like to hear UFC boss Dana White use.

Has anyone ever missed weight for a UFC bout by such a wide mark? Anthony Johnson tipped the scale at 197 pounds, 11 pounds over the 186-pound limit for his UFC 142 fight with Vitor Belfort. Belfort made weight and has agreed to fight Johnson anyway — as long as he weighs in again tomorrow at 2 pm and doesn’t weigh more than 205 pounds.

I get Belfort’s position. It’s a big fight in front of his home crowd in Rio, he’s put in the work to make weight and doesn’t want to miss the opportunity. He’ll also pocket 20 percent of Johnson’s purse, assuming Johnson makes the new weight. And the size difference won’t be that much considering Belfort will now put back on 15 or 20 pounds before the fight while Johnson won’t be able to indulge at all.

But there’s no telling the physical toll the weight cut had on Belfort, who’s seven years older than the 27-year-old Johnson.

Still, there’s no way this fight should be happening, if for no other reason than to send a message to Johnson and Thiago Alves and every other fighter who’s had trouble making weight. It’s completely unprofessional to miss weight. It’s inexcusable to miss it by 11 pounds. That requires effort, and lots of eating. Not that Johnson didn’t look cut like an action figure at weigh-ins.

Johnson moved up to middleweight precisely because he had such difficulty cutting weight at 170 pounds. He’s spent the last couple of months posting on his Facebook page and Twitter about the move to 185 and the muscle he’s been able to put on. Apparently, he forgot it was just a 15-pound jump between divisions, got a little crazy with the turkey and gravy at Christmas and finds himself on UFC boss Dana White’s fucktard list.

While cancelling the fight doesn’t make sense from a business perspective, I think fans would’ve understood. A contract was broken, one fighter (Belfort) has been put at a disadvantage as a result of his opponent’s actions, plain and simple. Cancel the fight and send Johnson home. And then to Strikeforce.

The excitement surrounding Saturday’s UFC 142 has little to do with the names attached. Featherweight champ Jose Aldo’s title fight with Chad Mendes aside, it’s a pretty average roster of fighters. But with 12 Brazilians scattered across the 10 bouts being held in Rio de Janeiro, everyone will be looking for a highlight reel finish.

There are also a couple of interesting storylines playing out. The former phenom Vitor Belfort aims to make it two in a row against Anthony Johnson, who has packed on a tonne of muscle for his middleweight debut. Sam Stout steps into the cage for the first time since his coach, friend and brother-in-law Shawn Tompkins died. He will face Thiago Thavares and it’ll be interesting to see if Stout handles the pressure better than teammate Mark Hominick did at UFC 140. And the ever-unpredictable (and scary) Rousimmar Palhares will face Mike Massenzio, who probably hopes that he escapes the fight with all his limbs in one piece.

A couple of weeks ago I suggested electrifying the cage to liven up boring fights. It was mostly a response to the lack of Pride-like pop during recent UFC events. The loss of Brock Lesnar and his WWE heelness also takes away a bit of the lustre. So why not introduce tag-team fighting to the UFC?

They were originally going to put a moat around the octagon and fill it with sharks or crocodiles, so why not have fighters compete in pairs? Why not? Because MMA ain’t figure skating, that’s why not. Just look at the final seconds of this video — do you want to see UFC fighters rolling around in a tangled, sloppy and sweaty mess like that?

A mediocre karate guy gets choked out by a mediocre jiu-jitsu guy. Okay, fine, whatever. But the karate guy taps, and taps, and taps, and the jiu-jitsu guy still chokes him unconscious. Gives himself, his club and the entire sport a huge black eye. Embarrassing doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s deplorable. This guy should be kicked in the nuts with a Buick.