By Ben Miller
We are absolutely and totally live from the Mandalay Bay Events Center! Press room, that is. (Two trivia points if you can guess which wrestling announcer I’m attempting to imitate there.)
Respected CBS Sports MMA journalist Todd Martin and I arrived a few minutes ago and we are both eagerly eyeing the buffet they are setting up. Therefore, this report will be short.
Todd is telling me that the first match goes off at 5:15 p.m. Pacific time, so make sure you’re back for that. In the meantime I’ll post a few updates if I have time during my setup.
A few noteworthy pieces of information so far. First and foremost, I finally saw Jason Giambi’s mustache at the sportsbook. Rare. We also saw several fighters. Interesting contrast between Melvin Guillard and Gabriel Gonzaga. We saw Guillard posing for pics with fans. Nice, but an interesting way to get into a fighting mood. Gonzaga, on the other hand, stared at the floor the entire elevator ride and then proceeded to stomp through the casino without looking up at all. He looked very focused. But then again so did Tim Sylvia before his fight with Nogueira.
We’re still a ways away from the first fight. I think it’s time for our rating system for the night. We’re going to go with movies again. For the December UFC it was awards season fare. This time we’ll go with summer movies:
***** - IRON MAN
**** - BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER*
*** - WANTED
** - THE WACKNESS
* - INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL
I must point out that Todd W. Martin is objecting to the Indiana Jones choice for one star. Now he is strenuously objecting. (Two trivia points if you can cite the early 90’s movie that I’m referencing with “strenuously object”.)
And heeeeeeeere we go! First match is Corey Hill vs. Justin Buchholz. Hill has quite the level of popularity. I like him because I’m 6’3” and he’s fighting in my weight class. Alvarez beware…
Really a good round 1 there. Hill initially got the better of it standing, but Buchholz his a few nice kicks.
By the way, either Mandalay Bay or Zuffa needs serious counseling on the status of their Wi-Fi for the media. I’m currently having to share my Verizon card with Todd and Gary due to their poor quality. I actually know a guy who knows a guy if they need some advice…
Big, big pop for the Buchholz win. Pulled guard, then gave up side control but maneuvered to Hill’s back for the RNC. Really, really good. Let’s give it BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER*…
Dennis Siver vs. Melvin Guillard is going to be next. Couple of quick notes first. Ring card girls just walked by. Very good. Dana White also just stopped by our table. Not to talk to me, mind you. But still. And no celebs yet, but quite a few fighters in the crowd.
In the least surprising event of the night, Melvin Guillard is entering to Lil’ Weezy. Somehow when I say, “straight up out the water with my Marc Jacobs goggles,” women don’t react the same way…
Dang, homie. That was quick. Right cross, down. Right cross, down again. And Young Assassin Guillard is your winner. Exciting, but without too much substance. Kind of like WANTED. Let’s go with that rating.
We’re still dealing with wireless problems here. Of all the problems… I should be embarrassed.
Arena is filling up pretty nicely. Most of the pricey seats are still empty, but the cheapies are pretty full. And Edith the Octagon girl (huge breasts; not Dave’s fave) appears to be getting an urgent text about a family emergency. You know, I’m assuming it’s that. Otherwise checking texts while working would be unprofessional, you know. Then again during the last show I was watching the NHL finals on Slingbox during prelims…
Cole Miller vs. Jorge Gurgel is up now. They need to show this fight if there is time on the PPV. Not that it’s a ***** fight or anything, but in the first round Gurgel hit a nice punch and Miller backed into the cage. And what happens when a guy backs into the cage? The flying knee, of course. Only this time the flying knee came from about 15 feet away and it turned into sort of a karate kick from an evil ninja in a bad martial arts flick.
We’re into the second round now and this is pretty good stuff. Crowd was really into a near submission by Miller…
Wow! IRON MAN. Easily. Go read Dave’s Description of that third round. Miller won with a triangle from the bottom with 14 seconds left in the fight. The amazing part, though, was that Gurgel fought it off for probably 20-30 seconds, including several turns. Dave Chiappetta from NBC Sports commented that it felt like a pro wrestling match where we might get the ref holding up the victim’s arm to see if he’s still awake. Bravo to both fighters, especially Cole Miller. If this fight was on the PPV or a Spike show he’d be over.
By the way, I’m now having to share my Verizon wireless card with 3 other people at ringside. Get your crap together, Zuffa/Mandalay! You’ve got probably at least 2 dozen sites trying to give you pub with live play-by-play online and you’re f’ing it up. The only good news is that I named my network “ForTodd” to get heat on my blonde bloviating buddy…
I think it is time for more trivia. Steven Peterson got two points with the Demi Moore/A FEW GOOD MEN reference to, “strenuously object.” Now the question is, “why is Dana White shaking everyone’s hand in the front row but mine?”
Mother!!! Gabriel Gonzaga has good taste in entrance music. Ahh, reminds me of my high school ski trip. Shout out to Mike Kedor and Reggie Manning if they’re reading.
Quick win via Kimura for Gonzaga over Justin McCully there. Dominance. Gonzaga sure looked dangerous there. THE WACKNESS because it looked like it could be one-sided and it was.
20 minute break before the PPV. Well, if the undercard is any indication, we are in for a great PPV. The Gonzaga destruction was nothing special, but everything else was nice.
Not that I’m stalking or anything, but Edith is on that phone texting non-stop. If she’s on a family plan, someone’s pissed.
On that note, it’s time to break. And when some people go on break, they go to their desk, have their cheese sandwich and are back in 15 minutes. When we go on break, we break. Three trivia points for naming the comic who is the author of that hunk. An extra point for naming the tour/movie he was on when he did that hunk.
Baba o’Riley!! Todd is lobbying for ending the montage with Wanderlei vs. Chuck rather than Bonnar vs. Griffin I. He may have a point. Email thoughts to me and I’ll fax them to Todd.
Two arena notes. First, there were quite a few boos for Jackson and almost uniform cheers for Griffin. I feel mildly vindicated there because I told Dave and Todd in the press room that there was a decent chance Rampage cold get booed. Second note is that LIddell is like the freakin’ pope. A good 10% or more of the arena stood up and started snapping pictures when he entered.
Marcus Aurelio vs. Tyson Griffin leads off the PPV.
You know, speaking of my high school trip, Jessie Ward was a friend of Mike Kedor’s (and an acquaintance of mine) when we were in high school. Did you know she was instrumental in getting Candace Michelle into WWE?
OK, OK. Back to actual work. Griffin is entering to Eye of the Tiger. That’s a song featured in BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER*. Really a great documentary. DVD release is September 30th.
First round is over. Oddsmakers look correct so far in favoring Griffin. Griffin is such an excellent wrestl—DAMN! Arianny Celeste just walked by with the ring card.
Decent second round. Looks like Griffin is still on top. While we break I am wondering if Aurilio is named after Marcus Aurelius Think of him as soft of a forefather to Tony Robbins.
Interesting moment in round 3. They were standing and Griffin was active with punches, but they were getting some boos. When Aurilio got stuffed on a takedown, the crowd booed. Then they cheered when Griffin got a takedown. I guess the crowd just wanted these guys on the ground, but that sure doesn’t make sense if they were Griffin fans (he got cheered strongly when the 30-27 sweep was announced) because Aurilio’s only offense seemed to be submission attempts from the bottom.
More boos for Jackson on the screen and more cheers for Griffin as we wait for Koscheck vs. Lytle.
I’m noticing an extremely high number of relatively young women with large fake breasts in and around Mandalay Bay today. I have to ask, what’s the point? I mean, do women get them done just to be a cocktail waitress? I guess it probably helps your tips. But if your goal is to be an actress or something reputable in the entertainment biz, fake ones at a young age seems to be more of a hindrance than a help. Now, when you hit your 30’s, I will say that Tommy John surgery can give your career new life.
Lytle predictably enters to Shawne Merriman’s theme music. Great boos for Koscheck. What a great heel.
Round one was OK. Probably Koscheck’s. Even more interesting was that Tito Ortiz decided to walk in front of press row and cause a commotion. Say what you want, but the guy knows how to play the game. He and Jenna have also eschewed the suit/dress look for a more rugged t-shirt/jeans combo. Both wearing Punishment t-shirts, of course.
Folks, we have a bloodbath. And the crowd is into it. Koscheck is making the case for banning elbows. He’s basically just getting on top of Lytle and trying to cut him with elbows. Kind of a cynical way to try to get a stoppage if you ask me. But as they say, don’t hate the player, hate the game.
Folks, this was a great lesson in pro wrestling. In round 3 Koscheck went with the same strategy of taking Lytle down and throwing non-threatening blows to gain a decision. He turned Lytle into a super babyface because when Lytle nearly got a guillotine after all that stalling the crowd went nuts. Then we had a second pro wrestling lesson after a stand-up. Lytle had blood streaming all over his face and the fans loved it. We had a third lesson where the heel Koscheck backed off in the last minute and a half to try to protect his decision. Then if that weren’t enough Lytle hit Koscheck with a few hard punches before the bell, giving the fans the feeling that their guy would have won if only the time limit weren’t there.
Koscheck did end up winning easily by decision and then got booed robustly. So what stories were told here? Let’s see:
1) 1: The story of the hero up against an enemy who uses loopholes in the rules to win.
2) 2: The story of a hero who’s been handicapped in some devious fashion. Then he fights back anyway.
3) 3: The story of the hero who overcomes all odds but the enemy escapes with a victory in a battle (but not the war) due to one of those loopholes.
Writers, I hope you were watching.
For ratings, let’s give Griffin’s win THE WACKNESS and Koscheck’s win THE WACKNESS for fighting but IRON MAN for storytelling.
Gleison Tibau enters to Iron Man for his fight with Joe Stevenson. Heh. Stevenson is hosting an afterparty at whatevertheclubatmandalaybayiscalled.
Stevenson let himself be caught in a non-threatening uma plata for several minutes as the first round ended. He may have lost the round that way. He was trying to just wait for a standup rather than actually working his way out. I hope he loses the round because I hate that crap.
By the way at ringside I am seeing yet another example of why it’s a curse to make lots of money. Some guy brought his annoying teenage sons (or son and friend). Not Nick Hogan annoying, but still. Anyway, they are just acting like wingnuts yelling at Octagon Girls as they walk by and marking out for fighters sitting ringside.
Stevenson won with a guillotine to a big pop. Guess I am out of touch with the crowd. Tibau actually had a pretty decent round going until Stevenson caught him.
I’m going to give this one WANTED because we had some interesting moves thrown into a good back and forth match.
Another big screen shot of Jackson and Griffin. Same mixed reaction for Jackson and same pop for Griffin. I am going to make a bold prediction that Jackson will get a huge pop with almost no boos by the end of the night.
Almeida vs. Cote is next. This one really has my interest. The betting line started with Cote as the fave, but it moved hard. I have a feeling that is public money, though. Henry has Pinnacle’s line at Almeida -112 but we just got told that Almeida closed at -175 at MGM/Mirage books. That tells me that Henry is willing to take Almeida money from marks and hold the line. Pinnacle is known as the smartest book around, so that is bad, bad news for Almeida if that’s what’s happening.
Lots of Canadian fans popping for Cote during intros.
Man, Almeida really sapped the energy out of the crowd there. He looks really good, though. Looks like bettors could be on target.
Round 2 is in the books and Cote really turned things around. This fight is slow-paced and the crowd is somewhat dead, but I am really into this fight. Very interesting battle with Cote doing a great job of keeping things on his feet and Almeida struggling with his wind and to get Cote to the ground. Let’s see how round 3 goes.
Pretty even round 3 I’d say. Crowd is really booing this one, but I’m going to give it WANTED. I found the battle of strategy pretty interesting. Kind of like a 1-0 game in baseball where the only run comes on a sac fly.
I will say that if they wanted the crowd subdued so that they’d be ready to pop for the main event, they’ve definitely done a great job. And I bet Dana White and/or Joe Silva are kind of frustrated right now. The dark matches were pretty dang great but the PPV fights have been a bit flat. Cote won a 29-28 split decision. And the sportsbooks clean up again. Man, I wish I could invest in Pinnacle.
Here we go. Griffin enters first to Dropkick Murphys again. He is the big time babyface.
Boos rain down immediately for Jackson’s music. Still lots and lots of cheers, but definitely lots of boos. 100% of black fans in the crowd appear to be behind Jackson. Something tells me this will be like when I watched Mayweather vs. Hatton at my house. The black contingent began rooting for the black guy even harder after he was booed hard as the champion.
Very, very mixed reaction as Jackson enters the ring with a scowl. Lots of scars on Jackson’s arms and upper back from his years fighting in Japan. Acne scars, that is.
Bruce Buffer is ready. The crowd is ready. Both guys are ready. Is Todd W. Martin ready? Damn skippy. Let’s go!
Really, really hot first round. Again, check out Dave’s play-by-play. Quinton got the biggest blow in with a knockdown off a right cross. Forrest got a huge pop when he wallwalked his way up after the knockdown. Let’s see round 2.
Big, big round for Griifin. He is such a great babyface. Really, what he did was somewhat unspectacular. He took Jackson down, took basically no risks but maintained dominance and had a mount for a long time to end the round. This is now Griffin’s fight. Will he close as well as he did against Shogun? Let’s see.
All on the ground in round 2; all standing in round 3. All punches for Jackson. Largely kicks for Griffin. But Griffin hit some good punches, too. Especially at the end. Here come the championship rounds…
Round 4 was amazing. Griffin tried a takedown but Jackson landed on top. The crowd pops but the fighters watching at ringside popped even harder. Then Griffin gets a triangle from the bottom but Jackson rises up for a powerbomb. I look down press row and it’s just a forest of fingers typing. Then they stand and trade. At that point I felt like I was watching the verdict of the O.J. trial. Every black face popping for Jackson, all others for Griffin. I can’t wait for this last round.
Well, a great finish to a match of the year candidate. It’ll go to the judges, and I don’t envy them. Griffin looked better early in round 5, but Jackson looked better late. Let’s see what happens.
I also want to say that not *every* non-black face was for Griffin. There was quite the racial split, though.
Griffin wins and the crowd goes apesh*t. Great win. I thought it was basically an even fight, but if you had to choose I’d give the nod to Forrest. Clearly there’s no such thing as a champion’s advantage anymore. That may be a good thing because I can remember some pretty unfair decisions years back when boxing judges really did give a champion’s advantage.
Rampage gave a great interview. And as predicted by your humble correspondent, he did, in fact, get a huge pop after saying that he got his ass whipped.
Well, this was definitely a thumbs-up show in my view. Even if the undercard would have been total garbage, you’d have to give it an Over The Edge ’98 style thumbs-up for delivering a memorable main event. (“This is a reminder…”)
Alright, I guess that’s it for me. I plan on writing an actual feature on the show soon. To be honest, though, I have no idea what the angle on it will be. Any suggestions?
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