UFC 97 final card

cowboyronnie · Post #1 » by **cowboyronnie** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 9:14 pm

MAIN CARD (televised)

* Middleweight champ Anderson Silva vs. Thales Leites
* Chuck Liddell vs. Mauricio "Shogun" Rua
* Krzysztof Soszynski vs. Brian Stann
* Cheick Kongo vs. Antoni Hardonk
* Luis Cane vs. Steve Cantwell

PRELIMINARY CARD (un-televised)

* Mike Ciesnolevicz vs. Eliot Marshall
* Xavier Foupa-Pokam vs. Denis Kang
* Jason MacDonald vs. Nate Quarry
* Ed Herman vs. David Loiseau
* David Bielkheden vs. Mark Bocek
* Ryo Chonan vs. T.J. Grant
* Sam Stout vs. Matt Wiman

cowboyronnie · Post #2 » by **cowboyronnie** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 9:20 pm

Great to see Cantwell rewarded for his sociopathy with a maincard bout. :roll:

IDK, the undercard is deep, but also sort of filled with played-out fighters. Stout, Chonan, Loiseau...
There's pretty much no one there who will ever be a contender, or even close. Wiman and Bocek might be the most promising fighters (granted I don't know Ciesnolevicz, Marshall or Grant). MacDonald and Quarry are both guys who have been around, but I really couldn't care less about that fight. Neither guy is exciting to me.

Xavier vs Kang looks to be the best there. With Bocek vs Bielkheden next. Wiman has had some really exciting fights.

Cane is an animal. He and Silva make this exciting.

Cammo101 · Post #3 » by **Cammo101** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 9:59 pm

Decent card. Silva should win, Chuck should punish Rua. Cane vs. Cantell will be the best fight on the card. Both guys can really bang.

cowboyronnie · Post #4 » by **cowboyronnie** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 10:55 pm

I'm picking Shogun, I think.

Post #5 » by **CPT** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 11:06 pm

I like the card.

Silva vs. Leites isn't close at all, but at least Leites has better BJJ. It's probably not good enough to win, but at least he has some advantage. Some of Silva's most recent opponents have had nothing on him.

Liddell vs. Shogun is meh. At least they aren't trying to sell it as a main event, although I'm sure it will take the second slot in the previews and stuff. Both guys have looked awful lately, so I hope one guy can look good in this fight. I hope it's Shogun, because there would be a lot of fresh fights for him if he's back, but I expect it to be Liddell.

Soszynski vs. Stann could probably be on the undercard, and likely would be if KS wasn't Canadian.

I hate Kongo, but the fight with Hardonk could be decent. Give Kongo one more win before feeding him to Carwin, Velasquez, or Lesnar.

Cane vs. Cantwell is awesome. Two young, hungry guys coming up, and both guys would have a case for top 10 with a win (Cane is a lot closer than Cantwell though).

All of the prelim fights (besides Ciesnolevicz vs. Marshall) involve a Canadian. Marshall was on the last season of TUF and seemed decent, and I think he trains at Jackson's. I'm hoping Kang can bounce back without any brain farts; he's too talented to be losing to guys like Belcher.

I kind of like both MacDonald and Quarry, but I don't understand why they are fighting each other. A gatekeeper vs. gatekeeper fight, as neither guy is ever going to be a contender. They would be better off either fighting guys on their way up, or fighting cans to get themselves wins to stay relevant. In this fight, one guy is going to lose, and the winner isn't going to be helped all that much.

Stout vs. Wiman could be pretty good.

Cammo101 · Post #6 » by **Cammo101** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 12:49 am

cowboyronnie wrote:I'm picking Shogun, I think.

It is going to be one of those fights where either guy could come out and look awful. Chuck came out and looked great in the much anticipated Wanderlei fight, I expect the same here. For a long time those 3 were the best of the best at 205. Chuck has a chance to further cement his legacy as the best Light Heavy ever by winning.

Also, Shogun has looked awful his last 2 times out. Maybe, coming off the injuries he will look better, but you have to wonder if setroids and now the lack of them is an issue here.

I hope it is a good fight. The Shogun who fought Coleman would not last a minute with The Iceman.

Nemesis21 · Post #7 » by **Nemesis21** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 2:17 am

Silva over Leites
Liddell over Shogun
Soszynski over Stann
Kongo over Hardonk
Cantwell over Cane

El Hardee · Post #8 » by **El Hardee** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 4:35 am

Take this one to the bank! Thales will beat Silva, Thales trained at my gym fro the 1st part of his camp. This was done so he could train with some stud wrestlers. (Aaron Simpson,Ryan Bader,C.B. Dollaway) Trust me, Thales was tearing these wrestlers up with wrestling towards the end. Thales WILL take Silva down and he will submit or GNP him for a win. Book it! I posted b4 the last TUF about Bader and he won it, now when Thales shocks the world I should be nominated for mod of this board...lol.

Cammo101 · Post #9 » by **Cammo101** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 5:09 am

What good is training with stud wrestlers when you can't last a minute standing with Silva. I like Thales a lot, but the only way he wins this fight is if Silva finally mails one in.

Post #10 » by **CPT** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 9:45 am

El Hardee wrote:Take this one to the bank! Thales will beat Silva, Thales trained at my gym fro the 1st part of his camp. This was done so he could train with some stud wrestlers. (Aaron Simpson,Ryan Bader,C.B. Dollaway) Trust me, Thales was tearing these wrestlers up with wrestling towards the end. Thales WILL take Silva down and he will submit or GNP him for a win. Book it! I posted b4 the last TUF about Bader and he won it, now when Thales shocks the world I should be nominated for mod of this board...lol.

Will you be putting down a few G's of your own on this one?

I'm surprised the odds for Thales aren't that great. Only +350 on the one site I checked. -500 for Silva. I guess those are pretty steep for a championship fight, but with the way most people are writing off Leites, I thought they would be higher.

cowboyronnie · Post #11 » by **cowboyronnie** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 9:53 am

Anderson;s ability to maintain range is unmatched. He's got a long stance, non-traditional for MT, but uses MT footwork instead of a sprawl to keep that lead out of danger (switching the leg out to south-paw, circling). Likewise, his strikes are all long, accurate and deadly powerful. It's going to be hard just to get a GR clinch, nevermind a takedown into a position from which he can ground and pound.

Nice to here that there will be competition, though. If anything a guy looking to close distance with Anderson will make it a pleasing fight for Silva fans.

cowboyronnie · Post #12 » by **cowboyronnie** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 4:18 am

bump for next weekend

Post #13 » by **CPT** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 9:42 am

The card has held up for the most part in terms of injuries and rescheduled fights.

The only change is Vinny Magalhaes coming in to replace Mike Ciesnolevicz against Eliot Marshall. I think it's a step up, but that's probably just because I'm more familiar with Vinny from TUF.

SpReEfOrAlL · Post #14 » by **SpReEfOrAlL** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 11:56 pm

CPT wrote:The card has held up for the most part in terms of injuries and rescheduled fights.

The only change is Vinny Magalhaes coming in to replace Mike Ciesnolevicz against Eliot Marshall. I think it's a step up, but that's probably just because I'm more familiar with Vinny from TUF.

Interesting fight. Even though Vinny's ground game could be the best in the division, the fight starts standing up. I see Marshall knocking him out. Vinny REALLY doesnt like gettin hit.

Tomato · Post #15 » by **Tomato** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 2:21 am

Was picking up someone today and who is it I see, Chuck Lidell leaving the Paramount in downtown Montreal. He was with an entourage of about 5 guys.

cowboyronnie · Post #16 » by **cowboyronnie** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 2:47 am

Lutter had mounted Silva??

cowboyronnie · Post #17 » by **cowboyronnie** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 3:29 am

I think Chuck's in trouble.

El Hardee · Post #18 » by **El Hardee** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 4:35 am

I think Lutter did mount Silva towards the end of round 1, and yeah I hate to say it but I think the Iceman is about to get worked.

Nemesis21 · Post #19 » by **Nemesis21** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 5:21 am

cowboyronnie wrote:Lutter had mounted Silva??

Yup, once or twice in the fight.

Post #20 » by **CPT** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 9:44 am

I don't know. Shogun had better be back to his old self from the Pride days if he wants any chance of beating Chuck. I haven't seen anything that leads me to believe that may be the case.

I also think Chuck still has something left, and probably enough to beat a sloppy Shogun, especially if Shogun chases after him.

I'm not a huge Chuck fan, but I think his latest losses can be explained, and aren't necessarily a sign that he needs to hang it up. Rampage is just a better fighter, and has his number. He wasn't prepared for Jardine, and only lost by SD. He was doing fine against Rashad until he got frustrated and started chasing him, which is not how Chuck usually wins fights.

If he's rededicated himself to training, trying to fill the holes in his game with fresh coaching at ATT, then he could have one last run in him.

I would prefer Shogun to win impressively, so we can see a lot of the dream matchups with him, but I kind of think he's one more unimpressive fight away from joining his brother in Japan.