UFC Fight Night 12 Thoughts & Commentary
January 24, 2008 by Adam Morgan
Josh Burkman vs. Mike Swick should have been a draw.
There’s no two ways about it. The judge who score the fight 29-29 was absolutely dead on correct. Burkman won the first round. Swick won the second. The last round was a 10-10 round and therefore the fight is a draw. Neither fighter did anything to gain an advantage in the last round. Swick landed a couple of shots and Burkman landed a couple of shots. Was it really Swick’s takedown defense that won him the fight? For either man to win that fight was an injustice to the other. It’s a shame that Burkman now has a loss on his record for a fight that he didn’t lose. No one likes draws, especially when it comes to combat sports but sometimes that’s just the way it has to be.
Is Swick strong enough for 170 lbs.?
That’s the big question coming out of this fight. He looked overpowered by Burkman against the cage and in the clinch. He showed very good takedown defense but still got bullied into the cage a lot by a very strong Burkman. I don’t think that Swick has the strength to deal with the top welterweights in the division. That’s a strange thing to say seeing as that was the big knock on him at 185 lbs. but it could be a problem for him at 170 lbs. as well. I don’t see Swick being able to handle the strength of anybody along the lines of Georges St. Pierre, Matt Hughes, Jon Fitch, Josh Koscheck, or even Diego Sanchez. Swick will stay at 170 lbs. because he’s committed to the weight class but I don’t think there’s a division that exists for a fighter of his size and frame in MMA right now.
Get well, Drew McFedries.
Drew McFedries looked like he did not want to be in the Octagon tonight. Who can blame him? His mother was tragically murdered three weeks ago and the loss had to have an impact on him. He looked flat tonight and lacked any kind of fire and rightfully so. To ask him to fight on a nationally televised card in front of millions of viewers just weeks after his mother passed is a tall order. Props to McFedries for fulfilling his obligations and not canceling the fight. Here’s to hoping that McFedries is able to get his mind right and comes back strong.
Nate Diaz outclassed Alvin Robinson.
Nate Diaz took it to Alvin Robinson from the outset. He landed a left hook that set up a shot and slammed Robinson to the mat. From there on it was Diaz’s fight. Even when Alvin Robinson swept him on two separate occasions, Diaz ended up with an omoplata the first time and ended the fight with a triangle choke the second time. His jiu jitsu continues to improve and he is becoming a more well rounded fighter each time out. Alvin Robinson was many peoples’ upset pick of the night and Diaz pretty much steamrolled him. Diaz looked great and it’s going to be fun to watch him develop in the UFC.
Thiago Tavares came out flat.
Where was the Thiago Tavares that fought Tyson Griffin? Tavares likely just had a bad outing but he lacked the tenacity and aggressiveness that he showed during the Tyson Griffin fight. Omigawa has a reputation for being tough to finish but Tavares narrowly escaped with a decision win over a fighter that he’s leaps and bounds ahead of. Omigawa is no Tyson Griffin. Tavares is a great young prospect and he has a bright future ahead of him, but tonight was a small hiccup.
Oh come on Morgan. The loss won’t hurt Burkman too much, he’s 20-5 remember. Not 8-5, no no, 20-5.
That fight was clearly a draw. I think the judges tried to make the crowd happy as they were booing like idiots through the 3rd. The judges probably expected that by giving a decision to the guy who landed a head kick they could win the crowd over.
I don’t think the judges really care about “winning the crowd over”.
Drew McFedries looked pretty good to me. He was patient and stalking Cote and they traded even until that devasting shot Cote threw. I didnt see any hesitation on McFredries part at all. I thought he looked focused until he got caught. Just my opinion.
Given the reality of Mcfedries situation, Diaz’s performance was the only redeeming value this Fight Night had. Spike TV’s relentless bs advertising threatens to turn mma into a complete joke. This wasn’t about sports, this was about Rambo and pathetic television commercials.
Please, please UFC, stop dumbing down your own incredible content. Find a different network or risk turning the UFC’s version of mma into a cartoon.
I have to agree with Anton K in regards to the commercials. I was saved because I started watching the telecast late on DVR and just fast forwarded through some stuff…but damn. I don’t care about Vince Vaughn or Sly Stallone, seriously. Is there any faker “tough guy” than Stallone? I’d have rather watched the drunk fight in the crowd.
Bonus sighting: during the Cote fight, they ran the camera over the crowd, and two guys were waving a Canadian flag. Sitting in front of the flag were poker pros Erik Seidel (seen on “Rounders” playing Johnny Chan heads up at the WSOP) and “Lucky” John Juanda. I can only imagine there were no juicy games so they stopped in to see what all the fuss about MMA was. I hope this card didn’t turn them off from the sport.
Kurt Pellegrino - Alberto Crane was a mismatch. Pellegrino has a boxing-caliber jab, and Crane looked mystified on his feet. If he’d just jumped on Kurt after dropping him with the kick and thrown 50 punches, he’d have gotten the stoppage. Crane looks like he could be a real force if he spent 6 weeks with Sityodong.
Speaking of which, are they everywhere? Them and Dellagrotte.
Sly needed a drug test…..The man is 60+ and looks like a beast. But in his little talk with Rogan he said it takes a major commitment to working out..just like mma. One thing Rambo you are on ROIDS!!! Give it up old man!!!!
If anyone deserved to win the Burkman/Swick snoozefest…it was Swick…he stuffed about 2, 000 takedown attempts(least it seemed that way) and landed just a few more shots on the feet(why didn’t he let his hands go?) Anyways, Burkman is probably the strongest guy at WW…he couldn’t get Swick down..so he(Swick) shouldn’t have any problems strength wise with the rest of the guys there.
“Spike TV’s relentless bs advertising ”
Is there any less commercials than whats on during an NFL game? No.
Yeah man, I would go with a draw all the way, the last round solved nothing for me. I had it one each before hand.
Man, Nate looked awesome. Dude was in buff shape and it lookes like he’s been really working at controlling top position. I think that’s the first time I’ve seen him really posture up and land some GnP from the top and stay commited to it, instead of dropping into a sub attempt. This kid is going to wreck some people, he’s got a good game and comes from a good camp.
Bring on a mid level LW for this kid, I think he can take ‘em.
Cote looked crisp, he was slicing Drew up through the middle with some tight jabs and uppercuts. I hope he gets to move onto a decent 185′er, Yushin Okami?
The commercials sucked, but to me whatever, it’s a decent night of fights on free. I don’t just sit on my ass to watch the commercials, the breaks give me a chance to get up and do some shit.
I wish they would have put the Cory Hill fight on instead of the Pellingro/Crane fight. Cory has the recognition from the show, everyone is talking about how this kid is crazy…show us, please.
“For either man to win that fight was an injustice to the other.”
I disagree here, slightly, because this statement makes it sound like they both deserved the win. Personally, I think the both deserved a loss. I was also yelling about it being a draw and saying so on the 5oz chat, but my reasoning is different. Neither fighter did enough or got anything going. A ‘W’ is a reward for a dominating performance and coming out on top. Neither guy put on a fight worth rewarding, and so neither should get a win.
I agree with the comments made about Spike overdue-ing it with the Rambo crap. However to compare MMA on Spike to the NFL on NBC/CBS/ESPN is like comparing a professional athlete to high school JV. MMA on television is just starting out, the NFL is America’s most watched sport. NFL makes hundreds of millions of dollars and has its TV productions down to a science. The UFC cant even swing a deal with HBO or CBS to get its first program up and running. Spike landed a big sponsor and whored the hell out of it. Expect more of this until they get the formula right.
Swick/Burkman was a snoozefest. Very boring fight overall. Stuffing takedown attempts should not give a fighter a win. Like Garth, I also DVR’d the event. I turned it on about 50 minutes in, and by fast forwarding through the bs, I was caught up after about halfway into the 2nd fight. That is ridiculous. 1 hour into the show, and the were only into the 2nd televised fight?
On a side note, I do like the fact that Rogan and Goldberg (both of whom I am not a fan of) were openly mentioning fighters outside of the UFC. They talked about Hidehiko Yoshida’a dojo, and Rogan also mentioned JZ Calvancante, which gives some credence to rumors the UFC and K-1 reached some some sort of fighter agreement.
Going into the fight I was hoping for the old Swick to flash across the octagon. But I feel Burkman won because he kept pushing the pace and landed several clean punches. Cmon guys, haven’t we seen Tito Ortiz win many times using this same strategy??
In the post fight interview Swick did say that he dropped too much weight to make the fight, something about being 179 a week ago. So one can assume he was concentrating too much on dropping weight and not enough on establishing proper strength for his new weight. For his sake, he better come out like gangbusters in his next fight.
I thought Burkman had more cage control than Swick.
Swick looked slow tonight…unlike his name states “Quick Swick” more like “Stiff Swick” if you ask me.
I thought the match was a draw no doubt.
I only was able to catch the last 2 fights of the night. Does anyone know when the replay will air?
Adam, any thoughts on Cote?
I thought while McFedries probably wasn’t in any mental condition to be in the cage, Cote still looked good. That’s three wins in a row for him now. I wonder who he’ll get next to fight in Canada? If Martin Kampmann could get healthy by then that might be an interesting fight.
Is Swick strong enough?? He stuffed Burkman all night guy.. It looked to me that he was much stronger than Burkman.
Swick wins by virtue of being the less boring guy. However, he can kiss his main card status goodbye forever. If you’re afraid of losing a fight by giving it your all, then why even fight at all? This UFN would’ve been much, much better had they just flipped the undercard with the main cards.
Cote is the real deal. Ever since that boring decision win over Scott Smith, he’s been carving through guys that he should’ve had trouble with.
“Cote is the real deal. Ever since that boring decision win over Scott Smith, he’s been carving through guys that he should’ve had trouble with.”
Don’t get too excited. We’ve yet to see if his ground game has come along that much since Travis Lutter iced the shit out of him at the TUF 4 finale.
Instead of trying to figure the Swick-Burkman fight out as to whether it was a draw or not, let’s just say that it was the “who cares” fight for me. Burkman can’t beat even mid-level echelon talent. He goes for the huge haymaker knockout without realizing that it’s very easy to see coming. He’s fairly short against most talent in the division, and rarely has a reach advantage. Most fights have him trading with a guy who has more range. The fact is that Burkman needs to either improve his boxing enough to get inside and throw straight punches, or somehow gameplan enough to take opponents down. He can’t do both right now.
Morgan’s assessment of Swick is spot on, in my opinion. Swick’s weight and power is obviously connected. The glaring problem I saw was that Swick was just hesitant in nearly every chance to exchange. He feared Burkman’s power, and that’s what made the fight go the distance.
Personally, neither guy is really worth much in the division, and it’s disappointing considering there might be a talent gap if GSP decides to crush Serra.
“Don’t get too excited. We’ve yet to see if his ground game has come along that much since Travis Lutter iced the shit out of him at the TUF 4 finale.”
the word from fabio holanda is that he’s improved his ground quite a bit…but being a guy that likes to put on exciting ko’s, i could care less about seeing his ground if he keeps this knock out action up.
Swick was way too leary about the takedown, which tells me he has no confidence in his ground game. He’s not even at the level of a gatekeeper for 170 in the UFC.
Whats with all the Stallone beef? The guy is an actor not a fighter. Who gives two shits if hes on roids? Its very common for actors to be required to change their build very rapidly for roles, whether they need to get fat or drop 30 lbs. I personally enjoyed watching him speak–I never really care to see the Rambo movie before last night, so I guess it worked
the next re-air is on saturday if you have comcast
AGREE W/ LUKE ON COTE!!
SWICK LOOKED TOO SKINNY AND WEAK. HE SAID HE OVERCUT, BUT WE’LL SEE.
HE PROBABLY BELONGS IN THE 180 OR 175 WEIGHT CLASSES THAT DON’T EXIST.
HOPEFULLY DAN HENDERSON DOESN’T GET ALL WEAK TOO. HE WAS A LITTLE THIN AND SMALLER THAN EVERYONE ELSE AT 205, ALTHOUGH HE HAD A LITTLE BIT OF BODY FAT TO LOSE.
QUIT CRYING ABOUT THE COMMERCIALS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS THE NEWEST RAGE IN MMA RIGHT NOW. HDNET FIGHTS DID IT WITH HALLOWEEN.
THIS IS HOW MMA GETS MORE BIGGER AND GETS MORE MONEY.
LIVE WITH IT.
I heard the comment Swick made about weight as well… he said he “got too small”, meaning I’d guess that he lost too much muscle mass in cutting. He’s just going to need longer to get used to the new body style he’s got. He’ll have to do some things a little different.
And whoever said he stuffed 2,000 takedowns has a good point. Burkman could muscle him to the fence but that was it.
Swick needs to shut up about his excuses. He got outmuscled at 185 and now he got outmuscled at 170. Perhaps he’s not that good? Stick to a weight class and forgo the excuses. He got a lucky win in a boring fight. He’s already lost even if he won the fight.
Cote may or may not have a good ground game, but he’s earned his status as an exciting fighter. You can improve your ground but you can’t learn fighting instinct. Look at McFedries. The guy’s fights always end in a KO one way or the other. His fights are always worth watching.
It might have been a boring fight , but that doesn’t mean it was a draw. I didn’t see a 10-8 round in there at all, and there is no such thing as a 10-10 round. The ref could have urged them on and told them he was going to take a point if they didn’t keep the action going, but that didn’t happen. Fortunately, I wasn’t a judge last night. One of the reasons I’m really enjoying Chucky’s WCL, 3 min rounds, constant action.
Silly rabbit stiff swick is for chicks. What’s up Derek B?
Dizzy up the girl.Hey bartender bring this girl another drink!
the fight wasn’t as powerful as it was hyped up to be.
It was a very strategic fight where both fighters looked fustrated because their gameplans weren’t working as they planned them to work.
Again Burkman had the cage control and I thought that was a big factor is scoring the fight for the judges.
you know,
i was thinking about it last night. . . and i think that if swick would have just let burkman get the takedown. . . he probably could have gotten the sub. . .
but. . . either way he got the W. . . and showed his takedown defense. . . i mean. . . if he would have let burkman get him to the ground . . . ya, he could have gotten a sub. . .BUT. . . he also could have lost a decision. . . or maybe a tko. . . SO. . . i’d say he played it smart. . . but burkman should have been more dilligent w/ his takedowns also. . .
Burkman didn’t show up well against Karo either… I have only seen 2 of his fights and both almost put me to sleep…
haha.
you should have seen some of his earlier fights. . .
they were hella exciting. . .
quick ko’s.
and quick sub’s.
crazy.
he didn’t look too bad though.
he just didn’t look determined either
#24 - It’s not the commercials per se that bothered me. I understand the realities of the television medium. It’s the the overall tone created by SPIKE that reduces mma to its lowest common denominator… I felt the entire event had no real substance… just another post-modern, everything is meaningless, gloss over.
The great thing about mma is that, at a core level, it’s as “real” as it can get. Why not respect that a bit more… the fighters and the fights, on some level, should sell themselves.
Mike Swick was cutting down to 170 for the first time, and he was the main event for the first time. That wouldn’t give you some nerves? I obviously think he didn’t fight to his potential but he found a way to win, and the great fighters find a way to win when there game is not on. I think Swick is a good fit for 170, lets remember he has been used to being the quickest fighter in all his fights since he was a small 185, and now he has seen Burkman’s quickness, who regardless of talent is a very explosive athlete. He will be just fine, plus we forget he hadn’t fought in nine months. Taking in to account all of those things I think it was a decent debut, he won, which is the objective.
But Nate Diaz looked absolutely amazing, I am also a Cesar Gracie student and was very proud that he got the win. His JJ is so slick and technical, he is always so active off his back. I would like to see him win a fight on his feet to show he is balanced. That guillotine didn’t put him in that much danger, he looked calm as hell and Robinson drained himself like that. He should have known better to try and submit Diaz with a guillotine out of half guard, you can’t get the proper leverage and you waste a lot of energy. I would love to see Nate Diaz vs Kurt Pellegrino, or maybe even Huerta (highly unlikely I know). The fight that sticks out the most is nate Vs. tyson griffin. Tyson used to be a Cesar student until he left for couture. Anyways, GO NATE!!!
“Why not respect that a bit more”
respect doesn’t make payroll.
I hear what you’re saying…this thing needs time to cook. Soon they will have Budweiser and Ford. As opposed to xyience and mickey’s.
Someday we may look back and say that we miss the old days. Bud and Ford may have more legitimacy and more money, but you’ll never read cool stories about how they went into bankruptcy and received death threats.
I still can’t get over pelligrino gettin his tooth knocked thruogh his mouth. that was sick. but hella credit for coming back and winning the fight. swick vs burkman was a snore fest. swick looked tentative and burkman ran out of ideas after he couldn’t take him down. and i may not like diaz but the guy is a freak off his back. your best chance in beating him may be to KO him.
swick and burkman was just 15 minutes of forplay should end in a draw !!!!!!
This card was okay for a free event. Solid contender match-ups. Nothing spectacular.
MMA Kamander gives this card 2 stars.
2 stars for Mike Swick vs. Josh Burkman
3 stars for Patrick Cote vs. Andrew McFedries
2 stars for Thiago Tavares vs. Michihiro Omigawa
3 stars for Nathan Diaz vs. Alvin Robinson
3 stars for Kurt Pellegrino vs. Alberto Crane
Events and fights are rated from 1-5 stars based on:
- action and excitement
- skill and technique
- significance and interest