Phil Baroni wins, Drew Fickett loses in weekend action
August 3, 2008 by Adam Morgan
Last night there were two MMA events that featured some exciting fights as well as some competition involving well known names in MMA. In Hawaii, ICON Sport: Hard Times featured a fight involving the always extravagant Phil Baroni as well as a possible Fight of the Year candidate as Bao Quach took on Mark Oshiro. Rage in the Cage 113 in New Mexico also featured a couple of former UFC fighters in Alberto Crane and Drew Fickett.
According to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Phil Baroni won via TKO at 51 seconds into the first round after landing an uppercut and a right hook that dropped his opponent, Ron Verdadero to the mat. According to the report, Verdadero immediately got up as the referee jumped in to stop the fight:
Shimada stops it as Verdadero QUICKLY gets back up. HORRIBLE STOPPAGE. Verdadero wasn’t even hurt. Oh man.
Also in action was Kala Kolohe Hose, who toppled his opponent Rolando Dominique via TKO in round two. With this victory, Hose rebounds from a stunning first round submission loss to Bubba McDaniel at the EliteXC: Return of the King show in June. Hose, from what the report says, doesn’t seem to have appeared too impressive but got the job done.
Also on the card was an apparent barnburner and a fight that the Star-Bulletin is calling Fight of the Year material between Mark Oshiro and Bao Quach for the ICON Sport North American championship. The fight was back and forth, with Quach having Oshiro in trouble several times with armbar attempts. It sounds like the fight was up and down, back and forth, and went everywhere that an MMA fight could go. Quach was able to secure a unanimous decision victory to become the new ICON Sport North American champion.
Also in action last night were Alberto Crane and Drew Fickett at Rage in the Cage 113. Crane is an ex-UFC fighter and Fickett is a veteran of the UFC and EliteXC. According to Sherdog, Crane apparently took care of business, getting his opponent, Adrian Valdez, to the ground quickly, then transitioning from an armbar attempt to a guillotine choke to force a tap in the first round.
Fickett didn’t fare as well, apparently coming into weigh-ins two pounds overweight:
Fickett came in over weight and had to run off two pounds, which may have taken its toll on him. Villa and his camp figured they would take full advantage of that by letting Fickett come out strong and then tire.
According to the report, round one was all Fickett with two head kicks, a takedown, and submission attempts from Fickett. But apparently he gassed early and in round two he paid dearly. Richard Villa came out firing with a hard right hand that dropped Fickett and he pounced on him from there, landing a barrage of strikes that forced a referee stoppage.
Full results for ICON Sport: Hard times can be found here. Full results for Rage in the Cage 113 can be found here.
nice to see ritc getting some publicity on here. RITC do some good shows for the public and fighters.
How many more non-title fights is Hose going to have?
REALLY HAPPY to hear about Quach’s win..
he impresses me more and more every time..
and it’s also nice to hear Baroni won, even though it may have been a bad stoppage.. I’m glad he’s finally seeing some success, apparenty, he’s need to go WW for a loooooong time..
i’m shocked to hear Fickett got TKO’d..
maybe he’s getting too cocky or something.. maybe that’s why he showed up overweight..
idk..
but, Fickett is a great fighter, with an outstanding record.. he’s beaten the top dogs..
so, to hear he lost to such low-level competition amazes me..
I didn’t see the Baroni fight, so I don’t want to pass judgement on whether it was too fast or not, but I do think we should take into consideration the fact that it was Baroni who was about to pounce on a seemingly unaware opponent. If it was a jiu jitsu practioner or judo bb i’d say it was too fast. But when Phil Baroni pounces on someone you have a two second window that is the difference between the other fighter walking away and the other fighter eating through a straw for the next few weeks. So how fast is too fast??
To read the comment of Fickett loosing to such a low level fighter is a joke. Fickett lost to Richard Villa and thats a name you will see alot more of. Fickett lost to a more prepared and a better fighter.
Not only was I at the Rage In The Cage fights, but I was at ringside. I am the trainer (and a pro fighter) for Richard Villa. I would like to add some light to the event report above. First, Drew did not attempt any head kicks therefore he landed none. Richard did attempt one and it landed with his foot instead of his shin.
The first round did belong to Drew, he did exactly what we anticipated. We did our home work, we were patient, withstood his choke attempts and defended the takedown attempts.
Yes, Drew was 2 pounds heavy. He cut them and knew he was supposed to make this weight from weeks before. We took this fight in less than a weeks notice and did not have all the details of the contract final until two days out. Richard was eating to put on weight. He would rather fight at 155.
This may have been an upset for Drew, but it was an opportunity for us to display what we knew we could accomplish. Not only is it disrespectful to think that Richard only won cause of two pounds (ask Drew if he was gassed, bet he would disagree) but it is an insult to Drew and his training camp to say insinuate that he was not prepared. Afterall, he is a UFC veteran.
We were so excited to finally have a chance to fight somebody of this caliber, even though it was outside of our weight class, but nonetheless, we accomplished the task at hand. We would love to prove that not only did it happen once, but can fight at 155 against anyone and compete at the same level.
Drew got beat, he isn’t invincible. He bled just like you and I. Was it an upset……..? Guess it depends on which side of the fence you sit at.
Thanks,
Anselmo
Eagle’s Nest MMA
Richard Villa is the real deal!!! Those that don’t know him may be surprised by the fickett fight. But those that do have watched Richard grow into a great fighter and were not surprised by the result of this fight we know how good he is and can be, he will be in the limelite soon remember the name because he is no joke. Those