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Should You Stay or Should You Go Now?

Which fighters should be dropped after losing at last night's TUF finale? Fightlinker has spoken:

Dante Rivera: DROP. This guy got owned from start to finish. I was actually shocked that one judge scored the fight 29-28 as opposed to the rest who scored it 30-27 … then I realized it was Cecil Peoples, so it made sense that he got it wrong. Riddle actually did better than Rivera at all the shit that Rivera was supposed to be good at. This guy is just not UFC caliber.

Jeremy Stephens: KEEP. Personally, I think Stephens is too young and raw right now to stick around in the UFC, but I doubt that he’ll get cut. Dana loves the aggressive guys and Stephens worked his ass off. Again, I think he’d be well served with a fight or two in the minors, but expect to see him back in the prelims.

Luigi Fioravanti: DROP. This loss makes him 1-3 over his past four fights, and even his win against Luke Cummo was uninspired. Personally, I think he was booked on the card to make Diego Sanchez look good on television. While he gave his best performance in a long time, it’s just not enough to justify keeping him around. As a side note, dude looked a bit thick in the gut … perhaps a drop to lightweight might help him out?



CB Dollaway: KEEP (ugh). Yeah, there’s no way Dollaway is going away yet. Fortunately it will be easy to ignore him when he’s fighting on the prelims for the rest of his short UFC career.



Evan Tanner: DROP (double ugh). If there’s anyone on the card who needs to take some time beating up scrubs outside the UFC, it’s Evan Tanner. I think he did a pretty damned good job … better than the 30-26 scores would have anyone think. But that doesn’t change the fact that Kendall Grove fucked him up good in the second, and that Tanner still looks rustier than an old shed roof.

He didn't discuss the undercard, so I'll throw in my own thoughts:

Rob Yundt: DROP. The kid is 0-2 in the UFC. I think he deserves a chance to go win some more fights in Alaska and come back strong for one final shot in the Octagon.

Jeremy Horn: DROP (triple ugh). Its sad to see a legend of the sport falling so fast, but let's face it he's looked like shit for four out of his last five fights. I guess we'll never get to see Tanner vs Horn. : (

Matt Arroyo: DROP. Kid's not ready for the UFC. Let him build in the minor leagues.

Marvin Eastman: KEEP. No shame in losing to McFedries. Eastman remains a good test for anyone at 185 lbs. By now Joe Silva has surely run out of other black fighters to throw at Eastman -- Rampage, Terry Martin, McFedries. Maybe the Beastman will do better against a white kid or a Brazilian.

Josh Burkman: DROP. The People's Warrior has lost 3 out of 4 and in unimpressive fashion. Send him to the WEC and see if he can get some wins and maybe earn a shot against Carlos Condit.

Gifs by smoogy!

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Sorry but a little off topic, not sure if it’s been mentioned but you can watch the fight of the night (Hazelett vs Burkman) at www.ufc.com. Great fight some slick sub attempts and striking.

by pr0cs on Jun 22, 2008 10:02 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

I forgot to mention, for free, sponsored by Harley

by pr0cs on Jun 22, 2008 10:02 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

You can get to the video in 1 of 2 ways. 1 – should pop up on the main page. or 2 – click on UFC on Demand at the top. Then Free Content at the top of the next page.

by !claw on Jun 22, 2008 10:52 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

What is the concensus on the tap. I didn’t get to watch it, but it looked pretty legit. Did he bitch in the post-fight interview? Are there any rules specifically about what qualifies as a tap?

by Heenan on Jun 22, 2008 10:56 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

100% he tapped

He got mad because Amir let go right away, so CB think he managed to get out of it. But regardless, he tapped first.

by mythbuster on Jun 22, 2008 1:51 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Yeah, there is absolutely no doubt that he tapped.

by Richard Wade on Jun 23, 2008 2:04 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Video: CB’s Post Fight Interview.

Check out Tanners too… sucks to hear him say “Maybe my day is done”

by Nick Thomas on Jun 22, 2008 11:21 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Fioravanti had some great takedown defense…

by Nick Thomas on Jun 22, 2008 11:42 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Yeah, that was a nice flippy.

by mythbuster on Jun 23, 2008 10:36 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

I was surprised by some of the punches Diego took. Luigi has some good power and Diego didn’t seem hurt at all by any of them.

by SplitBreast on Jun 22, 2008 11:54 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

nice head kick by diego in that gif….. i thought luigi was gonna do the flair flop for a second..ala buentello eilers…

by robnashville on Jun 22, 2008 12:24 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Anyone else thinking that Jesse Taylor is Amir’s next fight?

by Nick Thomas on Jun 22, 2008 12:53 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

That would make sense. That’s the fight that was supposed to happen. I’ve been pretty impressed with Amir. Guy keeps finding a way to win.

by pud333 on Jun 22, 2008 2:52 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Are they going to make Amir wait until sufficient time has passed to allow Jesse Taylor back in without it looking too much like they kicked him out just to let CB get back into the finale? I think that fight will definitely happen, but I have a feeling that Amir gets at least one more fight before we see Jesse Taylor in the UFC.

by Kierkegaard on Jun 23, 2008 9:47 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

JT will never be in the UFC

Didn’t you see the TUF showdown with Dana? JT Money will never appear in the UFC unless he REALLY has a come to Jesus and demonstrates some class. What if JT were to fight and beat Amir? I don’t see much upside for UFC and would rather see Amir fight a legit fighter rather than a TUF reject who grabs girls inappropriately.

by thetakeover on Jun 26, 2008 9:30 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Nice to see Diego back in form.

by Popetastic on Jun 22, 2008 1:09 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Hell, he looked better than before.

by Richard Wade on Jun 23, 2008 2:05 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

I have no problem with you guys posting my GIFs, but please use your own image host! I know you have one.

by smoogy on Jun 22, 2008 2:27 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

sorry about that smoogy

Moved them to my host. The ones in the comments are cool, no?

by Kid Nate on Jun 22, 2008 4:30 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Yeah we cool. I’d say mirror any that you intend to use in the future, I’m a cheapass and I don’t want to pay for pro photobucket so they’re liable to disappear at any moment, lol

by smoogy on Jun 22, 2008 4:33 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

I strongly disagree with dropping Luigi. He’s not at the top of his weight class, but he’s a strong undercard fighter and has hung in there with some of the top guys in the division.

At the very least he’ll be good to keep around to test some of the newcomers like Dong Hyun Kim, Chris Wilson and Yoshiyuki Yoshida.

by George Lucas on Jun 22, 2008 4:27 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

By the way Luigi could probably drop a weight class or 2. He looked like Mini Ricco Rodriguez.

by nitro on Jun 22, 2008 8:25 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Also Eastman is done. Of course there’s shame in losing to McFedries (who’s biggest win is Sakara at 205 almost 3 years ago), especially when you lose so quickly without showing one bit of offense.

by George Lucas on Jun 22, 2008 4:30 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

I think the “new” Diego is less of a contender. He’s made the classic mistake of moving away from what he’s good at while learning something new. The Diego of old would have taken Fiorvanti down at will, now he has rusty wrestling skills along with decent striking that won’t get him anywhere near the level necessary to beat the top guys at 170.

by Michael Rome on Jun 23, 2008 3:42 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

I beg to differ

Fioravanti trains with a great camp and clearly worked on takedown defense very hard. The single leg off the straight left to the jaw that Diego pulls in the gif above is very slick—right out of the BJ Penn playbook. But Fioravanti’s rollover flip escape was some badass shit. If Diego hadn’t had the strong stand up game to go to he’d have spent that fight going for the takedown and not getting them like he did against John Alessio.
Instead he was able to beat Luigi at his own game with some very impressive standup. Using his strikes to set up his takedowns is how he beat Karo too.
He backslid in the Fitch fight by going straight for the takedown without setting it up with strikes.

by Kid Nate on Jun 23, 2008 1:35 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

That pretty much covers it. Sanchez looked much improved.

by Richard Wade on Jun 23, 2008 4:06 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

DROP

Rivera & Tanner

I assume Tanner was trying to keep it inside to cancel out the reach advantage, but Kendall was still easily able to inflict damage.

Rivera I just dont think is UFC caliber, I give him props for trying! Can’t know unless you try!

all you gotta do is...

by imapimp08 on Jun 23, 2008 8:08 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

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