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TUF3 – SEASON PREMIERE~! Review.
By Luke | April 6, 2006
The Ultimate Fighter – Season Three
SEASON PREMIERE~! Review
The show starts with Dana White introducing the coaches. OH YEAH~! Tito Ortiz and Ken Shamrock are introduced. Dana then recaps the seemingly life-long feud between the two. Including the fight at UFC 40, and Shamrock’s face, which was churned into ground beef during that fight by Tito elbows.
Ken Shamrock spoke about Dana approaching him to be a coach on The Ultimate Fighter. Ken looked like he had that crazy look in his eye, like he couldn’t wait to do this. Dana sat down with Ken and explained that he didn’t want Ken and Tito fighting, unless it was on PPV. Next, Tito arrived at the UFC training center. Dana met with Tito, and surprisingly spoke about the hate that also existed between Dana and Tito. Hate might not be a strong enough word in that case. Dana then reminded Tito that this show was about the fighters competing for contracts, not about Ken and Tito, or Tito and Dana. Then, Tito and Ken met face-to-face. This was exciting. You almost expected them to punch each other right there. Then, they waited…and waited…and waited, for the fighters to arrive. They were obviously trying to accentuate the tension between Tito and Ken. Showing them waiting, but not talking to each other. In fact, barely even looking at each other during the wait.
Ken and Tito, then on consecutive days, put each weight division through intense workouts. This didn’t seem as harsh as the first two seasons, which showed the fighters puking and passing out after different workouts. Ken and Tito talked about their different training styles. Tito, who brought along Dean Lister as his grappling coach, and Ken who brought his strength and conditioning coach. He had some wise advice, “your body needs good fuelâ€. THANKS COACH~! Then he immediately them they need to eat protein, like steaks and chicken. As Ed Herman said, “I’m fighting on Tuesday, I don’t think I’m eating steak right before I fightâ€. Good call.
Tito and Ken then chose their teams. Ed Herman was pissed about being chose sixth. Hey, at least you’re on the show~! He was ready to fight at that moment. He even challenged Michael Bisping, who politely said “your living in a dreamworldâ€. Oh Herman. Tito chose Matt Hamil, a deaf fighter, first. It was obvious by the end of this episode that he will be a major focal point while he’s on the show. The other “BRIT~!†Ross Pointon, was chosen LAST. He didn’t like that either. Now, he’s pissed, and according to him, he needs to be.
The differences between Ken and Tito’s coaching styles became evident from the beginning. Tito was far more hands on – in there doing what he was asking his fighters to do. Ken was more detached, standing and watching from a far. Tito was the gentle fatherly type coach, who wanted you to feel loved, and valued. Ken was the hard-ass, prickly grandpa who said he didn’t want to be their friend. He was there to coach them, and help them attain their goals.
The first night at the house was all the drunken debauchery, and tomfoolery you could hope for – if you’re into that stuff. Kendall Grove, a 6-6 middleweight from Hawaii, got very drunk, and later when he passed out, a couple guys tried to shave his eyebrows. Unfortunately, this plan didn’t work because Kendall woke up, and his eyebrow, instead of being shaved got sliced open. OUCH~! The two British fighters, Michael Bisping and Ross Pointon were great. At one point the fighters were trying to pick up each others accents, eh. With Bisping and Pointon trying to say “THATâ€, and the American fighters trying to say “YOU KNOWâ€. It was entertaining. Surprisingly, none of this activity affected their training the next day. Interesting.
So, next, was the COIN TOSS~! Dana White had a special coin, that may have cost more than Gilbert Aldana got paid at UFC 57. On one side, it said “SHAMROCKâ€, and the other said “ORTIZâ€. This will decide which coach picks the fight to take place later on. And, Ken Shamrock wins the toss, and gets to play Suzy Matchmaker for this episode anyway. This is his strategy: Take the strongest from his team and match them with the weakest from the other team. Good strategy, lets see if it works. He picks Mike Stine to fight Kalib Starnes – from Vancouver, British Columbia. YAY~!.
Now, the FIGHT. Dana announces some new wrinkles for this season. The fight would only be two five minute rounds, with a ‘sudden victory’ round if the fight is a draw. The winner of the sudden victory round wins the fight. Sounds fair to me. Also, every fighter has to compete in a prelim fight, so to eliminate the chances of someone advancing to the semi-finals without getting in the octagon. Of course, the loser goes home. This all made me very happy, along with the news of no challenges, which is the best part.
Round One – They exchange shots, clinch, and then Stine pulls guard. Starnes lifts up Stine for a slam, Stine bounces up back to his feet. They clinch again against the fence. This time, Starnes REALLY slams him. Stine tries to roll over, but can’t. Starnes gets the mount and starts trying to reign down shots, surprisingly, Stine is able to sweep and get into Starnes guard, but as fast as I wrote that, Starnes had rolled through, and put Stine on his back, once again. As Stine tried to get up again, Starnes took his back, and then the fight was over. Starnes got his under-hooks in, and reigned down punches until John McCarthy stopped the fight.
A very one-sided fight. I don’t understand why, in 2006, fighters still think they have a chance without even an elementary-level ground game. The chances of a 10 second KO, which was the only chance Stine had, are very slim most of the time. Hopefully, Stine learned from this, and goes back to Jui-Jitsu school, wrestling school, just a ground technique of some sort.
Overall, it was a solid debut episode. It introduced most of the fighters, but not all, which is good because it’s better to get a few guys over, rather than no guys over. You have 12 more weeks to let people get to know the other fighters. Dana’s presence wasn’t overwhelming, which was nice, as it’s the fighters who should be the focus. I was overjoyed not to see any weight-cutting segments. Maybe UFC learned from last season, weight-cutting isn’t something you want to emphasize when you’re trying to get MMA over as a new mainstream sport.
Editor’s note: Erin Bucknell also has a review of this show.
Topics: All Topics, Luke Nicholson, MMA, UFC | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Overall I thought it was a good first episode, big o the drama though. I’m miffed that my favorite fighters so far (Matt and Mike Bisbing) are on Tito’s team and my tow least favorites (Ed and Kristian) are on Ken’s team. I don’t wanna root for Tito’s team. Bah.
[…] Luke Nicholson of Fight Opinion has a full review of the show that you can check out here. […]
Tito seems light years more professional as a trainer than Shamrock. Sham seems a one trick pony as a trainer–which does match his one trick fighting style. I felt bad for Shams fighters not even having a ground coach.
Here is Joey Arsenault’s TUF 3 review:
http://fightopinion.com/forum/index.php?topic=49.0
I think Tito is on this show for two reasons.
1. To promote himself
2. To have fun.
It seemd to me Tito was more interested in picking guys that he liked (guys he would enjoy working with everyday) as opposed to guys who gave him the best chance to win.
Here’s a TUF3ep1 review I found on Blogcritics
http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/04/07/081038.php
My review on ValeTudo.com of TUF 3
http://www.valetudo.com/?p=43
bisbing is a bitch. a very lucky bitch with no skills.