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UFC 9/19 American Airlines Center in Dallas
By Zach Arnold | September 19, 2009
Event reports: USA Today | Jake Rossen | Sherdog | MMA Torch | Bloody Elbow Yahoo Sports
Dark matches
- Lightweights: Rob Emerson vs. Rafael Dos Anjos
- Light Heavyweights: Vladimir Matyushenko vs. Igor Pokrajac
- Light Heavyweights: Eliot Marshall vs. Jason Brilz
- Middleweights: Drew McFedries vs. Tomasz Drwal
- Welterweights: Paul “Semtex” Daley vs. Brian Foster
- Lightweights: Dan Lauzon vs. Rafaello Oliveira
- Lightweights: Jim Miller vs. Thiago Tavares
- Lightweights: Efrain Escudero vs. Cole Miller
Main card
- Lightweights: Tyson Griffin vs. Hermes Franca
- Welterweights: Josh Koscheck vs. Frank Trigg
- Welterweights: Mike Swick vs. Martin Kampmann
- Heavyweights: Mirko Cro Cop vs. Junior Dos Santos
- Catch weight (195 pounds): Rich Franklin vs. Vitor Belfort
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 41 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
This card was much-maligned, but to me it looks like a very entertaining main card with a few potential great undercard matches to be aired.
Its a transitional card that will set up a lot of future action. With a win over Franca, Tyson Griffin joins Edgar and Maynard as BJ’s top competition. The re-building of Koscheck. I can only hope that Swick vs. Kampmann is 1/2 as good as Condit-Kampmann was. Who is the real contender, Cro Cop or Dos Santos?(personally, I think Dos Santos). Finally, Belfort returns but does he matter? If he can’t get by Franklin the answer is no.
Heavy on superstar-power, no. Interesting match-ups, yes.
The local, casual fans who I’ve spoken to about this card are all excited that there are so many fights on it.
I would disagree about not having star power. CroCop and Franklin are both very well known main-even fighters.
Trigg, Koscheck and Belfort are all very well known as well, and have all headlined a UFC PPV in the past (or several).
This card looks rock-solid, and IMO has much more bearing on rankings than UFC 102.
2 Hours of Free Prelims…. Commercial Free on SpikeTV before the PPV starts.
So 5 hours of fighting.
Cro Cop will find a way to get injured
“Will Spike TV air the two-hour broadcast live on all coasts or will it be a staggered feed?”
Why in the world would it be a staggered feed? If its staggered it would run into the PPV show, and the UFC wouldn’t do that.
Ed. For the ‘biggest’ show ever on Spike TV with the UFC 100 replay, it was in fact a staggered feed.
To air the prelims is definitley a step into the right direction.
1. People criticized the UFC in the past for having interesting bouts on the udnercard.
2. The casual fan gets to know the up and coming fighters.
Joe Rogan can talk and talk for hours to introduce a “new” fighter to the UFC fans during broadcast but if they already saw the guys it’s so much easier to connect to the viewers or catch their interest for a non main event bout.
And it definitely shows that the UFC needs a cable deal.
Who can complain about free high level fighting on TV? Those are the people whom questions must be asked of.
In any case, I’ll watch this then buy the Mayweather/Marquez PPV. The card for that has four fights that appeal to me and that likely won’t end in 35 seconds. Plus, if the prelims are already aired for the most part, its not like they can fill the time with fights I just saw for free.
5 Fights on the main card. Likely 4 fights shown live. That still leaves them with 4 additional fights to fill the PPV time if things go quickly.
This is pretty great.
The only problem I can see coming from this is how many casual fans have sat through a 5 hour MMA show on a TV screen? I know most of us have watched Japanese epics and are OK with it, but it might be overwhelming to some people.
“I like boxing,” White reiterated. “But boxing is doing it again with the next Floyd Mayweather fight. Nobody wants to see [Mayweather fight Juan Manuel Marquez]. Fans do not want to see that fight…”
http://www.philly.com/dailynews/sports/20090811_Bernard_Fernandez__Boxing_should_bow_to_UFC_s_Dana_White.html
White has typically said that quote above in the context that people DO want to see Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Paquiao instead. Even he said he wants to see that fight. And I highly doubt the UFC will put up a show against that event (if it ever happens).
If White is correct, then that’s bad. Marquez is the generally accepted #2 pound-for-pound boxer.
I happen to think that it’s promoter-speak on his part.
I also don’t think that there’s anything wrong with them aggressively counter-programming the boxing PPV. They have the means to do it and they’ve proven to be tough on competitors, so it’s strictly business on their part.
For a boxing match, Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Paquiao is about as good as it gets…and that’s pretty much where it ends.
My favorite move the UFC ever made is that they went the complete opposite of boxing in terms of building cards. They have FIVE interesting fights on the main card! When was the last time a boxing promoter even bothered to tell us who was fighting outside the main event?
Fluyid
Actually, UFC booked this date first, so they’re not counter programing boxing.
Ultimo Santa,
This entire boxing main card is actually very good. But I think PPV’s have been so bad for so long, it is going to be very hard to reverse that trend.
And HBO is not helping either. They are not advertising the undercard or hyping it up. The UFC always does, which is important.
It’s almost like HBO has done things the same way for so long, that they can’t work outside the box. They have a really good undercard here. They need to make it known more.
Does anyone know if Belfort-Franklin will be 5 rounds? I really hope so..
Has there been talk of main events, super fights, etc. being 5 rounds? They should definitely do that…I’m getting sick of all these close decisions.
Either that or there should at least be a 4th sudden death round if the fight is too close to call after 3.
HBO doesn’t even start 24/7 for another week. I think they have plenty of time to hype that entire card. Spending thousands on hypying Antonio Diaz/ZAb Judah now will pay no dividends later.
As for the main being a 5 rounder, man, I dunno. Honestly, if Belfort does win, it will probably be by lay and pray. I’d prefer we only suffer through 15 minutes of than than 25.
I feel like all this talk about making non-title fights 5 rounds is like the “Rich Franklin Rule”.
Franklins isn’t good enough to definitively win against guys like Henderson & Wanderlei. And yet he isn’t bad enough to get outclassed either. So what we have are a lot of close 3 round fights that make people want to see these 5 rounders. Outside of Franklin, there haven’t been many other times I’ve wanted to see a 5 round non-title fight.
If they do start to use them, I really really hope they use them sparingly. As in we see only 4 or 5 of them over the course of the entire year. Silva/Griffin could have been scheduled for 5 rounds. While it isn’t a definite rule, a fight between two former champions usually makes sense for that.
Ortiz/Coleman for 5 rounds, despite them both being former champions, would make me want to vomit.
I’m pretty sure Franklin, Wanderlei, Henderson, and Belfort are all former champions.
Oh, for some reason I read it like an indictment of doing the fights. Well, its still done from the perspective of being ex-champs. My attitude is that lots of guys have fought 5 rounds outside the UFC; no reason to pretend they can’t do it there too. It might lead to less prelims on PPV, but I don’t watch PPVs for the prelims.
According to Dave Meltzer…
“UFC and Spike TV will be officially announcing later today a one-hour commercial free special showing live undercard matches from UFC 103.
The first time airing live undercard matches of a PPV is to combat the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Juan Manuel Marquez match from Las Vegas that is also on PPV against the UFC show, headlined by Rich Franklin vs. Vitor Belfort.
The special will be one hour, not two as is being reported in some places, and will be based around TUF 8 winner Efrain Escudero against Cole Miller. The other match scheduled is Drew McFedries vs. Tomasz Drwal.”
I’m looking forward to seeing Efrain Escudero vs. Cole Miller, but I’m not particularly looking forward to seeing Drew McFedries vs. Tomasz Drwal. I would have much rather seen Paul Daley vs. Brian Foster as the other fight instead, but it will still be nice to see Escudero vs. Miller.
“Ed. For the ‘biggest’ show ever on Spike TV with the UFC 100 replay, it was in fact a staggered feed.”
Was the UFC 100 replay running right before their own PPV show?
There is no issue running a staggered replay. There is a huge issue running a staggered play of a show DURING YOUR OWN PAID EVENT.
From the UFC website:
““Providing an action-packed UFC pay-per-view, live and commercial free, to our viewers on both coasts, further illustrates Spike TV and the UFC’s commitment to its fans,” said Kevin Kay, president, Spike TV.”
Looks like it will be live to everybody….
I’m kinda excited about the Thomas Drwal/McFedries fight. Easly a toss up do to both fighters having power. a little bummed Jim Miller isn’t fighting on the card though.
TV Undercard I mean, sorry
Swick getting hurt definitely hurt this card.
I’m not so sure. I’m personally more stoked for Daley-Kampmann – both fighters have exhibited solid Muay Thai skills, and I think Daley poses more questions for Kampmann’s chin than Swick would have.
Texas combative sports = the opposite of progressive
http://mmajunkie.com/news/16205/ufc-requests-drug-testing-for-ufc-103-despite-lack-of-requirement-in-texas.mma
There have been a few good boxing events there too. Are those boxers not being drug tested? Yikes!
Glad the UFC is doing this. Fighters need to be drug tested.
American (White): 8 (Rick Story added)
American (Non-white): 6
Brazilian: 6
European: 6
Is this a perfect ratio for the Texas event? Zero japs and Koreans…Both Zuffa and AA executives do not seem to care about Japanese though I’m sure their business started involving more Japanese patrons this Fall.
If Tanner were alive, who’d he be facing in the main card? A rematch with Franklin would be sweet. Go Tanner.
I’m predicting:
Griffin over Franca by UD
Koscheck over Trigg by TKO
Kampmann over Daley by submission
Dos Santos over Cro Cop by UD (I’m done hoping for Cro Cop. Which means he’ll probably land his best left high kick ever to spite me.)
Franklin over Belfort by SD
From watching the prelims…Holy hell Dana needs to lose weight before he turns into Gary Shaw.
Did I catch the word “infamy” in the Machida vs Rua trailer? Spinning Machida heel is a weird decision.
Eye injury? Nasty.
UFC card was the worst since Arlovski/Buentello while the HBO Boxing card was great.. hmmm
Are you High Dave?
I thought it was a good solid card.
So how are people feeling about the hour of prelims lead-in to the PPV (and the one or more prelim fights that ran in both)?
I think maybe that’s more than I want to watch in one night, and the PPV what felt like a pure filler decision prelim in the middle of it that hurt momentum.
I’m OK with it if we get better quality prelims. Those were basically worthy of untelevised UFN undercards.