The Backstory: One of the most popular stars in UFC history, Ken Shamrock was coming off a one-sided loss to bitter rival Tito Ortiz at UFC 40 and at a major crossroads in his career: with losses in three of his previous four fights, was he finished? Proud as hell, Shamrock bit the bullet and got his ACL repaired, then swallowed his pride and began training with an entirely different camp, leaving the famed Lion’s Den behind to get ready for fellow UFC pioneer Kimo Leopoldo.
The rest of the heavyweight division, on the other hand, was skewing younger, with the two top young guns in the division, submission expert Frank Mir and giant slugger Tim Sylvia, facing off for the vacant heavyweight title. Sylvia’d actually won the heavyweight title beforehand by dropping Ricco Rodriguez like a bad habit, but he’d tested positive for anabolic steroids after his first title defense and was stripped of the belt. For his part, Mir had been making heavyweights tap left and right since his UFC debut, and at 25, seemed ready to run the table in the heavyweight division.
Trevor Prangley vs. Curtis Stout: Prangley’s making his UFC debut, while Stout, a knockout artist, is looking to finish the new guy.
Round 1: Stout lands a nice kick to Prangley’s ribs, and Prangley responds by shooting in and taking Stout down. He grinds Stout up against the fence and lands some solid body punches, and then goes in over top of Stout’s guard with hammer fists. He keeps punishing Stout’s ribs and kidneys with punches and elbows, then moves to side control and starts landing knees to the body, but Stout pushes off the fence and gets Prangley back into his guard.
Prangley stands up a little in Stout’s guard, so Stout almost snatches an armbar, but Prangley gets loose. With about two minutes left in the round, Herb Dean stands both fighters up, and Stout, a southpaw, immediately tags Prangley with a left cross and then scores with an inside leg kick. Prangley shoots in for a takedown, but Stout sprawls and then knees Prangley in the face as he tries to get up; he tries to knee him again, but Prangley grabs his leg and puts him flat on his back. Both men work for position there until the end of the round.
Decent first round: Prangley never stops moving or trying to improve position, probably realizing that Stout is light-years ahead of him on his feet.
Round 2: Stout rips off a nice inside leg kick to start, but Prangley shoots in, gets a double-leg takedown, and passes to half-guard; Stout almost gets loose, but in doing so, he allows Prangley to pass to side control. Prangley manages to get his arm around Stout’s head and neck, sits out, and just squeezes and pulls until Stout taps out.
The Verdict: A neat little start to Prangley’s UFC career, where he used his far superior ground game to get what turned out to be a very basic submission. Prangley’s UFC career turned out to be something of a mixed bag, but he’s gone on to hit his stride in BodogFight; Stout, on the other hand, saw this loss cement his career as a steppingstone, as he’s lost to Rich Franklin, David Loiseau, Anderson Silva, Daijiro Matsui, Zelg Galesic, and Ryan Jensen since.
Georges St. Pierre vs. Jay Hieron: A few of you might have heard of this St. Pierre guy, but Mike makes sure to remind us that Hieron was a 2-time NCAA wrestling champ. Casual fans would probably recognize Hieron as one of Randy Couture’s cornermen during his historic upset of Tim Sylvia, while more hardcore fans remember asking, “What the hell is Jay Hieron doing in there?”
This is St. Pierre’s second UFC fight, and he’s serving his time in the prelims until he catches the matchmakers’ attention, so he’s a bit more of an interesting afterthought with a funny accent than a real contender at this point.
Round 1:St. Pierre starts out with a few jabs and tries to take Hieron down, but Hieron shrugs him loose, so St. Pierre switches to kicks and misses a head kick and then a spinning back kick. Hieron throws out a leg kick, and St. Pierre responds with a left jab and an overhand right that turns Hieron’s legs to jelly for a second.
Seeing an opportunity, St. Pierre clocks him with a big left hook, which causes Hieron to try and shoot for a leg, but St. Pierre stuffs that and starts whacking away at the side of his head with hammer fists. Hieron works his way back to his feet through the clinch and gets free for a second…which proves to be the worst thing possible as St. Pierre cracks him with a right uppercut, just barely misses with a left hook, and absolutely pastes him with a right hook, sending him crashing to his knees up against the fence.
St. Pierre leaps in, and Hieron tries a single-leg from his knees out of desperation; he hangs on for dear life and actually manages to get back to his feet. Rather than try and take St. Pierre down, though, Hieron makes his second fatal mistake of this relatively short fight and lets him circle away. He pays for it almost instantly as St. Pierre dots his chin perfectly with a right hook and then chases his staggering body across the octagon, clipping him with a left hook and an overhand right that puts him on his back right against the cage. From there, St. Pierre dives into Hieron’s guard and just destroys him with punches until Steve Mazzagatti jumps in and stops it.
The Verdict: This is how competitors made names for themselves in the pre-Ultimate Fighter era: you showed up as a nobody from the sticks, managed to overcome your jitters just long enough to get a second fight, and then you started kicking ass and taking names. Unfortunately for Hieron, who was making his debut, he never got quite to that point. St. Pierre’s made quite a name for himself on the ground, but this was long before he’d earned that reputation, so I’m not quite sure why Hieron didn’t try to get him to the mat. Well, I guess he’s saving that strategy up for the rematch, which is likely to happen…oh, sometime around never.
Matt Serra vs. Ivan Menjivar: Menjivar was a training partner of St. Pierre and David Loiseau’s; as for this Serra guy, wasn’t he on some reality show or something? Mike pimps Menjivar’s aggressiveness, while Serra says that he’s not going to just lay around and pull guard like some other Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belts.
Round 1: Menjivar throws a low kick, but Serra catches it and takes him down almost immediately as Mike talks about how much Serra’s worked on his striking. Serra throws a couple of punches from Menjivar’s half-guard, then manages to pass to full mount, but Menjivar drags him to his feet in a clinch, where both fighters trade knees. Serra, not giving his opponent room to breathe, takes him back down and grinds away. From Menjivar’s guard, Serra pops up and lands a few elbows, then tries to pass, but Menjivar won’t let him past half-guard; Serra swings over and tries to take his back, but Menjivar pops to his feet into a clinch.
Serra shoots for another takedown against the cage, but Menjivar defends as Joe gives us a little primer in the fine art of Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Finally, Serra gets him down and tries to take his back again, but as he tries to get his hooks in, Menjivar reaches down, grabs one of his feet, and tries for an ankle lock, but the horn sounds to end the round.
Not exactly a round for the casual fan, but anyone who’s seen Serra’s fights knows that he really isn’t your typical BJJ guy who likes to slow the fight down. Menjivar, for his part, is doing an outstanding job of staying out of compromising positions against a guy with Serra’s reputation on the ground.
Round 2: Both fighters circle to start: Serra lands a nice front kick, then ducks under a Menjivar counterpunch and takes him to the mat. He keeps trying to pass, but Menjivar keeps pushing him into his full guard. Serra sits up with a little ground-and-pound, but Menjivar cracks him from the bottom with a couple of elbows. Serra manages to pass his guard and take his back, but Menjivar defends his back very well; still, he has to fight off a rear naked choke, but somehow manages to get back to his feet and almost get away.
I say almost because Serra still hangs onto a rear waistlock, and when both men get to their feet, Serra suplexes Menjivar back to the mat! Even more incredibly, Menjivar grabs one of Serra’s arms on the way down and wrenches it into a kimura! Menjivar is torquing back like madness on that arm, and for the life of him, Serra can’t roll out or away, but there’s only 10 seconds left in the round, and Serra just makes it to the horn.
The last 30 seconds of that round almost made up for the slower-paced first 270 seconds. Out of the 10 minutes in this fight so far, it wouldn’t be outrageous to estimate that Menjivar’s spent maybe 45 seconds somewhere other than on his back.
Round 3: Serra tries another front kick, but Menjivar counters with a jab to the face. Menjivar fires away with punches, missing a huge right hook but landing an odd-looking Superman punch, but Serra’s not too fond of getting punched in the face, so he clinches and pushes Menjivar to the cage. Both men fight for the takedown, but Serra manages to trip Menjivar and climb back into his guard, where he lands the occasional punch and elbow while trying to pass.
Just as the crowd—“meatheads sucking down Budweisers,” according to Joe—starts to get restless, Serra stands up a little too high in Menjivar’s guard and gets pulled into a triangle. He gets loose and goes back to trying to pass, but Menjivar locks on a nasty looking oma plata; still, it’s tough to submit a Renzo Gracie black belt, and Serra manages to step through, get loose, and get back into Menjivar’s guard, where he struggles until the end of the round.
The Verdict: A very Sherk-esque win here for Serra, as Menjivar was game but couldn’t keep his opponent off him long enough to mount any kind of sustained offense. Moreover, Serra wasn’t able to inflict a whole lot of damage on the ground, and so the fight essentially became a grappling contest, where Serra held a pretty decisive edge. Serra, of course, would go onto bigger and better things, and Menjivar’s been able to carve out a nice little career for himself since.
Phil Baroni vs. Evan Tanner: Baroni takes on the one man in the UFC who might be even crazier than he is: the enigmatic but very dangerous Tanner. Their first fight ended in a very controversial stoppage win for Tanner, so Phil, in typically understated fashion, predicts that this fight will end by “vicious, brutal knockout that’s going to be played on highlight films for years to come.”
Round 1: Mike and Joe immediately notice how slimmed-down Baroni looks for this fight as both fighters circle and trade jabs. After a minute or so, Tanner rushes Baroni, clinches, takes him down, walks him over to the fence, and tries to prop him up. Baroni almost gets back to his feet, but Tanner pulls him away from the fence and slams him onto his back. Still, Tanner can’t keep Baroni down, and both men trade knees in the clinch along the cage.
Baroni tries to strike, but Tanner sneaks inside and lands a short knee to Baroni’s ribs; Baroni, in turn, tries a little leg trip takedown, but Tanner steps out and backs away. Baroni takes the center of the octagon and tags Tanner with a short right uppercut, but Tanner follows an overhand right into a clinch and lands a couple of knees to Baroni’s jaw before he can circle loose.
Baroni ducks under another overhand right only to eat another knee, and decides to take the better part of valor and put some space between himself and Tanner. After a couple of seconds, Phil decides to come forward, but Tanner pushes him back with a push kick and then rushes in, grabs another clinch, and starts kneeing away, but Baroni’s smart (and probably slippery) enough to wriggle free quickly and go back to circling. Tanner clocks Baroni with another straight right and follows in up with still more knees from the clinch, but Baroni punches his way loose, and that’s the round.
Not a bad round per se, but considering the kind of fireworks that Baroni was promising before the fight, it’s a bit disappointing.
Round 2: Tanner follows a jab in with another sharp overhand right, then sneaks in again and lands another few knees from the clinch before Baroni backs off. As Phil backs away, Tanner rips off a nice leg kick to Phil’s lead leg; after taking a few steps back, Baroni paws away with a couple of soft jabs and clips Tanner with a left hook, but Tanner comes forward, hooks a plum clinch again, and starts landing yet more knees to Phil’s ribs. Both men circle, then Tanner pops Baroni with another overhand right, then both men go back to circling.
Tanner throws a sharp left hook and right cross, then tries another push kick, but Baroni smacks him right in the face with a right hook to remind him who the best striker in this fight is. Tanner jabs away and follows up with a knee, then goes back to jabbing away. Baroni covers up on a Tanner fake, so Tanner slips a knee through Baroni’s hands and onto his chin. Tanner charges Baroni with punches and pushes him into the cage and into a clinch.
Tanner keeps working for the takedown, then backs away, clocks Phil with an uppercut, then lurches forward, takes him down against the cage, and blasts him from the mount against the cage. Baroni gets back to his feet and tries to sprawl out, but Tanner takes him down again and plays drums on his ribcage with hammer fists until the end of the round.
Again, Tanner was active—not active enough to finish the fight, mind you—but Baroni was just so much more passive than he’d been in previous fights.
Round 3: Tanner comes out leading with his right again, scoring twice in a row with big right hands. Both fighters circle and trade the occasional shot: Tanner keeps popping Baroni with his right, then turning his back on Baroni as he follows through. Finally, visibly frustrated, Baroni puts his hands on his hips after Tanner pirouettes through another right hand; as if to accent his frustration, he fires a wild left hook at Tanner’s head that misses badly. Tanner tries another right over the top, but Baroni digs a nasty left hook into his ribs as he passes through.
Tanner flirts with disaster by throwing yet another right-hand pirouette, and Baroni ducks it, nails him with another left to the body and just creams him with a couple of right hooks to the head. Tanner’s clearly staggered as it looks like Baroni might actually be able to pull this one out, but Tanner backs away and Baroni doesn’t give immediately give chase, giving Tanner a little time to clear his head.
After ten seconds or so, Baroni starts pressing with punches, and one nasty uppercut finds its way right onto Tanner’s chin, giving him jelly legs against the cage. Still, Baroni lets Tanner circle away, and after about five steps, Tanner shoots in, trying to put Baroni on his back and regain control of the fight.
Baroni sprawls nicely to start, but Tanner keeps driving with his legs and eventually stacks Baroni up against the cage. Phil gets his underhooks in to stop the takedown and hangs on for dear life as Tanner keeps trying to reposition; the crowd, not always thrilled to see two guys fight for position for 90 seconds, is getting a little restless, and so Big John separates the two and restarts the fight. Having cleared his head a little, Tanner smacks Baroni again with yet another overhand right.
Baroni, obviously gassed, throws some wild punches, so Tanner fakes the overhand right and shoots in instead, putting Baroni right onto his back. Tanner pops up in Baroni’s guard and starts hammering away until the final bell.
The Verdict: Yet another loss for Baroni, who’d pretty much remade his body for this fight; Tanner, on the other hand, looked like his usual well-rounded self in the win. It’s weird seeing this after Tanner vs. Okami, though: after watching Tanner charge in against a guy with serious knockout power, watching a much more tentative Tanner against Okami was a crying shame. After everything that Tanner’s gone through, we don’t have any right to expect anything from him, but hopefully, he hasn’t lost that aggressiveness for good.
Matt Hughes vs. Renato ‘Charuto’ Verissimo: Hughes is coming off the business end of one of the greatest upsets in UFC history, as he was dominated (and pecked on the lips) by former lightweight contender BJ Penn in Penn’s first fight at welterweight. Here, Hughes is taking on Brazilian jiu-jitsu superstar Verissimo, one of Penn’s training partners and yet another very dangerous fighter who could submit nearly anyone from nearly any position.
Round 1: Hughes immediately shoots in for a takedown, but Charuto sprawls and pops back to his feet against the cage. Both fighters clinch: Charuto lands a nice knee to Matt’s midsection, so Matt pushes him up against the fence and angles for a takedown. After a little struggle, he puts Charuto on his back and climbs into his half-guard; Charuto does a great job of keeping Hughes close, however, and not letting him get enough room to light him up with ground-and-pound. Charuto tries to push off the fence to spin away, so Matt takes his back, but Charuto keeps squirming, rolls Matt through, and pushes him back into his guard.
From there, Charuto quickly locks on a triangle choke as the crowd goes crazy, sensing yet another upset; Charuto tries to turn it into a Nogueira-style triangle/armbar combo, so Matt picks him up and drops him on his head to in an effort to try and break the hold! Charuto won’t let go, so Matt starts to pick him up again, but this time, Charuto hooks one of Matt’s legs on the way up, and all of a sudden Matt looks to be in very big trouble.
Charuto reaches up and pulls down on Hughes’s head for leverage, then hooks his leg again, sending Matt to his back on the mat and putting himself in the mount position with the triangle still locked in. Somehow, Matt manages to roll over to all fours and slide Charuto off his head and neck, and even more miraculously, he climbs into Charuto’s guard!
Matt stands up and tries to mash Charuto up against the fence, but Charuto pushes off the cage with his feet and first almost gets an armbar and then barely misses another triangle. Again, Charuto manages to tie Matt’s hands up until the end of the round, though Hughes does manage to dive in with one big right just before the round expired.
A fun first round to watch, as Hughes got the early takedown that he was looking for only to spend the rest of the round fending off submission attempts from every angle. Verissimo, for his part, looked fantastic working off his back, but it’s still not somewhere that he wants to be for the entire fight.
Round 2: Both fighters circle to start: Hughes throws a lazy leg kick that Charuto catches, but Charuto then makes the mistake of clinching with Hughes instead of trying to take him down, which allows Matt to pick him up and slam him to the mat. Charuto rolls over a little, so Matt tries to take his back, but he can’t get his hooks in, so he holds his position. Charuto rolls through and almost takes Matt’s back, but Matt manages to hold him down and settles comfortably in his guard.
With Charuto’s head trapped near the cage, Matt tries to posture up and inflict some punishment, but Charuto refuses to give him the space that he needs and pulls him close. Charuto throws his legs up looking for yet another triangle, and Matt takes the opportunity to pass his guard and slide into his half-guard. Charuto sits up against the cage as BJ screams for a restart from his corner, but Charuto manages to suck Matt back into his full guard and tie his arms up again.
Charuto tries to get his legs up for an armbar or triangle again, but Matt discourages that by smashing him in the face with a big right elbow. Matt stands up a little and drops a couple of left hands, but Charuto pulls him in again and goes for yet another triangle, which Matt escapes fairly easily.
Matt keeps looking for the big punch on the ground, but Charuto does an excellent job of using his long legs to keep Matt’s T-Rex arms away. Charuto pulls out some brilliantly frustrating jiu-jitsu here: when Matt tries to get close in to mash him with an elbow, Charuto pushes him away with his knees and legs, but when Matt tries to posture up and reposition himself, Charuto sits up and sucks him in close.
Finally, Mario Yamasaki hears the boos and calls for a restart, and Charuto comes charging forward and just misses a knee to the midsection. He pulls Hughes back into his guard, and Hughes—far more comfortable on the ground than on his feet—is more than happy to oblige his wishes. Both men work from that position until the clock runs out on the round.
Round 3: Both fighters clinch and trade knees to start, then Matt pushes Charuto to the fence and pulls out a little trip takedown. He works into Charuto’s guard, but Charuto doesn’t allow him to pull loose; Hughes keeps grinding him into the fence, but—as has been the pattern through this fight–he can’t get free and lay a beating on Charuto, and Maz calls for a restart just as Hughes smashes Charuto with an elbow. On the restart, Hughes rips off a nasty low kick, but Charuto manages to trip him up on the way down; still, Matt wraps up his opponent’s legs, and Charuto seems all too willing to work off his back again.
Finally, with about 30 seconds left in the round, Matt leans all the way across Charuto’s body and starts bending his left arm back for a kimura. Charuto finally gets free, but essentially gives up side control in the process, and Matt mashes him with a couple of short elbows (the elbows, not Matt, though he is sort of a wee fella). At BJ’s behest from his corner, Charuto lands a few glancing punches from his back, but Hughes is in a dominant position and isn’t giving up much, and the round ends. Hughes gets the unanimous decision: two of the three judges even scored the fight 30-27, which makes me want to punch someone in the mouth.
The Verdict: With the obvious exception of the second St. Pierre fight, the only guys who have consistently given Matt Hughes any trouble are submission experts: witness his two losses to Dennis Hallman, his struggles against BJ Penn, and his less-than-inspiring win over Chris Lytle. He eats wrestlers and ground-and-pound types alive, but if he has to spend a fair amount of time fending off submission attempts, he becomes almost overly cautious and spends all of his time securing position rather than looking to end the fight–almost like a kind of defensive offense.
This is about as good an example of that as you’ll find, as Charuto had him on his heels for the entire first round, almost never letting him get comfortable even though he was in top position. To be fair to both Matt and Charuto, Charuto’s jiu-jitsu is practically obscene, although he sort of shot himself in the foot by constantly trying to pull guard on Hughes rather than mount a stronger stand-up attack or attempt to sweep him on the ground. Overall, this wasn’t an inspiring fight by any stretch of the imagination, but you can bet that Hughes was breathing an enormous sigh of relief over not being forced to submit for the second straight fight.
–Now it’s time for On The Mat with Marc Laimon, as the UFC again tries to educate its new fans in the various intricacies of MMA. But first, Mike and Joe remind the audience not to try this at home, prompting a great line from Joe–“Yeah, please don’t try to armbar your dog or anything”–which leads to an even more surreal exchange from Mike and Joe over whether it’d even be physically possible to armbar a dog. In any case, Laimon takes us step-by-step through an armbar, and that loud howl that you hear in the background is teenagers all over America hyperextending their little brothers’ elbows.
Frank Mir vs. Tim Sylvia: Weird how the UFC managed to help develop three top-notch young submission fighters in Josh Barnett, Rodriguez, and Mir, and less than five years later, none of the three is a world champion. As a 25-year-old, Mir had shot through the heavyweight division, with his only UFC loss coming via dramatic surprise knockout to Ian ‘The Machine’ Freeman. Sylvia, as everyone knows, was stripped of the heavyweight title after testing positive for steroids, and is looking to regain the heavyweight title, while Mir gets his first crack at the belt.
Round 1: Mir snaps off a leg kick to start, but Sylvia counters with a right cross. They clinch, but Sylvia breaks it with a strong knee to Mir’s ribs, and Mir backs away for a second. Mir lands an inside leg kick and tries to follow up with another, but Sylvia catches his foot and takes him down as Joe immediately questions the wisdom of putting a guy like Mir in the position that he wants to be in. Sylvia works Mir over to the fence, but Mir pushes off the fence, grabs Sylvia’s arm, immediately snatches an armbar, and bends Sylvia’s arm back at a grotesque angle. Sylvia tries to stand up and get away, but Mir’s got a bulldog grip and keeps bending; all of a sudden, we hear Herb Dean yell, “Oh, shit,” and he stops the fight.
Mir walks away with hands raised in victory, and the crowd, still not sure exactly what happened, serenades him with a mixture of cheers and boos. In fact, they don’t stop booing until numerous replays from different angles show what really happened: Mir slapped on the armbar, pulled the arm in and popped his hips out, and Sylvia’s forearm actually snapped, prompting Herb to lose the plot.
The Verdict: Mir did exactly what he wanted to: he got Sylvia to the ground right away, he didn’t take any real damage, and he almost immediately got the submission. In fact, watching this fight reminded me of something my jiu-jitsu coach talks about often: when the other guy locks a submission in, it’s important to know the difference between the kind of hold that merely hurts a lot—like an Achilles hold or can opener—and the kind of hold that can permanently mess you up, like an armbar or kneebar. To Tim’s credit, he didn’t tap, but then again, that’s what happens when you don’t tap–you run the risk of permanently losing the use of your elbow. Mir gives a great post-fight interview where he gets a neat little sideways dig at the fans for booing: “Hey, I just want to give the fans what they want to see. If they want to see me completely rip the guy’s arm off next time, then that’s what I’ll try and give them.”
Unfortunately, Mir wouldn’t get to enjoy being champion for long, as a motorcycle accident left him with severe leg injuries and forced him to vacate his title. He hasn’t been the same fighter since, having been upset by Marcio Cruz in his return to the octagon almost two years after beating Sylvia for the title, and then getting massacred in less than a minute by heavyweight prospect Brandon Vera. He’s rebounded since then with wins over the one-dimensional Antoni Hardonk and Brock Lesnar, but we’ll see how he looks after his first fight with an established contender.
Dennis Hallman vs. Frank Trigg: Mike gives us the quick recap of the bad blood stemming from the controversy surrounding their 2002 WFA fight, which you can read about on this very site in Scott Newman’s excellent review. Long story short, Trigg blatantly nailed Hallman in the junk, which the referee missed, and unlike Matt Hughes, Hallman wasn’t able to recover. The lesson here? Watch your nuts when you fight Frank Trigg.
Round 1: Both fighters sort of trade jabs, but since neither is a big striker, they paw at each other until Trigg lands a short, sharp right to the body and Hallman decides to pull guard. Hallman ties Trigg up in his guard for about 45 seconds and tries to shrimp out from underneath, but Trigg keeps the pressure on, then stands up in Hallman’s guard and rains down some nasty punches. Hallman grabs one of Trigg’s legs and tries for a kneebar, but Trigg steps through it into side control of sorts: Trigg’s effectively in side control, but Hallman’s still got Trigg’s now-bent leg and appears to be going for a heel hook. After about 20 seconds in this spot, Trigg gets a good enough position that he can reach Hallman’s face with his fist, and Hallman finally lets go of his leg.
Trigg props Hallman up against the cage, stands over him, and starts dropping punches again, trying to pass his guard; Hallman grabs his leg again and tries for another heel hook, but Trigg’s just flexible enough to bend down and pop Hallman with hammer fists until he lets go. As soon as he does, Trigg stands again and–with Hallman trapped and stacked up in a very small space between Trigg and the fence–starts raining down bombs right into Hallman’s face. Finally, Hallman manages to get his back off the fence and suck Trigg back into his guard, but Trigg just postures up and destroys him with two nasty left elbows. Hallman tries for an armbar out of desperation, but Trigg’s having none of that, thank you very much, and brutalizes Hallman with monstrous lefts until Maz steps in and stops the fight. Ever the sportsman, Trigg flips Hallman off as he walks away.
The Verdict: I’m not exactly a big Trigg fan, but he just methodically destroyed Hallman here. I remember Joe Rogan going off on a rant during a Travis Lutter fight about how only the very best grapplers can expect to win fighting exclusively off their backs (and for those of you scoring at home, he wasn’t including Lutter in that group), and while Hallman’s record is certainly impressive, he’s simply not in that class of fighter. Against a wrestling machine like Trigg, who’s exceptionally hard to submit when he’s in that kind of a dominant position, Hallman looked worse than useless.
Trigg was on his way towards his rematch with Matt Hughes–which ended exactly the same as their first fight—while Hallman wouldn’t fight again in the UFC until UFC 55, where his loss to Jorge Rivera bounced him from the promotion.
–Tito joins us on color for the main event, and to my surprise, foregoes his usual snark for some fairly sincere and respectful commentary.
Ken Shamrock vs. Kimo Leopoldo: We get the full pre-game hype package, with Kimo questioning Ken’s heart after his loss to Tito and Ken reiterating how hard he’d trained for this fight. To be honest, both guys look focused and in great shape here: Kimo’s as dense as ever, while Ken, at 218 pounds, is all kinds of cut.
Round 1: Kimo pops Ken with a couple of left jabs to start and pushes him to the fence, looking for a clinch and takedown. Both men trade knees in the clinch and start to move around the octagon together. Ken rips off a few sharp knees to Kimo’s ribs, but Kimo, using his 30-pound weight advantage, keeps pushing Ken around the ring, finally rolling him back against the fence. After Big John scolds Kimo for holding the fence, Ken pushes him back out to the center of the ring, gets double underhooks, pulls his head down in the clinch, and destroys him with a knee to the jaw.
Clearly dazed, Kimo drops to all fours, but Big John doesn’t stop the fight immediately, so Ken clips him with one nasty punch to the back of the head. At this point, Big John sees that Kimo isn’t even trying to defend himself and stops the fight.
The Verdict: What can you say about the kind of fight that never really gets started? Kimo thought that he’d be able to manhandle Ken in the clinch, but Ken used leverage to get Kimo into an ultra-compromising position and then power to end the fight. More of an exhibition than a real competition, this is the kind of last hurrah that a guy like Ken deserves; unfortunately, Ken didn’t get the message that this was supposed to be his last hurrah. A shame, really, but we shouldn’t let that ruin the moment here.
