10 Thoughts on UFC on Fox: Cain Velasquez vs. Junior dos Santos

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10. Lots of prelims on FoxSports.com tonight. Good work by the UFC. You should read our live coverage over here.

9. Norifumi “Kid” Yamamoto has lost both of his UFC battles after tonight. This continues the streak of Japanese fighters who come in with a ton of hype and fail in their fights.

8. DaMarques Johnson looked great with his TKO on Clay Harvison.

7. Cub Swanson is among the last “great” WEC featherweights to debut in the UFC and it looked like he came in over-confident to be sure. After such a great first round (which we had him winning 10-9), he appeared lax on his back against the cage and was submitted with an arm triangle by Ricardo Lamas.

6. I’m a sucker for a good D’Arce choke. Watching Dustin Poirier take Pablo Garza out with a second round submission made me squeal like a schoolgirl. I’m a sucker for blood chokes.

5. Clay Guida is going to have to put Ben Henderson on his back tonight if he wants to win. I don’t think that’s going to happen. Ben Henderson has worked on his wrestling and he’s got tons of hearts.

4. Ben Henderson is Gumby. That he could avoid those guillotines when he was mounted is a thing of beauty. We’ve seen this from Henderson before in his previous fights with Donald Cerrone and more – the dude just has guts and tons of flexibility. Now, he’ll get a title shot against UFC Lightweight champion Frankie Edgar. Good for the former WEC Lightweight title holder.

3. To start, Velasquez looks like his gameplan is to chop the legs out from the better boxer in Dos Santos. Junior has sho…Okay as I write all of this, Junior dos Santos knocks Cain to the mat and pounds him out for the title.

2. So what really went wrong with Cain Velasquez tonight? Was it “ring rust” or did the better fighter just prevail? There’s too many different variables involved in any fight but the simple answer is that the puncher with more power outstruck the wrestler who could strike a bit. Not to do Velasquez a disservice, but he’s not a boxer, despite having good boxing. Dos Santos caught him with a power punch over the ear that dropped him, dove in and took the win with repeated left handed hooks.

1. It’s a big day for MMA and for Junior dos Santos. Now, we’ll have to wait for the ratings to see what America thought. The last time that we had this kind of exposure for the sport, Kimbo Slice popped James Thompson’s ear. At least these two combatants handled the post-fight interviews with class, as was expected from two classy human beings.

An Inside Pulse "original", SMS is one of the founding members of Inside Pulse and serves as the Chief Marketing Officer on the Executive Board. Smith is a fan of mixed martial arts and runs two sections of IP as Editor in Chief, RadioExile.com and InsideFights.com. Having covered music festivals around the world as well as conducting interviews with top-class professional wrestlers and musicians, he switched gears from music coverage at Radio Exile to MMA after the first The Ultimate Fighter Finale. He resides with his wife in New York City.