What a difference six months can make for a fighter. Last summer both Rory MacDonald and Demian Maia were being looked at as title contenders, potentially one win away from a title shot. Would MacDonald face his longtime friend, mentor and teammate Georges St. Pierre for his title? Would Maia duplicate his excruciatingly awful title fight against Anderson Silva against GSP?
Close decision losses to Robbie Lawler and Jake Shields respectively, followed up by GSP abdicating his title for a pseudo-retirement of sorts, has left the welterweight division wide open. But both Maia and MacDonald are now on the rebound, needing a win to stay relevant in the division.
The feature fight for Saturday’s card is going to say a lot about the long term future of both fighters.
Fight Breakdown: This is an interesting fight on any number of levels, mainly because Rory’s top position game meshes very well with the dangerous guard of Maia. A key to it will be seeing where exactly Maia wants the fight to go, and vice versa, as this is going to be a fight about imposing will.
Maia wants this on the mat and his welterweight run has been the middleweight Maia that did everything to get to the ground and nothing more. He has a good, but not great, stand up game but he’s one of the best BJJ practitioners in MMA. MacDonald is good, but not great, with his submissions and top control. Maia will want to get this to the ground any way possible, including a jump guard pull, so he can work his ground game. He has a clear advantage there.
MacDonald is at his best when he’s standing up, working his technical boxing game and beating up the body. He has good MMA wrestling, and his top position work is smothering enough that perhaps he could survive 15 minutes in Maia’s guard, but he has the clear advantage standing. Look for him to work what he did against BJ Penn against Maia; keep it standing and punch him until he breaks. MacDonald is good enough on the ground to probably not get submitted but I think he’s smart enough to not go there unless he has to.
Why it matters: Maia is on the wrong side of 30 and another loss probably takes him out of the title picture permanently. He has to win to stay relevant in the division.
This is a big fight in Rory’s career right now. He was the heir apparent for so long to his teammate that winning became more important than anything else. The savage killer that debuted in the UFC, and destroyed Che Mills in emphatic fashion, gave way to a more reserved fighter who did just enough to win (or so he thought). He took the GSP style of takedowns and top control to its next logical step, a profound “lay and pray” where all he did was just enough to win the round (and prevent a stand up).
If the killer shows up, looking for a scalp, Maia could be in some trouble. If MacDonald the point grinder shows up he could be in for another loss.
Prediction: Maia
