UFC Fight Night 28/TUF Caligula Premiere - September 4th.

[canucksfreak19]

Because six hours just isn't enough, they are going to follow up the fight card with the two hour premiere of the latest season of TUF.

The only three fights of real note on this card are the three fights at the top of the card.

Main Card (on Fox Sports 1):
Glover Teixeira (21-2; #9 Light Heavyweight) vs. Ryan Bader (15-3; #10 Light Heavyweight)
Yushin Okami (29-7; #4 Middleweight) vs. Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza (18-3; #9 Middleweight)
Joseph Benavidez (18-3; #2 Flyweight) vs. Jussier “Formiga” da Silva (15-2; #5 Flyweight)
Francisco Trinaldo (13-2) vs. Piotr Hallmann (13-1)
Rafael “Sapo” Natal (16-4-1) vs. Tor Troeng (16-4-1)
Marcos Vinicius (20-4-1) vs. Ali Bagautinov (10-2)

Preliminary Card (on Fox Sports 1):
Felipe Arantes (15-5-1) vs. Edmilson Souza (13-3)
Lucas Martins (13-1) vs. Ramiro Hernandez (13-4)
Joao Zeferino (13-5) vs. Elias Silverio (8-0)
Keith Wisniewski (28-14-1) vs. Ivan Jorge (24-3)

Preliminary Card (on Facebook):
Yuri Villefort (6-2) vs. Sean Spencer (9-2)

 

[canucksfreak19]

Everybody made weight for the fights tomorrow:

Glover Teixeira (206) vs. Ryan Bader (205)
Yushin Okami (185) vs. Ronaldo Souza (186)
Joseph Benavidez (126) vs. Jussier da Silva (126)
Francisco Trinaldo (155) vs. Piotr Hallmann (155)
Rafael Natal (185) vs. Tor Troeng (185)
Marcos Vinicius Borges Pancini (126) vs. Ali Bagautinov (125)
Felipe Arantes (146) vs. Edimilson Souza (146)
Elias Silverio (169) vs. Joao Zeferino (170)
Lucas Martins (136) vs. Ramiro Hernandez (135)
Ivan Jorge (169) vs. Keith Wisniewski (170)
Yuri Villefort (170) vs. Sean Spencer (171)

 

[canucksfreak19]

The top three fights certainly delivered the violence. Most impressed with Jacare, he is looking scary good right now. And how about the influence of Duane Ludwig on Team Alpha Male? Whether it be Dillishaw or Mendes, or Jobi-won these dudes are now dropping the hammer on their opponents. So impressive.

 

[chadsexington]

lol at TUF Caligula. I think people gonna be disappointed on that end.

There was a lot of really poor matchmaking to get into the TUF house for the women last night. Flyweights fighting Featherweights...fighters with losing streaks fighting other fighters with losing streaks and so on. This is actually one season of TUF where I would've been ok with them just taking the 8 women that would've made the best show instead of having them fight to get into the house. There was some stuff that seriously backfired in the UFC's face last night worse than the whole Carson Beebe thing did. They probably **** a brick when Revelina Berto lost, for example (given her family history) and when Tara Larosa did too, because having her in close quarters with Miesha Tate would've been super volatile, especially given that some of Miesha's other detractors (and Tara's friends) are in the house.

Still...it'll be a good season. I hope both Berto and Larosa get a fight in the UFC someday. Berto will be a good draw, and Larosa just deserves one fight there before she retires. She's contributed so much to the sport that it was just a real shame to see her lose last night, even at the expense of getting a fellow British Columbian in the house.

 

[canucksfreak19]

I hope it's not TUF Caligula. What I am most looking forward to is seeing how bad Ronda Rousey can make herself come across this season.

I don't think the UFC really cares about who is in the house. There is nobody from that group of 32 that could bring extra viewers to the show. The show is about finding young, largely inexperienced fighters like T.J. Dillashaw, and Kelvin Gastelum. I think that this season has a lot of that potential on both the men's and women's side. Obviously Shayna Baszler is going to be the favorite, but I would not be surprised if Pena beat her next week, and I also think Jessamyn Duke has a very good chance to win it on the ladies side.

It came out a week or two ago that Tara had already taken a fight with a different org. I don't see her being able to string enough wins together at this stage in her career to get a fight in the UFC, but you never really know.

 

[chadsexington]

It came out a week or two ago that Tara had already taken a fight with a different org. I don't see her being able to string enough wins together at this stage in her career to get a fight in the UFC, but you never really know.

The UFC handled the women a bit differently than past seasons oddly enough. Colleen Schneider had already started promoting her fight for Sept 7th before the TUF premiere aired, and Pancrase leaked Larosa's fight a week before they were supposed to.

Realistically, she might only a fight away though Dave. She's fighting Rin Nakai at the end of the month, who is basically the best active 135er outside of North America. She wins there (easier said than done,) and she's pretty contract worthy at that point.

There's pretty well nobody in Invicta for her to fight since all of their major players are on TUF, although I don't know that she's welcome back there anyway, since they've basically never brought anybody back who missed weight for a fight there.