In the end, this show totally delivered.
As expected, Chuck Liddell retained the Light Heavyweight Title by knocking out Tito Ortiz again. What suprised us was how long it took. At several points through the first two rounds, Darkside proclaimed that if Tito won, he'd be firmly convinced that the UFC was fixed. When Tito was down in the first round and in trouble, Liddell seemed to back off - adding to Darkside's conspiracy theory.
In the end, The Iceman knocked out his old buddy and was really never in any danger.
The big "O" of the night came just before the main event when crowd fav Forrest Griffen was (as he put it in the post fight interview) "knocked the fuck out" by 'The Dean Of Mean' Keith Jardine.
I really liked the look of this fight on paper. Forrest beat Stephan Bonnar by decision, and Bonnar beat Jardine (altough I thought Jardine deserved to win that one). Both guys like to stand and trade strikes, which is exactly what they did. Griffin got caught though. Late in the first round he was rocked, hit the canvas and was out cold. When he opened his eyes he had Jardine on top of him filling his face his stiff punches. Big John stopped the fight and the crowd was stunned.
The truth is, this result won't hurt young Griffin a damn bit. He's still going to be popular and be a good draw. In fact, he's now a bigger fav because he's an even bigger underdog. Jardine has cemented himself as a star in the division. Jardine-Griffin II should be great.
One of the other highlights was when Mirko Crocop and Quentin Jackson were mentioned as being part of the UFC. Crocop will own the heavyweight division, and Jackson will add even more personality to the light heavyweights.
Here are the results for the entire card.
- Christian Wellisch defeated Anthony Perosh by Decision (Unanimous)
- Yushin Okami defeated Rory Singer by Submission (Strikes) 4:03 of 3rd Round
- Gabriel Gonzaga defeated Carmelo Marrero by Submission (Armbar) 3:22 of 1st Round
- Thiago Alves defeated Tony DeSouza by KO (Knee) 1:10 of 1st Round
- Michael Bisping defeated Eric Schafer by TKO (Strikes) 4:24 of 1st Round
- Andrei Arlovski defeated Marcio Cruz by KO (Strikes) 3:15 of 1st Round
- Jason MacDonald defeated Chris Leben by Submission (Guillotine Choke) 4:03 of 2nd Round
- Keith Jardine defeated Forrest Griffin by TKO (Strikes) 4:41 of 1st Round
- Chuck Liddell defeated Tito Ortiz by TKO (Strikes)3:59 of 3rd Round
I'm curious to hear what you all thought of the show.
1 comments: on "The Iceman Was Awesome!"
Howdy Doody Forresst sucks ANYWAYS. He's more vanilla than Bob Backlund.
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