Fanny Pack Antics

Unless you have been living under a rock for the last few days, then there should be no doubt that you have heard about the fight between Carwin vs Dos Santos. Why no Brock Lesnar? Simple, Lesnar’s medical condition has returned, such that he needed to have surgery again. To replace Brock, we now have Carwin. To be honest, I am a little disappointed, I wanted to see Lesnar get punched in the face, I guess that will have to wait for another day. So back to the fight at hand.

How would Shane Carwin win?

The way I see Carwin winning this fight is by control, although he has extremely heavy hands, I think that Dos Santos movement and speed will be too much for him. Instead, I see that Carwin will try and press Dos Santos up against the cage and dirty box him. This would be similar to what he did against Frank Mir (and we all no how that ended).

There is, however, one massive concern that I have for Shane Carwin and that would be his cardio. We saw in the Lesnar fight that he struggled after throwing a bunch of cardio, I wonder whether he would be able to keep up with Dos Santos.

How would Junior Dos Santos Win?

To put it simply, I see Junior winning by knock out. I consider him to be a better striker, I know that Share Carwin has heavy hands, however, I feel that Junion Dos santos is a much more technical striker.

Furthermore, we have seen that Junior Dos Santos has a decent level of cardio, in fact, he was able to go three full rounds of punching Roy Nelson in the face without getting tired. This is a major advantage that I think he has over Share Carwin.

How would the fight play out

I foresee that the first found minutes of the fight, both fighters will be trying to feel each other out, with neither wanting to do anything substantial. However, after a minute mark, I feel that Share Carwin will try and push forward to get the take down, if he fails JDS will counter punch.

One thing that Shane Carwin has to watch out for is the Junior Dos Santos counter punch, as we all know, he can through one hell of a punch.

In short, the longer the fight goes on, the more and more I see Junior Dos Santos pulling off the win – however, in saying that, if Shane Carwin does not win in the first round, I would not count him out just yet – he still has heavy hands and can pull off the knock out later on.

My pick for this fight would be Junior Dos Santos by knock out in the second round.

On check of the betting odds, I noticed that Shane Carwin as being ranked as underdog. This is probably because he has been out of the sport for so long fighting performance enhancing drug charges.

All I can say is that this should be a good fight, to bad the rest of the card is average.

The interesting fight of Frank Mir vs Roy Nelson is one of the most interesting fights on the UFC 130 card. I find this fight so very difficult to predict.

This is because their skills are so similar. So what is the key to this fight? In my mind, the key for Roy Nelson is to keep the fight standing, if the fight goes to the ground I see that Frank Mir has the advantage. They are both extremely good BJJ fighters, however, I see that Roy Nelson is better – that is how I can justify the statement.

Frank Mir is coming off the win over Cro Cop, which is nothing to brag about. Usually when you come off a win against such a legend, then there a lot of momentum backing the fighter, however, this does not feel like the case in this instance. Although Frank Mir won the fight against cro cop a lof people felt as if it was not a good fight. In fact, Dana White and Joe Silva (UFC match maker) were not impressed by his performance.

Then you have Roy Nelson that is coming of a loss against Junior Dos Santos, now, usually when a fighter is coming off a loss their is a loss in moment. However, I feel that the JDS fight increase Roy Nelson’s moment, such that he was able to take a massive beating, by one of the best HW in the sport and still was not able to get knocked out. I feel that this won Roy Nelson a lot of fans.

This is what makes the match so hard to predict.

I feel that Frank Mir’s size will play a massive role in this fight, Roy Nelson is often the subject of jokes for his fat belly, however, what people over look is the way he uses it. He often uses it to pin down an opponent, so much so that he cannot move. I feel that if Mir gets caught underneath that fat gut, then all the BJJ in the world cannot save you.

My prediction

At the last check of the odds, Frank Mir was showing to be the odds on favourite. However, my gut feeling is telling me that the favourite for this fight will be Roy Nelson. I think that Nelson will win by knock out.

The way I see the fight going is that there will be a lot of grappling early in the fight, however, as the fight progresses both fighters will tire and eventually Roy Nelson will land one of those heave right hands that one him the Ultimate Fighter contest.

The only way I see that Frank Mir winning this fight is by decision, I cannot see him being able to submit Roy Nelson or knock him out. heck if JDS could not know out Roy Nelson, then I do not see Frank Mir being able to do that.

To conclude, if Roy Nelson can win this fight, it will be huge for his career. If Frank Mir can win, well it will keep his career going so that he may fight another day.

The fight that nobody was really expecting, the fight between Rampage Jackson and Matt Hamill. I’ll try and break down the analysis of this fight into different pieces.

Rampage Jackson Is excited?

The question that a lot of people have been asking, is Rampage excited for this fight? This was raised as people felt that Matt Hamill was not a serious enough challenge for Rampage and therefore, Rampage would not be excited for the fight. However, in the press interviews, Rampage seems to be really relaxed and calm.This came off as him not being excited.

Rampage went on to say that reason for this was that “this is my job”. He likened the experience of fighting to that of being a teacher. A teach does not get excited for everyday that he or she goes to school, because it is their job. Fighting is Rampages job and therefore, he no longer feels excited when it comes time to fight.

That is not to say that Rampage hasn’t been training, in fact, he stated in another interview that he is in the best shape of his life, better than he was for the Rashard Evans fight and definitely better than the Lyoto fight (where he was criticised for being over weight).

Wrestler vs striker

We all know that Rampage is an exceptional striker, but how is his wrestling? He is fight Matt Hamill, who is one of the best wrestlers in the 205 division. That being said, how would Rampage fight this fight?

In my mind, it is quite simple, he cannot afford to be taken down by Matt. The way I see Matt fighting this fight is to go for the take-down, go for it hard and once he has gotten it, keep Rampage down. In Rampage’s recent fights, especially that one against Evans he has not really shown that much skill off his back. This is something that I expect Matt Hamill to exploit to the best of his abilities.

You may be thinking that I am counting out Rampage’s wrestling, well we all know that is where Rampage started his career, as a wrestler. However over the years he as  moved away from that style and started to become more of a striker, something that I believe may cause him a defeat this Saturday. Hamill is aware of this and will try and exploit it.

On the flip side, I think that Rampage has a rather large striking advantage over Matt Hamill. Rampage needs to avoid the take-downs, Hamill needs to avoid the power punch of Rampage.

Who will win?

The odds on favourite is Rampage Jackson and I would agree with that. However, I would not count out Matt Hamill – I think that if Matt Hamill can get the fight to the ground, tire our Rampage, then he will pull of the win. That being said, I do not think that Matt Hamill can avoid the power punch of Rampage, if Hamill shoots in he will get caught.

I am excited for this fight, Rampage is in line for a title shot if he wins.

If you’re on this website, then chances are you’re interested in Penn vs Fitch, there isn’t much to say about this match up. Except, I really, really hope that BJ Penn destroys Fitch. Penn is coming of a first round knock-out of UFC hall of famer, Matt Hughes and two decision loses to Frankie Edgar.

Where as, the last 7 wins by Fitch have all been decisions. He has not finished a fight since 2007, in one word that is pathetic. The man is not a finisher, this is why I am picking Penn for the win. Rather, I’m hoping that BJ beats that crap out of Fitch. On the card also, we have Bisping fighting another random that will not further his career – shocking effort.

That being said, as an Australia I’m really disappointing that the UFC has not brought a title shot to the shores of Australia. They have however managed to bring some of the top contenders, with Cain Velasquez  and now BJ Penn vs Fitch.

Does the winner of the fight get a title shot? That question is still unanswered, following Silva’s front kick knock out of Vitor Belford, Silva will be fighting GSP, if GSP can beat Jake Shields (which I think he is capable of doing). The question is, will the winner of BJ Penn v Jon Fitch get to fight GSP before Anderson Silva or after wards.

I for one am certainly hoping that it’s before, after all, both BJ and Jon have already fought GSP and lost – so there’s no reason why they should fight again.

That being said, you should definitely check out the UFC fight at the end of Feb – it’s promises to be a fantastic MMA match up between BJ and Fitch – let’s just hope that BJ does what he does best and runs through the guy.

Whoa… what can I say about this match-up? I’m disappointed to say the least, I was looking forward to Cain Velasquez v JDS, but more importantly JDS winning the Heavy Weight belt (yep I’m a Junior Dos Santos fan). Just in case you are wondering, Velasquez is out injured with a torn Rotator Cuff.

So that’s where are story picks up – Lesnar coming off a clear loss to Velasquez and looking to regain the title was offer a job has coach on The Ultimate Fighter – who would he match up against? Many fans picked Frank Mir – but that wasn’t the choice – given the recent history between Mir and Lesnar, that would have made for some exciting viewing to say the least. Alas, they gave the opposite positions to JDS (yes, I’m disappointed – JDS doesn’t have to prove he deserves the title shot – he’s beaten everybody is his path)

Just in case you don’t know, as with all TUF coaches, they fight at the end of the show and the winner usually gets a title shot. So this means that if JDS wins, he will get the title shot that he already had in the first place. If Lesnar wins, he gets a rematch.Why the hell did JDS accept the job? He’s risking his title shot for nothing in return. Sounds silly to me.

Let’s have a quick break down of Junior Dos Santos v Brock Lesnar

Junior Dos Santos has:

• Far better striking
• Amazing take-down defence
• Far better cardio

Brock Lesnar has;

• Strength and Size
• Questionable wrestling (I wasn’t convinced from the Velasquez fight)
• Heavy Ground and Pound (HAMMER FISTS OF RAGE!)

My verdict:

I see this fight going much the same way as the Lesnar v Carwin fight – if JDS can avoid the take down (keep in mind the JDS has fantastic take-down defence) then he should win, based on superior striking and cardio. The question is, can Lesnar get JDS to the ground and keep him there? In the Velasquez fight – Lesnar’s take-downs attempts were pathetic and not worthy of a UFC HW champ or a (NCA DIV 1 HW champ).

So if Lesnar can’t get the fight to the ground inside the first minute, my guess is that JDS will win.

I’m tipping JDS to win by knockout.