Let’s start at the top and work our way down.
-Someone needs to take away Glenn Trowbridge’s judging license. A card of 29-28 Ortiz is atrocious. Absolutely atrocious. I personally had the fight 30-26 Griffin, though I find 30-27 and 29-28 Griffin acceptable as well.
-Tito talked about having a cracked skull coming into the bout. Color me crazy, but I feel like the commission might pooh-pooh the idea of a fighter entering the cage with a skull fracture. Maybe deals were made to save an already anemic top of the card.
-Ortiz looked absolutely impotent on the feet all night and became a walking punching bag for Griffin in round 3. And, dare I say, Tito looked gassed in that last round.
-I’m not sure what to make of the Koscheck/Johnson mess. Koscheck outworked Johnson on the floor in round 2, there’s no doubting that. But between the weird knee/eye poke/Oscar performance and then the two eye pokes to “Rumble,” that was a bigger fustercluck than Napoleon at Waterloo.
-Volkmann/Thiago was weird. I don’t know what else to say about it.
-Rogerio Nogueira performed brilliantly. The left hand parry, jab/left straight combo had me marking out. (Hint, hint Nate!)
-Just talked to a friend about the fights and we were thinking of where Forrest goes from here. We joked that the only fights that make sense are rematches (Jardine, Evans, Jackson, Rua, etc.). Then it dawned on my buddy…have Forrest fight Rogerio. Brilliant!
-Great opening fight. Well, at least the first three minutes were great. Did Baroni’s power get lost in the translation to 170? Because he hit Sadollah with some clean power shots that didn’t seem to phase Amir. And props to that kid. He looked way better than I expected.
-Maybe I’m alone thinking this, but Joe got on my nerves tonight. I’m not going to get into the nitty gritty, but his call for some sort of hybrid glove that covers the fingers and still allows you to grapple had me tilting harder than getting two outed on the river. No, Joe, it’s probably not possible to create some sort of fighting mitten. Eye pokes are going to be a part of the game. Just accept it.
Overall, a fun night of fights. I really wish the Koscheck/Johnson fight didn’t have so many distractions, but thems the ropes. Forrest looked good bouncing back from the Anchor Punch of Doom. And we got multiple Diego “YUS” Sanchez promos! Perfect night!