Undercard Fights Offer Plenty of Fun at UFC 106

Share on Facebook posted 11-23-09 by John George

The Ulitimate Fighting Championship 106 had a whole slew of fine fights in addition to the main event bout between Forrest Griffin and Tito Ortiz. Broadcast live Saturday night on pay per view from Las Vegas, UFC 106 featured a bevy of bruising brawls between some fearsome fighters.

Josh Koscheck Dismantles “Rumble” Johnson

I used to dislike Josh Koscheck for man of the same reasons I don’t like Tito Ortiz so much. I thought Josh was arrogant, disrespectful and had a pretty boring fight style. I have now revised my opinion of him. I think suffering losses to Paulo Thiago, Thiago Alves and Georges St. Pierre have humbled him, and I now see him as a more mature, more professional and more grounded fighter. I like how he has been able to bounce back from defeat, and I was impressed with the fire he displayed in his convincing welterweight win over top-notch striker Anthony “Rumble” Johnson.

Johnson is a very, very large 170 pounder who stands six feet, two inches tall and couldn’t make weight in his last fight. He dwarfed Koscheck, who stands five-ten and isn’t exactly a small welterweight. Johnson is also an incredible athlete who possesses tremendous speed, agility and power. Koscheck is no whimp either, but I was sure he would be overmatched and knocked out in this fight. Instead, he fought a smart, tough fight that allowed him to get Johnson to the ground and tap him out with a rear naked choke with less than 13 seconds left in the second round.

In the first round, Johnson lost a point for throwing a knee at Koscheck’s head while Koscheck was on the ground. Multiple replays of the video left commentators Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg puzzled as to what really happened, but if you looked closely you could see that before the knee was thrown, Johnson jabbed Koscheck in the eye with his thumb. Koscheck was given time to recover, and Johnson lost a point for the knee, but the point was moot, as Koscheck was able to finish Johnson.

Amir Sadollah Beats Up Bad Ass Baroni

Loveable fan favorite Amir Sadollah (2-1-0) survived the early onslaught of a vicious Phil “New York Bad Ass” Baroni (13-12-0) to win a unanimous decision victory during their welterweight match.

Sadollah, who won Season 7 of The Ultimate Fighter reality show, has had a disappointing start to his UFC career, after being out of the action for more than a year and a half due to injuries and losing a fight that may have been stopped too early to Johny Hendricks at 29 seconds into the first round. He certainly redeemed himself in this fight, where he showed tremendous durability and heart.

Baroni came out strong and hard, as he normally does, and he connected with some hard punches. Sadollah managed to clinch and weather the storm, even as Baroni landed body punches and hard uppercuts. But Sadollah’s chin held firm, and he soon became the aggressor as Baroni began to fade. In the second and third rounds, Sadollah kept the pressure on with kicks and punches, essentially using Baroni for a punching bag.

The later rounds of the fight were reminiscent of Griffin’s third round with Ortiz, in which Ortiz basically stood around absorbing punches and kicks from a much more animated opponent. This was somewhat fitting, as Sadollah and Griffin are friends and training partners. I was very happy for Amir’s win, just as I was happy for Forrest. Both of them are good guys who are good ambassadors for the sport, and they deserve their popularity.

“Little Nog” Knocks Out Luis Cane

Antonio Rogerio “Minotoro” Nogueira (18-3-0) had an impressive knockout win over Luis Arthur “Banha” Cane at 1:56 in the first round of a light heavyweight contest. Nogueira is also known as “Little Nog” to tell him apart from his slightly larger twin brother Antonio Rodrigo “Minotauro” Noguiera, who is known as “Big Nog.”

Little Nog showed phenomenal boxing skills, as he used a series of jabs to set up an attack that included a devastating left hook and knee to the body that brought Cane down to the canvas. Minotoro then pounced upon Cane and pounded on him until the referee stopped it.

Cane is a powerful, skilled striker in his own right, and I would say that such a convincing win by Nogueira in his UFC debut puts Little Nog right in the mix with some of the top talent in the 205 pound weight class. I’d love to see Little Nog next take on someone like Keith “The Dean of Mean” Jardine or Michael “The Count” Bisping.

Kendall Grove Chokes Jake Rosholt

Kendall “Da Spyder” Grove (11-6-0) was able to use his length and superlative jiu jitsu skills to defeat powerful wrestler Jake Rosholt (6-2-0) by triangle choke at 3:59 of the first round in their middleweigt match-up. At six-foot-six, Grove is one of the tallest of middleweights, and he used his long legs to trap Rosholt and tap him out.

This was a good win for Grove, who is coming in off a unanimous decision loss to Ricardo Almeida. For Rosholt, who in is last fight managed to defeat Chris “The Crippler” Leben by arm triangle choke, it’s back to the drawing board to develop better jiu jitsu defensive skills.

The Other Fights

George Sotiropoulos (11-2-0) looked very solid in all aspects of his game during his second-round armbar submission win over Jason Dent (19-10-0). Both welterweights were game and looked good, but Sotiropoulos’ was able to employ superior jiu jitsu to get the win.

Ben Saunders (8-1-2) used a Muay Thai clinch to deliver some devastating knees that battered and knocked down Marcus “The Irish Hand Grenade” Davis (16-56-0), and Saunders finished him off with some punches for a technical knockout victory at 3:24 in the first round of their welterweight fight.

Brian Foster (13-4-0) delivered a dominating victory over Brock Larson (26-4-0), literally pounding Larson into submission after felling him with a big punch at 3:25 in the second round of their middleweight fight.

Japanese fighter Caol Uno (25-12-5) and Brazilian jiu jitsu expert Fabricio Camoes (10-4-1) ground out a draw in their lightweight bout after three rounds of a seesaw battle filled with strikes and submission attempts.

Paulo Thiago (12-1-0) got a unanimous decision victory over a very tough and previously undefeated Jacob Volkmann (9-1-0). This was Volkmann’s UFC debut, and the newcomer acquitted himself well against very high-level competition in the form of Thiago. I look forward to seeing Volkmann fight again.