What really mattered at UFC on ESPN+ 6 in Nashville on Saturday night? Here’s a few things…
1. Superman (punch) saves the day
Anthony Pettis wasn’t looking great in his first UFC bout at welterweight. Stephen Thompson battered and bloodied him, doing all the usual “Wonderboy” stuff to frustrate his offense while picking him apart at distance. Then Pettis remembered, oh yeah, he’s the guy who’s at his best when he’s airborne and on the attack. One leaping right hand later, Thompson was flat on his back and out cold.
Does this mean that Pettis is reborn as a 170-pounder? Not so fast. His power, at least when combined with the element of surprise, carried over well into the next division up. But we still have yet to see how he’ll fare against a bigger fighter who wants to get in close and put him down. Welterweight has all different types. Choose your next steps carefully, “Showtime.”
2. Well, golly, at least Thompson’s taking it well…
His response to getting totally and fully slept for the first time in his MMA career? “Golly,” Thompson said. “Superman off the cage. It was so ninja I didn’t even see it coming.”
So yeah, that’s pretty on brand for a fighter who often feels like a character from a TV show in the ‘50s.
Aside from those few seconds at the end of one round, Thompson was in control of this fight. You know, right up until he lost consciousness. It’s a heartbreaker, but it happens. Maybe it happens with greater ease on this side of the mid-30s.
3. ‘Big Pretty’ talked, but the ‘Razor’ delivered
Justin Willis is wise to at least part of this game. In the lead-up to his co-main event bout with Curtis Blaydes, he used his mic time to get himself noticed. Unfortunately, Blaydes turned out to be wise to the other part of this game, especially the wrestling part, which enabled him to spend three rounds tossing Willis around like a bag of fertilizer.
And yet, maybe Blaydes could stand to take a page or two from Willis’ playbook as well. Standing there after the win, being interviewed by the UFC heavyweight champ, Blaydes named off three opponents he’d like to face next, when he might have gotten more mileage out of telling the guy with the mic in his hand that he was next on the hit list.
But then, Blaydes is too polite for that. Maybe too realistic as well.
4. Are we doing Barber any favors with so much hype so early on?
UFC President Dana White singled her out as a rising fighter he’s excited about. The broadcast team hailed her as the next big thing. Her nickname is “The Future,” for crying out loud. That’s a lot of weight to put on the 20-year-old shoulders of Maycee Barber, who’s clearly still a work in progress.
Mind you, she doesn’t seem inclined to shy away from those big expectations. She earned a TKO over a tough J.J. Aldrich after getting off to a rough start, then she went and declared this her time. Still, you ask a lot of a young fighter when you build this narrative of promise and potential around them. Barber may have won this fight, but Aldrich showed a lot of other fighters in the division that there are big gaps in her armor. When you inflate the hype balloon so much, so soon, you end up giving her peers an incentive to pop it.
5. Give that man his camo shorts
Bryce Mitchell has his work cut out for him convincing MMA fans to think of him as something other than just the guy who got his scrotum mauled by a power drill. Winning a unanimous decision in the “Fight of the Night” and then yelling at Reebok to give him some camouflage shorts is a good start, though.
As I watched Mitchell’s backstage interview and listened to him detail his quest to put a better roof over his camper, I kept expecting the camera to cut to a shot of Hank Hill standing there blinking in the sun. Mitchell seems fully aware of the vibe he’s giving off. He owns it, too, shouting out Arkansas every chance he gets, as if anyone’s in danger of thinking he’s from Boston.
A guy like this might just have a personality big enough to overcome the power drill mishap. Winning two straight in the UFC doesn’t hurt either.
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