Making the Grade: Passes/Fails for UFC Fight Night: Condit vs. Alves
Carlos Condit returned to the Octagon after 14 months away on Saturday night and didn't skip a beat as he laid a vicious beat-down on former title contender Thiago Alves to win the UFC Fight Night main event from Brazil.
Condit needed only two rounds to inflict massive damage to Alves' nose to the point where the ringside physician didn't feel comfortable allowing the American Top Team veteran to continue any longer.
In the co-main event, Charles Oliveira put on his most complete performance to date as he tapped out Nik Lentz in a rematch after the two featherweights first met four years ago.
Oliveira picked up his fourth straight victory as he started knocking on the door of the top five of the featherweight division.
But we already know the results from Saturday night, so we're going to dig a little deeper into this UFC Fight Night card and find out what passed and what failed. This is Making the Grade for UFC Fight Night: Condit vs. Alves.
PASSES
Welcome back, Carlos Condit
It's always hard to estimate what an athlete will look like after major reconstructive surgery on the knee, but Carlos Condit may have actually come back better than when he left the UFC more than a year ago.
Condit suffered his injury in the Octagon during a takedown performed by Tyron Woodley last March, and after having surgery to repair the damage, the former interim champion traveled a long road to finally get back in action on Saturday night.
In his time away, Condit healed his knee but apparently just got angrier and more vicious while he was recovering. He took 14 months of aggression out on Thiago Alves. Condit was aggressive and unrelenting with his attacks, blasting away at Alves while landing 107 total strikes in just 10 minutes in the cage.
Condit's relentless pace and thirst for violence resulted in Alves' nose joining the UFC plastic surgery hall of fame alongside Rich Franklin after he tangled with Anderson Silva. The win vaults Condit back into title contention immediately, and beyond anything else, it just felt good to have "The Natural Born Killer" back doing what he loves to do.
Potential realized
Despite the fact that he's just 25 years old, it seemed like Charles Oliveira had already defined his UFC career after his first nine fights in the Octagon. Oliveira was an explosive finisher with some of the most aggressive striking and jiu-jitsu in the entire promotion, but he just seemed to fall apart when he faced the best fighters in whatever division he was competing in.
Oliveira lost to Jim Miller and Donald "Cowboy" Cerrone while he was at lightweight and then fell to Cub Swanson and Frankie Edgar after dropping down to featherweight. While there's certainly nothing wrong with losing to that caliber of fighter, Oliveira had the kind of talent that made him look like a future title contender.
In the past year, Oliveira has finally found the right combination of skills and confidence to re-ignite the idea that he could become a legitimate threat to the gold within his next few fights.
Oliveira capped off a four-fight win streak on Saturday night by absolutely demolishing Nik Lentz in his most complete performance yet. He was devastating on the feet, unrelenting on the ground and showed great conditioning even after putting forth an exerted effort through the first two rounds. When things went awry for Oliveira in Round 2, he didn't crumble or fall apart like he had done in some past fights.
Instead, he got his composure back, took a deep breath and came out looking for the finishi in Round 3. And guess what? He got it.
Oliveira has proven in his last four fights that he's ready to tackle the best of the best in the featherweight division, and now it's time to see what he can do against a top five fighter again.
Dominick Cruz doing fight stuff
A couple of shows ago, I gushed about Brian Stann's commentary while he was doing play-by-play with Jon Anik, and this week it's time to talk about Cruz and how he's by far the best analyst in the entire sport of mixed martial arts.
While Cruz has been dealing with multiple knee surgeries and a lot of time out of the Octagon, he's honed his craft as an analyst working before and after numerous fight cards where he breaks down the action like nobody else in the sport. Technically speaking, Cruz understands what's happening in a fight like few others, but his ability to convey that information back to the audience in a way that makes sense is just unreal.
Hearing him explain the exact movements that led to Rony Jason's triangle choke submission over Damon Jackson was eye-opening. He even takes time to get a jab or two in on co-host Michael Bisping when he's breaking down next week's fight card where Dan Henderson is headlining.
— Dominick Cruz (@TheDomin8r) May 31, 2015
Hopefully, Cruz recovers from his latest knee injury and returns to challenge for the UFC bantamweight title in 2016, but no matter what else happens in his professional career, there's no doubt he's got a bright future as the best analyst this sport has ever known.
FAILS
Thiago Alves might want to make a few calls to the best plastic surgeons in Florida, because when he returns home from Brazil, he's going to need them.
Alves put up a valiant effort against Condit on Saturday night, but an elbow strike in the second round changed the course of the entire fight while simultaneously resetting the former welterweight title contender's sinuses in an instant.
When Alves sat down in his corner and the cut man jammed tissues up his nose, it looked like something out of "Total Recall." Considering Alves couldn't even breathe through his nose at that point, stopping the fight was totally justified and hopefully there's no permanent damage done.
It was tough to watch and a picture is worth a 1,000 words, but the only one I can come up with right now is "ouch."
Darren Till pays homage to Paige VanZant
Listen, when it comes to tattoos, a portrait can be one of the best ways to pay tribute to a person you love or somebody that meant a lot to you in life. It could be a parent, a child or maybe even a musician that you really love.
But UFC newcomer Darren Till found out the hard way that getting a portrait tattoo of his girlfriend that suspiciously looks like strawweight star Paige VanZant will end up getting talked about more than the TKO victory earned in his debut.
Till's tattoo was all the buzz on Twitter before, during and after his fight, and even VanZant said the ink resembled her face quite a bit.
Hahaha wow. I agree, totally looks like me https://t.co/t0FtOfTBVJ
— Paige VanZant (@PaigeVanzantUFC) May 31, 2015
@PaigeVanzantUFC pic.twitter.com/TCSoerCYdc
— JustBleedMMA (@JustBleedMMA) May 31, 2015
Till said after the fight that he didn't even know who VanZant was when he was asked about his tattoo, but chances are he looked her up on Saturday night and now maybe even he's suspicious about who exactly is permanently inked on his arm.
EPIC FAILS
Here we go again
It always seems like the epic fail portion of this column is reserved for judging and referee misfires, and while I would love to talk about something else, the never-ending circus of follies that is MMA officiating never allows me any other option.
On Saturday night, the misfortune of the epic fail of the evening fell in the lap of judge Chris Lee following his scoring of the strawweight matchup between Julianna Lima and Ericka Almeida.
Now there wasn't much memorable that happened during the 15-minute fight outside of Lima taking Almeida down at will and essentially staying on top of her round after round after round until it was over. Lima didn't bother passing guard much or even mounting a lot of offense from the top, but she maintained her position to win a clear-cut decision.
Inexplicably, Lee not only scored Lima winning the fight, but somehow gave her two 10-8 rounds in the second and third frame! Now no one is doubting that Lima deserved the win, but there was an argument to be made that Almeida could have won Round 3 based on her striking attack in the first half of the five-minute session. Yet somehow Lee saw that a 10-8 round?
Listen, judging blunders need to be called out at all times, because that's the only way things will get better going forward. Lee didn't cost anybody a win, but he still got the call wrong in a major way by handing out two different 10-8 rounds in a largely uneventful fight.
In a perfect world, judges in MMA would be willing to hand down more 10-8 rounds, especially when one fighter truly dominates and nearly finishes another. But what Lima did to Almeida was a far cry from that, and Lee has to be held accountable for his ill-conceived scoring.
