UFC 143: Diaz vs. Condit

[Paul 584]

but Diaz had a takedown and was a minute or so from a rear naked or a body triangle arm bar, so I went with that as being more decisive in me making my choice.

 

I thought it ended badly for him. As the round ended Condit seemed to have the ground advantage to me.

[Guest John Hancock]

It was a funny camera angle, but Diaz had a body lock and was trying to straight him out for an arm bar, Condit rolled out of it, but Diaz rolled through and actually had Condit's leg when the buzzer went and the referee had to jump in and pull him away to stop him putting on a leg lock. Diaz got a takedown, almost got a rear naked choke, almost got an arm bar and almost got a leg lock, Condit was just defending on the ground, off his feet, there no offence.

[Paul 584]

Fair enough, I only watched it the once so I'll take your word for it fella.

[Guest John Hancock]

I've been pretty spectacularly wrong about things recently on this site, so i wouldn't if I were you :lol

[Paul 584]

Just went back and rewatched the last 10 seconds. Condit escapes Diaz, gets behind him and Diaz manages to trip Condit. Diaz doesnt get the leg until after the buzzer has gone, and Condit had released what he was trying to get. Thats not to say Diaz wouldnt have got it anyway, but I cant help feel he was trying to score extra points with the judges. :P

[Guest Jimmy Redman]

I gave Condit Round 2 anyway. It took him a little while to get into his groove, but by then he was already out-landing Diaz and for such a close round, thats what I went with.

 

I can see Round 5 for Diaz and thats what I would have gone with, not that it mattered on my card at that point, but I dont think it was clear-cut by any means since Condit kept up his game for most of it and Diaz couldnt do anything with the takedown. I think the only fairly safe round to call was 4.

[Guest Frank Botch]

I had Condit winning, pretty bummed out at the result and Nick's overall performance. Never changed up at all and got tagged with some pretty nice shots so his interview was a little off(shocking). The Werdum fight was fun, Nelson can take a hell of a punch. What an achievement. Goldberg kept saying the Japan show was in September, he mustn't listen to what he's saying either.

[Guest Jimmy Redman]

Yeah, for all the people underwhelmed with Condit's performance, Diaz's was worse considering he was 'supposed' to win and actually challenge GSP. If he fought like that against Georges he would do the exact same thing as Condit anyway - play it safe, avoid him and out-point.

[Guest Dusty Finish]

I was thinking about this earlier (and expect as many disagreements as agreements, but I feel like saying it anyway), regarding fighter pay. At the risk of sounding like a total UFC apologist...

 

My heart bleeds for poor, underpaid Nick Diaz. So fighters aren't getting anywhere near the majority of the company gross. Where in the real world do employees command this exactly? I and my colleagues do the majority of the functional work that keeps the business going. Money in the main floats to the top, because gaffers, shareholders, directors etc are paid to (and use revenue to continue to) run and grow the business, safeguarding my job & everyone else's job long term. I'm paid as per my level of responsibility- more than many, but not ultimate. See fighters: they're paid to train, show up, make weight, fight, and there ends their responsibility. Most of the UFC's revenue is likely tied up in investments, commitments, assets etc, with Dana White, Reed Harris & chums paid to ensure business is robust and the 300+ fighters under contract have an arena to go to work in. Regardless, while (not knowing this for a fact, admittedly), I'd wager Dana White draws a salary plus bonuses, with dividends from company gross likely tied up elsewhere, I very much doubt that if you tasked him to put $1m in cash in front of you by Friday that he could.

 

I'd love to know when marquee headline boxers' pay became the yardstick for what MMA fighters should be worth. For starters, ne'er an MMA fight has drawn the live cash gate that a big boxing match in Vegas has- this is likely down to establishment, and there'll likely never be parity as boxing has (and always will have) over a century head start. Still, this applies to the top guys only. One thing people lament about wrestling in the territorial days compared to now was that previously you had a few hundred guys making a good living, now you've got a couple of dozen making a very good living, and a few hundred making scraps on the weekends. I'd like to know (considering that Facebook prelims, Fuel etc have been going for a year or so) where boxing's equivalent of Rafael Natal (or whomever) is making $16k plus potential win and "... of the night" bonuses for a fight no-one saw? At least the money in MMA filters down, cultivating an eco-system, seeing as fighters need more fighters to fight in order to keep fighting.

 

If pay was such a scandal, why are so few kicking off about it? I think I know.... I can't imagine the likes of Frankie Edgar & Rich Franklin will be too desperate to find out what their market value in any field of endeavour will be without the UFC brand name as precurser. Ortiz, Couture, Penn, Rampage.... they all tried it..... and we all know how each of those cases ended up.

[Guest The Beltster]

Lets be fair, if he got paid $1 million bucks for 25 minutes work and a couple months worth of camp, cant be that bad can it. Most of us wont total that amount of money in total lifetime earnings. He got it in 25 minutes.

[Guest John Hancock]

He also gets a cut of the PPV buy rate as a bonus for promoting it, and I'm assuming there was some sort of deal going to do the Primetime.

[Paul 584]

http://middleeasy.com/images/stories/Author_Zeus/2012/02/screenhunter_02%20feb.%2004%2023.03.jpg

 

Interesting stats. Certainly backs up Condit winning in my mind.

[Guest John Hancock]

The problem with those stats is that they don't really have much to do with MMA's bizarre and incredibly open to interpretation judging criteria. They exact things they're judged on are;

 

- Clean Strikes

- Effective Grappling

- Octagon Control

- Effective Aggressiveness

 

There was hardly any grappling, other than Diaz making a pass, so he wins there. Aggressiveness is defined in the MMA rules as, "This simply means who is moving forward and finding success", which I'd give to Diaz too, seeing as he was coming forward the entire fight and him and Condit both had effectively the same striking success rate (43 for Diaz and 47 for Condit). Octagon control is a couple of things including take downs, attempting submissions, and dictating the pace of the fight, and I'd give that to Diaz too. The only category I'd give to Condit is striking, where the maths is clearly on his side.

 

I'm still saying Diaz won the first, second and fifth and Condit won the third and forth, although I'd say the entire fight hangs on how important each individual person things a takedown and a ground-pass are.

[Paul 584]

Effective Agressivness? I wouldnt call what Diaz was doing as effective, on the other hand Condit was landing blows and moving away before he could be counter punched. I'd call that far more effectivly agressive. And while the % were similer the number wasnt. 151 vs 105!

 

And I'd say Condit dictated the pace of the fight. He kept moving and stopped the fight being static. But I could be argued to call it a draw on that one as Diaz did get a couple of takedowns.

 

 

Got to stress thats just how I saw it, as you say the judges will as score it how they saw it (obviously really :P).

[Guest John Hancock]

That's the problem with MMA judging though, we can read the same rules, watch the same fight, look at the same stats, and interpret the fight without either of us being obviously right or wrong. This is what leads to so many weird calls.

[Paul 584]

Oh for sure, I was trying to say that I understood that fully. But as per usual my communicazionz iz bad!

[Paul 584]

Woah. Just heard that Condit has the new UFC record for most leg kicks laned. He hit Diaz with 68 of the frakkers!

[Guest The Beltster]

I think the judges gave it to Condit for his amazing display of tactical running away.

[dsrchris 190]

I can't blame the guy, I wouldn't want to stand and trade off with Diaz. Just...goddamnit, it just wasn't very...exciting.

 

A perfectly competent display of applying thought and tactics, but I wanted to see some b*tches get knocked out/tap out. :lol

[Paul 584]

:lol

 

Yeah, for all I enjoy a 'human chess match' (seriously, I loved the Shamrock/Gracie superfight!) you have to love the spectacle of a match ender!