Jones wants no part of Aspinall. He whoops Stipe, rides off into the sunset and rightfully so, one of the best to ever do it
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This is basically what could have been if UFC weren’t so toxic in their dealings with fighters and if Dana wasn’t such an egomaniac. Except for the muzzies, they still would’ve turned down their fights.
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Still no announcement on the final fight for 300.
I doubt the one Dana had in mind was able to be made but thats just speculation.
299 is gonna be fun but I want to know what the last damn 300 fight is. Perhaps it will be announced today since there are a lot of eyes on the promotion today.
Moicano vs Turner is the final 300 fight. Good fight.
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Dana should’ve got Mcgregor vs Chandler for UFC 300 and put that Card in Texas Stadium
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imagine the biggest event ever having zero names lol
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Moicano ducking Hooker like the plague
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Paddy ducking Moicano like the plague
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Just seeing the bout order now, missed it last night. Surprised but not surprised they bumped Nickal to the PPV.
So they got the fight between the former champs opening the card with a bang and then they got the familiar faces and hardcore fan staples like Miller and Green rounding out the early prelims. UFC has Yusuff and Lopes opening the main prelims to hopefully deliver incredible action. Those Sterling and Jiri fights are bigger than 99% of PPV prelim fights when you keep in mind Sterling and Jiri were both just headlining PPV’s in title fights in their last fights.
Its great having Oliveira open the PPV and then Nickal is there because UFC recognizes there is a potential great on their hands there so giving him that spotlight is huge but also builds towards the future. Then the title fights start.
UFC can’t make the UFC 300 a PRIDE GP and they can’t make it the HW division when Fedor, Werdum, Brock, Carwin, Cain, JDS, DC and Stipe were all around at the same time. Nor can they get Elon vs Zuk or Conor on the card.
Personally, knowing the promotion can’t perform miracles, I like what they were able to do with 300.
Main Card
205 lbs.: (C)Alex Pereira vs. Jamahal Hill
115 lbs.: (C) Weili Zhang vs. Xiaonan Yan
155 lbs.: (BMF C)Justin Gaethje vs. Max Holloway
185 lbs.: Bo Nickal vs. Cody Brundage
155 lbs.: Charles Oliveira vs. Arman Tsarukyan
‘Prelims’ Card
205 lbs.: Jiri Prochazka vs. Aleksandar Rakic
145 lbs.: Calvin Kattar vs. Aljamain Sterling
135 lbs.: Holly Holm vs. Kayla Harrison
145 lbs.: Diego Lopes vs. Sodiq Yusuff
155 lbs.: Jalin Turner vs. Renato Moicano
115 lbs.: Jessica Andrade vs. Marina Rodriguez
155 lbs.: Bobby Green vs. Jim Miller
135 lbs.: Cody Garbrandt vs. Deiveson Figueiredo
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I like it all, except the main event. Main events need star power. A clash of stars. That is what gets you on your feet. Stakes.
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So 300 has 12 current or former champs.
Only 11 men have earned more than 10 FOTN/POTN awards in UFC history, 4 of those men are on 300.
Only 12 women have earned more than than 3 FOTN/POTN awards in UFC history. 3 of those women are on 300.
Andrade holds the record for most OTN awards in female UFC history and she is on the early prelims while Oliveira holds the record for most OTN awards in overall UFC history and he is opening the PPV.
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Agree for sure though Pereira is quickly becoming a star. He burst on the scene and became the fastest champ and double champ in UFC history and is now a 2 weight Glory and 2 weight UFC champ.
Timing has to work for a huge main event like Jones vs DC, Fedor vs Crocop, Brock vs Carwin, Conor vs Aldo, Khabib vs Conor etc… and if the right champ and the right challenger were not available for April of 2024 then UFC has to go on with the show and do their best in the moment. Thats kinda how they approach things every month with their PPV’s, the show must go on, regardless of which big star champs or challengers are ready to go. In that sense its better than boxing, look how long it took to finally get Mayweather vs Manny and look how fans have never been able to get Fury vs Joshua despite waiting years and years.
I think UFC worked with what they had here and if they could have delivered Conor vs Khabib 2 or Jones vs Aspinall they would have but despite what some fans think, UFC can’t make a bunch of rich famous fighters do whatever the fans and promotion want whenever they want.
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^ All of that is true, but I think the fact they couldn’t find anyone, in spite of trying, speaks to their lack of stars. right now. UFC’s diminishing ability to make stars.
In the years 2008-2016, UFC could have found a match. All of these guys below vs a solid opponent would have been welcomed:
Brock Lesnar
Anderson
GSP
BJ
Jon Jones
DC
Shogun
Aldo
Conor McGregor
Randy
Chuck
Hendo
Rampage
Ronda
Hughes
Cain
Khabib
Overeem - Stipe - JDS - Tito - Bisping - Nick Diaz - Frankie - Faber - Machida etc etc
That is off the top of my head. Probably if I sat down, I could make a list twice as long.
Where are the new UFC stars to headline mega-shows? What stars have emerged in the last few years?
O’ Malley
Topuiria
Khamzat
Islam
Alex
Moreno
Francis - but gone.
Anyone else?
That said, UFC’s gates and PPVs are stronger than ever, so it’s possible that I am out of touch. But that is how it seems to me.
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Main Card
205 lbs.: (C)Alex Pereira vs. Jamahal Hill
115 lbs.: (C) Weili Zhang vs. Xiaonan Yan
155 lbs.: (BMF C)Justin Gaethje vs. Max Holloway
185 lbs.: Bo Nickal vs. Cody Brundage
155 lbs.: Charles Oliveira vs. Arman Tsarukyan
‘Prelims’ Card
205 lbs.: Jiri Prochazka vs. Aleksandar Rakic
145 lbs.: Calvin Kattar vs. Aljamain Sterling
135 lbs.: Holly Holm vs. Kayla Harrison
145 lbs.: Diego Lopes vs. Sodiq Yusuff
155 lbs.: Jalin Turner vs. Renato Moicano
115 lbs.: Jessica Andrade vs. Marina Rodriguez
155 lbs.: Bobby Green vs. Jim Miller
135 lbs.: Cody Garbrandt vs. Deiveson Figueiredo
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Lol at you heathens complaining about that card. You’ve been spoiled.
Maybe they have a lack of stars but I don’t know man. I think you might be a little out of touch on that but we all are to a degree.
Anderson was not a big star early in his PRIDE and UFC career and his star faded.
Same with fighters like Aldo, Randy, Hendo, Hughes, Chuck, Cain etc…they were all part of PPV’s that didn’t do massive numbers at all.
Per tapology, Hughes vs Gracie didn’t even break 700k nor did the 2nd Cain JDS fight, lots of Jones, Chuck, Rampage, Randy etc… headlined shows only did 500k.
UFC was way smaller before UFC 100 than it is today. Way, way less casual fans.
The live gates were tiny then too compared to now.
Maybe a lot more people that trained were passionate about the UFC growing back then but now a lot more casual fans follow the sport even if they are not into competing or training in wrestling, BJJ, judo, boxing, kickboxing, sambo etc…
Its just one metric but Pereira has 2M instagram followers. I think he is a far bigger star than say Hughes ever was because the sport is so much bigger now with the global casual fan.
Nobody was paying a 25M site fee for say Hughes vs Royce or Randy vs Chuck III. Hardcore fans were passionate about a growing sport though.
Stars always rise and fall though, look how big Sapp, Takada, Saku, K1 was in Japan…
Globally though the sport is huge compared to the JMMA days…there are more eyes on the UFC than ever before its just 70k fans in the Saitama arena has a different feel than millions upon millions of fans watching around the world via the APEX.
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Like you mention Faber and Stipe. Yeah they had a hardcore following but Stipe was never really a giant star and Faber was a WEC star but the promotion was not incredibly popular globally it just has a lot of nostalgia involved with it to hardcore fans.
Nostalgia distorts how older fans remember things, Big Nog vs Cain didn’t break 300k and neither did Stipe vs Werdum. Supposedly Silva vs Franklin 2 didn’t even break 200k.
As long as his career was, Aldo only has 3M instagram followers and Perreira already has 2M.
I don’t think the old stars were as famous as people remember and I think the 2024 stars are more famous than most older fans understand.
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Yeah, you are right. I think the ‘name value’, meant more to the hardcores at the time. But now, yes, the sport has spread, and is globally popular in a way it wasn’t before.
On the other hand, it is has come popular because of 20 years of excellent production, and marketing. And incremental enhancement of product. Maybe if we had those old stars today, with 20 years of promotion behind them, and a ripe fan base, maybe they would have been more loved than Islam, or whoever from today. When they were there it was all quite new.
For whatever reason, the UFC brand now is incredibly strong, and the individuality and star power, of fighters has diminished.
If you had to name the top ten UFC stars of today (excluding McGregor who doesnt fight anymore) who would you pick?
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