And i thought he didn't have a chance. But he had a great game plan, keep Sak away with the kicks and as soon as Sak tried to get inside, shoot. The kicks scored and Sak did shit.
I'm gutted as they were going to line up the renzo re-match if Royce lost but alas.
It must be difficult, on the one hand they must both know ther skills have waned and they both stink up the ring on eevry outing lately but on the other hand, someone is willing to pay them a dumpertruck load of money to keep on going.
"THEY BOTH LOST. But if you had to pick a winner you would pick the guy that went for more subs and had the only legit effective damage, SAKURABA."
Yeah, it was hard to look at Royce after the fight he'd taken so much damage. His arms were both dislocated from the shoulders, and his face... Well, it's a good thing he's already married. It made grown men cry when they showed it after the fight.
If Sak had the heart left to at least pretend to care about the last 2 minutes of the fight, maybe the result would have been different. Hanging him arms and rolling his eyes didn't help him.
Sak and Royce lost because they did not entertain us. We lost because we paid $35 for terrible fights.
Three 5 minutes rounds will never determine anything for these guys...it would need to be a much longer and more open format fight...and nobody sanctions those anymore.....
If you had 3 judges from Mars that understood MMA, but didn't know the fighters, Sakuraba would've won. He scored the only legit knock down of the fight, he had royces back, and went for two sub attempts.
Not taking anything away from royce, because he fought a great fight, but we saw an old beaten up Sakuraba who could barely get cleared to fight. He was probably at 33% of his old self, which is sad because he was such a fighter and is a great person for the sport.
I'd never watch Sakuraba fight again ( Yeah I would, but I wouldn't enjoy it ) he has done his part in evolving mma into the sport it is today.
Thank you Sakuraba for everything you given MMA. Your still undefeated vs any Gracie IMHO....