Dawson and Ben Rabah looked awsome, although they were so clearly classes above there opponents that it wasnt hardfor them to look so good. Dawson is damn exciting to watch though, i hope he moves rapidly up the ranks and starts making a bit of a charge at the top guys at his weight.
Mundine looked real sharp. he seems foccussed, wants to keep improving and being more aggresive and realises he will have to do his training overseas with better sparring partners to reach the level he wants to achieve.
as for Bonello.... it seems to me that the whole thing was a marketting ploy based on Royce Gracie and the early UFC's.
After watching it, im 100% sure that his team want to make him 'Australia's Royce Gracie' from coming out in a gi, to fighting a big buff guy who outweighed him by "30Kg" , to the pre-fight talk of beating him with Jui-Jitsu which allows a smaller man to defeat a bigger opponent, thru to the finish, an early takedown to choke.... the whole thing reeked of early Gracie marketing.
It might not be a bad ploy for him from that angle, but Royce became legend because he was fighting against some good opponents.. seeing a huge Kimo beat on him and having him still comeback to win was the kind of thing that endeared him to people.
I feel like what Keats said is correct. to the general viewer, seeing the fight go straight to the ground, end in choke without even seeing a punch, or seeing if his opponent had any skills at all, would do little to impress.
To really pull off the whole angle they needed to have someone with credibilty in there against him, even if it was a noted striker with no ground game. someone like Peter Graham would have fit the bill, a K1 champ, with a massive size advantage who would give him trouble on the feet till it got to the ground for the choke.
all in all, it didnt show much, probably missed the mark, but wasnt a bad idea, just poorly executed.
Justin you gave G a bit of stick when he ranked Trihey in his top few 90 odd kg fighters and said it was only because they were mates.
So in your honest oppinion (not bias) what did you 1 think of Boneloos fight last night and 2 what did you think it did for MMA in Australia for the regular non MMA fan?
Presented with MMA's biggest opportunity to expose mainstream watchers to the sport,
we have failed miserably.
IF the promoter insisted on Tony, we had a resposibility to the sport to present a quality match to the public.
IF the promoter didnt specify Tony, then why not use two exciting well matched fighters?
Opportunity wasted.
Someone once said MMA Australia got its baby teeth last night in regard to what was believed a big step forward for MMA. Well, someone dropped the baby on its head last night....
I would have prefered to see Kym and Matt Knight going at it over a 10 min round :)
The wy it was last night it might as well have been 2 BJJ Black Belts wearing there Gi's and fighting under rules of you can only win with a submission no points.
Now what I seen on the PPV 13/10/2004 Mundine card, the 2 Thai guys should have never step in a ring with well rounded boxers. This one Thai was getting killed, felt sorry for the poor bastard every time he threw a punch, he gets a multiple combos to the head and body. It was definitely was clear as day these are Thai boxers, just sad matching on the boxing promotion.
NOW on the debut of NO RULES match, the pre interview was real presented, Tony was polite and answered every question, spoke real well for the cameras.
The opponent that walked in the ring first, big short stocky guy, the ring commentator says he is a greco roman wrestler, (yeah right), they flashed his stats on the screen.
Tony comes down the ring with his crew, wearing a gi(found that quite strange with the hot weather, and first time he is fighting with a gi in MMA match), got there instructions from the ref. When the match started, Shasha(sp?) had his right hand down, you can see the left hook was coming, Tony threw a jab, shot in for a double leg, the guy responded ended up in Tony's guard. This guy was a real spastic no balance or posture for guy that has a wrestling background(this guy had NO IDEA what he was doing) just let Tony get his back so easily. 43 secs WTF?
There was nothing wrong with promoting MMA to mainstream, showing matches like that gives a bad impression in general, they had 10 min time gap, I would like to see some stand up action, G n P action as well. I don't want to sound like a asshole, the match really sucks, it will be nice if Tony fights someone with some exp., not some muppet donating his time to be a punching bag.
It was so embarrasing for me to watch the MMA fight as i had been telling my mates that know nathing about MMA how it would be good and will have plenty of skill and action. But it had nathing it was worst the Pro-Wrestling, after the fight i just drank my beer and nobody said nathing about it just wondered what the $!@%$ had just happened.
Who is the current KOTC middleweight champ, Tony or Joey V. ?
In the US Joey fought for the vacant belt in the last PPV match, Tony had his belt shining in the ring with his amazing finish on Wed. (no surpise of what he is going to do in the ring) well executed plan to perfection. I would like see this match up happen, no more quickies.
i agree, that shit was embarrasing. People at the pub with no idea of mma were laughing and calling it rock and roll wrestling. If that was a work then that sux. If it was real then that sux too. that shit just sucked.
p.s. is that a secret blackbelt technique to cross your ankles in back control?
Can't belive i'm going to stick up for Bonello here since he wants to fight me and all ;)
Maybe he knew what an easy fight it was so he was just mucking around, no different to half the boxers on the card fighting with their hands down and and sticking their heads and chins out at the opposition, thats not a boxing text book move either.
Hey tell Bonello i stuck up for him so he doesn't punch me either in our fight ;)
Oh thats right were boxing so maybe he will have to punch me at least a couple of times ;)
No big deal, I was just wondering why did he wear the belt to the ring, was that a promotion for the company?
The color commentators "said" that he is the world champ, not stiring the pot, the stuff was on tv. When Tony was talking in his interview a real professional, as for the fight, well it won't make match of the year for sure.
As far as a "show" at the venue....Spartan walked all over it as far as organiation, atmosphere, facillites,seating. I mean no annoucement of when fighters come out, the music just starts and they wind their way thru the crowds.
As far as the MMA fight.....the boxing crowd around me thought it was a joke. The ref in Tshirt didn't help to make it look more professional,and that is what we should have been aiming for? Another opportunity to showcase the sport goes begging
Hey Justin what did you think of the pre main fight entertainment?
Couldn't really hear it when it was on but it didn't go over real well either, but then again I was at the RSL and not sure many of the diggers are into that sort of entertainment ;)