UFC 63 9/23/06

[swope]

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Sherdog.com is far and away the best MMA site out there, in my opinion.

The Penn interview was posted on his blog, bjpenn.com but was linked from the Sherdog forums...

[/ QUOTE ]Do you believe Penn? I watched the replay many times and I dont ever see him grabbing his ribs in pain. However, he does look like he is going to pass out. It looks like he would have fallin over on his own in the 3rd round.

I lost a little respect for Hughes after his comments after the fight.

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penn comes out in the third with his hands down around his ribs, and makes no effort to protect his face from hughes' punches. this isnt because he was tired, its because he was protecting his ribs.

that said; being a professional mma fighter means being able to go 5 rounds without seperating a rib doing something you do hundreds of times a day; taking someones back.

the winner is the guy with his hand raised at the end of the fight, not the guy who almost does this or nearly does that, and most certainly not the guy who injures himself in the second of five scheduled rounds during a title fight.

i will be stacking up on hughes again during penn v hughes III because i honestly believe that penn will never be dangerous past round 3 of any fight until he undergoes like, gene therapy to cure his gas tank, and because matt hughes physical strength, conditioning, and sub defense is probably the strongest in mixed martial arts.

i urge those of you mocking the decision to value penn at -200 to stack up on penn again in their third fight. i have bills to pay.

[Performify]

Swope - certainly not mocking you bro, but you can't tell me you would have been happy at the end of the second round with a position on Hughes at -200, by a long shot.

I have no idea what separated ribs entail. if its something that could have been prevented with training, was a side effect of being out of shape, or was just a fluke injury. Assuming its the later, at the end of the second round, Penn wins this fight 9 times out of 10 based on the first two rounds. Maybe 95 times out of 100. But that's just my opinion.

We're all second guessing at this point, but in terms of handicapping for next time I can't imagine that we'll see anything resembling Hughes as a 2:1 favorite assuming the separated ribs thing is indeed a freak injury and not something having to do with conditioning. Because until Penn's ribs go, for two rounds Hughes looked like a 3:1 underdog or better.

I expect the line openes at -120 Hughes +110 Penn or something similar. Public money might come in on Hughes but i can't fathom that we'd see +200 Penn again.

[swope]

no offense taken.

rd1 was a decisively penn round, but it was a decisively penn round in all the ways one expected; penn landed jabs and defended takedowns. these are the things penn is real good at when he has a full gas tank.

the thing that a lot of people arent wanting to talk about with regards to round 2, is that although penn got in a totally dominant position (taking the back, rear body triangle, convert to rear triangle and near armbar), he simply couldnt close the deal. hughes survived, and although he was in danger, the argument can be made that he is basically another tito, in as much hes a astoundingly strong wrestler who may seriously be essentially unsubbable at this point.

i will be picking hughes to win in III simply because im not convinced penn is going to be able to stay out of trouble in rd's 4 & 5. taking hughes back is impressive, being unable to pull the trigger and get a sub when he has almost 3 minutes to do so should worry everyone who plans on betting on penn next time.

oh also someone was getting upset because sanchez & penn were mentioned in the same breath. sanchez is, in fact, a friggin nightmare matchup for penn, because sanchez' strongest card is his ability to impose his tempo on people, and penn's weakest card is his ability to keep his cool and stay in the fight when people are pushing their agenda on him. there is no comparing them in terms of grappling skills, but personally i would make a value bet on diego if they fought simply because hes got that incredible ability to dictate tempo. im not sure a lot of people in this thread understand how strongly thats going to affect bj.

[Oatmeal]

I think Diego would need to be +250 for there to be value though and given Diego's popularity (be he deserving or not) I just don't think we are going to get that price.

[jmillerdls]

Diego and Penn would be a great matchup...but Diego will never beat Hughes. I honestly think the next guy to hold the belt after Hughes is going to be Koscheck (I think Penn will go down in weight). Kos already looks to have better standup than Hughes so early in his career, and there is no argument that he's the better wrestler (something Hughes has never dealt with). Still at least a year away I think however.

About Penn not being able to finish the submission, he said that he injured the rib when getting the back...this would greatly reduce his capability in completeing the submission, let alone the round (note that he was barely able to stand after the bell).

[Fhil Ivey]

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If Penn would have won, Dana would have been so stressed his hair would have started to fallout...his EYEBROW hair.

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LMFAO!! Funniest quote i've heard this week.

[loveminuszero]

I have to disagree jmiller, I don't think anyone will ever take Hughes' belt again. I believe he'll retire on top.

[sonicboom]

hughes is a complete fighter now

[Aicirt]

This is kindve off topic, but I wanted to throw my two cents in about Josh Koscheck.

I agree about Kos having the best chance to beat Hughes. I really feel like he's going to go on a rampage through the welterweight division as he continues to make himself a well rounded fighter. He is by far the greatest wrestler in the UFC....nobody else even comes close. He would have been outstanding wrestler in the NCAA Division 1 his senior year if it wasnt for Cael Sanderson, the greatest college wrestler ever. He went undefeated his senior season....completely steamrolled the national tournament too.

He definatley has a lot of improving to do, but he has looked so much better after each fight that I really think he will continue to get better. By the time the UFC is ready to give him a title fight, I think hell be good enough to beat Hughes who will most likely be headed towards the end of his career at that point.

[rush66]

Kos went undefeated his Junior year. His senior year he had a very bad neck injury but was still an all american. He is certainly the best wrestler in UFC by a long shot.