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MMA - The Ultimate Fighter Episode 1 Recap


Welcome to the new MMA section. All articles are written by Joe Lash.
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MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 1 Recap

The 13th season of The Ultimate Fighter kicks off this year with an all welterweight cast. The two teams will be coached by recently dethroned heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar and current contender Junior Dos Santos.

Here's a quick back story on the show for those of you who aren't familiar with it. It's essentially a tournament consisting of 14 fighters split into two teams. Sometimes there are two different weight classes on the show; this season however they've chosen to focus only on welterweights. This season is also different in the fact that they changed the way you get onto the show. In recent seasons, they brought in twice the amount of fighters, and each man faced winning a single fight to get onto the show. Without having seen them fight, each coach chooses his team based on a single training session that they get to witness. After the initial bout, the winning teams coach gets to choose the matchup for the next fight that will take place in the upcoming week.

Needless to say, winning is the key to controlling how each coach wants this season to turn out, and you can tell it's a matter of pride for these guys to be in control of each matchup and to pick the right opponent for his fighters. There's also a fair amount of drama from time to time, but what do you expect when you take 14 naturally aggressive strangers and force them to live and train together for six weeks? Another fun point is that the coaches are always scheduled to fight each other some point following the filming of the show.

This episode kicks off with the fighters entering the UFC training center, and being introduced to their coaches and getting acquainted with the format of the fights. Dana White announces that they'll be using a 'wildcard' again this year. The wildcard is a second chance given to one of the losing fighters after the first round of fights is completed. The winner of that wildcard will be chosen by the coaches based on who had the best effort and most potential despite losing once already. It's a great incentive to behave in the house even if you lose because you still have a shot to advance.

As the training session begins, each coach uses his own assistant coaches to help put the fighters through conditioning drills and standard sparring to get a sample of what each fighter may be able to do. On the side, Brock Lesnar actually begins asking personal questions to each fighter to get to know them on another level, and immediately that's a huge advantage to him given Junior Dos Santos' language barrier. Dos Santos identifies Shamar Bailey and Ryan McGillivray as the best looking fighters to him.



The coaches meet with White to pick teams and Lesnar wins the coin toss. He can either choose the first fight matchup or the first fighter. He chooses the first fighter, and he picks Len Bentley. Dos Santos' first selection turns out to be one of his original favorites, Shamar Bailey. Here's how the teams shape up.

Team Lesnar:

Len Bentley, Charlie Rader, Tony Ferguson, Clay Harvison, Miles Jury (replaced by Chuck O'Neil), Chris Cope, Nordin Asrih.

Team Dos Santos:

Shamar Bailey, Ryan McGillivray, Javier Torres, Ramsey Nijem, Zach Davis, Mick Bowman, Keon Caldwell.

Caldwell, the last pick, discusses how he's at a disadvantage being the least-wanted fighter and how he has to prove himself. The teams then get settled in and begin their training sessions with their new coaches. Afterward, Dos Santos will pick the first fight matchup.

During Lesner's first training session, he finds out that one of his most talented fighters Miles Jury suffered a completely torn ACL and other injuries to his knee during the initial training session on day one. Jury is pretty disappointed as he finds out he's got to go home, but White explains that he's still on the UFC's radar due to his age and golden record. Jury is replaced by Chuck O'Neil, a little-known fighter who made it to the casting process but wasn't chosen to compete.

Dos Santos announces that the first matchup will be between his top overall pick Shamar Bailey and Lesner's final choice Nordin Asrih. As the fight begins, Nordin explains in his German accent "I likes to hit the people, you know?" Well... he didn't do much of that in this fight. When the bell sounded, Shamar immediately got a takedown and looked to establish dominant position and did so fairly easily. Nordin looked overwhelmed on the ground but managed to get up, only to be taken down again.

Bailey spends the entire round holding Asrih down and didn't really inflict any significant damage. Surely he won the round though and that's all that counts. The second round started with Asrih missing a ridiculous kick, and Bailey gained top position once again. Bailey spent the entire round switching between full mount and having Asrih's back to take another lopsided round in his favor.

Easy victory for Team Dos Santos and they move up 1-0 over Team Lesnar. Dos Santos will choose the next matchup and will continue to do so until his team loses a match. Stay tuned.



MMA Home
MMA: UFC Whom to Watch For - 6/19
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 8 Recap - 5/20
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 7 Recap - 5/13
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 6 Recap - 5/6
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 5 Recap - 5/1
MMA: UFC 129 - 4/27
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 4 Recap - 4/22
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 3 Recap - 4/14
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 2 Recap - 4/7
MMA: Strikeforce - Diaz vs. Daley - 4/6
MMA: The Ultimate Fighter Episode 1 Recap - 3/31
MMA: Bellator 39 - 3/30
MMA: UFC Fight Night 24 - 3/25

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Joe 04-07-2011 11:30 am xxx.xxx.xxx.189 (total posts: 3)
20     17

Luke, I only knew of Aoki and Diaz having won by gogo. Thanks for the info. And JV, I'm not asking people to put money on these fights. It's just predictions man... predictions.
JV 04-06-2011 04:45 pm xxx.xxx.xxx.217 (total posts: 2)
19     17

Luke beat me to it. Walter, get someone better for MMA picks. If you want someone that puts his own money into MMA bets, and is pretty damned good at it, get Ravishing Red Schafer.
Luke 04-06-2011 09:56 am xxx.xxx.xxx.173 (total posts: 1)
22     25

There has been four fighters to pull of gogoplata's in MMA FYI:

Ryusuke "Jack" Uemura

Win Isao Terada Submission (Gogoplata) Zst - Grand Prix 2 Final Round 1/23/2005 1 2:06

Shinya Aoki

Win Joachim Hansen Submission (Gogoplata) PRIDE - Shockwave 2006 12/31/2006 1 2:24

Win Katsuhiko Nagata Submission (Gogoplata) Dream 4 - Middleweight Grand Prix 2008 Quarterfinals 6/15/2008 1 5:12

Nick Diaz

NC Takanori Gomi No Decision - Overturned by NSAC PRIDE 33 - Second Coming 2/24/2007 2 1:46

Brad Imes

Win Zak Jensen Submission (Gogoplata) WFC - Downtown Throwdown 9/14/2007 1 1:31

Win Bo Cantrell Submission (Gogoplata) KOTC - Arch Rivals 10/27/2007 1 0:55


ARW 03-27-2011 12:00 am xxx.xxx.xxx8.75 (total posts: 3)
20     17

Davis is showing Lil Nog too much respect.. ( like Pat Berry vs Cro Cop) ... I might drop to 68.9 %. Ha!
ARW 03-26-2011 11:33 pm xxx.xxx.xxx8.75 (total posts: 3)
22     20

Anthony "lay on top of me" Johnson. Man, I forgot how huge he is for 170lbs.
ARW 03-26-2011 10:44 pm xxx.xxx.xxx8.75 (total posts: 3)
24     19

HA! Nice! You're batting 1000.
Stoner Simpson 03-26-2011 10:30 pm xxx.xxx.xxx.164 (total posts: 2)
22     19

so far im 1-0 exactly
ARW 03-26-2011 07:01 pm xxx.xxx.xxx1.54 (total posts: 1)
20     22

Nice!!! Love the new mma section. I've had so much success over the years betting on mma.. First bet I ever made was Griffin over Shogun And I've been about 70% since then. The key, I've found- Is being really picky and lots of research.. That being said: Tough picks tonight Small bet on Davis and small bet on Hardy.. Not touching anything else.. Good luck all.
Joe Lash 03-25-2011 11:20 am xxx.xxx.xxx.189 (total posts: 3)
21     22

Yes Jesse you're right, great catch.
Jesse Randel 03-25-2011 09:18 am xxx.xxx.xxx9.68 (total posts: 1)
21     22

I think you mean Gerald Harris, not Gerald Henderson. Other than that, well written and thought out analysis. Good to see an MMA component on Walterfootball!
Sam the man 03-25-2011 09:10 am xxx.xxx.xxx3.43 (total posts: 2)
21     22

Good writing. I can't wait to see this phil davis guy.
Joe Lash 03-25-2011 06:59 am xxx.xxx.xxx.189 (total posts: 3)
21     22

Stoner, a main card with all finishes would make for some happy fans!
Stoner Simpson 03-25-2011 04:47 am xxx.xxx.xxx.164 (total posts: 2)
21     22

Hell yeah my man walt is gettin down with the MMA too thats right i got
Davis via 1st rd. sub
A. johnson via 1st rd. KO
D. johnson via 2nd rd. TKO
Korean Zombie via 3rd rd. Sub
Walter 03-25-2011 01:58 am xxx.xxx.xxx9.63 (total posts: 1)
21     21

First comment... we're going to have comment boards like this all over the site soon. We're still working out the kinks, so this is not the finished

product.






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