UFC 101: Declaration

The UFC ran out of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for the first time in its history on Saturday night, as UFC 101: ‘Declaration’ saw ‘The Prodigy’ BJ Penn successfully defend his lightweight title by submitting top contender Kenny ‘KenFlo’ Florian, while middleweight kingpin Anderson ‘The Spider’ Silva moved up a division to destroy former light-heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin in just over three minutes.

After a demoralising loss to Georges St-Pierre earlier this year, Penn was out to prove that while he may struggle against monstrous welterweights such as GSP, there is no doubting his superiority over the 155lbs weight class. Florian, who spent time training with Saint-Pierre in preparation for the fight, attempted to implicate the same game plan used by the Canadian in his battle with Penn at UFC 94. Florian spent much of the contest’s four rounds attempting to press the champion against the cage in an effort to wear Penn down, but the strategy was not nearly as effective without the sort of size and strength advantage that St-Pierre enjoyed over ‘The Prodigy’.

Florian made Penn work throughout the bout, but it was the champion who came off better in each of the exchanges on the feet before taking the challenger down in the fourth round. Once the fight went to the mat it was only a matter of time before Penn’s world-class Brazilian jiu-jitsu became a factor, as he coaxed a tap-out from Florian with a rear naked choke at 3:45 of round four.

The night’s biggest talking point came in the co-main event, where middleweight ruler Anderson Silva made his second foray into the light-heavyweight division to face former champion and top-five ranked contender Forrest Griffin. Silva had faced heavy criticism over lackluster performances in recent title defences against middleweights Patrick Cote and Thales Leites, and it was clear from his performance against Griffin that ‘The Spider’ was determined to show why he has long been considered the sport’s pound-for-pound best fighter.

Silva dropped Griffin twice early in the fight with straight punches and displayed incredible speed, accuracy and reflexes by standing right in front of his opponent, hand at his sides, evading punches with the sort of head movement usually reserved for kung-fu movies. Griffin, visibly distressed at how the fight was unfolding, charged towards Silva in a final attempt at causing some sort of damage, only for the Brazilian to back pedal before knocking the crowd favourite out with straight jab at 3.23 of the opening round.

Upon regaining his senses Griffin immediately fled the ring, with his camp citing a dislocated jaw and loss of hearing suffered early in the fight as an excuse. Griffin’s management company has since refuted this, confirming that Griffin is physically fine but struggling to come to terms with the loss emotionally. It’ll be interesting to see how, and indeed if, Griffin comes back from what Joe Rogan described as “one of the most embarrassing knock-outs” in UFC history.

‘UFC 101’ turned out to be a very poor night for ‘Ultimate Fighter’ alumni. As well as Griffin and Florian’s losses there were also defeats for series winners Kendall Grove and Amir Sadollah, while former contestant Shane Nelson also dropped a unanimous decision in a rematch with Aaron Riley. Grove showed good striking and ground defence in spurts during his bout with former #1 ranked middleweight Ricardo Almeida, but could have no arguments when all three judges called the contest in favour of Almeida.

The subject of poor refereeing once against reared its head at ‘UFC 101’during Amir Sadollah and Johny Hendricks’ welterweight dual. Sadollah came into the bout having lost virtually all the momentum gained during his run to winning the seventh season of ‘The Ultimate Fighter’, having been left on the shelf for over a year following a severe staph infection and broken clavicle over the last twelve months – and it showed as he was dropped by two-time Division One wrestling champion Hendricks early in the first round.

With Sadollah down on his knees Hendricks continued his assault with a barrage of what looked like illegal shots to the back of the head, which seemingly went unnoticed by referee Dan Mirgiliotta. Replays suggests that Sadollah was on his way back to his feet when Mirgiliotta stepped in to call a stop to the contest at just 29 seconds of the very first round. Though Hendricks’ considerable talent and early dominance makes it impossible to suggest that Sadollah would have went on to win the fight, there’s no doubting that the stoppage was premature.

All in all ‘UFC 101’ was a solid show with plenty of talking points, both positive and negative. The main card started with an impressive display of grappling from Kurt Pellegrino as he controlled Josh Neer over three rounds to earn a unanimous decision in a battle of two men trying to climb the ladder in the UFC’s stacked lightweight division.

Most of the post-show discussion revolved around the future of Anderson Silva, as ‘The Spiders’’ outstanding performance brought about inevitable calls for a Dragonball Z-style super-fight with reigning UFC Light-Heavyweight Champion Lyoto Machida. Unfortunately though, Silva once again reiterated his unwillingness to do battle with his friend and training partner. We’ll just have to hope that UFC President Dana White can live up to his claim that should Silva deliver another impressive performance or two at 205lbs (and provided that Machida gets past Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua at UFC 104) that he will make the fight happen.