Machida vs Rua, UFC 104

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBlfLxolRIs

Machida as the undefeated karate master/inspirational babyface champion is awesome. Looking forward to seeing Machida calmly destroy Shogun and I hope it's as fun as Machida's destruction of Evans.

Little Inoki.

Loved it when Inoki bitchslapped him... twice.

Machida, KO, Round 1

As weird as it is, given Shogun's dropoff which has been as bad as any Light Heavy, Wanderlei and Chuck included, if anyone can beat Lyoto, Shogun can.

Embarrassing performance by Machida, and no way Machida should have walked out with the belt. Machida was really struggling with Shogun's brutal legkicks and Machida didn't offer much in this fight. Poor Shogun looked heartbroken in his locker room after the fight. He was fucked over by the judges tonight.

Cain Velasquez has an awesome entrance, and more importantly he looked incredible in his manhandling of Rothwell. Also, really dug the finish to the Stevenson-Fisher fight.

Thought the first three rounds were pretty close, I'll give it a rewatch. Smart strategy by Shogun.

I think the shots that Shogun was landing were doing so much more damage than whatever Machida threw out there. Like you said, it was a smart strategy from Shogun and it was very impressive to see Shogun go out there and deliver such effective strikes against someone that has been so elusive in previous fights.

I had Shogun winning 4 rounds to 1.

Yeah, I can see only one round that would have gone to Machida (Round 3) but I thought it was clear that Shogun had a significant advantage over Machida in all the other rounds. Those legkicks were doing a lot of a damage and were affecting Machida's movement.

Well, at least we'll get a rematch out of this and it could potentially have a better Machida performance.

One other note, the first takedown that Tibau hit on Neer was spectacular.

I figured Shogun would come out and fight a fight similar to the one he fought (little less conservative, but you gotta get the win) giving him a good chance to win if he executed, far better than any other 205 dude I could think of, and well

If anyone could've beat Machida, Shogun could've, and he did, but when you leave it to the judges. Definitely didn't think it was going to be a Machida win by KO in Round 1, and 'twasn't.

Rewatched this and agree with Cecil and co. I'd give the first three rounds to Machida. Watch the fight again, but this time don't listen to Rogan and the yes man.

Read it, rewatched, still bullshit

I'll try to see the fight again this week. Anyways, if anyone is interested, this is Cecil People's statement regarding his judging:

"I'm sure the fans who understand the technicalities of the sport agree with the decision too."

""When both fighters are engaged in a striking match what I always look for is the fighter who is being judicious, picking his spots, being accurate and landing the cleaner strikes which ultimately is what Lyoto did more effectively than Rua."

Saw Lyoto rush and miss alot of punches, that weren't damaging regardless, while Shogun landed a single hook to Machida's temple that rocked him, and there was no cleaner strike in that match than Shogun's shotgun blast to Machida's ribs or anymore telling a sign than Machida limping his way through rounds 3,4, and 5 so . . .

I just re-watched it--I still have Shogun easily winning three rounds, and arguably four. At the end of the fight, all of the key replays are of Shogun landing stuff, both of the announcers seemed convinced he'd won through their ongoing commentary, and something I picked up on that I'm not sure is being reported on too much elsewhere, is after the decision, you can clearly read Dana White's lips as he says to Shogun, "I had you winning this fight."