#cannonier

Joey

September 23rd

What to call this fight card. Hmm. Does weirdly good apply? It feels like a weirdly good card. UFC events in the middle of the day tend to have this extra level of good or bad on them. If it's good then it feels even better because it'll be done before 11 PM and you can go about your day happily. If it's bad then it feels extra bad because mid day MMA almost feels like having to be in school on a Saturday. This card is headlined by a pretty damn good fight at 185 lbs which feels weird given that its a dude who flamed out at 205 lbs vs a guy who got swamped by Cezar Mutante. Jack Hermansson vs Jared Cannonier being a) a headliner and b) a genuinely compelling fight tells the story of how quickly shit turns around at the higher weight classes but also how good fighters can find their way to adapt and evolve with time. The whole main card is pretty damn spiffy; you got two solid fights at 205 lbs with under the radar Polish LHW Michał Oleksiejczuk getting the big step up vs OSP, Ion Cutelaba vs Khalil Rountree figuring to be violent if nothing else, Gilbert Burns vs Gunnar Nelson the sort of short notice wacky fight at 170 lbs that people might be surprised by and an interesting fight pitting Brazil's Alex "Cowboy" Oliveira vs Denmark's Nicholas Dalby. There seems to be some confusion on what the fifth fight on this main card is as I've seen Alan Omedovsky/John Phillips, Mark Madsen/Danillo Belluardo and Macy Chiasson vs Lina Lansberg all listed but here's hoping it's the WBW fight since it's a fine challenge for Chiasson and a "prove it again" for Lina. Prelims are pretty good too with Lando Vannata vs Marc Diakiese and the return of Siyar Bahadurzada as stand out stuff. It's not a great card but something tells me this fight night will be more than alright.

Fights: 13

Debuts: Nicholas Dalby, Mark Madsen, Makhmud Muradov, Jack Shore, Giga Chikadze

Fight Changes/Injury Cancellations: 3 (Peter Sobotta OUT, Makhmud Muradov IN vs Alessio Di Chirico/Danny Henry vs Mike Davis CANCELLED/Thiago Alves OUT, Gilbert Burns IN vs Gunnar Nelson)

Headliners (fighters who have either main evented or co-main evented shows in the UFC): 8 (Jared Cannonier, Jack Hermansson, Gunnar Nelson, Cowboy Oliveira, Lina Lansberg, Ovince St. Preux, Lando Vannata, Khalil Rountree)

Fighters On Losing Streaks in the UFC: 2 (Ovince St. Preux, John Phillips)

Fighters On Winning Streaks in the UFC: 5 (Jack Hermansson, Jared Cannonier, Michał Oleksiejczuk, Gilbert Burns, Macy Chiasson)

Main Card Record Since Jan 1st 2017 (in the UFC): 32-19

Jared Cannonier- 3-3 Jack Hermansson- 6-1 Gunnar Nelson- 2-2 Gilbert Burns- 5-1 Ovince St. Preux- 4-4 Michal Oleksiejczuk- 2-0 Khalil Rountree- 4-1 Ion Cutelaba- 2-1 Mark Madsen- 0-0 Danilo Belluardo- 0-1 Nicholas Dalby- 0-1 Alex Oliveira- 4-4

Fights By Weight Class (yearly number here):

Middleweight-  3 (35) Welterweight-  3 (55) Lightweight- 2 (62) Light Heavyweight- 2 (37) Women’s Bantamweight-  1 (18) Bantamweight- 1 (50) Featherweight- 1 (48)

Women’s Strawweight- (24) Flyweight-   (14) Heavyweight- (27) Women’s Flyweight- (29) Women’s Featherweight- (7)

2019 Number Tracker

Debuting Fighters (27-52-1)-  Nicholas Dalby, Mark Madsen, Makhmud Muradov, Jack Shore, Giga Chikadze

Short Notice Fighters (25-35)- Makhmud Muradov, Gilbert Burns

Second Fight (49-29)- Allen Amedovski, Nohelin Hernandez, Danilo Belluardo

Cage Corrosion (Fighters who have not fought within a year of the date of the fight) (20-33-1)-

Undefeated Fighters (31-34-2)- Jack Shore, Macy Chiasson, Mark Madsen

Fighters with at least four fights in the UFC with 0 wins over competition still in the organization (11-8)-

Weight Class Jumpers (Fighters competing outside of the weight class of their last fight even if they’re returning BACK to their “normal weight class”) (26-18)- 

Twelve Precarious Ponderings

1- Is Hermansson about to become the latest victim of MMA chaos?

2- The story of Jack Hermansson is a fun one and another example of why activity will never burn you as a fighter. Hermansson was one of the guys who was winning impressively against not so impressive competition until the UFC put him against David Branch in March. He subbed Branch without much issue and his reward for that was a short notice replacement opportunity after Yoel Romero pulled out a fight with Jacare Souza. The UFC thought so little of Hermansson as an opponent that they not only promised Jacare a title shot if he won (for taking the fight) but ALSO moved it off of ESPN and to ESPN+. Despite the short notice call up and the quality of competition, Hermansson proved himself over five rounds as he pretty much effortlessly kept Jacare's crazy ground game at bay while taking the Brazilian down and boxing him up on the feet en route to a decision. Hermansson, like the ultimate "Just keep fighting" dude Michael Bisping, never had lingering losses because he always seemed to be fighting the next week. In so many words, Hermansson outfought his losses and kept a steady stream of wins coming so he was always in the radius. Now he's potentially one fight away from a title fight. Crazy sport sometimes.

3- So Hermansson should look in the mirror for every reason why he needs to take Jared Cannonier with 100% seriousness. Hermansson was looking to fight Kelvin Gastelum or Paulo Costa and both fights fell through, opening the door for him to basically HAVE to fight Jared Cannonier in order to fight at home. Cannonier has "earned" this fight by way of smelting David Branch and beating up on an aging Anderson Silva so there's really not much to his resume at 185 lbs that would give him a main event opportunity. That's basically what folks said about Hermansson when it came to the Jacare fight.

4- Are we officially out of the "Gunnar Nelson is a future title contender" phase? What say y'all?

5- Speaking of potential bandwagons, how about this Khalil Rountree one? We on it or off?

Finalized cannon girl, her name is Ayla. I think, I don’t remember her name at this point.