THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 10 REVIEW

This episode was surprisingly average, given that there two fights and a mind-boggingly awesome guest appearance. It's still one of the better ones of the season, I suppose.

AARON WILKINSON VS. KYLE WATSON

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 5 REVIEW

John Fitch, who actually appeared in the last episode, is recognized only this time around. He shares that attitude is the most important thing in fighting. It's much better to be an out of shape fighter who listens and has a great attitude, than the best athlete in the world who doesn't listen and has a bad attitude.

Back at the house, the annoying pranks continue. Alex Caceres places bleach in Nam Phan's fabric softener in order to prank Team Koscheck, but his teammate, Micheal Johnson, uses it first and gets seriously pissed off.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 9 REVIEW

This episode features two straight fights, and the first is between Jonathan Brookins and Sako Chivitchian.  Brookings previously won against Sako's close friend and fellow Armenian Sevak Magakian, via a very quickly executed Rear Naked Choke. It's up to Sako to prevent Brookins from ever using that technique against anyone  on his team again, as well as upholding his Armenian pride by avenging his friend's loss.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 4 REVIEW

Iron Mike sticks around and offers Team GSP some words of wisdom. He states that the smarter fighter always wins and that confidence is key, not only in fighting, but in any aspect of life.

Back at the house, Team Koscheck lets loose their sour grapes at Alex Caceres. Apparently, Caceres was yelling all sorts of profanities against Wilkinson during the fight and Team Koscheck took offense to that. Oookay. I honestly don't see anything wrong with that. Sure, yelling profanities against another person is a bad thing, but Caceres was essentially just cheering for his team in his own way. And now, just because they lost, Team Koscheck is looking for a scapegoat to vent their anger upon. And better yet, when Caceres gets annoyed at them for talking about him behind his back, Sevak goes into a mindless rage. Team Kosecheck definitely looks like it's being demonized, at least in this episode. Caceres just laughs it off, which is, oddly enough, the mature thing to do.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 3 REVIEW

As promised, Bruce Leroy grows too cocky because of his win against Jeff Lentz and goes off on a tirade of boasting. Pretty boring, though, as nothing really came of it. Back in training, GSP brings in Olympic silver medalist Gia Sissaouri to help train wrestling with his team. Koscheck, meanwhile, senses that his team might not be giving it their all and tells it to them straight.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 2 REVIEW

The fighters move into the house and one of them is quickly highlighted: Jeff Lentz, who lives a stereotypically unhealthy lifestyle despite being a professional fighter. He smokes all day and drinks all night, though still apparently works very well in training, with plenty of gas in the tank and strength in his muscles.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 1 REVIEW PART 2

Only a select few fights were aired in their entirety. Check out the first part of my review of the first episode of the newest season of The Ultimate Fighter to see what occurred there. This article focuses on the fights that were aired with cuts, and were shown as highlights. What was shown was still pretty impressive, though:

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER SEASON 12 EPISODE 1 REVIEW PART 1

The first episode was pretty awesome, as it was literally all about the fights. I'll start by reviewing the fights that were shown on air in their entirety, and then continue with the highlights tomorrow.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11: ROAD TO THE ULTIMATE FINALE REVIEW

“The Ultimate Finale 11: Road to the Finale” is a recap episode for the entire season. It contains a few extended and additional scenes cut out from the rest of the episodes. None of these scenes are really very significant, however, and aren’t really very impressive by themselves. They’re just some added bits of drama that possibly only absolute completionists of “The Ultimate Fighter” will want to see.

It’s a very effective transition to the live finale if you’ve missed most of the episodes, however. It summarizes the entire season pretty clearly so that you get pretty much all the important details.

HER'S A LIST OF THE ADDITIONAL SCENES:

1. Tito scolds Clayton McKinney right after he loses his fight against Kyle Noke. Tito says that the reason he lost was because he worried too much about his shoulder and didn’t put in enough effort during training.

2. Rich Attonito shows his swelled up, broken hand, after he wins against Kyacey Uscola via disqualification.

3. Team Liddell assistant coach Howard Davis gives the team a talk about how disappointed he was about Charlie Blanchard’s poor performance against Jamie Yager, and about the importance of focusing on winning matches no matter what.

4. More scenes of James Hammortree confronting Yager about stealing his shirt.

5. Joe Henle complaining in the house after Dana White gives James Hammortree the chance to fight again.

6. Seth Baczynski, in tears, apologizes to Dana White, Chuck Liddell, Brad Tavares and the rest of Team Liddell for his soccer kick to the face, totally insistent that it was an accident and that he absolutely is not a dirty fighter.

7. After Brad Tavares loses in the semifinals against teammate Court McGee, he is comforted by his good friend, Kris McCray.


That’s it. Among the additional scenes, the best one by far is the Seth Baczynski apology, because of the extreme outpouring of emotion involved.

So, what did I think of this season? I was honestly blown away. Sure, I’ve had less than positive reviews for some of the episodes, especially the early ones, but most of the episodes were absolutely fantastic.

I also had some terrible doubts about the coaches for this season, as both had already been on the show and had fought twice in the Octagon. I wanted to see two entirely new coaches, who hadn’t fought yet. However, my doubts were soon erased, primarily because of the hype and intrigue surrounding Tito Ortiz throughout the season. I believe that it really added an extra element to the show that fueled the overall drama perfectly. It’s sad that this had to befall Tito, since he’s still a legitimately great fighter, but it at least benefited the season very well. This was also the first time a coach, and not a fighter, was removed from the show, which was very interesting, to say the least.

I also love the fact that the season focused more on the fighters’ lives inside the gym and their fights in the TUF Octagon rather than their antics in the house. The wild card slot was pretty intriguing as well, which, I believe, will be used in the next season as well.

Ah, the next season! Team Koscheck vs. Team GSP! “The Ultimate Fighter 12” features two of my favorite fighters in the organization, Josh Koscheck and current Welterweight champion George St-Pierre, with a title fight after the finale! The season will feature lightweights and will begin airing on September 15, 2010.

Final thoughts? Again, I was blown away with “The Ultimate Fighter Season 11: Team Liddell vs. Team Ortiz” since it featured awesome fights and intriguing drama. I have high hopes for the next season and expect even greater fights and more surprises to come. Even after 11 whole seasons, “The Ultimate Fighter” shows absolutely no signs of slowing down!

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11 FINALE REVIEW PART 1: MCGEE VS. MCCRAY

Gotta say that I’m really very happy with the outcome here. I’ve said it several times during my reviews of the season, but I’ve always been impressed with Court McGee, despite his loss to Nick Ring, and I have never been too impressed with Kris McCray.

McGee has always shown that he has awesome striking, wrestling, BJJ skills and cardio throughout his fights, but McCray always seemed too one dimensional for me. The only thing he ever did was to wrestle and clinch his opponents and control them off the ground, and frequently performed what some would term “lay and pray”. In other words, control your opponent on the ground the majority of the fight and win on points. Literally the most boring, yet still effective, tactic in all of MMA.

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11 EPISODE 11 REVIEW

Wow, it’s finally the end of Season 11 of The Ultimate Fighter, huh? A spectacular two – hour special greets us this season ender, which promises loads of content and the semi-final matchups.

The episode begins exactly when the last one left off, with Rich Franklin introducing his assistant coaches to the team and surprise, surprise (unless you were massively spoiled like I unfortunately was)! It’s Forrest Griffin, Gray Maynard, and Tyson Griffin. We then immediately cut to the next semi-final matchup: Court McGee vs. Brad Tavares.

I really like this matchup. McGee and Tavares are both extremely talented and extraordinarily tough individuals, and having them both engage in the octagon will mean a guaranteed, all – out war, and that’s exactly what this fight was. Classic stand – up wars, aside, this was, unfortunately, not as exciting as one would have hoped. Both fighters fought their hearts out for sure, but both were also a bit tentative, and defensive at times, showing that each was aware of the consequences of what would happen if they simply let it out and became sloppy. Both were thus technically savvy of each others’ skills, looking for openings and capitalizing on them when properly presented, and retreating if necessary. Though the match was fairly even all throughout, McGee seemed the more active and more skilled among the two. Chuck mentions after the fight is over that he thought McGee won the first two rounds by at least a small margin, and I completely agree, which is why I was a bit shocked when the judges declared a third and final round. Fans of groin kicks rejoice for this round, though, as fatigue obviously dulled both fighters' senses somewhat giving us most probably the most groiun kicks ever in a single round. Near the end, though, McGee absolutely refused to let this go to the judges' scorecards like last time and literally puts Tavares to sleep with a rear naked choke.

This makes me very, very happy. Ever since McGee first fought, he pretty much became my favorite fighter of this season. He showed great skills, heart and cardio that could possibly take him all the way to the end, and it did. I am definitely rooting for him to win the finale next week.

 The next segment of the show pretty much expands on Dana’s massive support of the US armed forces. Several marines show up and take over the fighters’ training for a day. They show them combat techniques used in actual war situations, such as disarming an opponent with a gun or a knife, and sparring with bayonets. Their band of brothers style conditioning regimen is also pretty unique, such as simultaneous push ups with four people, whose legs are on the others’ necks, forming a rather odd square in motion. This supposedly not only conditions your body, but also builds trust in your teammates, which is, of course, vitally important to do-or-die situations.

What I found more interesting was what the soldiers wanted to learn from the UFC fighters next. Their primary concern was how to quickly get up off the ground. They could take their opponent down if they wanted to, or get taken down, but the point was that, in war, they should always be alert on their feet at all times. They apparently have not had much training in this department because of lack of experts on their side, but fortunately for them, the Ultimate Fighters had plenty of masters of wrestling and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu techniques for them to learn from. The day ends with the marines having a fun barbecue party over at the Ultimate Fighter House.

After pretty much devoting a vast majority of the season to inside the gym and outside the house, this special seems to want to catch up in a tremendous way. Pretty much everyone plays pranks on each other for entire segments of the show, a lot of people get pissed, and tons of stuff get thrown out of high places. In the end, though, all the finger pointing wound up on the same person the show already previously set up: Jamie Yager. Clearly the bad boy of the show, he wasn’t nearly as annoying or as entertaining as Season 8’s infamous Junie Browning . After that Dude, you’ve pretty much seen everything the show has to offer in terms of criminal behavior in the house, so I’m really not that impressed about how the show seems to want to frame Yager.

The show ends, of course, with the last semi-final matchup between Josh Bryant and Kris McCray. Bryant is the obvious favorite here, being extremely impressive in his wins within the show, but Rich Franklin pointed out something that I, and many others, may not have realized. Kris McCray may not be one of the more impressive and entertaining fighters in the house, but he was, without a doubt, the most hard working. This is because, prior to this one, he had already fought four times during his six week stay in the house, which means that he pretty much fought every Tuesday that he was there, according to Dana White. I was never impressed with McCray. Never. But you have to really admire the heart and dedication of such an athlete. Incredible stuff.

This fight was also an all-out war similar to the first one, but, as others who have seen McCray’s past fights know, his strategies mainly revolve around his wrestling, which means pinning his opponent onto the cage, and wearing them out. McCray managed to overpower Bryant during the first round with this strategy and obviously take the most points, but Bryant manages to reverse McCray during the second round and overpower him much of the time. Interesting stuff, which found both fighters, really gassed out by this point, meeting in a third round. Not much for tactics at this point, both fighters come out swinging like Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar. Only, since they were both gassed, it was almost like it was in slow motion. Both fighters threw and landed massive bombs, though, and tested each others’ chins time and time again during that last round of their lives. In the end, though, the judges declared that McCray did just enough to win via unanimous decision. Hard work and dedication pay off once again. Rich Franklin also jokingly says after the match that this officially makes him the only undefeated coach in "The Ultimate Fighter History", which I found hilarious.

So, the finals in Las Vegas next week will be between Team Liddell’s Court McGee and Team Franklin’s Kris McCray. As mentioned, I’m rooting for Court to take this one, but McCray time and time again (four times in a row in fact), that his heart and dedication can overcome pretty much any obstacle, so we’ll see. Either way, this is definitely going to be an exciting matchup!

The main event that evening is also between Ultimate Fighter alums Matt “The Hammer” Hamill and Keith “The Dean of Mean” Jardine. I really like both these fighters, but think Jardine can take Hamill out. Both are tough, though, so this is also going to be a very explosive matchup!

 As for Chuck vs. Rich? well, I already predicted that Rich would take this fight for one reason or another, but however it ultimately winds up, I sincerely hope that Chukc shows up in the best shape of his life. The UFC 115 Countdown hypes him up as usual, but I hope it's all true. Chuck may deny it all he wants, but he definitely did not look his former self in his last few fights. Hopefully, even thought Chuck loses this one, he'll put on a fantastic show and prove that he's worthy of several more years in the UFC.

 But, wait, there’s more! Yes, despite us knowing the results of the show, we still have another episode on the way. Next week promises us outtakes and never before seen footage during the taping of the show. I actually like this format way better than the ones they’ve used in the past. Before, they would sprinkle out these “house moments” throughout every episode and make sure they get their fair share. I was never really interested in that, as all I really cared about were the fights. Sure, these kinds of things are fun during the first few seasons, but after ten straight seasons of the same thing? Ugh, gotta change it up. And they did. Now, we got to see the important part of the show: the fights, and this last episode is more akin to a bonus of sorts to fans who followed the season through and through, which, I believe gives a much better effect. More fun next week in the last episode of The Ultimate Fighter Season 11, as well as the The Ultimate Finale 11! I can’t wait!

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11 EPISODE 10 REVIEW

Okay, so this is pretty much the best episode of the season thus far. Containing literally the best fight of the season, and several memorable twists and surprises, this episode makes me incredibly happy that this show is still continuing after being on the air for so long.

The show starts off immediately after the last one, with Chuck steaming after Dana tells him that he won’t get to fight Tito anymore. Aside from a lot of expletives from Chuck, nothing really materializes out of it, though. He doesn’t come crashing into Tito’s room like Rampage or Rashad would’ve in their season. Tito looks to have overheard all of Chuck’s badmouthing, though, but is shown to not do anything about it. It looks as though Tito’s merely accepted the fact, and expects Chuck to become angry and call him names. Both fighters come off as incredibly mature in this moment, though, with neither starting any sort of ruckus after the news is dropped.

The last quarter final match, which is between Team Ortiz bad boy Jamie Yager and Josh Bryant, follows immediately. Yager was very impressive in his last match, overpowering and knocking his opponent out very early in the first round. Like his last fight, Yager is again the much larger man, and is the clear favorite in this matchup.

Yager quickly rushes in with the same straight right that knocked his previous opponent onto the mat, but Bryant narrowly evades it and effectively counters with a right of his own. Yager is clearly hurt, and staggers toward the cage. Bryant charges after him and Yager attempts another knockout blow via a leaping right head kick. The kick being so high, Bryant easily ducks under it and goes for a take down, and presses Yager hard onto the cage.

The rest of the round, Yager seems more tentative and careful of his attacks. Though still aggressive, it is clear that he did not like Bryant’s early clean hit and wishes to avoid another. The round continues with Yager’s multiple leaping head kick attempts and Bryant’s counter punches and takedowns and ends with Bryant landing another clean punch and knocking Yager down onto the mat.

The second round continues the same way, with plenty of Yager’s leaping kicks, and Bryant’s clean counter punches and takedowns; in short, a complete stand up war. The battle rages on, and midway through the round, Yager slows down while Bryant becomes aggressive, which, I think, is something nobody expected of this match: the larger, stronger Yager is being overpowered by the smaller man! The bout continues until Bryant lands yet another clear punch and knocks Yager down a second time. Bryant leaps in with a side mount and unleash a series of ground and pound strikes until the end of the round.

Very excellent fight. Oddly enough, though, the judges announce it as a draw and a third round ensues. I totally disagree with that as I gave Bryant both rounds. Despite the fact that Yager looked the more impressive throughout the first round because of his leaping kicks and whatnot, his strikes weren’t nearly as effective as Bryant’s, plus the fact that he slowed down considerably during the second round and Bryant knocked him to the mat once in both rounds.

Judging oddities aside, what follows is something that was previously seen in episode one of the season: a fighter quitting. That’s right, big, bad ass Yager is unable to get up off his stool after a third round is announced. Tito walks away in disgust and literally everyone is disappointed. Who would have thought, right? Not only did the smaller man outperform his larger opponent, but he made him quit! Some would say that’s even more satisfying than knocking an opponent out or submitting him. A great fight is topped off with one of the oddest outcomes in Ultimate Fighter history.

After Yager is taken to the hospital by an ambulance, Dana White takes Tito aside and, here’s another Ultimate Fighter milestone for you, takes him off the show. That’s right: for the first time in Ultimate Fighter history, Dana White fires one of the head coaches during the taping of the show. Wow.

Tito doesn’t even argue. He did voluntarily pull out of his fight with Chuck and Dana offered all the expert medical attention the UFC can give to him. The only condition is that he has to leave the show this very instant to start whatever medical procedures he needs to get so that he can get back into the octagon as soon as possible. Tito agrees and leaves the gym, silent as a ghost, and aghast.

As Team Ortiz gets on their van to return home, they see their coach walk slowly and sullenly to his car. Clayton McKinney comments, “looks like he got fired or something”. We have a mind reader in the house. Dana is shocked that Tito immediately leaves and doesn’t bother to tell his team. He calls Team Ortiz out of the van and back into the gym to give them the devastating news. As expected, nobody believes it. If it is true, nobody in the team swallows that Tito would just take off and leave them cold. McCray surmises that Tito possibly went off to gather his thoughts first before leaving for good.

Thankfully, McCray’s right and Tito arrives at the TUF house several moments later. He explains what happened and properly says goodbye to his fighters. Tito has always been portrayed as an excellent coach on this series. He has always genuinely cared for his fighters, and constantly pushed them to their limits in order for them to become the best that they can possibly be. He showed this in The Ultimate Fighter Season 3 and once again, in The Ultimate Fighter Season 11. Despite a lot of his shortcomings, Tito showed some excellent heart throughout this show, and I honestly wish him the best for whatever’s to come his way.

The semi-final matchups are then announced. They are Brad Tavares vs. Court McGee and Kris McCray vs. Josh Bryant. The first matchup is a bit difficult to call since both are very excellent fighters, but I like McGee just slightly better in this one. Truthfully, though, I wish Dana had picked the fights slightly different, because this is the matchup I would have liked to see in the finale at Las Vegas. The second matchup is much easier to call. I’m pretty sure that Bryant will be able to easily win over McCray. McCray, despite being the only Team Ortiz fighter to reach it to the semi-finals, never really impressed me during the season. He does show plenty of promise, though, as he did showcase many clear improvements to his game as the show went on.

Something we’ve been expecting for some time now finally takes place on the show. Rich “Ace” Franklin finally officially replaces Tito Ortiz as a head coach on Season 11 of the Ultimate Fighter, and will fight Chuck Liddell at UFC 115. [LINK] What do I think of this matchup? Well, I like it way better than Chuck vs. Tito (though I honestly would have liked to see Chuck knock Tito out once again). This is, again, is a pretty hard fight to call, and while I really like Chuck Liddell and want him to win because he’s had so many straight losses in the UFC, I’d have to give this one to Rich. Rich is younger, and I personally believe, more skilled than Chuck. This is very much Rampage vs. Rashad, though: the stronger fighter vs. the more skilled one. And Rashad took that win mighty easily. I’m pretty sure it won’t be the same for Rich, though. Despite Chuck being older and, some have said, on his last legs in the game, he’s much hungrier now because of his series of losses, and if he catches Rich with one of his sledgehammers like Vitor Belfort did, Rich is going bye-bye. Either way, I’m sure it’ll be a very exciting matchup. It always is when these two are involved.

Before the show ends, however, Dana announces to “Team Franklin” that he overcompensated after taking Tito away from them. So, he’s given Rich a team of UFC fighters as assistant coaches, one of them is even a former champion! Who could they be??? IMPORTANT NOTE: If you absolutely do not want to be spoiled, I suggest you stay away from UFC.com, The Ultimate Fighter Season 11 Wikipedia page, and the MMA news sources for the time being, because the assistant coaches’ identities have been revealed prematurely. You have been warned!

The coaches’ identities will be revealed during the next episode, which will be a special two-hour season ender. It will also showcase both semi-final matchups and transition into The Ultimate Fighter 11 Finale at Las Vegas. It’s gonna be good!

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11 EPISODE 9 REVIEW

Yeah, um, wow, that was a very interesting episode. Did I mean that in a good way? Yes, absolutely, but others may not agree.

The episode almost immediately goes to the first match, which is between Kyle Noke (16-4-1) and Kris McCray (5-0), which is something I have always wanted the series to do. What with Noke’s record and the fact that his first fight against Clayton McKinney really impressed me, had me rooting for him all the way.

At least 90% of the match takes place on the ground. Tito’s gameplan for this fight is clear: take advantage of what he surmises is Noke’s weak wrestling game, and have McCray, a very experienced wrestler himself, take full advantage of it. And guess what? It works; totally. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make for the most exciting match in the history of the sport.

McCray easily takes Noke down every time he wants to, and keeps him there for as long as he wanted to. Now, many MMA fans, have been known to widely criticize fighters for “lay and pray” strategies. Lay and pray basically means that the more experienced wrestler among the two fighters lays on top of the other until the referee stands them up or, preferably, until the bell rings. If the former occurs, then the wrestler takes the other guy down again and repeats the strategy ad nauseum. This is actually a valid complaint, and some fighters have been known to use this exact strategy, to rest, to re-evaluate their game plans, or to just plain be lazy. This was actually pretty commonly seen in the UFC’s early days in the 90’s and is the reason why the referees can stand people up if they sense total inactivity.

Unfortunately, some of the fans I mention criticize even extremely skilled and popular fighters for using this strategy. Recent targets of such criticisms include UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre and welterweight top contender Josh Koscheck. St-Pierre was criticized for utilizing the strategy recently against Dan Hardy, and Koscheck, against Paul Daley. These two absolutely did not lay and pray during these fights. They remained active and tried to finish their matches on several occasions. This is especially true of St-Pierre who, if not for Hardy’s extraordinarily admirable heart, would have finished his fight early with his submission attempts. If this is true, then why all the hate? Why all the unnecessary criticisms? Because a good majority of UFC fans out there still don’t appreciate the intricacies of the ground game if it goes on for two long without clear switching of positions, submissions, ground and pound, and whatnot. These things are easily achieved if one fighter is more skilled than the other, but if their levels of ability are much closer to each, they tend to neutralize each other for much of the time, resulting in people getting bored there isn’t any clear action occurring, and that one of them is conducting “lay and pray”. Such criticisms that result from lack of technical appreciation rather than objective evidence is what makes people such as UFC color commentator Joe Rogan and UFC president Dana White openly call these people “uneducated fans”.

With all that said, did McCray utilize the “lay and pray” strategy? Absolutely not; the primary proof being that referee Herb Dean, who has been called, and literally is, one of the best referees in the business, never stood the fight up. However, a good majority of the entire fight was composed of a primarily unexciting ground game. Both fighters pretty much tried to stay active enough just to not stand up. Sure, transitions and submission attempts were made, but literally nothing occurred that could make this fight genuinely exciting, especially if you consider that the fight went to the third round and the exact same thing kept occurring. So, yes, it was 15 minutes of nearly “lay and pray”. And this is exactly what the “uneducated” fans like to hate. And you thought the GSP vs. Hardy fight was boring? Boy, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.

But, wait! If McCray did indeed control Noke the entire time, then why did the fight go to a third round? Why didn’t Tito’s strategy propel him to a decision win after the second? The answer is simple: he got tired. McCray lost his first fight after getting into the house because he lacked cardio. This guy gasses out after every first round, and Tito has been shown to shake his head because of this. Why is he still gassing out? He trains the same way the other fighters do and they don’t gas out as easily. Whatever the case, he at least showed some clear improvement here, because he seemed to have gotten a second wind during the third round.

Since McCray was tired in the second round, Noke was able to become more active, earning him the decision for that round, but because of McCray’s second wind in the third, a repeat of the first round domination occurred, and he earned the victory.

Okay, fight’s over, now back to the melodrama. What’s on the plate this week? Why another injury that needs to be addressed! I swear, this season has by far the most on-air injuries than literally any other. But, wait! This time it’s a bit different! This time Tito’s injured! Tito goes back to his doctor for some sort of checkup and returns with the news that his neck needs to be operated upon. He takes the doctor’s advice and, yes, pulls out of his post – season brawl with Chuck.

Alright, this is really, really bad for Tito’s image. A lot of the time when Tito loses, he complains that it’s because of some sort of injury he had, the most recent of which was after his loss against former light heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin at UFC 106. Now, I respect MMA fighters tremendously, and understand what they go through during training, so I almost never complain when fighters speak out about their injuries (though I do get very disappointed when fights I want get cancelled because of injuries, such as the Forrest Griffin vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira at UFC 114). But, even I was really annoyed when Tito complained about his back directly after losing the fight. The crowd boo-ed him aplenty for it, and Forrest stepped up to defend him, but, in my eyes, the boos were necessary. Why? Well, in the UFC 106 Countdown special, Tito addressed his past injuries and stated that all were okay and that he firing on all cylinders, better than ever, and not an ounce under 100%. So, after all that hype, one can understand when the fans don’t like it if he complains that he lost the fight because of an injury. He should have just gave Forrest his props and admitted that he was simply the better warrior that night like so many other fighters do. But, no, his favorite excuse has to rear its ugly head again, and once again on this episode of the show.

So, am I complaining or even annoyed because of this? Frankly, no. I honestly rolled my eyes a bit when Tito conveyed the news about his neck, but I wasn’t shocked because I knew some sort of news was coming because the preview for the last episode stated so, and we already knew for some time now that Tito would be replaced as a coach and as Chuck’s opponent for quite some time now. So, the shock of him pulling out was really blunted there. But of his favorite excuse? Well, Tito has had a bad history of spine surgery, so it’s really not surprising that such a thing could occur. Then again, I’m more understanding than a lot of other MMA fans about this sort of thing, so my reaction isn’t nearly as entertaining as it probably should be.

In any case, the show must go on, and the second quarter final matchup is underway. Yes, as the last episode preview also promised us, we have a double dose of fights on our hands! The second quarter final matchup is between Brad Tavares (4-0) and Seth Baczynski (11-5). This is a very good matchup, as both are very good standup fighters and were pretty impressive in their last bouts. Still, if I had to pick one, I’d have to agree with Dana and go with Tavares. He seems more aggressive and devastating on his feet, despite his lack of experience compared to his opponent.

The fight starts and is pretty exciting. Tavares, again, is a good standup fighter, so the obvious strategy is to get him to the ground, which is what Baczynski does very early on in the first round. I can honestly hear the groans now. “Oh, God! Not another boring ground game?” Fear not, good reader, as the ground game this time is actually very exciting this time around. Baczynski looks to be the more skilled fighter on the ground, as he manages to get dominant positions early and even almost finishes Tavares with his submission attempts.

 Tavares, though, shows that his ground game is nothing to be taken for granted, as he not only manages to escape all of Baczynski’s submission attempts, but also manages to reverse positions and deliver some devastating ground and pound. Nice.

 Both fighters stand up during the last five seconds of the fight, and Tavares slips on a knee strike attempt. Baczynski capitalizes by planting a solid soccer kick to his downed opponent’s face. Not nice.

Yes, that’s how the second fight ended: by disqualification. Kicking a downed opponent to the head is illegal in the UFC. Baczynski shows immediate compassion by saying “sorry” to his opponent several times and does not, for one second, seem to regret the loss. He clearly looked more worried about his opponent’s well-being than his own fight career. Tavares was clearly knocked out the moment the kick hit him, and his whole body went limp and his face fell completely flat on the floor. The first time Baczynski says “sorry” to him, Tavares oddly says “for what?” The doctor examines him, notices the memory loss, and declares that he was indeed knocked out. Herb Dean stops the fight based on the doctor’s analysis, and Seth Baczynski goes on to check up on Tavares’ health.

All well and good, since everyone acknowledges that it was an accident, Tavares was immediately brought to the doctor’s attention, and the rules were followed to the letter. The End.

Wait, what? Not everyone showed sportsmanlike conduct during the event? Yup, as clear as TV can show it, the Team Ortiz coaches become extraordinarily furious at the decision, spouting such nonsense that “the kick hit him in the chest”, “the kick hit him in the armpit”, “he’s faking it”. Man, that’s just really inhuman. Sure, it sucks really bad that your team lost the match, but you can clearly see Tavares’ head react violent to the force of the soccer kick. Even if it didn’t hit squarely on his face, his brain was still jarred plenty good. And if his brain was a soccer ball? It would have wound up in the parking lot.

But, wait, there’s more! The Team Ortiz coaches then add “they already had one gift!” They were clearly mentioning the match between Rich Attonito and Kyacey Uscola, where their fighter, Uscola, was disqualified for kneeing the then-downed Attonito in the head. Attonito hears this, and becomes enraged at the coaches themselves? A gift? Damn crappy gift these pair of events turned out to be. The shouting matches become increasingly absurd, and Tito even walks up to the Liddel’s fighters. Chuck sees this and runs up to Tito to defend his guys, and both teams have to struggle to keep both their head coaches apart.

Dana White looks on at the whole thing and is completely dumbstruck. Man, the Team Ortiz people are really being set up as the “bad guys” this season, huh?

Anyway, Dana pulls Chuck aside, and spills the beans that Tito pulled out of their fight. Chuck stands up in rage and Dana utters the best line of the episode: “don’t break your phone”. Roll next episode preview.

Next episode continues the fun! Wheee! Chuck and Dana continue their conversation about Tito not fighting, and Dana talks to Tito about the odd situation. No coach has ever been “kicked off” the show before for whatever reason, and Tito probably should be because of him backing out of the promised post-season match. What’s to be done? All this plus the last quarter-final matchup between Jamie Yager and Josh Bryant, and the announcement of the semi-final matchups.

So, why do I mention in my first paragraph that others may not like this episode? Well, I’ve been an MMA fan for almost a decade now, and I can appreciate a lot about this sport, but the casual newcomer, of course, does not have the same viewpoint. If a viewer who has never seen MMA before tunes in to this particular episode to finally check out what all the fuss is about, he’s in for a lot of negativity. A boring first matchup, fighters pulling out of their fights, disqualifications, and unsportsmanlike behavior are what await him. Definitely not a good way to sell a sport.

Check out my reviews of the other episodes of The Ultimate Fighter season 11 here!

THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER 11 EPISODE 8 REVIEW

Very excellent episode we have this week, with plenty going on every step of the way to keep the viewers excited. It starts off almost immediately with the wild card fight, featuring Kyacey Uscola and Kris McCray. Now, Uscola really impressed in his fight against Rich Attonito. He was showing a very good stand up game until he got disqualified for that illegal knee. McCray, on the other hand, didn’t impress me at all. His skills didn’t seem sharpened enough and he gassed way too early in the fight. So, needless to say, I was for Uscola all the way in this fight.

The first round was pretty darn incredible. Both fighters came out very aggressive but Uscola seemed to have the advantage early on when he caught McCray with that stomp kick to the knee. It hit dead on and looked to have twisted McCray’s knee a little bit. Needless to say, he was hurt. Unfortunately, Uscola fails to immediately capitalize on this and simply watches on for a few seconds while his opponent literally drops his hands to wince in pain. Even when he does wise up and charge for the attack, he does so way too cautiously. Instead of bolting and jumping on his opponent with punches in bunches, he comes forward slowly, tentatively, almost in fear that the person whose leg was almost taken out just a second posed an incredibly large threat. McCray was wide open and Uscola didn’t take the opening, plain and simple.

Even odder is, Uscola seemed to slow down after that initial bout of aggressiveness and McCray seemed to pick up the pace even more, which is pretty much the complete opposite of what one would have expected after that first minute or so. McCray’s leg was obviously hurt as the spring in his step was partly lost and he slightly limped on it from time to time. Still, Uscola never became aggressive ever again and was just tentative much of the time. That didn’t stop the rest of the round from being fairly exciting, though. Both fighters still threw punches and kicks back and forth, and it wound up close near the end, with McCray getting Uscola’s back on the ground.

Alright, this is where Uscola pays for his early mistake. McCray takes down his opponent very early ion the second round and submits him within the first minute. What? Really? Yes, it was that fast. I was stunned, to be perfectly honest. Uscola’s record of 18-15 isn’t exactly impressive, but he has 33 professional fights under his belt. 33! McCray, on the other hand, only has a record of 5-0. 5 Only 5 professional fights, plus a lackluster showing in his last one, which cost him the match. Uscola had the obvious advantage in terms of experience, but still lost very easily to a hurt opponent. I honestly can’t believe it until now, but really, hands down to McCray on this one. He obviously wanted it way more, showed the heart of a champion, gutted it out until the end, and improved way more from his last fight. I was perfectly honest when I mentioned he didn’t impress me at all in his last match, but he went all out here and fought like a champion.

The quarterfinal matches then need to be decided so Dana gets Chuck and Tito in a room to discuss who fights who. Needless to say, all three of them bicker for a few minutes until Dana gets tired of wasting time and sends them out, leaving him to sort everything out by himself.

The first fight will be the rematch everyone wanted to see: Nick Ring vs. Court McGee. I was personally very happy about this, since I was very happy about their performances during the last fight and felt that McGee was indeed robbed when the fight went straight to a decision instead of a third round. The stare down was intense this time around, instead of being slightly comical like before.

The second fight is Kyle Noke vs. Kris McCray, the third is Brad Tavares vs. Seth Baczynski, and the fourth is Jamie Yager vs. Bryant. My predictions for these ones are Noke, Tavares, and Yager.

After the fighters have settled back into the house, a surprise pops in to say hi. Forrest Griffin comes in the door looking like Andrei Arlovski and pulls out an Xbox 360 game. It was really great to see Forrest on the show again. He was part of what made The Ultimate Fighter a successful franchise in the first place and is a former champion.

I really like the guy and he’s still one of my favorites, but I was pretty annoyed when I reliazed he was there to devote an entire segment of the episode to marketing UFC Undisputed 2010. Granted, I’m not one to criticize, since I’ve inserted products into my articles before, but I didn’t want to waste too much time with people telling me how great the latest UFC product is.

Thankfully, the segment didn’t take very long and was actually very enlightening in a way. Forrest was there for only 2 hours and the guys seemed to have the greatest fun in the world. As Rich Attonito said, it was the fastest two hours of his entire stay in the house. Everyone seemed to have genuine fun at the 2 hour break they got, what with being cooped up with potential opponents for months on end with very limited forms of entertainment available. Plus, in the end, Forrest got to reenact his fight against Tito, with James Hammortree controlling his coach. Hammortree knocks Forrest out and “avenges” Tito, in a way; really fun stuff.

To be quite honest, though, and yes, I’m being extremely hypocritical here, but I have played the demo of the game on my PS3 and, from what I’ve seen of what was shown on this episode, it really does seem to be a very cool game, what with the awesome graphics, animation, controls, fighter choices, and everything, so check it out if you like. There’s an Amazon link at the bottom the article for the gaming unit of your choice.

Unfortunately, after all the hilarity dies down, bad news come crashing back in. Nick Ring goes to the doctor to get his ailing knee checked and finds out that it’s as bad as he and Tito think. The doctor basically says that he Ring can still fight if he really needs to but, he can screw it up even worse if he does, which may lead to all sorts of serious, and permanent, damage.

Dana drops by the house that evening and talks one on one with Ring. Dana doesn’t say it out loud, but he’s obviously very concerned about the injury and doesn’t want Ring to suffer in the long term for it. He asks Nick if he still wants to fight. Nick says no. Flat out no. He realizes that he’s dropping the opportunity of a lifetime, but doesn’t think it’s worth it if it means he might never be able to walk again afterward. Choosing to back down and fight another day, he shakes hands with Dana and they walk back into the house to make the big announcement.

All the fighters are stunned by the news, of course. Dana says that he’ll discuss it with the coaches to see who’s replacing Ring and tell them the results as soon as possible, but before he can make it back to his van, James Hammortree steps up and demands he get the spot. Dana, as everyone knows, loves this kind of attitude, and grants him the fight right then and there.

He announces it back at the house and Joseph Henle is pissed. He’s been campaigning to get back in the competition since his loss, and getting his possibly chance taken away just kills him. He at least makes this known to Dana, which might bear positive fruit in the future.

Alright, enough drama! It’s fight time! Court McGee vs. James Hammortree, round one! It’s an excellent round, with both fighters coming and staying very aggressive until the end. It wasn’t the most brutal stand up war ever seen, with both fighters coming out of it pretty much uninjured, but it was a war nonetheless.

The second round is all déjà vu, though, as Court McGee submits James Hammortree within the very first minute; with a standing guillotine, no less. Very, very impressive, to say the least.

I am absolutely pleased with this episode, and my wish about the series continuing to be awesome every episode most probably will come true, as the preview reveals that we’ll not just have two fights again, but the whole Tito drama piece that winds up with Rich Franklin replacing him as a coach and as Chuck’s next opponent finally takes place!

Check out my reviews of the other episodes of The Ultimate Fighter season 11 here!