I had my doubts going into this card about whether or not Paramount was going to completely piss us off or not. On one hand I thought that a new set of executives and what not might breathe some fresh life into what I have found in the past couple of years has become sort of a dying product that stays around merely because there is no viable competition On the other hand I realize that Paramount needs to make a ton of money in order to get back their nearly $8 billion investment.
I have to say that after watching the first ever Paramount event that I am quite pleased that they didn't commercial break the hell out of us.
It was a sold out crowd in a huge arena in Las Vegas and it was sold out because of course it was sold out because all of these events are. The amount of money that they make at the gate of those things must just be through the roof because one day I thought I would treat myself and go to one of them when they came to town and nosebleed-section tickets were $300 each.
The events transitioned from one to the next very smoothly without undue delays caused by commercials and as I mentioned in a comment to someone else, for whatever reason the feed I was on wasn't subjected to any commercials at all, instead we got a screen that said "commercial break in progress." I can only guess that the bar I was at must have been using some sort of online illegal feed but man, that's their problem not mine.
As far as the actual fights were concerned, well, there was a lot left to be desired as most of the main card was just straight up boring and this is especially true for the girl who has been a UFC darling for a decade now and keeps getting big time events despite a near complete lack of performance.
Have a look at how far away from one another these two are but also now imagine them both dancing a jig from side to side and circling around the octagon occasionally throwing in some long-distance jab and then immediately retreating back to dancing position. If you can imagine that and then keep thinking about it for the next 15 minutes you basically saw the same fight that I saw live, in your head just now.
During the broadcast of this fight, there was so little action that Joe Rogan had enough time to remind us of a fight that Rose had vs. Carla Esparza which is a fight that is often referred to as the "most boring in UFC history."
Sad to say though, this fight vs Natalia Silva might be a close second as far as most boring is concerned. The fans were booing both of them, and when talked to after the fight Natalia's first words were an attempt at English to apologize to the fans and then she switched back to Portuguese I think and did more of the same.
I think Rose gets preferential treatment by the UFC because she is reported to be exceptionally nice in person and a lovely woman to be around - well, unless she is trying to punch you I would imagine. But in this situation I don't even know why she was in this bout since she has failed to perform in any sort of exciting way since her shock defeat of Zhang Weili for the championship. That was in 2021 folks! That's how long it has been since Rose had an exciting fight. Every single one of her fights, all 8 of them since then, have ended in decisions: Some were wins, some were losses... all of them were boring.
Boring was kind of the name of the game for the main card with only 1 and a half exceptions. Some people were excited about Derrick Lewis fighting at heavyweight but I said it in the room before the fight began "UFC is using this guy to push other talent, they don't expect him to win AND, if he doesn't KO Acosta in the first 90 seconds, he is going to gas out."
Once Derrick's tree-trunk sized arms swung wildly about 35 times dude was gassed, and was laid out on his back and while the damage he was taking wasn't severe, they have a rule in UFC with the refs where you, as the guy on the bottom that is getting pummeled, you need to be appearing as though you are defending yourself and making some progress in getting up. Derrick I think had already thrown in the proverbial towel at that point and the match was called a TKO.
Speaking of people that UFC desperately want in the limelight again, Sean O'Malley also fought on the main card. That was reasonably entertaining but I was kind of shocked that neither guy was able to get a finish when at certain times in the fight both of them appeared to have the other rocked and all they had to do was finish it. I know I know, it's easy to be an armchair quarterback during these things.
O'Malley won and didn't immediately call for a title fight, which I thought was a wise move seeing as how Dvalishvili already destroyed him twice, and Petr Yan only just took the belt away. Give it some time Sean... you know that they are going to give it to you because they love you at UFC. Get some sponsors in the meantime and get that money!
The real reason for the festivity in the night was the one true main event, which in itself is shrouded in controversy since it was an interim championship featuring two guys who aren't even in the top 3 of that division.
A major reason for this is because Paddy is again, a darling of the UFC and has been kind of hand-fed opponents to beat in order to move up in the ranks. I'm not saying dude isn't good... he clearly is, but there's a reason why they had him face Justin Gaetje for this belt fight and it isn't because the two of them are the two best people for the fight.
What I think the UFC wasn't planning on was that Gaetje got the better of Paddy almost from the very start.
Paddy the Baddie left the arena looking like a different person than when he got there but I will say this for the guy, he was NEVER trying to win on points. He was going for it in ever second of every round and this was especially true in round 5 where by everyone in the world's internal scorecards Paddy was down at least 3 rounds to 1, maybe 4-0.
He gave it all that he had and the crowd around the world was wildly entertained by this. There was literally never a dull moment. In the end there was no doubt whose arm was getting raised and Paddy was already cheering for Justin before Bruce Buffer even finished announcing it. He knew, Justin knew, everyone who saw the fight knew.
It was one of the most entertaining fights that I have have seen in any UFC event in quite some time and that was a fantastic cap on the bottle of what I thought otherwise was a rather "ho hum... meh!" sort of competition. I guess there is truly a reason why they save the best for last and thank goodness that the ref let it ride because it was an all out war.
I didn't pay much attention to the events that they have coming up because I nearly didn't even attend this one. My fandom for UFC has waned considerably in the past couple of years and I remain hopeful that Paramount can turn things around. I also wish that they would stop rigging the fights to promote clearly favored fighters and instead give us the fights of the two people that actually deserve it the most. It will be interesting to see who they give Sean O'Malley and well as Gaetje and even Pimblett next.
What do you think?