I only watched the main card and after being there for 3 hours to see only this portion of the event in Las Vegas I can honestly say that I am very happy that I was not there to watch the rest of it.
I don't know why I bother to get excited about these things when nearly half of the main card is just pure garbage. When I looked around the local bar most of the people weren't even looking at the screen during many of the main card events and this includes and was especially true for the main event with Pereira vs. Ankalaev.
I am sure that whoever has to compile the highlights of this particular fight really had to work hard in order to find things that were even worth highlighting because essentially, nothing happened for 25 minutes. There was some leg kicks in the first round but very little else. I understand that fighters try to preserve energy for later rounds but I honestly expected a lot more from two very powerful fighters with very impressive histories.
Often in title fights I get the impression that the people involved aren't trying to win nearly as much as they are trying to not lose. Aside from some combos that lasted for just a few seconds, virtually nothing happened in the main event and by the time we got to the 4th round, one of the guys in the octagon realized that all he had to do in order to secure victory was lock up his opponent in order to get more "control time." Twice these hugging contest were broken up by the referee because Ankalaev wasn't even trying to do any damage, he was just locking up Pereira so that he wasn't able to do any damage in reverse.
This is a major flaw of the point system in MMA, you get given points for controlling the fight but the tactic of locking up your opponent so he can't hit you while not even trying to do any damage to him is a dirty tactic. It works though, and that is why people do it.
I think that Anakalaev is going to find himself in a bad spot now though, because there is exactly zero enthusiasm for him being crowned the new light heavyweight champion.
You know that you haven't won over anyone when the fans all boo when you get the belt put around you. Ankalaev isn't fully to blame here though, Alex didn't go for big shots early either and instead was going for a style of hurting your opponents mobility by taking out one of his legs. This tactic didn't work though and while I commend Alex for successfully defending every single takedown attempt, I also don't believe that Ankalaev was actually going for them. He wasn't posturing for position, he was posturing to have "control time" which unfortunately the judges take into account when choosing a winner.
This wasn't even the worst fight of the night though. It was the most disappointing because everyone expected this to be a banger and it was far from that. When Ankalaev's had was raised as the new champion, neither fighter had so much as a small cut on them because nothing happened.
The worst fight of the night definitely goes to the only female fight that was on the main card.
Now you would imagine that the job of someone doing immediate press releases is to capture the best moments of a fight and the above is the best you can come up with. Well the reason for that is because very little else happened in this fight. It consisted almost entirely of the two women leaning on one another and then hugging on the ground with almost no damage happening to either fighter. The cut on Lucindo's face was from an injury sustained in training camp. It was re-opened because of a very light and grazing shot that was one of the only strikes thrown in a stand-up fighting position for the full 15 minutes.
The crowd booed almost the entire time the fight was taking place because both of their strategies seemed to be more akin to wrestling or jiu-jitsu than an MMA fight. It was boring as hell.
Thankfully, Justin Gaethje and Farael Fiziev put on an amazing show that was one of the best fights in recent history. Both guys were absolutely exhausted by the end of it because they truly gave it everything that they had. The other fights were either stacked in serious favor of one particular fighter, or the two people in the octagon looked like they had turned up for some light sparring.
It's been a while since I have felt like a pay-per-view event was a complete waste of my time.... and that is exactly how I feel about this event. I think for the next PPV, I am just going to sit it out and catch the highlights the following day.