UFC 97: Rua Stops Liddell – Is This The End For Chuck?

By Matt Stein: Last night, we may be seeing an end of an era as former UFC light heavyweight champion Chuck Liddell (21-7, 14 KOs) was stopped in the 1st round by Brazilian Mauricio Rua (18-3, 14 KOs) in Montreal, Canada. Rua, 27, was rather easily controlling the first round when he suddenly unleashed a sweeping left hook that caught Liddell flush, sending him down on his back on the canvas. Rua then jumped on Liddell and pounded him with a half dozen hammer fists while Liddell was helplessly trying to get to get up. The referee then jumped in quickly and stopped the bout at 4:28 of the round to prevent Liddell, 39, from getting hit with any more shots.

Liddell has now lost four out of his last five bouts since losing his UFC light heavyweight title two years ago in a 1st round knockout at the hands of Quinton Jackson in May 2007. Liddell for whatever reason doesn’t seem to be able to take a big shot like he used to and has now been stopped from head shots in three of his four losses. Although Liddell remains a big star in the sport due to his earlier accomplishments several years ago, he might want to consider calling it a career at 39.

Rua dominated most of the fight, landing big looping right and left hands. Rua’s shots didn’t look all that powerful, but the angle that he was throwing them in seemed to be something that Liddell was having a hard time adjusting to in the fight.

Again and again, Rua was able to land these shots with Liddell taking them cleanly each time. When Rua would attempt straight punches, Liddell would often block them with ease. Liddell never was able to do much in the fight other than to land a few right hands. Most of his attempts were blocked by Rua on his gloves, and the ones that did land weren’t all that hard.

In a much more exciting bout on the same card, Canadian lightweight Sam Stout (14-5-1, 8 KOs) defeated American Matt Wiman (10-5, 4 KOs) by a unanimous decision. The final judges’ scores were 29-28, 29-28, and 29-28. I had Wiman winning the bout due to his superior work in the 1st and 3rd rounds.

However, Stout being a Canadian was probably given the benefit of the doubt on the scoring, even though he took a savage beating from Wiman in the 3rd round. With the fight on the line in the 3rd, Wiman seemingly won the bout by scoring multiple take downs, busting up Stouts nose and left eye and picking him up and slamming him a numbers of times on the canvas.

It was a pretty one-sided round. However, the judges saw differently and gave Stout credit for both the 1st and 2nd rounds. Wiman, though, was the much more aggressive fighter in the 1st round and scored two takedowns in the round. It should have been enough to win the round on the judges’ scorecards, and wondering whether they got the fighters mixed up when scoring the bout.

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