By Jim Dower: Last Saturday night’s UFC 99 event turned out to have a high number of exciting matches in Cologne, Germany. Fighting in front of a large crowd of 13,000, heavyweights Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic and Cain Velasquez helped finish the card on a strong note with victories over Mustapha al Turk and Cheick Kongo. In the lower weights, Dan Hardy defeated Marcus Davis, Spencer Fisher outpointed Caol Uno and Mike Swick stopped Ben Saunders.
In a fight fought at a 195 pound catch weight, Rich Franklin defeated Wanderlei Silva (32-10-1, 22 KOs) by a three round decision. Silva, 32, a former Pride middleweight champion, fought tooth and nail against 34-year-old Franklin. Silva appeared to win the 2nd and the 3rd rounds.
However, the judges saw it differently and gave Franklin the win. Silva came into the match having lost four out of his last five fights, with two of them by stoppages. There were more than few MMA fans who felt that Silva’s time had passed and that he should consider retiring from fighting in the MMA. However, Silva looked good throughout Saturday’s fight, albeit a little tired at times.
Franklin did the better punching in the first round as most of the action was conducted standing up. Silva landed a few kicks in the round but nothing hard. He took Franklin to the mat once in the round but was unable to keep him there for long.
In the 2nd round, Silva staggered Franklin with two hard right hands to the head in the early going. In the last minute of action, Silva teed off on Franklin with big right hands. In the 3rd round, Silva appeared to be well on his way to winning the fight as he landed a lot of big right hands and had the German crowd screaming in appreciation.
However, Franklin scored a takedown late in the round and the fight stalled for most of the remainder of the round. Silva got to his feet and was feeding Franklin with elbows to the head as time ran out. I still had Silva winning the fight, but the judges were more impressed with Franklin’s lighter shots.
Former high school and college wrestling star Cain Velasquez (6-0, 5 KOs) totally dominated 6’4” Cheick Kongo (14-5-1, 8 KO’s), beating him by an impressive three round unanimous decision. Kongo staggered Velasquez with two huge fight hands in the opening round. However, Velasquez immediately recovered and took Kongo down with a double legged takedown.
Once Velasquez had Kongo down, he kept him on the mat and pounded him for the entire round with back fists and clubbing shots. Kongo was able to make it to his feet a couple of times, but Velasquez easily took him back down to the mat without any trouble.
In the 2nd round, Kongo once again hurt Velasquez with a big right hand at the start of the round. But just like in the previous round, Velasquez shook it off and took Kongo to the fence where Velasquez was able to take him to the mat. Once he had Kongo down, Velasquez stayed on top for the entire round punishing him with shots to the back of the head and to the face.
Velasquez wasn’t putting a lot of power on the shots, but they still had a withering effect on Kongo as he looked exhausted by the end of the round. Kongo’s nose was bleeding badly from one of the many punches he took during the round.
In the 3rd round, Kongo took Velasquez to the mat briefly, but wasn’t able to keep him down for long. Velasquez was able to take Kongo down after a brief back and forth scuffle on their feet and punish him for the rest of the round on the mat.
At the end of the fight, Kongo stayed down on the mat for awhile, bleeding from his nose and looking exhausted. He never stood a chance against Velasquez who because of his superior grappling skills was able to easily dominate him.
In what turned out to be a mismatch, Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic (25-6-2, 19 KOs) stopped Mustapha al Turk (6-5, 4 KOs) in the 1st round after hurting him with a finger in the Turk’s left eye. Turk, 35, got pocked on the eye with a left from Filipovic, 34, and then turned away in pain as Filipovic teed off on him with shots as Turk tried to cover up.
After taking six shots to the head, Turk went down and the fight was stopped after Filipovic landed three shots to the head of the helpless Turk. The referee failed to see that Turk had been poked in the eye and didn’t stop the action.
It probably wouldn’t have mattered because Turk looked slow and wild with his punches and didn’t appear to have the skills needed to beat Filipovic if the fight had been marred by the eye poke. Prior to this fight, Filipovic had lost two out of his last five fights. It seemed as if was brought in for Filipovic to get a much needed confidence builder.
In welterweight action, Mike Swick stopped Ben Saunders in the 2nd round. After a boring 1st round which had little action, Swick chased the tall 6’3” Saunders down and landed six consecutive right hands to send him down on the canvas.
The last punch that connected, a right to the temple, badly hurt Saunders and put him on his hands and knees on the mat. Swick then finished him off with a left hand to the head while he was down. The referee then stepped in and stopped the fight.
In easily the dullest fight of the night, lightweight Spencer Fisher defeated Caol Uno by a three round decision. It was more of a tactical battle with Uno constantly trying to take Fisher down. Much of the time, Uno would fail at taking him down as Fisher would successfully sprawl to foil the takedown. Fisher scored the better shots but there weren’t many of them because Uno was good at keeping Fisher from landing.
In the other welterweight match on the card, Dan Hardy (22-6, 11 KOs) defeated Marcus Davis by a three round split decision, a fight that left Davis’ face a bloody swollen mess by the time that the fight was over. Davis, 35, dominated most of the 1st round by staying on top of Hardy after taking him to the mat.
However, late in the round Hardy got to his feet and landed several hard right hands a big elbow that bloodied Davis’ forehead. In the 2nd round, Hardy dropped Davis with a knee to the head and spent the better part of the next minute beating Davis up on the mat. Later on, Davis landed a big left hand and finished the round strong.
Davis knocked Hardy down at the start of the 3rd round with a left to the head. However, Hardy came back and took Davis down and hit him with some huge elbows while he was down, smashing his nose and creating a huge hematoma on the left side of Davis’ face.
For the rest of the round, Hardy stayed on top of Davis beating him up with big shots. At one point, the action was stopped to allow Davis to get up. He staggered to his feet as if he was hurt from the big shots Hardy had been hitting him with.
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