Formula One and NASCAR fans probably consider themselves erudite engineering nerds compared to those blood-thirsty brutes lining the cages of UFC fights.
Fiddlesticks. Let’s face it – a significant chunk of auto racing spectators show up just in case there’s a really spectacular wreck.
But prizefighting fans can’t fool anyone. We also relish those moments when things crash and burn. Ultimate Fighting has come a long way in trying to make every match interesting, but mixed martial arts is still judged on points, just like boxing. The majority of bouts consist mostly of fighters parrying each other or carefully applying holds while random fans yell stuff at them.
Classic fights just aren’t an everyday occurrence. Neither are weird and memorable knockouts. When strange and scary things happen in an MMA octagon, it breaks the monotony. But it also shows just how much violence and ferocity can be summoned by a top-flight martial artist at any time.
For gamblers, it’s an unnerving situation. How to avoid getting soaked by a fighter unexpectedly springing a leak? Maybe it helps to look at some truly lopsided bouts and try to find a common thread on the losers’ part. After all, someone has to answer for any ridiculous fail.
Here are a handful of the craziest KOs in UFC history.
A 27-year-old Conor McGregor had won 5 out of 6 bouts by KO or TKO and an interim Featherweight championship heading into his highly-anticipated December 2015 match with José Aldo. Aldo was on a hot streak of his own, enduring 9 consecutive title defenses before his bout with The Notorious.
Handicappers were expecting fireworks. They just couldn’t have imagined how quickly the explosion would come.
In typical UFC style the pair mouthed-off at one another leading up to the date, McGregor doing everything he could to get inside the head of the cerebral Brazilian. At the weigh-in for the fight, McGregor dismissed his opponent’s chin, boasting, “I know that the soft part of his face won’t be able to take my shots.”
Aldo vowed to respond by taking the fight to his opponent in the octagon. Sportsbooks began moving the line on under (2 ½) rounds shorter-and-shorter into the minus-payoff territory. Knowing what we know now about the psychology of the combatants, I would have bet the under anyway.
The Brazilian pressed forward on McGregor from the opening bell, trying to prove his mouthy opponent wrong. Instead, McGregor unleashed a sneaky, powerful hook that put Scarface to sleep just 13 seconds into the 1st round.
“Unbelievable,” said a shell-shocked Joe Rogan on the air. “The first punch (McGregor) threw. Slept him.”
The fight marked the end of Aldo’s reign as the most highly-regarded Featherweight in the sport, and helped turn The Notorious into a worldwide icon.
Due to the volatility of title reigns in many UFC weight classes, challengers are installed as odds-on favorites more often than in Heavyweight boxing. Our next insane knockout occurred under just those circumstances.
Matt Hughes was a well-established MMA fighter coming into a 2001 bout with then-Welterweight champ Carlos Newton. Hughes, a strong grappler and the odds-on betting favorite, stood at 29 wins and just 3 losses vs Newton’s paltry 10-4.
Hughes was not a fan of Newton’s showboating style. “This guy’s off in la-la land, thinkin’ this is some entertainment show,” the challenger told reporters. “I’m gonna mop this guy up.”
That’s not exactly the way it worked out.
During the bout in Vegas, Newton expertly performed counter-moves on the mat, locking in a triangle-choke hold in the fight’s final moments. In a bizarre sequence, it looked as if Hughes had turned to his corner to say he was tapping out, but he then somehow managed to use brute strength to lift Newton into the air for a vicious, if improvised, body slam.
Newton was knocked out cold and a woozy Hughes was crowned the new Welterweight champion.
The strange incident would lead to a solid title run for Hughes, including a victory in a rematch against Newton. After the 2nd fight, Newton would never fight for a UFC title again.
Galore ‘The Paranormal’ Bofando fought Charlie Ward in Scotland on July 16th, 2017 as preliminary entries on an unremarkable UFC Fight Night card. Unremarkable – except that the Bofando-Ward match would add another body-slam finish to the annals of MMA.
With a background in kickboxing, Bofando was known as an excellent athlete and striker. Even though the Londoner was not a veteran MMA fighter, he had managed to win 3 of his first 4 contests by knockout. The Irishman, Charlie Ward, was a bit of a green-horn himself. That would come into play heavily on Fight Night in Glasgow.
For all of 2 minutes, the combatants appeared evenly-matched. Then Ward lost his legs and appeared to unravel in the clinch. Bofando turned his opponent over and in his words, “dumped” the Irish Middleweight head-first onto the mat.
Ward was knocked unconscious, the 2nd fight in a row he had failed to stay awake for the ending of. He left the octagon for good a short time later.
The footage is worth it for Bofando’s weekly over-the-top celebration. He acts as if a beaner-body slam finish was his grand plan all along.
Ronda Rousey has traced a memorable path through American pop culture, from upstart folk hero, to tortured UFC favorite, to WWE pro wrestler. Her crowd-pleasing clinic of technical grappling and striking (albeit staged) at Wrestlemania 34 came against none other than Stephanie McMahon, showing how much the promotion already trusts The Rowdy One.
But Rousey’s previous encounter with a McMahon – or at least a McMann – came on February 22nd, 2014 when she stepped into the octagon to defend the Bantamweight title against the talented 33-year-old Sara McMann.
Money lines were unexpectedly tight on the week of the showdown in Las Vegas. Rousey was unbeaten, a former Judo Olympian and a fan favorite. But McMann was unbeaten as well and had also competed in the Summer Olympic Games as a grappler.
A legend in the making, Rousey KO’d her formidable foe with a WWE-style combination. Before the fight, she verbally assaulted McMann with a mean-spirited line about the latter’s motherhood. “She has to go home to that kid,” Rowdy sneered. “I can afford to be selfish, where she can’t.”
McMann selfishly got into a standing scrap early in the fight with Rousey, fighting on Rowdy’s terms instead of her own. That’s the death knell in a bout with a killer.
Consider the memorable Rousey-McMann finish in terms of a World Wrestling Entertainment match. First, the 2 women got into a locked, classical position for a test of strength (check). Rousey struggled mightily before getting the upper hand to wild cheers (check). Rousey then landed a single magnificent blow, a Harley Race knee-drop – ahem – no, actually a Muay Thai knee to the mid-section.
McMann collapsed with pain, and the referee called the match in the 1st round.
If you’re superstitious, you might believe that the whole episode was a foreshadowing of Rousey’s eventual turn to showbiz. If you’re not, then believe that she is just that awesome to have planned out the entire career arc to come. But there’s a dark side to turning MMA fights into trash-talking, attention-grabbing spectacles… even if you’re fortunate enough to land the triumphant knockout.
Ronda Rousey used dirty psychological tactics on Sara McMann. There’s no getting around it. The so-called “Arm Collector” might have been the referee-bias collector too, as many onlookers felt that McMann could have recovered and made a war of the bout.
At the same time, I can argue that Rousey’s shameless mind-games were a part of her weaponry as a competitor and not meant to be taken at face value. Fighters probably aren’t concerned about whether their opponent would like and appreciate their kids. They are concerned, however, when an opponent appears to be clowning them in public, getting an alpha-dog upper hand before the fight even begins.
Why was a mean streak so integral to Rousey’s success as a shoot-fighter? Time for wisdom from “Nature Boy” Buddy Rogers, a pro wrestler from another age whose catch-phrase lives on in Rowdy’s rude attitude.
To a nicer gal, it couldn’t happen.
If we learn nothing else, it’s that UFC bouts are some of the least-predictable events in sports. System bettors are very often screwed trying to bet on mixed martial arts. (Stick to those daily 5-innings bets on Major League Baseball, guys.)
But for the hobby gambler, there is opportunity in the chaos. Every fight reviewed in this blog post won money for gamblers on the under (total rounds). Debating whether or not specific fights should be picked to end quickly is putting the cart before the horse. In order to win an O/U, you have to wager on an O/U. At least consider it!
It’s a popular trope to pick a favorite MMA striker and wager against your buddies. But sometimes the best way to win is to count on the chaos itself, as opposed to counting on either combatant.
Nobody can predict lightning-quick KOs in evenly-matched bouts, but they still happen. The ever-present possibility creates a small amount of added value in almost all bets on early-round finishes.
Don’t get “slept” when betting on the UFC. Picking winners and losers is great. But there’s always more than one option available, more than one way forward.
Just ask Ronda Rousey of World Wrestling Entertainment.
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