This Saturday, January 22 the UFC will hold their second Fight For The Troops event. It will be held in Fort Hood, Texas. This is how I think the main card will go.
Main card
- Lightweight bout:
Evan Dunham vs. Melvin Guillard - Heavyweight bout: Matt Mitrione vs.
Tim Hague - Featherweight bout: Mark Hominick vs. George Roop
- Heavyweight bout: Pat Barry vs. Joey Beltran
- Lightweight bout: Cole Miller vs. Matt Wiman
(Each name above has a Wikipedia link)
Evan Dunham vs Melvin Guillard
Evan Dunham was supposed to be fighting Kenny Florian for the main event but due to an injury to Florian, therefore Melvin Guillard, (who was supposed to fight Yves Edward on the prelim card) will step in for Florian.
Dunham coming off a loss against former UFC lightweight champ Sean Sherk, (in which many, including myself thought he won) will try to rebound from that judging error. Guillard coming off a win against Jeremy Stephens will try to keep on the winning streak. He's coming into the fight with a 3 fight win streak.
Dunham the Brazilian jiu jitsu black belt will have a HUGE advantage on the ground. He has a really good submission skills and I think will be looking to put Guillard on his back and put Guillard into his weakest aspect. But, Dunham has shown he can use his striking effectively and efficiently.
Guillard's change to train at Greg Jackson's camp, has been a good career move. He's become a more disciplined fighter. A lot of people have been saying he played it safe his last fight against Jeremy Stephens. It may not be as exciting by not seeing him brawl, but why would he want to take a chance at getting knocked out and lose. If you lose you get cut from the organization. Why would he risk that, I think a wins a win. Guillard will try to keep this standing and use his wrestling to keep this fight standing.
I like Dunham's advantage in the ground but he's going to be facing a talented striker. With Guillard training at Greg Jackson, hes been becoming more well rounded and better at his weakest areas. I have Guillard taking a decision. Chin test for Dunham.
Matt Mitrione vs Tim Hauge
Despite Mitrione having only 3 professional fights, the Duke Roufus product has shown a lot of promise in this sport. He loves to strike and I think has pretty good ability on keeping distance. Honestly, I think that Mitrione will try to keep it standing against Hauge.
In all honesty, I haven't seen Tim Hauge fight to much except when he got knocked out by Todd Duffee and lost a decision to Joey Beltran. Can't say much but he did submit Pat Berry, in which he was getting beat down but showed some heart in the fight and came back with the win. I know that he does have a purple belt in Brazilian Jiu jitsu.
Its a toss up for me, but I'm going with Mitrione only because I think his striking is more crisp and training with Duke Roufus means that his stand up is going to be better. Tossing a coin and it lands on Mitrione.
Mark Hominick vs George Roop
This is my fight of the night candidate. Mark Hominick has one of the best technical strikers in the featherweight division. He has pin point accuracy and a vicious liver shot. Mark Hominick is well versed on the ground too. He also has a little more incentive than Roop, if he wins he is told that he will be getting a title shot against the featherweight champ Jose Aldo. Hominick also has A TON of momentum behind, having a 4 fight win streak.
George Roop is a scrapper though. He comes in and fights. He just gave the best performance of his career by knocking out the Korean Zombie, a guy in which nobody has finished. That highlight reel knockout had him up there with knockout of the year candidates.
SO don't count Roop out of this. That might happen. But he's primarily known as a striker so this should be a stand up war.
I'm going with Mark Hominick with this one. He brings more technique and a more refined striking game than Roop. Second Round TKO , hopefully by body shot that crumbles Roop. Plus we get to see Aldo get to fight a very good striker.
Pat Barry vs Joey Beltran
Even though Pat Barry lost his last fight against Mirko Cro Cop, he showed hes one of the best strikers in MMA period. He knocked Cro Cop down in the first round of their fight a couple times. If he sustained the brilliance he showed in the first round, he could have won the fight.
But the downside with Barry is that he had surgery on his hand after the Cro Cop fight and nobody will know how that hand will hold up during his fight.
Beltran is also a striker. He is also coming off a hard fought decision against Matt Mitrione, months prior. Both have a ton of power in their strikes and can end fights instantaneously. This is going to be a stand up war. I want to say Beltran by decision but I feel like Barry can finish in the first round. I'm going to call a KO for Barry.
Cole Miller vs Matt Wiman
This is going to be a tough one to call. Wiman is a very tough and durable guy but I love the fact that Miller always wants to finish the fights. Miller looked a lot better in his stand up game against Ross Pearson and his ground game is always sharp. I feel like Miller has a huge on the ground , but Wiman is not someone you should count out. I mean he comes into the cage and fights each time and gets into some great battles. I mean look he wracked up 3 fight of the night awards against Thiago Tavares (win), Jim Miller (loss), and Sam Stout (loss).
I'm going with Miller finishing by submission in the 3rd round.
No comments:
Post a Comment