The UFC celebrated its 100th event last night with an all-star fight card at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas. The show did not disappoint as there were a number of quality scraps for the fans to enjoy. For MMA bettors, well, let's hope they stayed with the chalk, especially in the three headlining fights. Brock Lesnar got his revenge in the main event with a TKO win against Frank Mir, Georges St. Pierre retained his welterweight title with a unanimous decision victory over Thiago Alves, and Dan Henderson shut Michael Bisping up with a stunning KO in the second round.
The main event fight of the evening, a battle for the heavyweight title between Brock Lesnar and Frank Mir, was lopsided right from the beginning. Lesnar displayed a patience that he did not do in his first meeting with Mir and he was better off for it. Mir, however, was not. There was a brief feeling out process at the start of the first round, but Lesnar moved pretty quickly to get the fight to the ground. Once there, it was all but over for Mir.
Lesnar used his tremendous size advantage to dominate the Las Vegas native from the top position. Lesnar passed Mir's guard and layed directly on the former champs chest. The Minnesotan then pinned Mir's right arm behind his head, rolled him into partial side control and began to tee off on his face. Mir survived the action by getting into a more guarded position with about a minute left in the first round.
The second round began with a few glancing blows before Lesnar got Mir to the mat again. Amazingly, the current champion let Mir up and he almost paid for it. The jiu-jisu black belt landed some great knees on Lesnar before the former WWE star realized he needed to get things to the ground again.
Once Lesnar had things on the mat, he proceeded to gain a similar position to the one he had in the first round, only this time he was able to squeeze Mir against the cage. With no wiggle for the 30 year old Mir, Lesnar repeatedly reigned down thunderous shots to the side of his face until referee Herb Dean moved in to stop the fight at 1:48 into the round.
Georges St. Pierre had a dominating performance as well, but he did it over the course of five rounds. It was no secret Alves wanted to keep the fight standing up so he could use his vicious leg kicks to setup a knockout punch. That game plan never materialized for the young Brazilian as St. Pierre used quick jabs and leg kicks of his own to neutralize Alves' standup attack. Once he had established the threat of a counter-strike, St. Pierre was able to repeatedly take Alves to the ground.
St.Pierre controlled all five rounds by dominating the Brazilian on the mat, and although Alves was able to get back to his feet on a few occasions, he was never able to do anything substantive once there. The only time St. Pierre looked to be in any trouble at all was in the fourth round. The French-Canadian got too high on Thiago's back and slid over the top. Alves quickly moved to get on top of the champ in an attempt to land some leather from the top position. St. Pierre absorbed a few decent shots, but was back to his feet within a minute.
St. Pierre indicated to his corner that he had injured his groin some time in the third round, but whatever happened, it was not enough to stop him, nor was Alves.
Dan Henderson apparently had a lot of animosity build up toward Michael Bisping when they coached opposite each other on The Ultimate Fighter 9. He never said much to counter all of Bisping's talk during the show's filming, but it clearly got under his skin. Well, last night Henderson let his fist do the talking and it spoke loudly.
It was clear from the beginning of the fight what the former Olympian's intentions were as he stalked the quicker Bisping around the Octagon. While the Englishman displayed good movement, it was the older, more experienced Henderson who controlled the pace of the fight. Bisping was able to score with a few punches, but "Hendo" landed the heavier shots and at one point looked to have dazed the TUF 3 winner. The first round ended with Henderson ahead on points and having his way inside the cage.
The second round looked much like the first, but it was even more apparant that Henderson was waiting to unload a bomb once Bisping misstepped. "The Count's" error occurred at about 3:18 into the round when he circled to Henderson's right after backing away from a small combination. Henderson unloaded a punch for the ages that landed directly on the 30 year old's chin. The Manchester native was immediately out and his head hit hard off the mat upon landing. Henderson, however, was not done and slammed another blow into Bisping's face as he lay motionless on the ground.
Asked if the last punch was necessary, Henderson replied, "I think that one was just to shut him up a little bit."
Bodog.com UFC 100 Results Payouts:
Brock Lesnar wins as a -255 moneyline favorite
Georges St. Pierre wins as a -280 moneyline favorite
Dan Henderson wins as a -260 moneyline favorite
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