Me neither! No doubt that's gonna be a great fight. I said when they announced the fight that if he beats Holloway i'll get behind calling him one of the best in the division.
So if he beats the champion and claims the belt, you might call him ONE of the best? haha But seriously, it's hard to dislike either guy. I still am rooting for Max, I think, but I'm so glad Ortega rose up in the division to break through this Aldo/Max/Frankie rotation.
He's on a great streak but we've seen some take one loss and not recover. I think i'll find it more impressive to see a win over Holloway than Edgar.
Haha I know what you mean - you want to see more from him. But if a person is currently ranked number 1 and currently has the belt, you'd have to say he's objectively (one of) the best. You can't really deny him that because he could hypothetically never win a fight again, ya know?
Totally true. I guess i've just been on the Holloway train for some years now and Ortega is pretty new to me. I had only watched him live 3 times which was from his fight with Moicano foward. I've since watched a few more of his fights online and he's definitely deserving of his rank. I think my issue was i've seen him called THE best because of his win over Edgar. And to me, he doesn't get that title just for being undefeated and beating Frankie who was noticeably shorter and smaller than Ortega in the ring. On top of that, being flagged in your first UFC fight isn't the best look.
That last point is one of the only things that keeps me from being 100% sold on him. He's already way bigger than almost all of the division so to get popped for steroids at 23-ish years old is not good. I still feel like Max is a bad stylistic match up for him but we'll see. Frankie relies on his movement and threat of the take down to get people off their game on the feet, but that doesn't work for Ortega who doesn't care if you take him down. Max is going to fight with a much different strategy.
I expect Max to keep it on their feet. Brian is a great striker, but much more of a threat on the ground. All around I am pumped for this card the more we talk about it.
I'll probably try to watch, but I'm not going to lie, I've basically been off the grid as far as fights go ever since the Khabib/Iaquinta fight with all of that drama on the card. I was checking updates like crazy that week but ever since then I've been way too busy to keep up with MMA.
Whittaker/Romero II was amazing to watch live. Been a very long time since I was that worked up during a fight. Quite possibly since McGregor v Alvarez. I was literally yelling at my phone every time either landed a significant strike and still can't believe they both went the distance.
Halloway is out for Saturday Doesn’t sound good. He’s experiencing concussion like symptoms. Crashed and was hard to wake up
Damn. Hope he gets better soon. He looked super off in this interview. All the comments are about how stoned he looks so I guess that explains why.
Wow he does sound pretty awful there. Slurring his words and everything. That’s three fights in a row he hasn’t been cleared for. Hopefully his camp is taking care of him because that is not a good sign...especially as young as he is.
Looks like they tried to keep Ortega on the card and have Stephens step in but there's not enough time. Halloway won't be ready for UFC 227 so I'd imagine Ortega/Stephens will be booked at some point soon for the interim belt.
I don't blame anyone for sitting and waiting - he earned the shot and has been ready so let him do what he wants. Though you gotta feel for Frankie. He gave Ortega the last minute shot when he didn't have to, got beat and lost his title shot, then doesn't even get mentioned when the tables are turned. Seems like he always gets the short end of the stick. Edit: Meant "didn't get mentioned" as in "he's not in the conversation" because he just had something done to his shoulder so it's too short of notice as the reports coming out all say. It was weird that they even suggested having him fight Stephens instead of Ortega, though.
That was so damn weird. It looked like there was a patch of ice under the table. I swear the UFC I scripting this stuff but doing it to actually LOSE money for some reason.