Russ Gray's Blog

UFC 98 is tonight, and I’m sad at how little excitement there is for the title fight. A lot of people were hyped for Rampage/Evans, but Rampage’s surgery has meant Machida finally gets his shot, and predictably the general assumption is that it’ll be a snooze-fest.

I disagree. I think it’ll be fascinating, and after GSP/Penn this is my most anticipated fight of the year so far.

Both fighters are carrying a reputation from their early fights of being negative, cautious fighters. Both fighters, however, are coming off a series of impressive wins against class opponents. Machida submitted Soko and brutalised Thiago Silva, and almost had Ortiz in the first round, Ortiz saved only by the bell. Evans practically took Chuck’s head off, and almost pounded Griffin’s head through the mat.

The potential problem in this fight is that both traditionally counter-punch, and when you have two counter punchers you wonder who is going to step up and press the action.

I expect Machida to go for it tonight though. Evans, whilst chalking up some impressive victories, has relied somewhat on landing a big counter punch in matches that he was otherwise losing. That’s a dangerous strategy against someone as accomplished in defence as Machida. Quite simply, I think Evans will have difficulty landing anything significant, and Machida will push in the knowledge that his technique is light-years ahead of the champion’s.

I’ve got money on Machida, basically. Evans can win if he manages to land a couple of big hits – Machida’s chin is relatively untested, mostly because no-one has managed to hit it yet – but I expect Machida to do the business, and I’m going to go out on a limb and say he’ll do it quickly – 2nd-round TKO or submission. And maybe, just maybe, one of my favourite fighters will start to get a little more respect – which he’ll cement when he defends the belt against Rampage in the autumn.