The Fairytale of UFC 116: Lesnar Earns His Crown… and MMA Fans get a Spectacular
Posted by David Bateman on July 10th, 2010
When Dana White describes an event as “the best night of his career”, you know it must be a good one.
UFC 116 will not be forgotten by any MMA fan in a hurry. That tends to happen when two FOTN bonuses are awarded in the same night (to Akiyama v Chris Leben and Krzysztof Soszynski v Stephan Bonnar respectively). Then, there is the not-so-small issue of Brock Lesnar.
It’s the closest thing MMA has to a fairytale. The UFC Heavyweight World Champion becomes unbelievably unwell, near death — then makes a triumphant return against possibly the most dangerous striker in MMA history. Love or loathe him, no one can deny Brock Lesnar the title of number one heavyweight in MMA, and not just because Fedor lost…
For whatever reason, Lesnar has always had his doubters and haters. At UFC 116, he proved them wrong. Not only did he beat Shane Carwin, he did so by submission. It may have been a fairly simplistic, rudimentary submission, but it was effective nonetheless.
But what makes this performance impressive, was Brock winning after taking a brutal beating in the first round. No one else has ever withstood an onslaught from Shane Carwin. His knockout power is unrivalled. Yet, somehow Brock took everything Carwin could muster, and prevailed. Anyone questioning his chin, or heart, must surely now renegade on their previous thoughts.
Had Brock done this on any ordinary night, it would be remarkable. But he did so in his first fight back, after a lengthy layoff because of an extremely severe illness.
When you consider that such an epic tale was not worthy of FOTN honours, you begin to see why Dana was so delighted with this event.
While Brock grabbed the headlines for his Blockbuster return, Chris Leben’s story is almost as intriguing. When hearing Leben had agreed to fight Yoshihiro Akiyama just two weeks after defeating Aaron Simpson, I assumed he had suffered a concussion that had gone undetected. Fighting on two weeks notice in 2010? It didn’t appear to be the decision of a sane man. Then, I remembered. It’s Chris Leben. In the space of two weeks, he has gone from rank outsider in the middleweight division to a genuine contender if he wins another fight or two.
The fight against Akiyama was something special. Back and forth action that could genuinely go either way on the judges’ scorecards, when Leben snatches a Triangle victory with 20 seconds left on the clock.
Before that fight took place, Leben’s fellow TUF 1 alumni gave his own FOTN performance. In a do-or-die fight for Stephan Bonnar’s UFC career, at least as far as competing is concerned, The American Psycho showed the qualities that have served him well throughout his career. Krzysztof Soszynski is no push-over, but Bonnar’s relentless pace proved too much. Seemingly back to his brawling best, Bonnar is an amazing competitor.
While Bonnar’s performance was impressive, George Sotiropoulos was arguably even more so. Fighting Kurt Pellegrino, the Australian extended his UFC record to 5-0, and gave himself a very good chance at a title shot at 155 pounds.
Perhaps how brilliant UFC 116 was is best encapsulated by the fact that a Chris Lytle fight was one of the worst on the main card. Regardless, Lytle’s submission victory over Matt Brown was far from dull, and would likely have won SOTN had it not been for Lesnar’s arm triangle in the main event.
Overall, UFC 116 was a huge success, and potentially the UFC’s event of the year.
July 10th, 2010 at 2:10 am
“Love or loathe him, no one can deny Brock Lesnar the title of number one heavyweight in MMA, and not just because Fedor lost…”
Yeah, you know I’m not a fan of the guy. I’ll say it’s about 75% Fedor’s loss and 25% Lesnar’s win… but you have to rank Lesnar #1 at this point.
I prefer to just fall back on both results being a victory for jiu-jitsu though. Ha!
July 12th, 2010 at 7:29 pm
For me, Brock is just a phenomenon. I’ve always loved the guy- his work ethic makes me feel guilty for ever resting. In my opinion, he was always going to overtake Fedor, because no-one else has fought the same quality he has in their first few fights and done as well.
Who else can say they’ve beaten fighters of the quality of Frank Mir, Randy Couture and Shane Carwin in their first six fights? For me, that shows Brock will one day be considered the greatest HW ever. By the time he has fought 20 times, his record will be unbelievable.
While I always thought Lesnar would overtake Fedor, I didn’t expect it to happen so soon. I thought he’d be ranked no.1 HW 2-3 years down the line, after demolishing all the UFC’s HW division.
A lot of people will disagree with this, but in my opinion, if Lesnar can beat Velasquez and Dos Santos/Nelson, his record will already be more impressive than Fedor’s.
July 15th, 2010 at 2:53 pm
Heh. Yeah, I’d be one who disagrees there. Fedor was on top of the HW MMA world for seven years. Let’s wait until Brock stays on top for seven months before talking all-time…
Re: his stellar record, don’t forget that Lesnar also lost to Mir in that six bout span and the Couture he beat was not really among the elite heavyweights anymore. Off the top of my head, I’d say BJ Penn’s first six bouts are probably at least comparable. He blew away several top fighters including Caol Uno, and then fought the top guy to a majority decision.
TH