Strikeforce: Heavy Artillery Thoughts And Commentary

I have to say that I think Strikeforce rebounded well from the disaster of their last show, as the Strikeforce "Heavy Artillery" show was fairly entertaining.  There were some solid fights, some good KO's and a submission.  Also, Strikeforce finally managed to get their heavyweight champion to defend the title he won about 3 years ago.  So I give them props for doing something they were already supposed to do I suppose.  However, why they didn't show the Lyle Beerbohm/Shaolin Ribeiro fight is beyond me.  Why wouldn't they want to highlight a up and comer?  Anyways, on to the fights:

-Britt vs. Calvalcante: I picked Britt to win this one in my only wrong pick of the night.  It was a fairly close fight with both guys landing, and Britt probably landing the better shots up until the point where he got rocked.  Nice job of Calvalcate swarming and getting the impressive finish.  I guess we'll see Calvalcante take on Strikeforce LHW champion King Mo Lawal next?

-Gracie vs. Randleman: I said it in the open thread, props to Kevin Randleman for fighting with a bum knee.  It was clear to me that he wasn't all there physically(when is he?).  I wasn't impressed with Roger Gracie.  Also, the commentators stating that he only trained 20% in his standup was probably true because he couldn't even hit Randleman with any frequency even though he had like a foot reach advantage.  They better bring him along REAL slow.

-Jacare vs. Villasenor: Jacare is going to be a problem if he can ever get his cardio on point.  His striking  has improved a great deal IMO.  He was able to land some nice left hooks as well as some nice kicks against Villasenor.  It appears that Jacare is posed to try and become the Strikeforce middleweight champion once Jake Shields leaves to goto the UFC.

-Silva vs. Arlovski:  Man.  I was surprised to see Silva just take it to AA in the standup department, but it wasn't really close.  I loved the way Silva was patient and countered AA pretty effectively.  I'll give AA credit in that he took some pretty good shots from Silva and stayed in the fight.  I wonder if the long layoff had any affect on AA's performance?  He can say goodbye to my top ten list of HW's.  Should Silva supplant him?

-Overeem vs. Rogers:  This wasn't even a contest as Overeem just had his way with Rogers.  When Rogers was going backwards in the fight, I knew it was a wrap like reynolds.  I was surprised at how Overeem just threw him to the ground like a little kid.  Strikeforce must be able to do Overeem vs. Fedor.  That's their money fight if Fedor gets past Fabricio Werdum next month.


Thoughts on the show/fights?

SBN coverage of Strikeforce St. Louis: Heavy Artillery