I have to say that I was kind of disappointed in the event. Although I was surprised at how good the Sherk vs. Griffin fight was, the rest of the card was just ok. Let's go fight by fight below:
Sherk vs. Griffin-Sherk utilized his underrated boxing game and some timely takedowns to win this fight. There were a couple of exchanges during the fight in which both fighters landed some absolute bombs. However, no one was in any real danger of being stopped. I picked this fight to go the distance, but I must admit the fight went much different than I anticipated. Sherk places himself in a good position to continue knocking off up and comers, and I wouldn't be surprised if we saw BJ Penn vs. Sean Sherk 2 at some point next year.
Fabricio Werdum vs. Junior dos Santos-Huge upset here and I commented in my predictions post that dos Santos looked quick and explosive. However, I never thought he would do that to Werdum and that is a major setback for him. Because the fight was so short and there was relatively little action up until the KO, I won't be dropping Werdum to far in my rankings. I think he did a Chuck Liddell and just got caught.
Gray Maynard vs. Rich Clementi-You may have read herewhere I spoke on Gray Maynard being the bully of the UFC LW division. That's exactly what he did to UFC vet Rich Clementi last night. He pretty much used his wrestling to score big slams, doing just enough on the ground while avoiding Clementi's submission attempts. Maynard can pose problems for a lot of fighters, but he must learn to do more in terms of his offensive game if he wants to continue up the LW ladder.
Thiago Alves vs. Josh Koscheck-Wow, I just knew that Koscheck would be able to take Alves down and grind out a decision. Boy was I wrong as I don't recall Koscheck getting one single take down all night. Alves set the tone early in the fight with a left hook that rocked Koscheck, and that may have thrown Koscheck off his game. Alves was relentless with devastating leg kicks and combinations that frustrated Koscheck. Alves had Koscheck hurt several times, but was not able to finish him. I give BIG props to Koscheck for taking this fight on 2 weeks notice, he proved to be very game and I don't see this loss hurting him that bad. Alves asked for a title shot, and I would be hyped to see Alves vs. GSP.
Anderson Silva vs. Patrick Cote-I was really disappointed in this fight, because it was like Cote knew he didn't belong in there with Anderson Silva. When you start bragging about making it to the third round DURING the fight, that tells me all I need to know. Silva toyed with Cote like a little kid and did whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. I was disappointed in SIlva because of this, I felt like he should have just gone on and put Cote away instead of playing around. Screw a re-match, Silva has 5 fights left on his contract and all of them should be in the LHW division unless they give Nate Marquardt a re-match with Silva at 185.
How would you rate UFC 90 on a scale of 1-10?