UFC 79: Georges St-Pierre Vs. Matt Hughes III & Chuck Liddell Vs. Wanderlei Silva

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  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    The bad computer juju has hit me hard. :( I started up my laptop last night and got this blank screen. So I restarted it and got nothing ... eventually I got this scary DOS-like screen, so I shut it down quickly (at least it wasn't the blue screen of death). I'm going to take it into the computer shop tomorrow so maybe they can salvage it. The only thing I really care about saving is all my music and some pictures. Cross your fingers for me!

    I'll still be around on Saturday for the finale, just posting slower because I'll have to do it from my cellphone (they still aren't evil mooks).
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    ReleasH wrote:
    My predictions for Saturday ...
    Main Card:
    Roger Huerta Vs. Clay Guida - Huerta by tko
    Mac Danzig Vs. Tom Speer - Danzig by submission
    George Sotiropoulos Vs. Billy Miles - Sotiropoulos by submission
    Jared Rollins Vs. Jon Koppenhaver - Rollins by decision ... but I might change my mind at the last second on this one

    Pre-lims:
    Dan Barrera Vs. Ben Saunders - Barrera by tko
    Matt Arroyo Vs. John Kolosci - Arroyo by decision
    Paul Georgieff Vs. Jonathan Goulet - Goulet by tko
    Troy Mandaloniz Vs. Richie Hightower - Hightower by submission
    Roman Mitichyan Vs. Dorian Price - Mitichyan by tko

    right, right, right, wrong...etc. :D:D:D

    i think after i watch the marathon tomorrow and see roman's reaction to the doctor again, i might have to change my pick from price to the crazy armenian guy! :D
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    ReleasH wrote:
    The bad computer juju has hit me hard. :( I started up my laptop last night and got this blank screen. So I restarted it and got nothing ... eventually I got this scary DOS-like screen, so I shut it down quickly (at least it wasn't the blue screen of death). I'm going to take it into the computer shop tomorrow so maybe they can salvage it. The only thing I really care about saving is all my music and some pictures. Cross your fingers for me!

    I'll still be around on Saturday for the finale, just posting slower because I'll have to do it from my cellphone (they still aren't evil mooks).

    good luck, releash. i hope they can save you info. that was the worst part the first time mine crashed on me. fingers are crossed here for you.

    oddly enough, mine seems to have made a recovery and everything's working fine. the fan isn't noisy and it's running smoother than before...all a certain sign that i'll get that "blue screen of death" you mentioned. :D

    what's going on with the electronics, eh?!? for this one time only, i will extol the virtues of having the cell phone for saturday night! ;)
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    here's a good article about roger huerta from espn's page 2. every buckheit article i've read, i've liked. she does a very good job of covering the sport and the athletes, i find. one error, though....he hasn't had 22 fights since 2006! :D i think she meant to say over his career...


    El Matador: From humble beginnings to UFC's brightest young star

    By Mary Buckheit
    Page 2
    December 6, 2007


    Roger Huerta had to teach himself how to survive. He had no choice.


    Sounds simple, but that's probably the biggest factor leading to Huerta's swift rise to prominence in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. Since a mixed martial artist endures an attack on his life each and every time he steps into the octagon, the basic requirement of the sport is simply the ability to survive. And Huerta's childhood taught him nothing if not that.


    Roger Huerta faces his biggest fight yet on Saturday night at The Palms.
    "I can't believe I'm here," the 24-year-old Huerta told me over the phone from his home and training headquarters in St. Paul, Minn. -- where he's been training for his big bout against Clay "The Carpenter" Guida on Saturday night in "The Ultimate Fighter" Season 6 finale. "I think about what I saw as a little boy, and living through all that went on down there around me -- the war and the gangs and the drugs -- and sometimes I really just can't believe I'm alive."


    Huerta's troubles started when his parents' marriage disintegrated dramatically when he was 5 years old. He said his father was involved in an affair, a discovery that sent his mother spiraling into an agitated and abusive state. Huerta spent time in foster care while a bitter custody battle ensued. His father was awarded full custody, but his mother wouldn't stand for the ruling. So she seized Roger from her ex-husband's home in Dallas and fled to her parents' home in El Salvador. Then, still severely emotionally unhinged, Lydia Huerta took flight herself, leaving her son with his grandparents -- who could do nothing but keep him in the house all day, away from the ferocity of the civil war that raged outside.


    Huerta's mother eventually would return for him -- but only to take him to San Juan, Mexico and drop him on the doorstep of his father. By this time, Huerta's father had developed into a violent drug addict. Meaning Huerta was forced to fend for himself, selling trinkets and gum on the streets.


    All of this occurred before his 13th birthday. "I should be dead," Huerta says, bluntly.


    Eventually Huerta's father split, as well, leaving Huerta homeless, with no family but the street gang he fell into. Yet somehow, through all of this, he persevered. He kept going to school because it was the only place that offered him safety, not to mention a meal. "No matter what I was feeling or what was going on, I felt safe at school and I worked hard at it," he says. "I didn't know where I might be sleeping that night, but I knew where I would eat lunch the next day."


    Huerta's endearing personality and poise surely played a part in several families' willingness to take him in and care for him during his middle-school years. Eventually the mother of a friend was given legal guardianship, and she provided his ticket out of San Juan. "That's how I first moved to Austin [Texas]," Huerta explains. "We had a little apartment there."


    Huerta settled into his new surroundings -- still modest, but stable and supportive, which was all he needed in order to excel in school and wrestling. And, while attending Crockett High School, Huerta first met Jo Ramirez -- an English teacher who set out to advise Huerta about his college applications, but ended up building a much stronger bond with him. "She was the first one to really hear my whole story," Huerta says.


    Ramirez helped Huerta get into Augsburg College in Minnesota -- a school with a well-regarded wrestling program -- and eventually legally adopted Huerta in 2002. "She's my guardian angel," Huerta says of Ramirez. "That's my mom. She's my rock, she's my angel, she's my back. She is amazing. She is everything to me.


    "I don't remember what my real mom looks like. If I saw her today I wouldn't know her. Not even if she were sitting right next to me at a table in a restaurant. The last time I saw her was first grade. And my dad? I don't know anything of him. I mean, I don't know what ever happened to him."


    What happened to Roger "El Matador" Huerta, however, is nothing short of a Cinderella story.


    Huerta made the move from wrestling mats to octagons right after he was exposed to his first MMA bout in Minneapolis. "It was that kind of thing where you see something and that's all you want to do," Huerta says. "You just feel it."


    "The sport came so naturally [to him]," says UFC play-by-play announcer Mike Goldberg. "It didn't take long for everybody to notice that he was a very good fighter."


    Huerta's meticulous grappling style led his trainers to coin his now-household nickname. "They started calling me Matador, like the bullfighter, because they said I look methodical when I fight, like each move is planned out," says Huerta. "They said it looks like I don't struggle much.

    "That's what they think, anyway. I think I struggle quite a bit," he adds, with a chuckle.


    Struggles? Perhaps. But Huerta has never looked like a crazed kid carrying out a vendetta on his past. "Somehow he has found the strength within himself to put that past away," Goldberg says. "He is able to compartmentalize and contain all that. ... We're all amazed because he is upbeat and smiling all the time; he's gentle and so sincere. The kid was practically raised by street gangs, yet he's the most soft-spoken and polite guy you'll ever meet. And on top of that, he's got real talent."


    Back in May, Huerta was in Las Vegas for UFC 71. It turned out to be a rough weekend for UFC's biggest star, Chuck Liddell, who suffered a knockout at the hands of Rampage Jackson. But it also proved to be a celebration for the sport as a whole -- thanks to Huerta making the cover of Sports Illustrated, a first for mixed martial arts.


    "I got off the phone [after hearing the Sports Illustrated news] and I hopped right on the bike and I just rode for as long as I could," Huerta says. "I don't drink anymore. I don't party. Everybody is always like, 'Oh, the cover boy, you're the cover boy.' But I want people to know that I train hard and I work hard and I want to be a champion.


    Huerta, whose record is 20-1-1 since his UFC debut in September 2006, can take the next step on Saturday night. "This is Roger's shot at validation," Goldberg says. "He has the potential to someday fill the shoes as the next Chuck Liddell-type. He has the potential of being the first name people mention when they talk about the Ultimate Fighting Championship."


    Huerta says he never stops thinking about the circumstances he overcame, and the purpose he believes his journey was meant to serve. "I don't know why I made it out alive," Huerta says. "But I want to show people what is possible."


    Some would say he already has.

    http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=buckheit/071206
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    everbody makes the weight. we're set to go!

    Main Card:

    Roger Huerta (155) vs. Clay Guida (155)
    Mac Danzig (168.5) vs. Tom Speer (170) (mac made it known yesterday that he plans to cut back down to compete at LW after this fight)
    Jared Rollins (169) vs. Jon Koppenhaver (170)
    George Sotiropoulous (169) vs. Billy Miles (170)
    Dan Barrera (170) vs. Ben Saunders (169)

    Pre-lims:

    Troy Mandaloniz (170) vs. Richie Hightower (170)
    Matt Arroyo (169) vs. John Kolosci (170)
    Roman Mitichyan (170) vs. Dorian Price (170)
    Paul Georgieff (170) vs. Jonathan Goulet (170)

    go huerta! go guida! i can't wait for this match. :)

    p.s. vas-y goulet!

    edit: dan vs. ben has been added to the main televised card. :)
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    i'm fading in and out watching this marathon today. i feel a nap coming on, but with only a few hours to go, i think an adrenaline rush might kick in soon...

    should have taped the K-1 grand prix instead of getting up at 4 am this morning to watch it live. i didn't even truly wake up until the end of the third match!

    releash, i hope you're out there with the evil cell phone if the computer is still on the fritz. otherwise i'll be talking to myself, with nobody home. :D i think everyone seems to be checking out the boxing tonight. they'll be missing the fight of the year, though!... i wish huearta vs. guida was five rounds!
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    mookie blaylock 10 wrote:
    i'm fading in and out watching this marathon today. i feel a nap coming on, but with only a few hours to go, i think an adrenaline rush might kick in soon...

    should have taped the K-1 grand prix instead of getting up at 4 am this morning to watch it live. i didn't even truly wake up until the end of the third match!

    releash, i hope you're out there with the evil cell phone if the computer is still on the fritz. otherwise i'll be talking to myself, with nobody home. :D i think everyone seems to be checking out the boxing tonight. they'll be missing the fight of the year, though!... i wish huearta vs. guida was five rounds!

    Hey mooks!! (waves hi)
    I'm here on the evil cellphone. My computer is still down for the count but I'm borrowing my roommates' for tonight. Getting excited for Huerta (and his shorts) and the rest of the fights. Vas y Danzig!!

    I just woke up from a wonderful nap so I'll be all rested for the fights!
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    ReleasH wrote:
    Hey mooks!! (waves hi)
    I'm here on the evil cellphone. My computer is still down for the count but I'm borrowing my roommates' for tonight. Getting excited for Huerta (and his shorts) and the rest of the fights. Vas y Danzig!!

    I just woke up from a wonderful nap so I'll be all rested for the fights!

    right on! :)

    i was happy to hear they added a fifth fight to the telecast. it will be interesting to see how the rematch with ben and dan goes.

    also, i won't post spoilers again, but i'd like to chant a little tune...

    goulet, goulet, goulet, goulet...goulet, goulet! :D

    that just woke me up!
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    pre-lims are complete and aboot fifteen until the show starts...don't feel like watching tommy beat george again on the show...must...look away...:D
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    mookie blaylock 10 wrote:
    right on! :)

    i was happy to hear they added a fifth fight to the telecast. it will be interesting to see how the rematch with ben and dan goes.

    also, i won't post spoilers again, but i'd like to chant a little tune...

    goulet, goulet, goulet, goulet...goulet, goulet! :D

    that just woke me up!

    :):D Glad you're awake now! Only a couple more minutes ... I'm also happy they are showing Dan v. Ben. Let's hope Dan doesn't get beaten to a bloody pulp this time.
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    I still can't decide who I think will win in the Jared Rollins v. Jon Koppenhaver fight.
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    ReleasH wrote:
    I still can't decide who I think will win in the Jared Rollins v. Jon Koppenhaver fight.

    tough one to call, eh?

    ...sorry about the goulet spoiler. i was just happy to read that jonathan got the win. that should probabaly get him on the april card in montreal. :)
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    mookie blaylock 10 wrote:
    tough one to call, eh?

    ...sorry about the goulet spoiler. i was just happy to read that jonathan got the win. that should probabaly get him on the april card in montreal. :)

    I guess I'll stick with my gut and say that JRock will get the win.

    No worries about the spoiler, mooks. Good for Goulet. So are they still planning on having an event in Montreal? I thought that was essentially not going to happen since GSP is fighting Hughes in a couple weeks. I guess if GSP wins then he and Matt could fight in April for the unification title. I still want to come up there at some point.
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    Close first round ... I would give it to Saunders, but Dan really came on at the end.
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    yeah, that's the rumour. jason macdonald said in an interview that he is fighting at the ufc's first canadian show in montreal in april. supposedly, they're going to try to have georges on the card if he is healthy and ready to fight, but that also depends on serra's health...a lot of if's !

    pretty good first round. completely different from the first fight. great knees and takedown defense from ben. i'd have to give it slightly to ben.
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    ben probabaly pulled that one out at the end. those are the positions where i wish knees were legal from north / south. he might have been able to finish after the head kick.
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    wow, that body triangle of Saunders is amazing. Dan can't do anything.

    I would definitely give it to Saunders. I would be surprised if it was not a unanimous decision
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    i was about to say the same thing, releash. definitive round three all ben. dan didn't have much to offer but his strength. ben looked impressive. at 24, and 6'3"...and continuing to train at ATT...look out ww's! :D seriously, though, he has some serious potential.

    edit: seriously...:D
  • ReleasH
    ReleasH Posts: 743
    mookie blaylock 10 wrote:
    i was about to say the same thing, releash. definitive round three all ben. dan didn't have much to offer but his strength. ben looked impressive. at 24, and 6'3"...and continuing to train at ATT...look out ww's! :D seriously, though, he has some serious potential.

    Ben cracks me up! :) He can barely keep a straight face. He's got the significant height/reach advantage but also has the technique to back it up. +1 for his serious potential mookie
  • mookie blaylock 10
    mookie blaylock 10 Posts: 4,042
    also, it was nice to see ben give a sadistic smile for the big screen as he was trying for that rear naked choke for a couple of minutes. always have to entertain the fans! haha

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