Lineal 3 update, Thoughts on Spherical card, and balance is restored to WFW division

Good evening gang!

I hope you're all doing good, time for the weekly update! So work is coming along well now, a little faster than I expected too. This time last week I had 10 minutes of work done, today, were sitting at 30 minutes. I've just finished detailing Cro Cops lineal title reign and about to move onto Noguiera. So things are going well! I definitely didn't expect to get a half hours work done by this time, but when it came to discussing some of the Pride events Cro Cop was a part of I ended up just going off on the usual tangents which were fun as hell to write! I'd imagine it'll be mid-October or so before it's ready to upload though.

So, Noche UFC eh?

That was a bit of a strange card. I watched the prelims, and honestly, I thought the whole concept of the Sphere was a complete bust at that point. It seemed genuinely pointless. It was jsut a big, echoey Arena, and Instead of showing fighter intros etc, as they normally do, they were just zooming in on the big screens in the sphere, so people at home were just seeing these slightly out of focus blurry interviews/previews, with some Aztec frames around them. It didn't seem to be worth a fraction of the hype at that point. But, I have to admit, even as someone who criticizes the UFC probably more than I should considering they tend to be the main source of topics for my videos, once the main event started, they pulled that shit off.

The image wall looked fantastic, and even though some of the "SINCE THE DAWN OF MAN, HUMANS HAVE CRAVED FISTING" videos were kinda corny, it was damn impressive all the same. Having the gigantic figures of each fighter looming over the octagon as they were introduced was fantastic, and while I would've liked to seem them change up the backgrounds a bit more (it seemed like there were only one or 2 different backdrops during the fights themselves) it was an amazing spectacle. It just would've been cooler if they went all out and had full on human sacrifices to Quetzalcoatl in the background is all I'm saying. Like just say fuck it and go full Mortal Kombat with it.

This actually made me a bit sad though, as this shows the kind of creativity the UFC can come up with when they're not busy planning the 5th Apex card of that month. And in a way it almost felt like a glimpse of what a real successor to Pride that actually cared about putting on a show and not just a fight card might have looked like. The amazing designs for the ring girls outfits, the backdrops, using drones for sweeping camera shots, it was all top, top tier. As part of Lineal 3, I spend a chunk of time talking about Pride Shockwave 2002. And if you've seen Shockwave 2002, you'll know its legitimately the biggest, most insane spectacle to grace MMA, ever. Noche UFC came close, but for my money, it didn't outdo Shockwave 02. But it's the first event in I don't know how long to actually wow me with its spectacle, creativity and production values. Imagine if anytime the UFC went overseas they pulled out something like this?? But, they wont. In fact, i doubt they'll ever do The Sphere again. The gate was apparently $23m, which is fantastic, but I doubt after renting the sphere and putting together that whole package that a lot of that $23m was left. At least not enough to make it financially viable to do it again. Not for a company that seems loath to spend anything other than the absolute bare minimum, unless it happens to coincide with a Nelk boys birthday. So enjoy this spectacle while you can, is all I'm saying.

As for the fights?

 ORDER HAS BEEN RESTORED! THE QUEENS REIGN SHALL BE ETERNAL!

Okay, so Valentina v Grasso 3 wasn't the most exciting fight you'll ever see. I am willing to concede that. However as a Valentina stan, it was an edge of the seat fight. There were a few hairy moments when Grasso was threatening subs off her back, and I had flashbacks to the first fight, but man, that was about as dominant a performance as you could hope for. 5 rounds to nothing, and 15 minutes of ground control time in a 25 minute fight is an insane statistic. New mythical fighter is unlocked: Valentina Nurmagomedov.

What I was most surprised by though, was how Valentina beat Grasso on the feet in every exchange. Grasso's strength is her boxing, and she outboxed Val in the first fight, (i think it was a bit more even in the 2nd) but in this one, she seemed tentative, ate counters in every single exchange, and seemed outclassed on the feet. Some takedown defense would go a long way for her going forward.

It was a bit of a shame that the main and co-main reduced the pace of the card to that of an asthmatic Snail, as pretty much everything from the Prelims up to Ortega v Lopez was absolute fireworks. It was just unfortunate for Mexico its fighters went 2-7....

I don't think it takes a NostradaMMAs to predict that Merab was going to smother O'Malley as he did. I had said as much to anyone who had asked me about that fight. Wrestling is the meta game once again, and maybe O'Malley got somewhat lucky against Sterling (the punch wasn't lucky, it was accurate af, but the stoppage was maaaaybe a touch too early). I've said it before, but O'Malley is the kind of guy I feel like I should hate, but don't. I think he actually seems like a pretty good guy, he just looks like a complete dickhead. He's also a pretty exciting fighter, and it's a pity he didn't get any real kind of substantial title reign, and now were going to be stuck with Merab "The decision machine" as champ for a while. Again, Merab seems like a good guy, he's funny, respectful and likeable, but fuck me he's not someone I'd ever pay to see fight.

Again, its a shame the event ended on a slog, as up until then, it was probably the best card since 300. And hands down, the best show the UFC has ever staged.

But Valentina, may she reign for a thousand years, won, so that's all that matters really.

That's about all for now! I'll catch you all next week. Thank you again everyone for your support, and for reading, if you made it past the glazing to get this far 😆

Take care and just bleed,

Nap