GSP Vs Matt Serra (the first time)

It was back in April of 2007 that the UFC decided to guarantee Matt Serra a shot at the title for winning a reality TV show. Here are some assorted facts from just before the fight:

Matt Serra:
8wins
4losses
1789 rating
1W – 1L in his last 2
3W – 3L in his last 6

GSP:
13wins
1loss
2102 rating
Won 6 in a row after losing to Matt Hughes
Last win was a victory over the very same Matt Hughes mentioned above
Won 7 in a row prior to that one loss

That is where the fighters basically stood coming into the fight. Now lets look a bit deeper at what they had to “gain” and “lose”, what they were “risking” and what their possible “reward” was.

Matt Serra – Risk(s)
Injury.

Honestly, that’s it. He was .500 in his last 2 fights, .500 in his last 6 fights. He’d just earned a title shot by avenging a loss to Shonie Carter and winning a very weird decision over Chris Lytle.

If Matt Serra were to lose this fight no one would say anything. He wouldn’t plummet in the rankings (he wasn’t top anything most places to begin with).

GSP – Risk(s)
His status/ranking.

GSP at this time was considered the #1 welterweight pretty much everywhere. He had won six in a row, he’d just avenged his only loss ever, and was considered by many one of the top p4p fighters in the world.

Matt Serra – Reward(s)
I don’t really have to speculate on the potential rewards for Matt Serra since I know what did happen. For winning this fight Serra immediately leapfrogged a few dozen other fights and landed squarely at #1 on several ranking lists. Additionally, Serra went back to the TUF house as a coach.

Serra also remained very high on the many ranking lists for quite awhile. His next fight after beating GSP didn’t happen until over 1 year later. Following that loss to GSP in the rematch, Serra remained on many lists until over a year later again when he finally had another fight and lost to Matt Hughes.

I say none of this to take away from Serra as a fighter or as a person, but simply to illustrate the point that Serra literally built *YEARS* off of this one single win. That shows just how much “reward” was available for him.

GSP – Reward(s)
Equaling his previous career high of 7 wins in a row?

In all seriousness, there was nothing for GSP to gain from this fight. Serra was an unranked(ish) fighter that though liked, was a tremendous underdog. After just beating the only fighter to beat him and the man considered the greatest welterweight of all time, GSP got matched up against someone no one mentioned prior to the show.

Imagine if GSP had simply beaten Serra on that night, and I’m not talking about a really brutal beating, but just a solid, undisputed unanimous decision. Looking back from today would we mention Matt Serra when talking about GSP’s best wins?

When talking to a friend of yours about why GSP is one of the p4p best would you have even gotten to Serra’s name given the list of other fighters GSP has beaten? Even now when looking back at GSP’s career do you mention his win over Serra?

Heath Herring Vs Brock Lesnar

A more recent fight that helps illustrate bad Risk vs Reward in matchmaking happened last August when Heath Herring got matched up against Brock Lesnar.

Brock Lesnar:
1win
1loss
Coming off a submission loss in his UFC debut

Heath Herring:
28 wins
13 losses
Coming off a win over Cheick Kongo following a “loss” to Big Nog that could have easily been stopped in Herring’s favor.

What makes this fight so weird (from a ranking point of view) is that Brock Lesnar actually wound up higher ranked for beating Heath Herring than Heath Herring would have been if he’d won. Please take a second and think that over.

Heath Herring was obviously the higher ranked fighter going into the fight. He’d fought some of the best in the world, he’d just beat an up and coming contender in Kongo, he’d gotten within fractions of a second of beating Big Nog (#2 in the world at the time), etc.

Meanwhile, Brock Lesnar was 1 and 1 at the time. His first fight ever was a win over a guy that was 3-5 (3 wins, FIVE losses). After that he fought Frank Mir and lost that fight in the first round.

Knowing all of that, I pray it’s safe to say that Heath Herring was ranked higher at the time of the fight. Now lets look at the fight from both sides. First the side we know…

Brock Wins
Brock Lesnar beat Heath Herring via decision and in doing so earned a title shot. That’s right a fighter beat a 3-5 fighter, got submitted in the first round of his next fight, and by winning a decision in their third ever fight was given a title shot in the “best organization in the world”.

Yet again I am forced to point out that I take nothing away from Brock, but rather it is important to realize the sheer amount of “reward” this fight garnered. A decision win over Heath Herring was enough to get a 2-1 fighter a title shot in the biggest organization in the world. That is a *LOT* of reward.

Heath Wins
Lets now take a look at it from Heath Herring’s side of things. If Heath Herring wins does he get a title shot? If so then why wasn’t this just billed as a #1 contender fight? Also, if Heath Herring wins that means Brock is now 1-2. His only win coming against a 3-5 fighter and he’s lost two in a row in the UFC. Would Heath have even gotten much credit for beating Brock at that point?

Going back to the question I posed about mentioning Matt Serra when explaining GSP’s career, would a 1 win, 2 loss Brock Lesnar really make the list at that point for Heath? Remember Heath has wins over Evan Tanner (his first loss ever after winning 6 in a row to start his career), and Igor Volvchanchyn (seriously look up his fights if you want to be entertained…and frightened a little). Heath also had fought fighters such as: Fedor, Cro cop, Big Nog(a few times lol), Vitor Belfort, and many others.

Put yourself on August 10th, 2008 after Heath Herring beat a now 1 and 2 Brock Lesnar and tell me how you’d use that win in a discussion to promote Heath Herring without mentioning Brock was “large”.

Can’t have it both ways

What I find interesting is that in a lot of cases the bad matchmaking relies on both fight outcomes to justify the fight. For instance, people try to give GSP credit for beating Matt Serra in the rematch, but the only reason for that is that Serra actually won the first fight. Had GSP simply won the first time, no one would even mention it.

In a similar case some like to claim, “beating Brock would have helped Heath’s career” because they are piggybacking on the fact that Brock actually won and got a title shot. If Herring simply won and Brock fell to 1 and 2, no one would have been accepting that. To make matters even worse, Brock is still very early in his MMA career. His loss against Frank Mir is already discounted by some and if he were to win the rematch many will “forget” it entirely.

It seems very likely that even if Heath had won and Brock still went on to be great in the next couple of years people wouldn’t have given Heath very much credit because Brock was still so “new”.

Again I pose a question, what is the scenario where Heath Herring really would have gained from beating Brock Lesnar? Obviously a win at that time wasn’t going to do him much good, and Brock had far more to gain from a win.

Know a scenario where a win over Brock would have really gained Heath something? A year or two down the road after Brock had actually fought a few more people. If Brock came into the fight at even 5-2 as a slightly more established fighter then the risk vs reward would have been more even between the two fighters.

Year of the Upset

It’s fairly common to hear people talk about big upsets and what not in MMA, but understand they are bred out of poor matchmaking. When you see a fight announced try to step back for a second and look at it from all angles. Ask yourself:

“What if Fighter A wins? What do they gain? Where do they stand?”
“What if Fighter B wins? What do they gain? Where do they stand?”

In many cases these “bad fights” are simply inevitable because the matchup makes a “good” outcome almost impossible.

Disclaimer

I know some people will read this and think I’m hating on Fighter A or Fighter B specifically and that simply isn’t the case. My intention is to piggyback onto this rant tomorrow and address another key point in discussions like this. Till then I’m off to do other evil things…

Diego Sanchez Vs Kenny Florian Fighter Comparision

Diego just had a solid showing against Clay Guida and although he said the cut was a bit rough he seems fairly acclimated to lightweight at this point. Given the back story with Florian, and the fact that win or lose Kenny Florian will still be a highly ranked lightweight I think they should square of next regardless of how the BJ Penn fight plays out.

Jamie Varner Vs Joe Stevenson Fighter Comparision

Also scoring a big win recently was Joe Stevenson. I think a great fight for him in his attempt to move back up the rankings would be against Jamie Varner. This is a fight that might be less likely given organizational differences, but the fight makes a ton of sense.

Varner is one of those fighters that people seem to dismiss, but click the link above and look at how he stacks up historically compared to Joe Stevenson. The two fighters overall level of competition is *VERY* similar. Additionally, Varner has a higher win%, a higher KO%, and a higher sub%. Simply put Varner has earned the right to fight at a higher level and show whether he really belongs there.

For me this is exactly the type of fight that should be made because both fighters have something to gain, both are risking something and the fight is good from both a sport (ranking) and fun (entertainment) point of view.

JZ Vs. Eddie Alvarez Fighter Comparison

I’ve actually heard rumors recently that this fight might happen, but haven’t seen anything confirmed yet. As you can guess I’m all for such a fight. JZ is an incredibly entertaining fighter with heaps of potential. He has faced many of the best lightweights and although he’s suffered a couple losses there’s no reason to believe he won’t start moving right back up the rankings.

Moving up the rankings is exactly what Eddie Alvarez has been doing lately. Sadly some might not have followed Alvarez recently as some of his more recent fights have been outside the more popular organizations. Like JZ, Eddie has faced some of the best fighters in the world. It’s interesting to notice that although both have lost to Shinya Aoki, and both hold wins over Andre Amade, Eddie actually holds wins over Hellboy and Kawajiri (both of whom have defeated JZ).

Whoever is trying to make this fight happen has my full support and I thank them for trying to put together such a great match.

Not to mention…

Although the lightweight division is such a “mess” it’s also very entertaining and full of incredible fighters. Whether the fights I mention above happen or not there are lots of other great fights already setup for fighters like: Penn, Florian, Aoki, Thompson, Melendez, and Kitaoka.

I know some look at the lightweight rankings on this site and think it proves the system stinks. The truth is it proves that the lightweight division is ferocious~!!! You’ve got so many great fighters clumped so closely in skill and and most of the fighters have wins/losses already against each other. It’s going to be very difficult for anyone to put together a solid win streak against this level of competition.

When a fighter does pull of a few wins though it is important to remember that doesn’t make their opponent trash and it doesn’t mean they are forever going to sit atop such a stacked division. Whether you like or the loath the person that appears at number one in the coming weeks and months I think it wise to respect whomever is there for all they have accomplished and wish them luck in holding onto that spot…they will surely need it.

Better Intro?

History has taught us that when personal skill/style is absent it is wise to hop on the nearest pair of coattails and ride your way to the top. Given my complete lack of both style and skill I found it prudent to simply ride on the coattails of a better intro instead of trying to write my own. Without further ado…

Some…Nights
Some…Fights
Go slippin’ through the cracks

But, Guess…who?!
EVIL…POOH
Is pickin’ up the slack

There’s no fight too long,
No fight too quick
When you need info just click

M – M – A – E – L – O
For your answers
M – M – A – E – L – O
When there’s questions

No No it never fails once you get there
Somehow everything is fair!!!

M – M – A – E – L – O
For your answers
M – M – A – E – L – O
When there’s questions

No no it never fails, with Evil Pooh
They’ll show the where’s and why’s and who’s

M – M – A – E – L – O
For your answers
M – M – A – E – L – O
When there’s questions

M! – M! – A! – E! – L! – O!

If you need help finding the beat check out Inspiration and then try again. 8)

Tune in next week when I butcher one of these Next Week?

Hating the game, not the player

Mike Swick got screwed at UFC 99. Not by bad judging, and not by bad reffing. Nay nay, Mr. Swick sadly found himself as just another victim of bad match making. I’d held out all hope since the moment this “fight” was made official that something would change, but sadly, it never did.

I know what some are thinking, “Swick won”, yeah he did, and in doing so claimed a prize of basically nothing. It was an empty win from a fight where he had almost nothing to gain and far, far too much to lose. Even Joe Rogan (who I sometimes get accused of being too hard on) got it right when he pointed out at the start of the fight that the fight really made no competitive sense.

As Joe pointed out Ben Saunders had a lot to gain from the fight, but basically nothing to lose. On the reverse side, Mike Swick had almost nothing to gain and tons to lose. Swick is a fighter that had won three fights in a row since dropping to welterweight (after a loss to Yushin Okami). Prior to that lose he’d won five fights in a row at middleweight.

Instead of getting a “step up in competition” he was given a fighter that though promising simply isn’t at that “next tier”. Please understand that this is nothing against Saunders and he could easily be 2k+ some day and a world champion, but on that night, at that point in both of their careers it was a horrible match up choice. Let’s take a look and see if we can’t come up with some good options for Swick’s next fight.

Mike Swick Vs Martin Kampmann

Is an interesting match up. Kampmann has two wins in a row and also recently dropped form Middleweight to Welterweight. Both guys have the ability to end a fight. This is a fight that makes sense from a ranking and an entertainment point of view.

Mike Swick Vs Karo Parisyan

Is an interesting match up as well. Karo is a fighter that seems to always be “two fights away” from a title shot. After an accident took away his chance against Matt Hughes, he’s struggled to put the right streak together. Karo’s most recent fight was a NC and right before that he lost to Thiago Alves. The winner of this fight would likely only need 1 more “solid” win to guarantee themselves a title shot. Again, seems like good risk/reward for both fighters invovled.

Mike Swick Vs Matt Hughes

This is a fight that Swick pseudo asked for following his win over Saunders. I know some think Hughes should just retire, but like I mentioned last MMM he obviously still wants to compete. Both fighters are quite close in ranking and this is one of those “crossroads” types of fights. Swick is obviously on his way up and many think Hughes is on his way out.

Looking at this fight from an actual fight point of view I think it’s pretty interesting as well. Swick has fast hands and solid striking. Hughes…not so much. Hughes has great take downs, but Swick has demonstrated a solid guillotine in previous fights and might be able to catch Matt while he’s working for a take down.

Putting it all together

Any of the above fights would work well for Swick and help clear up the somewhat cloudy welterweight picture. If I had Carte Blanche I think this is what I’d do (with random notes)…

Mike Swick Vs Matt Hughes – Hughes Vs Alves possibly to follow, Swick gets possible title shot or number one contender fight off a win.

Dan Hardy Vs. Martin Kampmann Should be fireworks. Likely #1 contender fight to follow for winner.

Matt Serra Vs. Marcus Davis Both coming off a loss (Two in the case of Serra). Both fighters are “heavy handed” at welterweight and although likely to bang, there’s still a chance for some excitement on the ground.

Ben Saunders Vs. Dustin Hazelett Saunders is still on the rise overall and a loss to someone he really shouldn’t have been in the ring with shouldn’t take away from that. Let him test himself against an exciting ground fighter like Hazelett. Not to look too far ahead, but I think the winner of this match versus the loser of the Kampmann/Hardy match would be a very interesting follow-up. *shrugs*

Be gentle

I know it’s a lot of fights and law of averages says everyone will hate at least one, and someone will hate all of them. All I ask is that you think about it, and explain what would be so bad about them. From a ranking standpoint all of them seem quite sound, and from a “would I pay money for this” they seem sound as well. There is no doubt that dozens of other equally great fights could be made though. As long as fighters are in competitive matches where both involved have something to gain, I’m all for it.

A majority of the complaints I get regarding this site tend to boil down to “Fighter A is too high”. Usually I respond to this by simply stating that if someone would beat them they’d go lower. However, I often understand where the person commenting is coming from. I’ve contended for awhile that if I could just make a fight or two here and there it’d help “clean up” a lot of the data. With that in mind I thought I’d start up a new little segment called, “Monday MatchMaker”. (insert corny it’s mmm mmm good blurb here)

Matt Hughes Vs. Jake Shields

I’ll start right out by saying this isn’t the fight I planned to mention today. However, with the result from this weekend’s Strikeforce card (Is the spoiler alert supposed to go before or after you give away information? *shrugs*) the fight became even more interesting in my opinion.

Shields

Shields is a fighter that has been on a tear for awhile now, but seems to get no respect. People constantly think he’s rated too high, but he just keeps winning. A solid win over a fighter like Matt Hughes would likely make more people finally take notice.

Hughes

Hughes is an all-time great who’s career is starting to wind down. I personally felt that professionally he should have retired several years ago because there simply was nothing left for him to do. There is no doubt that Hughes has the hunger to continue competing though and the chance to avenge the recent loss of a training partner is an extra little incentive. (Spoiler alert? Bleh, I’ll work on it)

The Fight

I know some fans will be weary of a fight that has very little chance of a standing KO finish, but this match could be explosive. Hughes’ BJJ continues to be underrated, and Shields is more tenacious/explosive than many realize. Since both fighters excel in the same areas it would be interesting to see who was able to impose their will on the other.

The fight also balances out nicely is that whichever fighter won, would be ranked higher (on this site, and likely others). This means both have something to gain, and both have something to lose (a topic I’ll discuss more in the coming weeks).

Fighter Comparison – Matt Hughes Vs. Jake Shields

Brock Larson Vs. Josh Koscheck

Since the above match isn’t very likely due to the organizational differences between the fighters, I figured I’d throw in an extra matchup. This is another welterweight showdown, but in this case both fighters are currently in the UFC.

Brock Larson

Similar to Shields mentioned above Brock is a fighter that some think is “too high”. Again though, he continues to win. One of the obvious knocks on Brock is that he hasn’t faced very difficult competition. Looking at:

MMA ELO – Current Welterweight Rankings

we see that although Brock is ranked quite high currently his Strength of Schedule is the fourth *lowest* of the fighters in the top 25. (Evil Tip – You can sort the rankings pages by the various columns by clicking on the column heading, in this case “strength of schedule”).

Taking on a tested fighter like Koscheck would show whether Brock is ready to hang at the upper levels of the welterweight division.

Josh Koscheck

Josh is a fighter that needs to get back on a roll. After winning five in a row (including giving Diego Sanchez his first ever loss) Kos lost a decision to GSP (big understatement). He came back from the loss to win two in a row, but then lost another decision to Thiago Alves. Following another win was…you guessed it, another loss.

Kos needs to get back on the right track and a solid win over an experienced fighter would be a great start.

The Fight

I have to confess that I haven’t a clue where this fight would go. Truth be told I think these two could fight 5 times and have 5 different outcomes and they’d likely each win at least one. Brock has only gone to decision 3 times in 28 fights, so it’d be interesting to see how he would handle things if the fight went into the later rounds.

Fighter Comparison – Brock Larson Vs. Josh Koscheck

The first of many?

So there you have it, a quick little breakdown of a couple potential (though not overly likely) match-ups. I personally see both fights as being interesting, reasonably marketable, and sound from a rankings standpoint.

Other than fixing the intro, please let me know what you loved/hated. If I don’t get too much hate mail for this I will do it again next week. 8)