MMA-UFC UFC 234 Melbourne

[Dan]

 

[Dan]

Again it's hard to get fighters to come here but at the same I hope the UFC don't continue to take advantage of aussie mma fans by continuing to have average cards. Rod Laver was packed and I honestly thought this morning waking up that it be only half full.

The fans in this country not only turn up in big numbers but also (unlike the UK) pay for the ppv.

The loyalty shown needs to be reflected in the cards.

 

[Topkent]

You do realise the first half of this year has already been planned out? They can’t just create a PPV and put it in Sydney in the next 4-5 months.

No idea why you are trying to make this personal guy. I have no idea who you are.

UFC 236 in April is unassigned an nothing after may has been organised.

Feb, March, April, May, June
5 months.
* yourself.

 

[HLM*]

No idea why you are trying to make this personal guy. I have no idea who you are.

UFC 236 in April is unassigned an nothing after may has been organised.

Feb, March, April, May, June
5 months.
**** yourself.

I’m not, i’m just correcting you. Dana white was asked about this in the post fight presser today and I’m repeating what he said. Don’t shoot the messenger champion.

 

[JG22]

Sounds like Gastelum is just gonna miss his chance, I think in an out 4-5 months Adesanya faces Whittaker in Sydney for the title.
Gastelum probably has to face Romero or someone else to get the number one contender spot again because I can't see them having Adesanya wait 9 months to fight Whittaker.

I know they aren't officially assigned yet but they do have places in mind for those mid year pay per views.

We don't really get more than one PPV every twelve months or so, and that's as a whole country.

But I can definitely see what your saying with Issy v Rob. But thats a lesser draw out of this region.

I think they try and rebook Rob v Kelvin ASAP sometime in the middle of the year, likely in an American city.

If Whittaker wins, a return against Adesanya here late in the year makes sense.

 

[Topkent]

I know they aren't officially assigned yet but they do have places in mind for those mid year pay per views.

We don't really get more than one PPV every twelve months or so, and that's as a whole country.

But I can definitely see what your saying with Issy v Rob. But thats a lesser draw out of this region.

I think they try and rebook Rob v Kelvin ASAP sometime in the middle of the year, likely in an American city.

If Whittaker wins, a return against Adesanya here late in the year makes sense.

It's very possible it's not in Australia an they add them to a Vegas or New York card. Whittaker isn't huge around the world but Adesanya is now.

It's a balancing act, Gastelum deserves the shot but I don't see who Adesanya fights if not Whittaker next?
Maybe Gastelum?
I think after the sales on this one the UFC comes back to Australia this year sometime.
Volk, Bam Bam, Anderson, Crute etc there's alot of talent from here to stack a card plus the Ufc knows they can sell out a stadium without even having international stars. Might not be a PPV but they'll have a big fight night here for sure in Sydney for Whittaker.

 

[Topkent]

If style bender is the number 1 contender he either sits out 6-9 months waiting for Whittaker Gastelum or he over takes him.
I'm just not sure the UFC will want to lose his momentum, they need a new face big time

 

[HLM*]

Adesenya said he wants to take a bit of a break now as he’s been flat out the last 12 months. It fits in perfectly while he awaits the winner of Rob/Kelvin.

Interestingly enough when Dana was asked to confirm he would not strip Rob of his title he refused to and said it all depends on the severity of injury and recovery time. So if this hernia injury is more complex than were lead to believe and he needs an extended amount of time to recover, we could see Rob stripped and Kelvin/Adesenya fight each other for a title.

 

[phantom13]

As one of the few who actually went along yesterday here’s some thoughts

- we all love Rob and as disappointed as I was he had to pull out you can’t blame the guy, that being said... he won an INTERIM belt around 18 months ago and has, technically, never defended it. I can’t say that I like the schtick Kelvin pulled yesterday but I also can’t say I blame him
- I’m sure the extremely late pull out factored into them not making an interim belt but honestly they should have, take the fact Rob is an Aussie and a loveable guy to boot out of the equation and his champ credentials are paper thin
- I had a good day out with my mates but this card was horrible. Having been to quite a few ufc cards in my time this was comfortably the worst
- amazed that the stadium was still pretty much full, expected a lot to bail. Feel like that’s good and bad, Aussies are sports mad but us filling a stadium for this sort of s**t card makes me think the UFC sees this an an easy money market and will keep giving us garbage cards
- RLA was a shambles yesterday. Lines for toilets were 20 mins, lines for drinks were about the same, RSA crew wound back from 4 beers per person to two, the EFTPOS was failing all over the place. It got upgraded just before the tennis and imo it’s gone backwards
- The ufc won’t learn from this but if they should have any takeaways from it they might wanna consider paying blokes to be on stand by in the future (the extremely late nature of Robs pull out probably means this card wouldn’t have been saved but it’s food for thought)
- celeb row, cowboy, Joanna, hotties in the crowd really made the event far better than the fights did
- not really a conspiracy theorist a lot about what happened with rob feels contrived
- finally (and this will be a controversial take) Robs teams post about “could die from a punch” was ridiculous. I don’t expect with whatever went on that he could have fought and im certainly not saying he should have, but every fighter “could” die everytime they get in the cage so this just felt like a ridiculous attempt at playing off how “tough” Whittaker is on a day when an unfortunate injury really blew up an event so many fans invested time and money in

 

[Topkent]

As one of the few who actually went along yesterday here’s some thoughts

- we all love Rob and as disappointed as I was he had to pull out you can’t blame the guy, that being said... he won an INTERIM belt around 18 months ago and has, technically, never defended it. I can’t say that I like the schtick Kelvin pulled yesterday but I also can’t say I blame him
- I’m sure the extremely late pull out factored into them not making an interim belt but honestly they should have, take the fact Rob is an Aussie and a loveable guy to boot out of the equation and his champ credentials are paper thin
- I had a good day out with my mates but this card was horrible. Having been to quite a few ufc cards in my time this was comfortably the worst
- amazed that the stadium was still pretty much full, expected a lot to bail. Feel like that’s good and bad, Aussies are sports mad but us filling a stadium for this sort of s**t card makes me think the UFC sees this an an easy money market and will keep giving us garbage cards
- RLA was a shambles yesterday. Lines for toilets were 20 mins, lines for drinks were about the same, RSA crew wound back from 4 beers per person to two, the EFTPOS was failing all over the place. It got upgraded just before the tennis and imo it’s gone backwards
- The ufc won’t learn from this but if they should have any takeaways from it they might wanna consider paying blokes to be on stand by in the future (the extremely late nature of Robs pull out probably means this card wouldn’t have been saved but it’s food for thought)
- celeb row, cowboy, Joanna, hotties in the crowd really made the event far better than the fights did
- not really a conspiracy theorist a lot about what happened with rob feels contrived
- finally (and this will be a controversial take) Robs teams post about “could die from a punch” was ridiculous. I don’t expect with whatever went on that he could have fought and im certainly not saying he should have, but every fighter “could” die everytime they get in the cage so this just felt like a ridiculous attempt at playing off how “tough” Whittaker is on a day when an unfortunate injury really blew up an event so many fans invested time and money in

Whittaker was going to defend his belt against Romero but Romero missed weight.

Beat Brunson, Romero x2, Souza, Hall.
9 fight win steak.
He's probably the least marketable champ in history, Dana white would * him off in a heart beat if he wasn't that good but he's a legit champion

 

[HLM*]

As one of the few who actually went along yesterday here’s some thoughts

- we all love Rob and as disappointed as I was he had to pull out you can’t blame the guy, that being said... he won an INTERIM belt around 18 months ago and has, technically, never defended it. I can’t say that I like the schtick Kelvin pulled yesterday but I also can’t say I blame him
- I’m sure the extremely late pull out factored into them not making an interim belt but honestly they should have, take the fact Rob is an Aussie and a loveable guy to boot out of the equation and his champ credentials are paper thin
- I had a good day out with my mates but this card was horrible. Having been to quite a few ufc cards in my time this was comfortably the worst
- amazed that the stadium was still pretty much full, expected a lot to bail. Feel like that’s good and bad, Aussies are sports mad but us filling a stadium for this sort of s**t card makes me think the UFC sees this an an easy money market and will keep giving us garbage cards
- RLA was a shambles yesterday. Lines for toilets were 20 mins, lines for drinks were about the same, RSA crew wound back from 4 beers per person to two, the EFTPOS was failing all over the place. It got upgraded just before the tennis and imo it’s gone backwards
- The ufc won’t learn from this but if they should have any takeaways from it they might wanna consider paying blokes to be on stand by in the future (the extremely late nature of Robs pull out probably means this card wouldn’t have been saved but it’s food for thought)
- celeb row, cowboy, Joanna, hotties in the crowd really made the event far better than the fights did
- not really a conspiracy theorist a lot about what happened with rob feels contrived
- finally (and this will be a controversial take) Robs teams post about “could die from a punch” was ridiculous. I don’t expect with whatever went on that he could have fought and im certainly not saying he should have, but every fighter “could” die everytime they get in the cage so this just felt like a ridiculous attempt at playing off how “tough” Whittaker is on a day when an unfortunate injury really blew up an event so many fans invested time and money in

You can’t hold Romero missing weight in their last fight against Rob and completely dismiss him as never defending the belt, though I get what you’re saying.

If you think an interim belt should have been created immediately, who should have fought for it yesterday?

 

[Milpool]

I think Gastelum's belt stunt was purely because he might be known he could just get overlooked entirely for Adesanya. It wouldn't be fair at all but Dana doesn't really give a s**t about that, he knows Whittaker vs Adesanya is the money maker. You could have Gastelum vs Adesanya for an interim belt but this interim belt stuff is getting ridiculous. Whittaker needs to recover fast and face Gastelum on a card already created. Less pressure on Whittaker and sorts this logjam out.

 

[phantom13]

Whittaker was going to defend his belt against Romero but Romero missed weight.

Beat Brunson, Romero x2, Souza, Hall.
9 fight win steak.
He's probably the least marketable champ in history, Dana white would **** him off in a heart beat if he wasn't that good but he's a legit champion

I’m not holding rob accountable for it but on his record it doesn’t count as a title defense. So he won an interim belt that got upgraded without him fighting any champion or former champion and hasn’t actually defended it in 18 months (by the time he does it will almost certainly be two years).

You can’t hold Romero missing weight in their last fight against Rob and completely dismiss him as never defending the belt, though I get what you’re saying.

If you think an interim belt should have been created immediately, who should have fought for it yesterday?

By the time he pulled out they couldn’t have done it but probablt Adesanya and Gastelum (which would have robbed the fans the chance of seeing Silva).

 

[Rendaw]

The next fight will either be Whittaker v Gastelum or Gastelum v Adesanya for interim.

Adesanya said in the past that he is more interested in fighting the best fighters and will pick the belt up at some point on the way. He may be inclined to fight someone else like Rockhold or Souza instead of waiting.

 

[Peter Sidorkiewicz]

Israel is still one fight away from title shot.

He hasn't fought a top 5 middleweight fighter yet and he should before he gets a title shot.

If Rob is the off the shelf for a while, then logically match him up against Kelvin for interim belt.

If Rob v Kelvin is re-booked, then he needs to fight either a returning Wideman or Jacare. Or winner of Romero/Costa.

 

[Ry009]

Dana/UFC have escaped a lot of heat for the card and too much focus has been on the title match falling through.

Worst possible combination of events occurred yesterday for UFC in Australia with the card the way it was and fans not bailing and getting refunds like they should have.

 

[deklares]

event was a sell out; 15,238 fans at Rod Laver Arena bringing in $3,484,155 at the gate.

https://www.foxsports.com.au/ufc/th...a/news-story/d00987edfa343151fc0716dc75380f9f

At the end of the day maybe it is Australia and in particular Melbourne's thirst for all things sport that may be it's own worst enemy. Dana knows he can put dog s**t cards together and he'll get a sellout. You can't put together stacked cards all year long; so I'm sure it comes in handy knowing he has his loyal fans no matter what in Australia.

 

[the_interloper]

As one of the few who actually went along yesterday here’s some thoughts

- we all love Rob and as disappointed as I was he had to pull out you can’t blame the guy, that being said... he won an INTERIM belt around 18 months ago and has, technically, never defended it. I can’t say that I like the schtick Kelvin pulled yesterday but I also can’t say I blame him
- I’m sure the extremely late pull out factored into them not making an interim belt but honestly they should have, take the fact Rob is an Aussie and a loveable guy to boot out of the equation and his champ credentials are paper thin
- I had a good day out with my mates but this card was horrible. Having been to quite a few ufc cards in my time this was comfortably the worst
- amazed that the stadium was still pretty much full, expected a lot to bail. Feel like that’s good and bad, Aussies are sports mad but us filling a stadium for this sort of s**t card makes me think the UFC sees this an an easy money market and will keep giving us garbage cards
- RLA was a shambles yesterday. Lines for toilets were 20 mins, lines for drinks were about the same, RSA crew wound back from 4 beers per person to two, the EFTPOS was failing all over the place. It got upgraded just before the tennis and imo it’s gone backwards
- The ufc won’t learn from this but if they should have any takeaways from it they might wanna consider paying blokes to be on stand by in the future (the extremely late nature of Robs pull out probably means this card wouldn’t have been saved but it’s food for thought)
- celeb row, cowboy, Joanna, hotties in the crowd really made the event far better than the fights did
- not really a conspiracy theorist a lot about what happened with rob feels contrived
- finally (and this will be a controversial take) Robs teams post about “could die from a punch” was ridiculous. I don’t expect with whatever went on that he could have fought and im certainly not saying he should have, but every fighter “could” die everytime they get in the cage so this just felt like a ridiculous attempt at playing off how “tough” Whittaker is on a day when an unfortunate injury really blew up an event so many fans invested time and money in

Agreed on it being a bad thing that everyone still rocked basically, the card was pretty ordinary from the get go anyway, they sold it out in 8 minutes when having only announced two fights!

And yeah WTF was that about with winding back from 4 drinks to two, i was in a 4 way shout and made it a real pain in the arse!

I went through a few options in my head for a replacement (Cowboy, Dan Kelly, even Chael) but the late nature of it made it impossible. Even two days earlier i reckon they would have been fine.

And yes, a lot of hot women there (and some less hot at the Royal afterwards ha ha)

All in all i still had a good day. Kang v Ishihara a clear fight of the "night", Jim Crute did well (though nearly ****ed it up) and Kai Kara France scored a lucky decision, puzzling really, I had the other bloke winning every round. Israel v Silva was electric, kept expecting something awesome to happen and it never really did I guess, they were both too slick for the other to land something huge. Silva's chin held up well as it always does.

 

[Joker91]

Rod Laver Arena is a absolute disgrace.
$16.50+ for a burger.
$18 for a roll.

Pathetic that they can get away with that.

 

[Joker91]

I'm also not sold on Adesanya.

 

[phantom13]

Agreed on it being a bad thing that everyone still rocked basically, the card was pretty ordinary from the get go anyway, they sold it out in 8 minutes when having only announced two fights!

And yeah WTF was that about with winding back from 4 drinks to two, i was in a 4 way shout and made it a real pain in the arse!

I went through a few options in my head for a replacement (Cowboy, Dan Kelly, even Chael) but the late nature of it made it impossible. Even two days earlier i reckon they would have been fine.

And yes, a lot of hot women there (and some less hot at the Royal afterwards ha ha)

All in all i still had a good day. Kang v Ishihara a clear fight of the "night", Jim Crute did well (though nearly ****** it up) and Kai Kara France scored a lucky decision, puzzling really, I had the other bloke winning every round. Israel v Silva was electric, kept expecting something awesome to happen and it never really did I guess, they were both too slick for the other to land something huge. Silva's chin held up well as it always does.

It’s a really tough beat, I’ve read a lot about the fact that they couldn’t change any details of any of the fights as the weigh ins had already occurred (so the fights and the durations were set and couldn’t change). I’ve seen some ill will to Rob for pulling out which is just absurd, UFC getting heat but I’m not sure how much blame can be leveled at them either. Had Rob pulled out a week or even 3 days and the ufc just sat on their hands and done nothing sure, then go off on them. Horrible circumstances really.

 

[00Stinger]

Sounds like Gastelum is just gonna miss his chance, I think in an out 4-5 months Adesanya faces Whittaker in Sydney for the title.
Gastelum probably has to face Romero or someone else to get the number one contender spot again because I can't see them having Adesanya wait 9 months to fight Whittaker.

If Gastelum misses his chance over that, the UFC are ****ed.

He flew half way around the world, he made weight & heturned up to fight

 

[deklares]

On paper yes Whittaker's title credentials could be described as bordering on illegitimate but considering Bisping who is the last 'legitimate' champion only really had to go through Anderson on his way to a title fight, Whittakers path to the title more than makes up for the way he won it. Adesanya and Gastelum's runs nowhere near as impressive. Gastelum had trouble with Jacare who Whittaker starched and Adesanya didn't look overly impressive against 43 year old Anderson on his last legs. Whittaker's shaky title credentials are more a product of the hold up to the division the Bisping/GSP era had than anything else.

 

[phantom13]

Rod Laver Arena is a absolute disgrace.
$16.50+ for a burger.
$18 for a roll.

Pathetic that they can get away with that.

$9.90 for a beer and could only get 2 at a time from about midday onwards. Supposedly they had some issues with drunken behavior but I didn’t see any?

 

[phantom13]

On paper yes Whittaker's title credentials could be described as bordering on illegitimate but considering Bisping who is the last 'legitimate' champion only really had to go through Anderson on his way to a title fight, Whittakers path to the title more than makes up for the way he won it. Adesanya and Gastelum's runs nowhere near as impressive. Gastelum had trouble with Jacare who Whittaker starched and Adesanya didn't look overly impressive against 43 year old Anderson on his last legs. Whittaker's shaky title credentials are more a product of the hold up to the division the Bisping/GSP era had than anything else.

I think doing mma math is wrong, styles make fights Bisping KOd Rockhold who kicked his ass the first time etc etc.

Whittaker’s credentials and questioning them is done on his own record and the ridiculous circumstances (which for the record are not in any way his fault).

Bisping lost the title to GSP who then sat out, Whittaker beat Romero for the interim title and then never got the chance to unify the undisputed/interim title. So the neysayers have the “he’s never won the undisputed belt”. Then he has the Romero rematch and Yoel misses weight (again not at all his fault) but means that fight is not a title fight.

Facts (which are without context to be fair) are he won an interim belt 18 months ago and had not defended it.

I suspect (only my opinion) had he pulled out earlier they would have scrambled together an interim belt and that they would have been justified in doing so