UFC ON FOX 2 LEAVES ME SO DEPRESSED!

Yeah, Rashad won - but for the 12th time in 15 fights when facing opponents 6'0" or larger dating back to and including his fights on TUF 2, he didn't finish the fight (by contrast, he has finished both of the opponents under 6'0" he has faced over that same period). 

In addition, with Chael Sonnen's "moral defeat" against Michael Bisping, you can forget about Sonnen beating Anderson Silva this summer.  I don't care if Anderson Silva was turning 97 in April instead of the allegedly "cursed" age of 37; anyone who now thinks that Sonnen is going to beat AS on the latter's home field (as in soccer field?) ought to have their head examined. 

And to add insult to injury from my point of view - which is that Rashad must move down to middleweight (a very real possibility if Anderson Silva were to lose the title there) - Lyoto Machida is making loud noises about doing that; and if he does it, no way Rashad will, since that effectively removes Rashad's loss to Machida from Rashad's record, for the purposes of determining the 205-pound rankings. 

Rashad deserves a better fate than spending the rest of his career battling for second place at light heavyweight; but that is now precisely the fate for which he is headed, after the Jones-Evans fight proves to be a carbon copy of either the Johnny Bedford-Louis Gaudinot fight from the TUF 14 finale card, or the Anderson Silva-Forrest Griffin fight from UFC 101.

* Edited at 01.29.2012, 8:48 AM ET *

How would it be like Anderson/Forrest? Anderson was just too quick for Forrest. Rashad is at least as quick as Jones. The Bedford/Gaudinot would be closer but Bedford is kind of a plodder and Rashad's more of an equal wrestler to Jones. Rashad could've been holding back last night especially since Jones was there watching. That's the angle I'd believe if I was a fan of Rashad's.

And he was also very adept at blocking/parrying strikes which bodes well for combatting Jones long range techniques.

to me the main event showed that rashad has little chance againts Bones.
Davis is basically Jon Jones without the striking and that will be the big difference.

besides that what depressed me was that Einemo and Maia made poor decisions and lost like that.
Maia wa probably the worse thing of the night. He thinks he was a boxing champ not a BJJ champ...

I enjoyed it. I hope now people will stop doubting Bisping.

UFC on Fox left me extremely disappointed.  I felt the Evans/Davis fight, the Sonnen/Bisping fight and the Maia/Weidman fight were lackluster.  I just couldn't believe that Maia didn't even use his best weapon.  What was he thinking?

And Evans didn't try to take Davis out enough for me.  I felt it was a disappointing snooze fest.  This is not the way to build our fanbase with the casual, mainstream fans.  I know not all events go according to plan but this was 3 fights that left me tepidly lukewarm.  

K1 Maia needs to GTFO. Now.

And contrary to the popular opinion, Evans impressed me vs. Davis. It showed me that he indeed does have the skills to be the sole person who stands a chance against Jones. He showed outstanding boxing with great evasiveness, he showed great wrestling and his speed was faster than ever.

The one thing that will be his downfall is his cardio which did not impress me to say the least. If he could keep up his first round workrate for 5 rounds, he'll be able to beat Bones. But he won't.

Yeah Maia did not impress me at all lastnight. he should have just stuck to what he is good at. 

Oh his striking's good. He needs to stick to what he's the best in the world at, his freaking ridiculous BJJ that could submit Rickson Gracie.

i agree with anik. evans destroyed the "spirit" of davis in first two rounds. i will take a chance with evans vs bones. i was also impressed with lavar johnson. those uppercuts were nasty vs beltran. 3-0 for Strikeforce fighters vs ufcs fighters and griggs and diaz are next. whoever said SF fighters could not compete needs to learn some math. lol. i told you SF fighters would hold there own or do better than wec fighters did. same thing when bellator fighters start coming over.

* Edited at 01.29.2012, 12:13 PM ET *

Bellator i think has some amazing fighters in all their ranks. LHW though i havent had time to look at. but BW, FW, LW, WW have some scary people. HW maybe.

tl;dnr

* Edited at 01.29.2012, 12:22 PM ET *

The only thing that did leave me disappointed it K1 Maia. He doesnt use his jitz anymore and it really bugs me.

Maia was extremely disappointing. I honestly never thought i'd see him trying to make a scramble to stand up lol

its obvious they need to put someone like josh neer vs another striker in the WW division so we get a bloody fight for fox tv. i must admit i watched the weidman //maia fight again on mmatko.com and i fell asleep. they need to put two strikers together in any division in LW or above.

They need more exciting matchups on Fox cards. For every Shad/Davis they need a Barry/Hunt type of matchup

What the hell are you talking about TS with Rashad facing 6'+ to under 6' opponents. Sure he finished Sean Salmon and Jason Lambert but their skill level is nowhere near that of the 6'+ opponents he's faced. The fact he finished them had nothing to due with their height it had to do with their skill. He finished 6'2" Chuck Liddell, 6'3" Forrest Griffin, and 6'2" Tito Ortiz. If we are jumping back in time Rashad didn't finish Hector Ramirez who is 5'10" or Jamie Jara who primarily competes at MW now. Moving to MW won't help him in the height department looking down the top 10 here, there is only 1 top 10 MW under 6' tall. From what I read from your post is that Evans should run and hide from Jones because he doesn't stand a chance. Really the only argument for him moving down is Jon Jones is too good. 

Personally, I think they should have put Nate Diaz vs. Jim Miller as a #1 contender fight, for the next UFC on FOX card. Good fight, that has a really good chance of being super-exciting as well as having title implications. I think Jose would be great on FOX. Only 1 round, but it would be a highlight unlike anything they would have otherwise seen. The problem is, the UFC needs to build new stars. Rashad's 32. He's probably got 4 years or less left in the sport. Weidman is 27, but last night's performance did nothing to build him into a star. I really think the UFC should be using FOX as an opportunity to give the younger guys that are closing on a title shot, the chance to build large followings. People watch certain players in the NBA, because they watched them play in college. Darren Sproles, went to a high school in my hometown and broke a zillion records there. Now, everyone I know that watches football, always watches Sproles play specifically because he played in our hometown, then at K-State. Watching people fight when they're young so that the average fan can see how much better they are getting, creates a built-in fanbase for later. That's why I think that guys 27 and younger, with a tendency to put on good striking fights, and that finish a lot, are probably the best people to put on FOX cards. Just keep building the brand.

I'm still happy. It was a free card so i can't complain

* Edited at 01.29.2012, 1:50 PM ET *

I think we could all conclude that Demian Maia is freaking crazy and deserves entrance into the Worst Gameplanners in MMA list.

@zarog, that depends who is lw champ in a few months, i dont think bendo vs miller is a marketable first defence.

what the hell was maia thinking trying to keep this standing, if he worked on the ground he'd arm bar this easily