The Flog!

The Ultimate Fighter Season 10 TUF10 – Episode 4 aired last night. The episode covered a few men and the possibilities of their fighting. Matt Mitrione caused quite a stir when he told an opposing team member that the other fellow might be fighting, and with whom, basically telling the opposing team his own team’s strategy. Mitrione’s teammates called him a snitch. Evans was considering having Mitrione fight Marcus Jones but felt that Mitrione was afraid of Jones’s size.

As for Jones, while he was training with his teammates, he consistently hurt people, seemingly unaware of his strength. My feeling is that if he’s hurting people during training, he has limited experience and limited control: if you hurt your partners, they won’t want to train with you. It’s no longer fun for them and most of what they learn is not to play with you – just the way kids react in kindergarten.

Evans commented on his team, on individuals’ abilities and personalities.  He seemed very happy with his team, having won the first three fights. As for the fighters for this episode, Evans picked Brendan Schaub, who trains with his own team, and Jackson’s Demico Rogers. Jackson was thrilled with this match-up, commenting on how big Rogers was. Jackson’s direction to Rogers was to take Schaub down, pass to the side and pound him out. Rogers, himself, felt that his wrestling and jiu jitsu were sufficient to defeat Schaub.

One of Schaub’s coaches suggested jabs, and a long, hook cross. Evans said that Schaub was super-athletic, a great listener, technical, and took direction well.

When the tale of the tape appeared, I expected Rogers to be a giant in comparison to Schaub. In fact, they were the same height (6’4″), close in weight and almost the same age. The only significant difference was 3 inch reach advantage which Rogers had.

The actual fight was short. It began with Rogers shooting for a take down which failed. After rolling a bit and standing up, the next attempt at a take down worked. Rogers ended up in Schaub’s guard, with Schaub trapping his arms. Rogers did not accomplish much, due to Schaub’s movements. Rogers stood up with Schaub still on the ground. He then jumped at Schaub to throw a punch and ended up in Schaub’s guard again. Rogers passed to the side, elbowed Schaub in the head and was very high on Schaub’s body. He then tried to mount Schaub but got turned over.

Schaub ended the match with a variation of hadaka jime, rear naked choke, also called the anaconda choke. Ordinarily this would involve tori (the giver of the technique) applying hadaka jime lying on the ground behind uke (the receiver of the technique), trapping uke’s legs with his own. In this instance, although Schaub was looking to trap the legs, they were not yet trapped. Rogers, as uke, should have been working to prevent the leg trap and to move his way onto his stomach. Instead, he tapped out very quickly, attempting no defense against the choke.

Jackson left Rogers on his own in the octagon, merely staying on the sidelines, feeling sorry for himself.

Schaub was disappointed in his performance, but he was active on the bottom, showed control, and took advantage of the opportunity when it presented itself.

One aspect of this season which I had noticed, but hadn’t quite verbalized, is that it seems a lot like commercials with a bit of reality show thrown in. There are so many commercials that they are inserting short (perhaps 30 to 60 seconds) video clips in between the many commercials, perhaps to ensure the audience stays tuned in. Last night’s show had two of those mini-clips. Both times I assumed that the show was back on, but then they were over, and we had another five minutes (I’m guessing) of commercials. The UFC must be making money, but this is irritating. If it weren’t for the fights I wouldn’t watch any of this. Previous seasons showed drunken antics; this season has the testosterone-laden arguments between Jackson and Evans.

Perhaps there really is little to show. This group of men is older, mid-twenties to mid-thirties, maybe more mature then in previous seasons. Instead of fillers of commercials or videos of fighters doing exercises or sitting around the table, I suggest showing details of training sessions. The coaches bring experienced people with them, so why not take advantage of them and have them show some of their favourite techniques. Every one of our students would be keen to watch. Serious martial arts students are always looking for new techniques to use for that next match.  

The Ultimate Fighter Season 10 TUF10  is on Spike at 10 p.m. EST on Wednesdays.

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 1

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 2

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 3

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 5

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 6

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 7

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 8

Click here to go to TUF10 Episode 9

ayjay

Ocotober 8, 2009

Tags: anaconda choke, brendan schaub, demico rogers, evans, hadaka jime, jackson, jiu jitsu, marcus jones, matt mitrione, rear naked choke, The Ultimate Fighter Season 10, tori, TUF10, UFC, uke

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 8th, 2009 at 12:59 pm and is filed under Martial Arts, The Ultimate Fighter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.