Defending Champs Dominate at UFC 73 “Stacked”

Forget about the Ortiz vs. Rashad fight; it ended in a foreseeable draw. Herring vs. Nogueira? It only ended in the typical Herring fashion with a judges decision after three rounds of mostly standup fighting. The Florian fight ended with KenFlo victorious and threatening the rest of the 155 pound weight class while his ridiculously obnoxious corner danced and screamed behind him. The focus of the UFC 73 main card was on the two championship bouts with Middleweight Anderson Silva up against Pancrase champion Nathan Marquardt and Lightweight Sean “The Muscle Shark” Sherk fighting Hermes Franca.

Sherk vs. Franca

Although Sherk dominated about 24 out of the 25 minutes in the Octagon, you’ll still see him struggling to get the respect he deserves from UFC fans. Most of the match was spent on the ground with Sherk easily passing Franca’s guard to mount and attempt to rain down punches to the side of his challenger’s head. While many fans in the arena boo’ed, Sherk dominated with his ground ability against a confident Black Belt Jiu-Jitsu fighter. Franca did absolutely nothing on the ground until the later rounds and tried to end the fight multiple times with a knee to Sherk’s head during the takedown attempts. The only time that Franca had a chance was in the beginning of Round 2 when he landed a nice knee and sent the defending champion sprawling to the mat face-first. Sherk didn’t waste any time on the ground and kept moving while Franca attempted his effective haymaker punches that easily missed Sherk’s head as the fight went back down to the ground.

The judges saw it for Sherk with a 50-45, 49-46, 50-45 decision.

Silva vs. Marquardt

The main event of the evening was certainly an exciting match…for the most part. Although there was only one round of action, there was plenty to see from both corners. Marquardt looked promising against the Brazilian Muay Thai and Jiu-Jitsu fighter early in the round as he took the fight to the ground and showed everyone that he was not going down easy. After the fighters were stood up due to no action on the ground, Marquardt tried to take Silva down, but ended up in a bad position and Silva ended the fight with only 10 seconds left in the first round with a Technical Knockout thanks to a flurry of right hands to Marquardt’s head. It certainly won’t be the last fight for “Nate the Great” as he provided for a good matchup against a fighter who recently made quick work of Chris Leben and then-defending Middleweight Champ, Rich Franklin. Silva, nicknamed “The Spider” because of his spider-guard tecqnique, is set to fight Franklin again in a highly anticpated rematch.

Did the UFC Main Card live up to the “Stacked” hype? Almost. Let’s see what UFC 74 can do.