Matt Hughes’ UFC 87 picks
By Curtis Clontz on Aug 06, 2008
Matt Hughes is a legend in the sport of MMA and what he says about the sport matters. This time around the future Hall of famer made a few picks from Saturday’s UFC 87 from the Target Center in Minnesota. Hughes will be in attendance and has picked GSP to retain his title as well as Brock Lesnar to be victorious over Heath Herring.
Here is exactly what Hughes had to say:
“This weekend coming up will be UFC 87 up in Minnesota. Going up there with some friends, I plan on having a good time. I like the fact that I can stay in the Midwest and drive up there. My predictions for the fights are GSP and Lesnar to win. I think they both have a great chance of winning and I think they can go in there and win as easily as they’d like to. But as everyone knows, this is fighting and anything can happen, so there’s always a chance that Fitch or Herring could get their hand raised.”
Matt Hughes has also been doing an interview or two over the past few days. In a recent interview with MMARated.com. (The entire interview can be found at here.) In this interview Hughes talked about his current health, his next fight, his analysis of the GSP vs. Fitch fight, the Randy Couture situation, as well as his take on the Brock Lesnar project.
Matt Hughes may seem like old news to many of the new fans of the sport, but he is a huge superstar and has been called the Brett Favre of MMA because of his unwillingness to give in to Father Time and continue to participate in the sport he loves.
Filed Under: Predictions • UFC
Comments (14)
Get 1 Now
Get Free Gear
Matt Hughes is a good, but he is so OVERRATED. Hughes is not a complete fighter because he has virtually no standup. In the past, many of Matt’s competitors were a great fit for Matt(stylistically).
If you put Matt up against a good striker with very good takedown defense, then Hughes will usually lose.
I wouldn’t consider myself a Hughes fan, but I’d say he has decent standup. St. Pierre and Penn both have pretty good takedown defense, but he was able to dominate both of them at one time. Stylistically, he’s fought almost every kind of fighter in the past 10 years.
I think he’s just getting burnt out…he’s got almost 50 fights under his belt and he probably should retire soon.
He is getting older and the fight game is starting to pass him by. He isn’t overrated, that would be like saying MJ was overrated after his prime. No matter what he is the greatest 170 ever. You can’t be the G.O.A.T and be overrated.
Come on Brandt De Lorenzo… BJ Penn was NOT even close to his top conditioning/shape when he fought Hughes. Furthermore, BJ Penn relied mostly on his talent in those days and he didn’t take mma as seriously as he is these days. Today, with BJ’s serious training, nutrition etc. BJ would beat Matt Hughes 9/10 times.
As for St. Pierre, he was STARSTRUCK in his first fight with Matt Hughes because Matt was his idol at that time. St.Pierre made MINCEMEAT out of Hughes in their second fight and St. Pierre dominated Hughes and submitted him in their third fight!
Curtis, I also disagree with your statement that puts Hughes in the same catagory as Michael Jordan. Comparing Hughes to Michael Jordan of the NBA is PLAIN NONSENSE. If you compared Fedor or Anderson Silva to Michael Jordan, then that would be reasonable.
As for being older, Randy Couture and other great “older” fighters (ie George Foreman: boxing) have proved that Matt Hughes has no excuse when it comes to age. MATT HUGHES IS OVERRATED SIMPLE AND PLAIN!
Well Hughes was also younger, had fewer fights, and continued to rely on a game plan which wasn’t as outdated at the time. I’m not totally disagreeing with you, but I just feel he has lost his touch for other reasons.
Well Brandt DeLorenzo, at least we can agree on the fact that Hughes cannot use age as an excuse.
It is very obvious that Hughes has virtually no standup and that makes him an INCOMPLETE mma fighter. All you need to do is watch his fights over again and see.
Enjoy the fights tonight!
MATT SEAMS TO BE JELOUS OF GSP AND FOR I WOULD NOT COMPAIR HIM TO BRET, BRET HAS MUCH MORE CLASS BUT YOU BE THE JUDGE QUOT FROM HIS BLOG “The last fight of the night was Georges and Fitch. Georges didn’t look as big as he has before and he seemed like he had gotten tired from the first round. Fitch had the game plan of countering Georges and you just can’t do that. You can’t counter a quicker fighter. To be honest, halfway in the third round I got up and walked out of the arena and went to my hotel. The fight wasn’t the most exciting and I wanted to get out of there before everyone else was getting up to leave.” OH YA PER MATT GSP IS OUT OF THE RUNNING FOR POUND FOR POUND BEST FIGHTER DOES HE NEED TO BE REMINDED THAT GSP TAPED TAHT ASS!!
Ray,
I never compared the two, I just used MJ as an example… But since you brought it up MJ is the best of all time…agree?
At this point matt hughes is the best 170 of all time… So they really could be compared. A better comparison would be say of Jerry Rice being the best WR ever, not the best football player ever. hughes is the best 170 ever, not the best fighter ever.
Sure he can use age… Randy beat Gonzaga who is pretty much out of the title chase for the moment. I am a Randy fan but to say he is making huge strides of late would be foolish, I mean how long has it been since he fought. For all we know he has been getting rusty, does he actually have time to lose a fight due to ring rust?
Do you have GSP ahead of Silva and Penn in the your own P4P ranking?
Curits, it is laughable when you say: “At this point matt hughes is the best 170 of all time… So they (MJ and HUGHES) really could be compared.” I DISAGREE 100%
In addition, I don’t think that the Jerry Rice analogy is very good either, but it’s not as silly as the MJ comparison. Rice played in the NFL. The NFL had been around for many years prior to Rice and there were many amazing players who played WR before Rice. Jerry Rice shattered the records of so many players (in the WR postion) before him. By comparison, MMA is still in its infancy, so even the Jerry Rice comparison is not a very good one. He (Hughes) is the “best 170 of all time.” How long of a time has it been?? Not a very long time when comparing it to the NFL or the NBA. The (“Hughes is the best 170 pound fighter of all time”) statement is utter hyperbole.
And as for age, Randy has performed much better in his last two fights, than Matt Hughes has in his last two fights. As we all know Randy’s legal issues have tied him down and prevented him from fighting. Randy beat Tim Sylvia and took the UFC belt away from him when Randy was well OVER 40 YEARS OLD. Hello?? Tim Sylvia was the former UFC champ, remember? Tim gave Nog a good fight recently; Tim is no slouch. Althoug Randy would lose to Fedor, Randy was the UFC champion when he was past the AGE OF 40. Hughes is not even 35 yet, HUGHES HAS NO EXCUSE WHEN IT COMES TO AGE. George Forman(boxer) had some great fights and victories in his older days too.
Face it Matt Hughes CANNOT USE AGE AS AN EXCUSE and HUGHES is NOT a COMPLETE mma fighter and he is OVERRATED.
Rick…a little harsh there!
I wouldn’t say he’s not a complete fighter. He focuses on wrestling, but so do many other wrestler-turned-MMA fighters. Even Brock Lesnar, who hasn’t wrestled legitimately (WWE doesn’t count) for years, spent most of his last fight on the ground trying to win on points. Hughes shouldn’t use age as an excuse, but instead, he should remind us that he has fought competitively through 50 professional MMA bouts. And while Jeremy Horn has had over 100, every fighter is different and Hughes may have just burned out.
Although I used MJ and Jerry Rice, I never tried to use their sport’s as a comparison. I understand that the differant sports are/ were in differant places.
Do you feel that Hughes is the best and most dominating 170 ever? That is what his Hall of Fame plaque will say…
Is age an excuse, no… but not everyone ages the same. For every Foreman there are 20 that could not continue to get better with age.
No, I don’t see Hughes as the best 170 ever. Hughes, has achieved a very impressive record but he’s only 34 and he has no career limiting injuries. At Hughes’ age, he should be able to put up a formidable fight against GSP or Thiago Alves. Hughes’ EXPERIENCE should give him a tremendous edge over these guys, but it does not because he is NOT a complete mma fighter. I don’t think Hughes would stand a very good chance against Fitch either. Again, Hughes will usually lose to any fighter that has good striking and very good take down defense.
With Hughes’ experience, he should be able to EVOLVE and he should be climbing his way up to the top. In fact, with his experience, Hughes should be many steps ahead of the rest of the 170 pound fighters, but he is not. Hughes is a fighter who has had a great run at the top, but he is NOT the best 170 ever.
matt might have been very good for his time but what does he do circl and try to take you down, you wouldent consider tito is the best 205p of all time, both tito and matt ufc records are similar. this sport is evalving great complete fighters unless your realy good at takeing people down when they know your going to take them down fighters are just going to adjust,if matt is unwilling to pose a treat on his feet well his last two fight speek for them selfvs. as for gsp ranking for pfp of cours anderson is 1 if not for fedor. but i woudnt consider him below Bj after all he did beat Bj whether Bj was not in shape or at the top of his game he showed up fight and lost but hopfully soon this will be answered because even thow Bj sais hes in the best shape of his life we havent seen him go past two round? ps matt is a hater
matt hughes is one of the most overrated fighters of all time. Now don’t get me wrong he was without a doubt one of the most dominating middle weights of his era. However here is a better analogy in basketball michael jordan dominate slashing to the lane with spectacular dunks and reverse lay ups. Basketball evovled cause of this and at the same time jordan began getting older. So jordan changed his game turn around jump shots more team play and strategy. Matt hughes brought unstoppable wrestling power to the table he cause the sport to evolve unfortunately unlike jordan he did not evolve with it.