Post Fight Night 21

What an exciting night of fights from North Carolina! Let's start off with Big Country. He is the real deal, and if there were any nay-sayers out there after he won the Ultimate Fighter season 10 competition, they have probably been silenced by now. It took Roy Nelson only 39 seconds in the first round to take out Stefan Struve. Skyscraper's reach is 83 inches and dwarfed Nelson's reach of 74 inches, but this did not make the slightest difference as Nelson rocked Struve with a big overhand right and finished the fight by raining down shots on Struve who remained grounded after being buckled by Nelson. And Nelson handled himself after the win by showing his humor and graciousness by complimenting Struve and jokingly calling out James Toney.

Takanori Gomi was the last Pride Lightweight champion and seemed to be one of Kenny Florian's biggest challenges yet. However, KenFlo stuck to his game plan and looked like a champ in his fight. He threw many jabs (similar to BJ Penn's jabs) to The Fireball Kid's head and landed a vast majority of them. Florian also studied Gomi's game and that showed when he took caution to cover up against Gomi's right hooks. After an impressive and entertaining stand up battle which favored Florian, KenFlo was able to submit Gomi with a rear naked choke. This win brought Florian closer to another title shot, and maybe the third time will be the charm for Florian who has suffered two losses in title bouts to Sean Sherk as well as BJ Penn.

And how can this post be complete without mentioning the power mishap in the Bojangles Coliseum. This was a UFC first, and was a major problem for the event, as the power was cut during the announcement of the Roy Nelson vs Stefan Struve fight. The power could not be brought back fast enough and for the viewers watching on their televisions, Caol Uno's fight against Gleison Tibau was broadcasted (Uno lost in round 1 in 4 minutes 13 seconds via TKO).