Event Title: UFC 66: Liddell vs Ortiz 2
Event Date: 30 December 2006
Event Venue: MGM Grand Garden Arena
Event Location: Las Vegas
Date submitted: 02 January 2007
Submitted by: Sean McClure
What a stellar night of fights for the UFC. Quinton Jackson, Heath Herring, and Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic were all confirmed for future UFC events and all of the fights on the card were exciting and none went to decision. The stoppage in the Ortiz versus Liddell fight was yet another questionable one for UFC referees and one that made me very frustrated with the way MMA referees seem to sometimes get caught up in the moment. That being said let's move on to the main card fights.
Round 1 - Right off the bat Schafer eats a big right hand and I was sure that Bisping would have an easy night of it. I was wrong and proven so as Eric takes Bisping down. Michael quickly gets back up and Bisping opens up with his legs, kicking Schafer at the first sign of a good opening. Bisping takes Schafer down and gains the mounted position, but decides to get back up shortly after and lands a HUGE kick that hurts Schafer bad. Michael follows it up with some ground and pound that stops the fight.
This one had the most bizarre finish of the night and was the result of the referee not enforcing his decision to stand them up from their positions on the ground. On a side note, Babalu was in Cruz's corner for the fight.
Round 1 - Arlovski stops a take down attempt with a beautiful sprawl and reversal that puts Cruz on his back. Andrei stand back up and from there it was like a race to see who could secure a heel hook the fastest as attempt after attempt was made by both fighters. The bizarre moment in question came when Herb Dean stepped in after a heel kick landed to Cruz while both he and Arlovski were attempting heel hooks. Instead of enforcing his decision to stand them up to let Marcio recover, he let the fighters dictate whether they would or not. They choose to stay in the same positions and Cruz indicates he is okay. As soon as Herb steps away, Pe De Pano tries to free his leg and doesn't see a big right hand that connects squarely and knocks him out cold. It is in my opinion that Dean should have made them stand up, but it is also my opinion that it was Cruz's mistake. You cannot fault the referee when the fighter emphatically asks to stay in a bad position.
Round 1- Chris Leben takes MacDonald down, but quickly gets back up to his feet where he is most comfortable fighting. They exchange punches and MacDonald shows that he has a very nice jab. Jason repeatedly goes for the take down and Leben keeps stuffing them with extreme prejudice. Chris opens up with knees and hard punches to end the round.
Round 2- After a weak kick attempt, Leben takes MacDonald down. Jason gets up and hurts Chris with a big right hand and ends up on top of Leben who is scrambling to defend. MacDonald secures a very tight guillotine choke ending the fight by choking Leben out.
Round 1- Immediately Forrest and Keith start trading leg kicks. Both fighters are swinging for the fences, but Jardine's leg kicks are hurting Forrest. Griffin is finding his range nicely as he circles Keith. Out of nowhere, Keith lands a combination that hurts Forrest bad and he moves in for the kill landing bombs to the TUF season 1 winner who cannot defend them.
The ending to this fight was questionable, but the fight was undeniably exciting.
Round 1- As expected they are standing and Tito is game to exchange with Liddell. Chuck stuffs a Tito take down and starts swinging wildly with looping rights that are answered in kind by Tito. Tito gets cut at the two minute mark by a good right hand and Chuck moves in smelling blood. Ortiz gets rocked and Liddell tries to finish him, but can't do it and the fight ends up back on its feet.
Round 2- Tito starts with the take down attempts again and then lands a very nice leg kick on Liddell. More striking exchanges and it is here that I start to believe that Chuck could be in for trouble. Tito lands a nasty body kick and then a big right hand that rocks Liddell a little bit. Finally, Tito takes him down and looks like he is in a great position. Liddell, like clockwork gets right back up and lands an elbow to Tito to end the round.
Round 3- Tito lands more leg kicks and Chuck is swinging like he is trying to kill Ortiz. Tito attempts a take down and then lands another big leg kick. Chuck lands some body shots setting up for a big right hand that misses wide. Tito shoots in and ends up on his back with Chuck throwing hay makers that miss yet again. It's up on its feet again and in an exchange, Liddell rocks Ortiz who drops back in to the fence and then on his back. Chuck steps on top and starts firing away, but Tito is defending against almost 90% of the strikes. Tito rolls to get up and a second later the referee stops the fight in what was obviously a premature stoppage despite Tito's bad position. Dana looked less than happy as he walked in the cage, but Tito made no excuses for his loss and praised Chuck Liddell for his win.
Despite the bad call at the end of the Ortiz fight there were some major surprises in Jardine beating Griffin and MacDonald choking out Leben. Arlovski is back in form, looking to climb back up the ladder. Finally, Tito showed that he had tremendous courage, heart, and that he has improved and matured.
UFC 66 delivered some great fights and provided the stage for some major announcements that I am excited to see come to fruition.
