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[jdwall]

cain, the way he just rolled up and smoked big nog was totally tubular

[beau420]

I voted Sotiropoulos, but for me it was a tie with Sotiropoulos, Cain and Bader....I never knew Bader could look so good on his feet....and his hand speed. I was surprised....I was thinking Bader was going to Maynard Jardine for 3 rounds with tons of takedown attempts and sloppy punching with pushing predictable jabs....but Bader moved on angles, his punches had some pep on them, and he snapped his jab a few times nicely.

Everyone else has talked about everyone else, and no one has voted for Bader, so I thought I would share some of my insight on a guy he may have been overshadowed by the other 3 great displays of the night.

[U shut ur FACE]

Cain for sure. Nog has never been finished like that (i'm excluding his fight with Mir because of staff) and it looked like he was pretty much knocked out; which I thought I would never see...

[willpunisher]

i liked sotirop from tuf. always humble and quiet. his bjj is sick! and now that his stand up is getting better. wow i'm loving it. he man handled stevenson. that proves that he needs bigger fights from now on. maybe guida or florian next. i would love to see how he does against them.

[pantomime horse]

George Sotiropoulos.

I've been a fan since he was on TUF and it's nice to see a BJJ fighter who uses alot of different skills to win a fight. He can turn a bad position into a full mount. He's got the heart, the striking, and the ground skills to go far.

Yes, Cain impressed me, too. He looks very solid and beating Big Nog sends a statement that he's ready for anybody. I look forward to seeing him fight Brock and Dos Santos.

[Boo]

I say George because that was the only fight I picked wrong. I underestimated how good he really is. It was also my favorite fight of the night by a long shot.

[Fedorlei Gomipierre]

4. Cain looked really, really good on the feet and was far FASTER than I'd expected him to be and he really put the mitts to Nog, however I don't feel he necessarily was the reason for that dominance, rather it's more Nog's last hurrah? He displayed great power in those strikes and really expressed another facet to his game, but I don't know if this wasn't just an example of Nog being past it.... I'm concerned Cain won't be able to replicate this against somebody with JDS' striking or Lesnar's size etc, but he was still impressive nonetheless....

3. Godamn does Bader remind me of a young Chuck Liddell! He's just identical in style sans the kempo kickboxing stuff. Great wrestling base, retarded striking power, poor cardio in late rounds and in definate need of refining. I think Bader is a notch below Jon Jones because he's still evolving into a more rounded fighter at a slower pace, but should still be considered a top prospect. I have Bader, if he can really fine tune his striking, taking out alot of big shots in the LHW division. I think Bader with that striking potential and his wrestling base, could SERIOUSLY be the next Chuck Liddell. I think he needs to get the hell outta Arizona asap though, because he's not evolving at the rate I think he should in comparison to the Jardine and Red fights, in which he both almost got caught in. He's good on his way to great and am not too sure we're seeing the sharp decline in Jardine, who may simply have taken too many BIG SHOTS in his career. Good showing.

2. Wand impressed me greatly because he exercised great restraint in his striking, showed much improved footwork and timed his explosions perfectly. I can't remember the last time I saw Wand execute so many well placed legkicks and didn't just blow his wad early, but he really come in with a gameplan more than simply murderdeathkill which was a treat. Again, I don't know if Wand'll be able to take this victory further in the division past Akiyama, but he showed a marked improvement in areas he really needed to work on and I think this may be something of a comeback against a fighter who isn't running away for three rounds.

1. Last night was George Sotiropoulos' coming out party to the majority of the UFC. The moment I saw this guy's name against Joe Daddy, I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach that Joe wasn't gonna fair so well and unfortunately I was correct, because George is a fucking maestro on the ground. He's like Maia or Palhares in regards to grappling transition and his striking is so solid that he's not in a terrible threat to standup on his feet. Let's make one thing REAL clear, Joe Daddy isn't a pushover. He's got solid wins against Fisher and Nate within the last six months orso and really has alot to throw at fighters. Good subs, great cardio, solid chin and superb wrestling....and he got completely owned. Sotiropoulos was two steps ahead the whole way through and it was a treat to watch him. Thing is, I have Joe Daddy ranked ahead of Maynard, Sherk, Jim Miller and Griffin and think that this is just the very beginning of George's destruction of the lame, boring, dullass LW wrestlers under UFC's banner. Good god this is a great thing! Sincerely impressed with this guy!

[Rambo]

Velasquez impressed me the most. He showed he's confident and ready to fight anybody. He wasn't even remotely intimidated of Nog. He just went out there like Tyson and ran through Nog as if he stole something. Very good performance from Velasquez. People love KOs and he delivered! Great for marketing too. Dana has a winner with this guy. People want to see Velasquez no matter who he fights next. How about a Velasquez vs Couture fight?

[The8thPlague]

George S.

Because I haven't seen Joe Daddy get man-handled like that since fighting BJ Penn.

[Dr. MMA]

It easily comes down to Sotiropoulos and Velasquez.

I picked both of them to win their respective fights and they did and both did it in a dominant fashion. Although, I didn't expect Velasquez to KO Big Nog, I did expect to beat him convincingly (maybe even to a point of nearly outclassing him) in every round. Sotiropoulos, on the other hand, I expected him to do alright on his feet and on the bottom, but do really well on top. I thought he would squeeze by a decision but we clearly saw that he did much more than that. Stevenson couldn't do anything to him on top and got spanked when he was on the bottom.

I like that George has an aggressive style of guard passing and it throws a lot of guys off. They are left defenseless a lot of times. By the time they react, he's on to his next move.

So considering George went above my expectations, he gets the nod for "who impressed me the most". Cain always impresses me.

I'll comment on the other guys too:
CroCop did not impress me with his standup. He doesn't have the flow in his combinations like he used to. Even though he wasn't left high kick happy this time, he was still left side happy with his punches. I was so glad he jumped in the guard to finish Perosh off. People may not remember but CroCop has shown some bruttal GnP in his fights (e.g against barnett).

Wanderlei - What impressed me is that he used his kicks a lot. He's finally deciding to use more of his tools. His trips were classic MT trips too. However, I felt he was tentative at the wrong times. I don't blame him though after being KO'ed brutally the last few times.

Bisping - He moved great in and out. His timing for takedowns were pretty impressive too and his strategy was one of the reasons that Wanderlei was tentative. I was telling my gf that the difference between aggressive fighters and cautious fighters really show at the end of the round. Cautious ones use the last 10 seconds to usually circle whereas aggressive ones go nuts. So, I expected Wand to go nuts at the final seconds of every round. Glad he did it in the 3rd.

Bader - Showed good striking and a great finishing instinct.