- Commissioner’s statement on Ventura, Marte
- Ronnie O’Sullivan: Masters champion ‘felt so vulnerable’ in final
- Arron Fletcher Wins 2017 WSOP International Circuit Marrakech Main Event ($140,224)
- Smith challenges Warner to go big in India
- Moncada No. 1 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- Braves land 2 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- Kingery makes MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- New Zealand wrap up 2-0 after Bangladesh implosion
- Mathews, Pradeep, Gunathilaka to return to Sri Lanka
- Elliott hopes for rain for Poli
Opinion: Watching Through the Rearview
- Updated: December 19, 2016
Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed below are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sherdog.com, its affiliates and sponsors or its parent company, Evolve Media.* * * I watched UFC on Fox 22 after it had already finished. I had to work on Sunday morning, when most fight cards are live in my time zone, and after the requisite hweshik — a Korean custom where you go out and drink with your boss — all the hands had already been raised in Sacramento, California.While I was out, I couldn’t help myself; by the time I rolled home, I knew the who and the how of the event’s winners. I probably could have left it at that and scanned through play-by-plays and post-fight analyses, but there’s a difference between reading about fights and actually watching them. So that’s what I did. For whatever is lost in the way of genuine intrigue, watching fights through the rearview makes up for it with added clarity. Upsets, bad decisions, surprising performances — they all make more sense when you expect them. The experience is less exciting than not knowing, of course, but it provides a different lens through which to understand what happened. The strangest part about watching a fight for the first time when you already know the end result is how normal it can be. I assumed Urijah Faber would win, and by the time “California Love” cut through the showers of applause at the Golden 1 Center, I knew he would win. The odd part, though, is that it felt no different than the majority of Faber’s fights for the past 10 years. I distinctly remember the first time I watched Faber fight live, when he defended his World Extreme Cagefighting featherweight strap for the fourth time against Jeff Curran. At that time, I had watched basically all of Faber’s WEC and King of the Cage fights after the fact, on DVD or online, knowing he had won before I actually watched any of them. Against Curran, Faber had cultivated an aura of inevitability; he would find a way to win, like he always did, because he was the best damn featherweight fighting in North America. Of course he was going to win and probably by some submission he’d find in a scramble. From then on, I had always been a conflicted fan of Faber’s. He was undeniably the man when the sub-lightweight ponds …
