Three sports were at the forefront yesterday and none of them were the NBA, NFL, or MLB. I know a lot was made of the ‘sports equinox’ last week but this was the superior sports day. College Football, The Breeders’ Cup and the UFC took over the sports world and honestly, it was one of the best days in sports in a long time. Sadly we did get some controversy with another horse death at Santa Anita and the early stoppage in the Nate Diaz-Jorge Masviadal fight.
Breeders’ Cup
Everyone knows I’m a big horse racing guy, The Breeders’ Cup is one of my favorite sporting events of the year. I honestly wish it was on a Thursday and Friday though just so it didn’t create more channel flipping for me on College Football Saturdays. It’s always worth it though. Covfefe and Bellafina kicked off the big time racing day by dominating the rest of the field. Covfefe, the favorite, held off Bellafina. I’m not going to break down the races, frankly because I think that’s a boring read and I’m nowhere near an expert, but others have. But I will tell you if you’re a person who watches/gambles on the Kentucky Derby, give The Breeders’ Cup a shot. It’s one of the most entertaining sporting events out there with a ton of big races, lots of money being thrown around and the best horses on the planet.
College Football
Honestly I was doing a lot of channel flipping throughout the day between the Breeders’ Cup and trying to keep an eye on all the MAC games I bet on. But I was able to catch most of the big games. Obviously the biggest game in college football is next weekend when LSU travels to Alabama. But there were a lot of good games that showed us what to expect the rest of the year. First of all Georgia showed they’re still one of college football’s dominate teams. They beat Florida 24-17 but I think they actually played better than the score line. Fromm looked good against a great Florida defense showing he can get the job done versus the big boys. Georgia’s defense is legit. For Florida that’s pretty much it for their season, at least they’ll be in a big time bowl, that they probably won’t care about.
SMU goes down
The Mustangs lost to Memphis 54-48 in a great game. This game actually hurt for me because I’ve become one of the leaders of the SMU bandwagon. The Mustangs put up 24 in the fourth quarter to make it a game. But this game was really about Memphis showing that they’re one of the best offenses in the country. Brady White made a couple huge plays. The SMU defense actually did a pretty good job at keeping my boy Kenny Gainwell in check. But they allowed Damonte Coxie to dominate on the outside and catch two touchdowns. Watch out for this Memphis team the rest of this year and especially next year, if they bring back White, Gainwell and Coxie.
The other two big games were in the PAC 12
Utah has officially proved they are the second best team in the PAC 12. In the first half it looked like Washington was going to win the game, but the Utes started to get some pressure on Jacob Eason and he completely fell apart. I’ve been beating the Eason is an elite QB prospect drum, I don’t know anymore. Zack Moss only averaged 3.7 yards a carry but made some huge tough runs. Utah overall was just too tough for Washington.
Oregon Ducks
Some people might be thinking Utah is the best team in the PAC 12 and I’m here to tell you that you’re wrong. The Oregon Ducks are the best team in the PAC 12 and the only team outside of Clemson, Ohio State or an SEC team that should be in the playoff conversation. The Ducks absolutely dominated. 56-24 on the road against a pretty solid USC team, that beat Utah, is an impressive win Justin Herbert is rolling and Oregon actually has top of the line athletes. This is the only legit team west of the Mississippi.
UFC 244
Even with all the other great games and events going on. The UFC put on the best show. The first fight I watched was Corey Anderson knocking out Johnny Walker in the first round. It was a pretty big upset but it didn’t look like it. Anderson absolutely dominated. The next fight was the start of the main card and man did it start with some fireworks. Kevin Lee knocked out Gregor Gillespie in the first round. It was one of the greatest knockouts I’ve ever seen. I honestly thought there was a chance Gillespie was dead.
Heavyweights
Next we got some big boys in the ring. Derrick Lewis and Blagoy Ivanov but on a pretty decent show. It was a pretty standard Derrick Lewis fight. Some standing around followed up with him swinging for the fences. The guy seems like hes got cinder blocks in his gloves. I was pretty impressed with Ivanov he took the the punishment and almost submitted Lewis a couple different times. Lewis got the win by decision in the closest fight of the night.
Wonderboy is back
Stephen ‘The Wonderboy’ Thompson but in a helluva performance against Vicente Luque. Before I get into the Wonderboy I want to shout out Luque a little bit. He took a beating from one the best fighters in the world and kept coming forward. He throws hard and with a good amount of volume. This dude is a good fighter who’s going to do some big things in the UFC. But this fight was all about the return of Thompson. The first round was tight but he just took over the rest of the way and absolutely punished Luque. I honestly don’t know how he didn’t finish it but the Wonderboy is officially back.
Main Events
Gastelum vs Till was the worst fight of the night. There was a lot of standing around and missed punches. It didn’t really hurt this card because everything else was so electric. I guess Till announced that he belongs in the middle weight division.
Diaz vs Masvidal
So this wasn’t how most people expected the BMF belt to be given out. Before I get into the decision I think it was pretty clear Masvidal was the dominte fighter. He was stronger and faster than Diaz and stunned him a couple times. But to be fair to Diaz. He kind of has a rope a dope strategy. He’s OK with taking some damage to wear the opponent down because he trust his jaw so much. I honestly think we saw that Masvidal’s edge in strength and speed was starting to disappear from tiring out a little bit. The fact Diaz survived up to that point was insane though. He did tag Jorge and wobble him a couple times too, it wasn’t completely one sided. Then that was it the fight was called of due to Diaz being cut.
The stoppage
My officially thoughts on the stoppage are that it was kind of bullshit. I know Diaz was leaking blood pretty good and those cuts were pretty deep. But you have to know the fighters in the ring when your the doctor. You could stop almost all of Nate Diaz fights for cuts if you wanted to. My man starts bleeding when other fighters look at him. Also with all the hype about the BMF belt you can’t stop this fight unless someone is unconscious in the ring or someone taps. The fight was setting up to be an all timer and we were were robbed of that.
What a day
It doesn’t get any better than this. It was such an exciting sports day I forgot to even mention that Canelo Alvarez is knocking people out again. I need next years Breeders Cup day to be surrounded by other elite sporting events.
Its important to not skip over what’s happened at Santa Anita this year and throughout horse racing with the death of horses. I just don’t feel like this is the article to touch on those issues. Maybe I will in an upcoming article, but for now, these two do a good job covering the event.
