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thesportssoundoff · 5 years

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“A bittersweet ESPN Fight Night” UFC Rozenstruik vs Overeem Preview

Joey

December 1st

It's been an "interesting" experience on ESPN, one with plenty of ups and downs and roundabouts but we come to an end on December 7th withwith a finale card for ESPN from DC. It's a good card on paper but one that a) has been besieged by injuries and b) overshadowed by some truly heartbreaking circumstances. It's headlined by a heavyweight fight pitting Alistair Overeem in the midst of his 3rd (fourth?) renaissance run taking on rising HW Jair Rozenstruik. Underneath that we have a bevy of solid women's fights that have also been somewhat shaken by injuries as Cynthia Calvillo faces solid Brazilian striker Marina Rodriguez in the co-main event with Aspen Ladd vs Yana Kunitskaya settled in underneath that. After that we've got some great fights at bantamweight, a few fights at HW and MW and then some action filler. It's not the worst card in the world and it's got some merit especially if you're in the midst of this rather gross MMA drought we got goin' on.

Fights: 12

Debuts: Billy Quarantillo, Jacob Kilburn, Joe Solecki

Fight Changes/Injury Cancellations: (Claudia Gadelha OUT, Mariana Rodriguez IN vs Cynthia Calvillo/Walt Harris OUT, Jair Rozenstruik IN vs Alistair Overeem/Courtney Casey OUT, Mallory Martin IN vs Virna Jandiroba/Carlos Condit vs Mickey Gall CANCELLED/Chris Fishgold OUT, Jacob Kilburn IN vs Billy Quarantillo/Alonzo Menifield OUT, Makhmud Muradov IN vs Trevor Smith)

Headliners (fighters who have either main evented or co-main evented shows in the UFC): 8 (Alistair Overeem, Cynthia Calvillo, Ben Rothwell, Aspen Ladd, Yana Kunitskaya, Stefan Struve, Ricky Simon, Thiago Alves)

Fighters On Losing Streaks in the UFC: Ben Rothwell, Trevor Smith

Fighters On Winning Streaks in the UFC: Alistair Overeem, Cynthia Calvillo, Marina Rodriguez,Yana Kunitskaya, Song Yadong, Bryce Mitchell, Jair Rozenstruik

Main Card Record Since Jan 1st 2017 (in the UFC): 34-15-1

Alistair Overeem- 4-2 Jair Rozenstruik- 3-0 Cynthia Calvillo- 5-1 Marina Rodriguez- 2-0-1 Aspen Ladd- 3-1 Yana Kunitskaya- 2-1 Stefan Struve- 1-3 Ben Rothwell- 0-2 Rob Font- 3-2 Ricky Simon- 3-1 Cody Stamman- 4-1 Song Yadong- 4-0

Fights By Weight Class (yearly number here):

Women’s Strawweight- 2 (30) Heavyweight- 2 (39) Bantamweight- 2 (57) Featherweight- 2 (59) Women’s Bantamweight- 1 (21) Middleweight- 1 (47) Welterweight- 1 (73) Lightweight- 1 (75)

Light Heavyweight- (44) Women’s Flyweight- (33) Flyweight- (15) Women’s Featherweight- (8)

2019 Number Tracker

Debuting Fighters (40-62-1)- Billy Quarantillo, Jacob Kilburn, Joe Solecki

Short Notice Fighters (32-41-1)- Marina Rodriguez, Jair Rozenstruik, Mallory Martin, Jacob Kilburn, Makhmud Muradov, Virna Jandiroba

Second Fight (56-40)- Makhmud Muradov, Virna Jandiroba

Cage Corrosion (Fighters who have not fought within a year of the date of the fight) (23-40-1)-

Undefeated Fighters (42-40-2)- Bryce Mitchell, Marina Rodriguez, Jair Rozenstruik

Fighters with at least four fights in the UFC with 0 wins over competition still in the organization (12-9)- Tim Means, Matt Wiman, Trevor Smith

Weight Class Jumpers (Fighters competing outside of the weight class of their last fight even if they’re returning BACK to their “normal weight class”) (33-26)-

Twelve Precious Ponderings

1- First and foremost, this is the saddest main event in UFC history. Jair Rozenstruik is fighting in place of Walt Harris who right at the peak of his UFC run was forced to step away and endure a situation you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. As much fun as we may poke at Walt Harris the fighter for some of the sillier moments in MMA that are attached to his name (a six fight non fight series with Mark Godbeer, fighting Werdum on two hours notice, his first UFC run), professionally speaking he had finally begun to put everything together and was on a 5-1 run that really should've been a 5-0 streak if you remove a fight vs Fabricio Werdum that he took on a days notice to help save the card. That doesn't even account for his other loss being a silly DQ loss where he clearly fouled Mark Godbeer during a break in rather controversial fashion. It's sad on a professional level but heartbreaking on a personal one as Harris pulled out of this fight due to the then disappearance (now confirmed murder) of his stepdaughter. What Walt Harris and his family are going through currently pales in comparison to anything fight related and is truly one of the worst things a human being has to endure. Walt Harris put his fighting career on hold as his personal life crumbled around him through no fault of his own and that is tragic. As intrigued as I am by this main event, it's the epitome of "With a heavy heart" because in a just, fair and loving world this is Walt Harris going for the biggest win of his career. Rest in peace Aniah Blanchard and may the Harris family find the strength to get through this trying time.

2- Is Alistair Overeem essentially blocked off from the title picture? Let's say Overeem beats Jair Rozenstruik and does it impressively. That's now three wins in a row. Normally three wins in a row at HW gets you a title fight but ahead of him in terms of contenders you have Curtis Blaydes (beat Overeem), Ngannou (almost killed Overeem), Volkov (likely fighting Ngannou) and DC (this would've been a hell of a fight 2-3 years ago). Derrick Lewis is about to be tied up in an utterly meaningless fight and OVereem probably beats or HAS beaten everybody behind him. As such---what's really his place in the division? Is he the official Keith Jardine/Kenny Florian/Mark Munoz gatekeeper to the title shot who never gets the title shot?

3- Had this discussion a few weeks ago but is Alistair Overeem a top 5 HW of all time?

4- Why are allowing Aspen Ladd to fight at 135 lbs? It just feels needless.

5- A lot has been made about the lack of contenders for Amanda Nunes but I think we can have a genuine conversation about Yana Kunitskaya taking none of those spots if she can beat Aspen Ladd. Kunitskaya with three straight wins over the likes of Lina Lansberg, Marion Reneau and Aspen Ladd would probably at worst put her in a #1 contender fight if not directly into being Nunes' next opponent. With Amanda Nunes basically being a better Mighty Mouse in terms of name value, it's not like you need to be a big name to get a fight.

6- Tim Means vs Thiago Alves in 2019, eh? Fine. You guys do you.

7- The same should be said for this rather blegh Ben Rothwell vs Stefan Struve fight. Rothwell has not been the same guy since coming back from his USADA suspension and Stefan Struve really should've gone through with his retirement.

8- Is this too much too soon for Song Yadong? To this point, Yadong's fought guys ranging from fun but limited (Bharat Kandare) to established quality veterans lacking a defining trait (Felipe Arantes and Alejandro Perez). Alejandro Perez was a fine but safe step up since Perez's defining traits (consistent workrate, a solid kicking game at range) weren't going to do much against Yadong unless we were all wrong about him. Outside of a blip here or there, Yadong has passed every test but Stamman is IMO a genuine top 10 bantamweight who brings high level strength with him. We've seen that Yadong does some of his best work in tight but we've never seen him have to wrestle with a strong compact wrestler type. Stamman is also probably the most polished fighter Yadong has ever faced in his time in the UFC with experience against elite dudes like Aljamain Sterling. This is a really good fight and perhaps a bridge too far for China's best male fighter in the UFC.

9- Matt Wiman's long awaited return to the UFC was about what you'd expect for a dude who basically missed out on the rise of the athlete/real sports era of the UFC. Wiman looked woefully out of his depth vs Luis Pena and while he didn't humiliate himself in terms of heart, it was certainly not one of the highlight reels. Wiman is back and taking on debuting fighter Joe Salecki in yet another "old school UFC LW vs DWCS guy" fight. Perhaps Wiman can get some good vibes after Joe Lauzon boxed up Jonathan Pearce and had one of the cooler moments of 2019 in his out of nowhere win. Remember debuting fighters have bad numbers in 2019!

10- Cynthia Calvillo vs Claudia Gadelha was on paper a tremendous fight with plenty to discuss but Marina Rodriguez vs Cynthia Calvillo feels like one of those weird throwback style clashes. Rodriguez is a fantastic muay thai striker with good movement who cuts a frenetic pace. On the other hand, Cynthia Calvillo eats up this kind of fighter with her grappling and quick takedowns. Rodriguez allowed Randa Markos to spend 10 minutes taking her down at will. As such, I get the feeling things are about to go real bad for Rodriguez unless her takedown defense has grown overnight.

11- Ricky Simon is subjecting us to more Urijah Faber fights so let's just say that I hope he has a great performance to make up for that.

12- Should there be a limit to the number of DWCS guys on one sole card?

#MMA #UFC #Rozenstruik #Overeem #fights #Rothwell #Struve

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kaleraniel · 7 years

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Whenever we write, it’s something we do together. We may not always actually talk, but we both contribute more or less equally (whether or not Terra actually notices it and doesn’t chalk it up to eir own thoughts ahaha) Anyway, thought we should make a list. Or rather, two lists. Fics in progress, and fics we haven’t started but want to.

In progress, in order of current motivation to finish (kind of)– *“"sequel”“ to fake dating au. Just need to add some stuff (maybe up to 1k? We can’t shut up about these two and their healthy communication I mean talk about goals, right) and tweak the characterization to fit the established au. Motivated by time, mostly. Hope to get it up by Valentine’s Day. *gym au where it’s gay and such a pity Javert’s has prosopagnosia and always distracted by Valjean’s arms, and how Valjean’s never seen Javert out of uniform and doesn’t recognize him in workout clothes and is ever so distracted by his runners calves. Absolutely tragic. *dw doctor/TARDIS fic. I think I’m into that a lot because of that symbiotic relationship. I’m always about symbiotic relationships, probably given my own nature, haha *dæmon au, because that’s always important. Won’t be finished anytime soon. *magic au, because it’s almost done and why not? *leverage ot3 fic, since we don’t expect that to be too long, and also I mean it’s leverage so that’s always good. *phone call perceived unrequited perfectworldshipping fic, since we still think that’s really good and just the right amount of angst that is satisfying as hell. At least for us to read. That bittersweet kind of thing, where they’re just a hair’s breadth too late, they miss each other by just a second, if they had only reached out sooner but it was never the right time. Both of us love that shit so much. Kind of wary of posting two 5+1 fics so close together though. *Vampire!Javert, even though we’re undecided what direction to take that one right now. We have up to the bridge, but we can take it to the potentially nsfw direction or somewhere else that’s sfw. *self indulgent fic, since it’s self indulgent. Also at a standstill since we lost so much of it. Might not ever post because it’s fairly personal with the amount we project our own struggles with depression onto Javert. *sad fic, because that seems short. It’s hard to write. Haven’t been struck with that inspiration where the words come with that yet. Terra wants to write that more than I do, out of some kind of desperation to prove we can do something other than sickening fluff we can hardly bare to edit lol. There’s no rush. We have two modes: sickening fluff that apparently makes people scream and/or laugh out loud (which is? Unexpected? That funny stuff is fun to write but we never expected it to be as much fun to read), or angst fic that will break you. Absolutely no in between. *the other sad fic, which is also really personal, but it’s also half informative so somehow the part of us who loved to educate overtakes the anxious part of us hahaha. That fic requires an actual map so we can get things in order, and more research than we’re willing to put in at the moment. So, standstill. We know exactly where we want to go with it though. Probably the fic we actually use words to talk to each other about the most. Usually it’s just feelings, melding together in that writing zone to where we are really one with each other and not separated at all. That can be fun too, but I like talking. *the one where Javert is a ghost. We have the beginning, but Terra’s more interested in how Javert works and functions as a ghost rather than actual plot and I’m stuck on what to do so it’s at a standstill. *wolves fic, because that’s such a good quote we can’t not use it. Don’t know where we’re quite going with it exactly. Have a vague idea but nothing solid. *Vegas au, requires casefic which means a case and we aren’t quite sure how to handle that yet. Of course, because it revolves around casefic, we can’t do much with it yet but we have the first scene written out that probably will need redoing at a later date but whatever. It’s Vegas. *butter for lube. I hate Terra for this. So much. *touchfic, requires massive reworking. It’s 25k. Like half of that is going to have to be rewritten entirely or cut and that’s going to take so much time and effort. Totally know where we’re going, it’s just how to get there that’s the issue. *3rd person POV fic. Know what we’re doing, just not sure how to make it into a good fic. Also we keep getting distracted by OCs, so large sections of that are going to have to be cut or at least severely minimized. Those are just the things we have actual parts written, not just outlined.

To write, in no particular order– *REVERSE GROUNDHOG. We’ve been wanting to write this for literally years. And we have about 80% of it planned to a T in our brain. We just. Need to write it. And figure out that last 20%. *werewolf Valjean, for obvious reasons. There’s never enough supernatural (not the show, although the influence is most definitely there) AUs nor creature!aus *superhero AU, fight us okay *coffeeshop au #3, where jvj is a crime novel author and lowkey uses the cases Javert mutters about in his books that Javert’s a closet fan of. Idea half stolen from Paper Monsters, a cherik fic. *olive garden au aka coffee shop au #1, which Terra promised Stephanie like four years ago *Coffeeshop au #2, which is so similar to the Australian au that we might scrap it, or just write it for our own enjoyment and never post. *the one we call Mercy, with swensonvert and raminjean, which is decidedly nsfw and will go to the Shame Account. *buddy cop AU inspired by… oh what’s that movie. With the two lady leads. It’s kind of recent and super good. *leverage au with the Les Mis faves, of course. I wish we had more straight up Leverage ideas, because that’s such a good show. We yell at each other about it so much. *ink on skin soulmate au because we love soulmate AUs. *dw dæmon au where humans are the only species who have dæmons and the Doctor is absolutely fascinated by this. Thought of this yesterday, so it’s pretty new. *the one where the main pairing is Javert/Seine with lots of suicidal ideation. *Toulon nsfw fic. We don’t know how to introduce the nsfw aspect, honestly. And our Jean le cric isn’t canon characterized and it bothers me. Terra says run with it, "because fuck it it’s fanfiction,” but it bugs me. Technically, it’s partly written, but it bugs me so much I’m not counting that. *TiMER soulmate au. That one’s interesting because it plays off the idea of people evolving and growing, how the person that’s “perfectly comparable with you” may meet you earlier on (and at that point, you are good with them) but their timer doesn’t stop then. Javert’s timer resets and resets to the point where he thinks it’s faulty and Valjean’s remains constant, only skipping around near the barricades because Javert himself is fluctuating then too. Anyway that’s a lot of fun but requires a lot of looking things up in the brick and referencing the Les Mis timeline often. *music au, because we love those too, and although we collaborated with Star on the one we did for the Big Bang, we’re still not satisfied because it doesn’t /exactly/ match up with the one we constructed in our head. It’s good and we enjoy it immensely, but it doesn’t scratch the itch. If we end up rewriting it with the same plot points and stuff, we won’t post it. Might change it up, making Valjean a solo piano or luthier, but always secret composer Madeleine and always concert master Javert. *coffeeshop au #4, where they keep meeting on accident during rush and leave post its on each other’s coffee and only know each other by their coffee names. Occasionally they talk in line but it’s just a meet-cute honestly. We don’t expect this to be long, just a cute little idea. Javert always freaks out with the reveal and makes things longer and harder though, even when we expect that of him. *possibly doctor/surgeon!Javert and Valjean always coming to the ER because of shit he gets himself into by performing mostly selfish actions. Javert has beef with him for some reason. Maybe mugged him when he was a student of important things that held him back, or otherwise heavily inconvenienced him and he pressed charges, of course. *lowkey artist Valjean, who is really good but doesn’t think he is. Don’t know if this should be modern or canon era. Inspired by a friend who has Valjean hair we met at fiddle camp. He’s very good and does both realistic and caricatures that really capture people and that’s such a Valjean thing. *white collar inspired fic, half planned out. Valjean as an art thief and Javert as his pursuer. When Javert puts him away the first time, Valjean’s just gotten in with bad people. He changes when he gets out. His motives change to be more Leverage-like, and it becomes almost a game of cat and mouse. In his forgeries he starts writing stuff to leave Javert, little post it notes on the wall where a painting used to be, etc. Javert is confused but honestly missed chasing Valjean. Then after one incident where Valjean handcuffs Javert to something and leaves him there after banter/lowkey flirting, he leaves these files proving how corrupt the people he’s robbing are, as well as proof that the paintings get returned to a good place or the money from the sale goes to a good cause with only a little bit missing to pay for Valjean’s own humble life. Javert starts doubting. Valjean sees him on the bridge, paints him, then breaks into Javert’s house to hang it (and also buys him food because Jesus your fridge is barren, must feed you). It’s even signed with his real name and painted in his own style. Javert is kind of touched, even if he’s pissed off that Valjean could break into his apartment so easily (he changes his locks and only gets halfway through the milk before it goes bad. There’s a reason he doesn’t keep much food. It’s because he’s never home to eat it). Then, when Cosette is in danger, Valjean panics and doesn’t know who to go too except Javert. Javert comes home one day to Valjean pacing in his front room (and is annoyed he broke in /again/, why can’t he ring the doorbell like a normal– he doesn’t know why he could even thing of Valjean as normal and then thinks he should be more angry a know criminal is in his home and somehow looks like he belongs there). And then minor casefic- Javert helps him in exchange for his freedom. After, Javert manages to get Valjean as a consultant with an ankle bracelet thing a la white collar because damn it, he’s definitely gone for him. The first time Javert visits Valjean’s house he’s annoyed because Valjean has an original Monet hanging in Cosette’s room, which means the one they think is real is actually a forgery. That’s been developing in our brain for a long time too. We should just write it already. *TWEWY au, where Valjean ends up dying the same week as Javert. It’s a normal Game, of course. Unsure if we should have Reaper!Javert or not. Still working out the logistics of that. Who should be Conductor, Game Master, other reapers. Composer, even. *modern au where Javert’s a cop and keeps pulling over former criminal Valjean who’s now a successful and well know businessman. They end up making out against the side of Javert’s cruiser after many cop-based innuendos. Valjean’s license plate has 24601 in it, obviously. *original!weird friends AU. Featuring Grantaire/Javert friendship that neither will admit is friendship, born of over a year of arresting Grantaire for being drunk in public and various other minor crimes and watching him in the drunktank. They talk about being mentally ill, so bipolar lithro Grantaire and prosopagnosia lowkey depressed Javert. They talk about Grantaire’s unrequited crush that’s both ideal and hell for him, and teases Javert relentlessly about his not so lowkey crush on Valjean. Probably Grantaire POV. Grantaire crashes his car/motorcycle through Valjean’s shopfront window, and Grantaire just has him call Javert, totally unknowing that this is the guy Javert’s crushing hard on and has to deal with that awkward mess while very drunk and very manic. Possibly recognizes Valjean as Cosette’s dad, idk. Arranges for them to meet up very sneakily, because they’re not friends and this is just to make Javert shut up about this guy, yes totally, not to make him happy or anything. Shut up. They’re not friends. (Wow that was almost entirely Terra there. It’s late. We’re tired and not used to separation.) *AU!weird friends au where everything is the same as the above au except Grantaire has a vine account (Vine will be mourned). Obviously set when Vine was still alive and well. Consists mainly of Grantaire filming Javert while mentioning Valjean and watching as Javert attempts to be chill but is totally /not/. May involve him dropping massive amounts of paperwork, or spilling boiling hot coffee on himself. Definitely features him threatening Grantaire with arrest, not like that phases Grantaire anymore. Cosette sees his vines, mostly the one where Javert actually sees Valjean and walks straight into a street sign or trips over a parked car or something, and recognizes “oh my god that’s my dad”. They gleefully try to get them together and Grantaire’s vines consist of them actually meeting and Javert crushing harder than a 12 year old girl and Valjean’s being absolutely smitten with him. Probably told strictly through social media and video descriptions? It would be fun to try that since the texting was so fun in fake dating. Grantaire’s name is drunktank420 and you can’t stop me. *Canon era transman Javert. Can’t stop us. It’s ideal. …there’s more, because there’s always more. We are always thinking of fic. Anything cute or neat that happens in real life you can bet one of us latches onto it and an AU is born right there. It’s 5am we should sleep. Fic is too much fun for the both of us, which is why I completely endorse it. I would love to explore Valjean’s PTSD and anxiety more and having Javert learn how to calm him down or see the signs to remove him from his stressors. Also, obviously, Javert’s depression, suicidal ideation, and recovering from his suicide attempt. And his prosopagnosia, ADHD-ness, and his dyslexia in more detail. I put bits of it in almost everything but we want to examine it more.

#fic talk

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