UFC 97: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

[Spoiler Alert - here be spoilers]

I was really excited for UFC 97 this weekend - the main card (and undercard) were chock full 'o fights I was amped to see - Liddell/Rua, Silva/Leites, Quarry/Macdonald, Wiman/Stout, and especially the prodigal return of David "the Crow" Loiseau to lock horns with Ed "Short Fuse" Herman. Unfortunately, the event was a huge sad trombone for me. First, I purchased the PPV and had my DVR all set up (I miss TiVo.) Last night some friends came over to watch the event with the Wifey and I, and when we queued up the taped event, all we got was 15 hours of UFC promo material. After a frustrated call to DirecTV, I learned that UFC is no longer allowing PPV purchasers the ability to record their purchases. Bullocks! So, rather than let the night go to waste, I asked them to credit my account and purchase the event for that evening, which they did, except instead of HD they fed me SD. Ok, not that huge of a deal, but still annoying. Even more annoying is that we came into the event 1.5 hours in. This would have bugged me more, but the Wifey and I caught the first 3 fights at a bar the night before and they were all BORE-fests (including the Cheick Kongo fight. Snooze.)

We tuned in literally at the moment Shogun Rua put the lights out on Chuck Liddell's illustrious career, which would have been a little more exciting if we had at least seen the first 4 minutes of the fight. The rest of the evening wasn't much better. Not only did they not air the Quarry or Loiseau fights (boo), but the Silva main event was the most painfully boring 15 minutes I've spent in a long time. Leites was mercilessly outmatched, and spent most of the fight lying on his back like a gimp turtle, waiting for Silva to fall into his warm embrace. The one saving grace of the evening was the Wiman/Stout fight - both Stout and Wiman (who is really fighting the pretty, just accept your Abercrombie good looks, Matty!) put it all on the line and gave a really good show.

Eh, I guess there's always next time.

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I keed! I keed! Chuck Liddell is a great champion and deserves a lot of respect and admiration - happy retirement, Chuck!