UFC Vegas Preview

Episode Transcript

Speaker 2 (00:00):
Greetings.

Speaker 1 (00:01):
I'm Luca Fury, and welcome to my main event preview
for UFC Vegas one two, presented as Alwi's by Furies
Fight Picks on Patreon. This is a pretty fun main
event here, had it not been the main event, that is,
Jared Cannoneer taking on RoboCop Gregory Rodriguez, had you slotted

(00:24):
this as say the third fight of a pay per
view card and be like, oh, alright, all right, let's go.
Let's that's some pretty fun stuff. I'm for this, But
as a main event Jared Cannoneer coming off two losses
in a row, I'm not so sure about that. So
this is the UFC in twenty twenty five. It's just
the modern version of the UFC. Unfortunately, but hopefully it

(00:45):
is a fun fight. Although I do think that could
kind of go either way sometimes to kind of a
feeling if it's going to be a fun fight or
not or a bad one. This one really could go,
Like I said, either way, I could see it being
a fun kind of shootout, and I could also see
it being one of those matchups where they both respect
each other a lot and are a bit hesitant and

(01:06):
god shy looking for the perfect shot while also not
wanting to make a mistake. I actually lean more towards
the ladder being a bit of more of a respectful performance.
But there's definitely some potential for fireworks here. Nonetheless, I'll
get into that just momentarily real quick. Do you undermind
you guys, as there is a bunch more content over
on the Patreon that is, at patreon dot com Slash

(01:29):
Furies Fight Picks. There's the several other fight breakdowns in
podcasts form breakdown the rest of the main card each week.
There's also the post fight show. There's the staff picks article,
the cheat sheet which has all sorts of tape, study
notes and fighter analysis, wag your notes, etc. And of course,
most importantly of all, the official bets had a huge

(01:49):
year last year of around seventy five units. That was
number four in all tracked handicappers out there. It is
of course third party tracked and verified of course, so
unfudging those results. Already have several bets up now, not
only for the CFC card, but the other NIME events
as well this week, so check it all out again
at Patreon dot com Slash Furies Fight Picks. With that

(02:12):
aside getting into the fight breakdown here for the main
event again Jared Cannoneer against Gregory Rodriguez, we have Rodriguez
as the favorite minus two thirty. Comeback on canonear is
plus one ninety. And this is a pretty tricky want
I have to admit. On one hand, we have Jared

(02:35):
Cannoneer at his best is a very solid, pretty technical striker.
He has better counterability than aggression. He oftentimes actually has
sort of the Jarsenio rosenstrike issue where he just sits
around waiting for the perfect counter opportunity and sometimes it
never occurs, and then he ends up losing a decision

(02:57):
which he could have done more or at any point
and just simply didn't. So that's definitely something to watch
out for. Here is like I mentioned, we could see
a matchup that is fireworks. We also more likely could
actually see a matchup that has a lot of moments
of tense sort of waiting around trying to.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Find that perfect shot for the counter, etc. Etc.

Speaker 1 (03:20):
And that has kind of been the story of Jared
Cannoneer's career, and he just lets fight slip away doing that.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
So I can see minute after minute.

Speaker 1 (03:29):
Of that here I could see round after round of
that here at his best again, with his wrestling and
overall takedown defense, he's not so much of a takedown lander,
but he does actually have some pretty solid takedown defense.
Not elite in terms of it being infallible by any means,

(03:50):
but it's certainly quite solid. You have to be, generally speaking,
a pretty decent wrestler or take an artists to take
him down. That has gotten worse over recent years, so
we'll get to more in a second, but again, at
his best, he is a pretty solid takedown defender. In
terms of his jiu jitsu game, we've not really seen
it offensively too much, but he actually has a really

(04:11):
great ability to retain guard and also maintain it. You
watch guys past his guard, he just finds the way
to get back to half guard, then full guard, and
then eventually stand up. Very very good at technical defense
in that regard. It's not just like the Derek Lewis
just stand up, No, he actually is technical in that regard,

(04:31):
so again uses it much more defensively than offensively.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
But at his best.

Speaker 1 (04:35):
Again, another area that he was very technically sound, and
so overall at his best he checks the boxes for striking, wrestling, grappling.
He also had pretty solid cardio two, had good power,
good counters and reflexes. Not the best chin, but it
wasn't horrible either, but certainly had been I wouldn't say

(04:57):
a weakness, but it was something that he certainly looked
to and that's again why he did have some of
these slower paced matchups. And so overall he was a
very very solid fighter at his best. Was it enough
to be championed now, but it was enough to earn
a well deserved title shot.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Well.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
Since then, his shin has certainly gotten worse, his defense
and reflexes have gotten worse, his cardio has definitely gotten worse.
His activity level in the cage in terms of the
volume and the amount of strike city throws. And I'm
under sorrying about stats like, oh man, look at he
threw more in this fight than that fight. Actually, look

(05:34):
at the fights and the opportunities that were there to land.
Is he actually throwing? Is he actually taking advantage of them?
And when you see fighters on the clear decline, especially
when they're actually straight up shot, you'll see them just
not taking advantage of the opportunities that they would have earlier.
In their career where before they had that killer instinct
that reflexes to just pounce on the slightest weakness or

(05:55):
the glaring mistake. You know, sometimes it would be subtle,
sometimes it'd be obvious, but nonetheless, and then you see
in the later stage of their career they're definitely not
pouncing on the subtle mistakes and they're not even getting
the glaring ones either. And that's the point we are
at with Jared Cannoneer.

Speaker 2 (06:12):
Now.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
Again, he is quite up there in age, I believe
forty years old now, so at his best he was
a very good fighter in terms of his skill set,
but flawed in terms of his execution again, waiting too
much trying to find that perfect shot. Well, now, during
the regressed period of his career, take all those issues,
but then just make them even worse. And we've seen

(06:36):
that in his fights recently, for example, where he was
basically knocked out against Cayo. I mean that's a matchup
where prime Jared Cannoneer is actually kind of a good
style matchup. There.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
He should be able to keep the fight on the feet.

Speaker 1 (06:49):
If he gets taken down, he should be able to defend,
and he should also be the better boxer, but as
we saw there, just couldn't pull a trigger, couldn't really
defend strikes, and it was overall not a great showing
from him. We also saw against Emovov. Now you can
have some questions about the stoppage and the sequence of
events that all led to that and everything, but still
overall not a great performance. Got rocked, got hurt very

(07:11):
badly there. It's Jared cannoneer at this point in time.
Like I said, he already had those flaws, They're just
much more glaring now. So the reason why I mentioned
all this specifically the fact that his reflexes have gone
his chin has gotten much worse, and his cardio has
seemingly gone out the window as well. Is the opponent
he has here, RoboCop Well. His strength is that he

(07:35):
also is somewhat well rounded. He actually has a very
good ground game, he just doesn't really choose to use
it that much. He isn't that technical of a striker,
but he has a lot of power and aggression, and
his wrestling is a kind of hit or miss on
both sides. A big issue for him, though, was a cardio.
He tends to slow down in his fights. It has
seemingly gotten better a little bit lately, but in the

(07:58):
past it had been a real issue for him. His
chin has been an issue in multiple times. He got
knocked out in his most recent UFC loss a few
fights ago. He was stopped multiple times with strikes on
the regional circuit. His defense, like I mentioned, not great.
He's also, as I said, not up there in age
in terms of being like forty years old at canonear.

(08:20):
But this is not some young prospect. He also has
a lot of fight years on and he's taken a
lot of damage as well, and so his flaws as
a fighter. He's still, I guess you could say in
his prime. But his flaws as a fighter are one
doesn't take damage well, two gets hit with a lot
of damage because his defense isn't good, and three doesn't

(08:41):
have good cardio, so he slows down and then takes
damage even more easily than as well, in addition of
course to being more susceptible to the grappling. So if
you said prime Jared Cannoneer against RoboCop, here you have
Cannoneer who could be defensively sound and actually that slow pace,
that kind of looking for the perfect counter opportunity would

(09:03):
actually keep him safe in the early going, and eventually
RoboCop would wear himself out looking for big shots and
moments of aggression, if not actually presenting the counter opportunity
for Cannoneer at some point eventually, if RoboCop doesn't land
the big ko early, which against prime Cannoneer probably doesn't happen, well,
then robo CoP's gonna tire out and Cannoneer can start

(09:26):
to actually outpace him at that point, if not actually
kohim so over a five round fight in their primes,
and again RoboCop is still basically his prime. I would
say that it's a pretty good stylistic matchup for Cannoneir,
But man, the way that he has fallen off the
way again, cardio is not there, So throw that out
the window like that that would normally be a massive

(09:49):
advantage like that basically be the deciding factor here. Just
don't get knocked out in the first ten minutes and
you win the fight. If you're Cannoneer, well that goes
out the window because I don't even know if he
has a better cardio anymore, he very well might not,
So throw the CARDI advantage out the window. Then talk
about his superior defense and counterability and shot selection. Well,

(10:12):
again that seems to have gone. His defense is much
worse now, he's much more hittable. His chin is even worse.
So take those advantages, throw them out the window.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
Now on the feet, what do we have.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
We have a guy in Jared Kennoneer who doesn't throw
many strikes, who doesn't have particularly good reflexes which you
need to land the good counters like he used to,
which also makes him more deceptible or used to be
susceptible defensively. Pulled to Mike goldbrig there to neutrify, as
if to nullify and neutralize at the same time. Now

(10:44):
he makes him more susceptible defensively if he does not
have those reflexes and so canonear overall.

Speaker 2 (10:51):
On the feet, what does he really offer. He's not aggressive.

Speaker 1 (10:56):
He's not gonna win rounds based on volume or point five.
Throw that out the window, especially with the cardio. He's
not aggressive and going to land the KO shot on you,
So throw that out the window before the threat of
the counter from him. The threat of the big KO
in return is why actually some of his fights would
be kind of not so exciting like the Israel out

(11:17):
of signing title fight because Israels respected his striking so
much there and so without that threat anymore, really you
can kind of just probably be aggressive on him to
an extent. Obviously, he can still unquirk some counters if
you give him some really egregious opportunities, but generally speaking,

(11:38):
he's just kind of inert on the feet, and that's
his best area by far. So let's say this fight
doesn't take place on the feet, who's getting takedowns? It's
probably going to be RoboCop who's going to be controlling
on the ground. Well, again, Jared Kinnear in his prime anyways,
had the good defensive guard and good get ups, which
I think he should still have to an extent, but

(11:58):
maybe in close rounds or not much else is happening,
that might be a deciding factor. Judges still are swayed
by that, Whereas on the flip side, Cannoneers probably not
going to be landing any takedowns on RoboCop here. So
if you just go through the different areas grappling, wrestling, striking,
it's either no advantage for candoneer, it's neutral or a

(12:20):
disadvantage for him. Then you talk about Cardio again, it's
either no advantage for Cannoneer or disadvantage. Talk about Chin again,
no advantage or disadvantage, Like, where's the advantage for Cannoneer here?
He has fallen off in not the most drastic ways,
but in enough ways that it has just basically ruined

(12:41):
his game, because again, he is a counter fighter. Anderson Silva,
as I've talked about in the past with him, look
at the way once his reflexes went, it just fell
apart all of a sudden. Just one of the most
brilliant defensive fighters we'd ever seen in MMA or combat
sports history is getting outstruck by Derek Brunson and needing

(13:01):
robbery decisions. I got you kidding me? Like that was
Anderson Silva. It happened basically overnight. The reflexes went, the
counters went, the defense went, everything went. He's still had
the power, he's still the speed, he's still the general
striking ability. He just didn't have the reflexes to land
those pinpoint precision counters in those split second exchanges. And

(13:25):
Jared Cannoneer seems to be the same deal. He just
has fallen off, just absolutely fallen off, so maybe he
can still uncork the big counter here on ROBOCOPU. Again
defensively a liability himself. He gets overly aggressive, he puts
himself out of position, he doesn't have good defense with
his arms, with his blocking, with his pirying, he doesn't

(13:46):
have good defense with his head movement. And when he
gets hit, he does not have a good chin, never has,
never will. I will say from the fight with pictures
that have been coming out, looks like he's on all
of the good supplements, and we have seen sometimes those
can at least help buffer your chin. They can't absolutely
fix it, but they can help buffer it. So maybe

(14:08):
we'll see he is again the much younger guy to
begin with. So overall, it's just one of those matchups
that I've talked about in the past that I hate handicapping,
which is we have one fighter who in their prime
the line would be flipped if not higher. But now
he has clearly fallen off. He is up there in age,
and it's the question of has he fallen far enough

(14:30):
off that now the other fighter is actually above him
at this point in time, I mean may and the
wager at Cannoneer looked his last two fights. It was
so bad, especially with the chin man. The chin looked bad.
The defense is one thing, but to see that, like
when he actually finally does take a Cleveland shot, it
just seems to be game over at this point. Rodriguez

(14:51):
has some big power, and I think he probably will
get to Cannon here at some point. Here, I will
say this, Yes, I just dunked all over. Canan nears
cardio as much as it's regressed, which it absolutely has.
I would still say that on paper, he probably should
have the cardio advantage unless he gets hurt early. Of course,

(15:11):
so it's probably a situation where it's still RoboCop early
or cannon Ear late, kind of like could be in
their prime. It's just not as clear cut like I
could actually see RoboCop potentially having some success later on.
This is, you know, a five round fight which he's
not used to training for. Maybe I'll show us some
improved cardio again, looks to be on some good supplements.

(15:32):
Whereas Cannonear, we've seen him in five rounders over and
over and over. How many five rounders is it for him?
Four or five in a row, something like that. I
think it might be even six in a row, something
along those lines. So if he's been training for nothing
but five rounders and we're still seeing him gas in
the championship rounds, like this is who he is at
this point. Whereas RoboCop, I will say, we have seen

(15:55):
fighters in the past. They're maybe not the best cardio
in a three rounder, they're good for two rounds, tire
in the third. Once they get the five round, or
they up the cardio to not just a satisfactory degree,
but even a degree greater than you'd expect, they'll actually
have solid five round cardio. They're not going to be
morobd abolished Philly in five rounds and you know, just

(16:15):
be completely demolishing people to pace, but they'll actually be
you know where you'd be like, okay, maybe they could
be a three round fighter. In a five round er,
you know, I have three good rounds of cardio, then
maybe tire the last two. No, they'll actually show up
with full five round cardios. So not saying that's going
to be RoboCop, but I'm just saying I do expect
improved cardio. So again, no matter how many times I

(16:37):
no matter how long I go on about this fight,
and so I'm gonna come back to the same thing.
We have Jared Kennoneer who is falling. We have Robo
Cop who is climbing, and at this point in time,
the odds have Robo Cop as around a two to
one favorite because he probably has actually surpassed Cannoneer. Do
I want to lay the chalk on him? Am I
confident in that? No? But do I think it's a

(17:00):
pass situation At the same time, Also, no, I'm not
really interested in betting this fight. Same thing for even
like a total, because again, it's probably one fighter early
or the other fighter late, not guaranteed, but most likely,
And so if you're betting the total, you're probably also
betting a fighter anyways. For example, if you bet the under,

(17:21):
it's pretty much a play on RoboCop, if you bet
the over, it's pretty much a play on Cannony or
not guaranteed but most likely anyways. So it's just a
fight that I don't love from a betting perspective, tricky
card overall generally in my opinion, Not to say that
there aren't some spots we do have again, several official
bets up. More on that in a second, but as

(17:42):
for this fight eikes very tricky. In terms of official prediction,
I will go with RoboCop by TKO, but.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
Not super confident in that one.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
Again, as for the official bets, we do have several before,
not just as UFC card, but the other MMA events
as well, one last week for about a year and
a half. Nothing to write home about, but a win
is a win. As I mentioned earlier, came off a
big year last year, around seventy five units altered party
track and verified good for the fourth best amongst all

(18:14):
tracked handicappers. Hundreds of units now life to date. Not
just the official bets available over on the Patriot which
is again patreon dot com Slash Furies fight Picks, but
also a bunch of other content as well, such as
my main card podcast where I break down the rest
of the fights. Also the post fight show, the after
show analysis where I break down the card and recap

(18:37):
it after the fact, give my thoughts on the performances
as well as the future for the competitors. Also a
bunch of written content the cheat sheet articles, tape study notes,
fighter notes, fighter breakdown notes, all sorts of goodness in them.
Of course, the staff picks, articles, and more so check
it all out again Patreon dot com, Slash Furies Fight Picks.

Speaker 2 (18:58):
Otherwise, until next time, where we do have. It's nine
straight weeks of UFC left. I'm looking fury and thank
you for listening.