Big Bad Blog Video Theater-Miesha Tate vs Rin Nakai

Here's the match video of Miesha Tate vs Rin Nakai from today's UFC show in Tokyo. It was on UFC Fight Pass so I know a lot of you don't subscribe. And the fight was in the middle of the night. I did watch it live so you could all get your beauty sleep. When this fight was announced, I said that Rin could win if she controlled the pace of the fight and be aggressive from the very start. Aggression in the first round has been a big problem for Rin over the last couple of years. So I knew after the first minute of round one that Rin would lose. She just didn't seem ready to me and I knew she wouldn't get away with that in this fight no matter what she did later. The one thing that Miesha worked on that seemed to pay off in this fight was her takedown defense. If Rin gets a clean takedown and top position early in the fight, that changes the tone of the fight. But it never happened. Single leg takedowns were not going to be successful. And though Rin got Miesha's back a couple of times later in the fight, she never got the position she needed to go for a finish. Rin won the third round. But she needed a finish and seemed a little desperate. She needed to do more than win that round. And she hadn't done enough earlier in the fight to wear Miesha down and set her up for a finish. So the start of fights is still a big problem for Rin Nakai. I scored it 29-28 for Miesha. Two of the judges scored it 30-27 and the other judge scored it 29-28 for Miesha. Leading up to this fight, all Miesha talked about was finishing the fight. But she never came close to a finish and by the third round, she seemed content to outpoint Rin. Obviously Miesha didn't want to get caught by Rin's ground game. But if she thinks a win like that will get her back into title contention, she's dreaming. She's still a gatekeeper which is what she was in this fight. Enjoy the video!