Holloway vs. Volkanovski. Haven’t seen Max Thai march like that since his Lamas fight – a fight I always point to when referencing Max building off his opponent’s offense. Max is looking incredible. Damn! Robbery Review: Alexander Volkanovski vs. Max Holloway at UFC 251 New, 108 comments By Alexander K. Lee @AlexanderKLee Jul 14, 2020, 12:00pm EDT So ‘Blessed’ is best off waiting to see how other results pan out.And that last thought applies to Volkanovski, too, though with a little more clarity; the Australian’s next defence should come against the winner of Rodriguez vs Magomedsharipov, a contest that’s scheduled for 29 August. He’s putting on a clinic right now. At that, White polled the attending media members to answer the question with a question.“Did anybody in here score it for Volkanovski?” White asked. Aleksandar Rakic says he’s ready for a shot at the UFC light heavyweight title following his dominant win over former title challenger Anthony Smith. I have 3-1 Max, but that third round was a coin flip. Anytime a popular fighter like Holloway puts in a spirited effort like that and loses a close decision, there’s going to be some second-guessing and calls of “robbery.” With the fight still fresh, let’s dig into the supposed scene of the crime.Alexander Volkanovski def. Disclaimer DMCA. To learn more or opt-out, read our In Saturday’s co-main event, “Blessed” attempted to regain the featherweight belt that he lost to White was asked if he felt Holloway did enough to win his rematch against Volkanovski and while he didn’t answer the question directly, he made clear his feelings on the quality of the UFC 251 judging.“Listen, man, you can’t leave it to these guys,” White said. It was a real toss-up in the moment.The failings of the 10-9 must system were laid bare at UFC 251, with the scores of each round looking the same, even though anyone with a set of eyes could tell you that the Holloway rounds were the most convincing. In no way was he just throwing “pitter-patter” shots, and though he couldn’t return the favor by visibly stunning Holloway, there were definitely moments where the challenger was given pause.I also think that Holloway’s early success shaped the narrative going into the third round, as well as the fact that he was doing so much better than he did at Not a robbery.
The champion punished Holloway with them in their first fight, and you can tell they were a point of emphasis for “Blessed” heading into this encounter. But I had him losing the fight 3 Rounds to 2. In fact, many fans feel that latter fight should have been for the vacant strap, not Yan’s match-up with Aldo.Yan is 15-1 and undefeated in 10 bouts, while Sterling is 19-3 and has won his last five. Regardless, he picked up a lot of steam heading into the final round.Holloway’s pace was so steady, and he found a home for his jab throughout the fight. Volkanovski also secured three takedowns in the championship rounds, but as mentioned above, they led to only brief moments of control and shouldn’t have affected the scoring.Volkanovski landed the vast majority of head (64-44) and leg (67-31) strikes, while Holloway’s impressive body work was reflected in a 27-6 advantage.Looking at the 27 media member scores tallied by MMA Decisions, Holloway earned twice as many nods as Volkanovski, with 18 scoring it for the challenger and nine for the champion.As of this writing, Holloway has a healthy amount of support on MMA Decisions, with 52.3 percent scoring Saturday’s fight in his favor 48-47. UFC 251: Matches to make after first Fight Island event. All three judges gave rounds one and two to Holloway and rounds three and four to Volkanovski. In an inversion of their first fight, it was Volkanovski who began to work from behind, showing the tenacity of a champion.
Holloway’s head kick and uppercut were the most telling moments of the fight, and they should have been scored as such.I had the first three rounds for Holloway, though I’d be lying if I said I felt confident about giving either man the third round. Give credit to Volkanovski for making it close enough for the judges in Rounds 3 and 4 before securing the 5th without a doubt.