Predicting the rest of the tournament

EndlessCritic

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Pantoja vs France: Pantoja finds his way to the ground and gets the sub.
Antolin vs Ogikubo: Relatively easy sprawl and brawl win for Antolin
Candido vs Shelton: Very difficult fight to pick. I think Shelton uses his athleticism to keep this on the feet.
Elliot vs Schnell: Another difficult fight to pick. Schnell keeps it on the feet and outboxes Elliot.

Pantoja vs Antolin: Pantoja again finds his way to the ground and gets the sub
Shelton vs Schnell: Schnell sprawls and brawls his way to another competitive win.

Pantoja vs Schnell: Schnell keeps it on the feet and beats Pantoja in a war.


Frankly, it is clear Pantoja now has the easiest road to the finals, and I would be shocked if Pantoja does not meet (and beat) Antolin in the semifinals.

The other side of the bracket is incredibly tough to pick. All four guys are legit, and all with very different skill sets. Shelton's the best athlete, Elliot has the most experience, Schnell is the best striker, and Candido is the best on the ground.

May the fantastic fights continue in what has arguably been the greatest season of TUF ever.
 
I think Pantoja or Elliott wins. I'd be pretty surprised if Schnell wins. He has shown issues in quite a few fights on AXS. I know he avenged it, but giving up his neck to Mai. Losing in a lot of different spots to Garcia. He can't make those type of mistakes against in a tournament like this.
 
I want to say that one of my reasons for picking against Elliott is that the show hasn't really featured him at all, but the truth is, the show hasn't really featured anyone at all! None of the 8 quarterfinalists have received any more screen time than any other.
 
It's a really good tournament. Antolin is probably the least interesting to me. I think the quick turnaround and lack of fight camp to form a true gameplan favors a guy like Elliott. A guy like Shelton would have to execute really good gameplanning to make it to the finals.
 
Frankly, it is clear Pantoja now has the easiest road to the finals, and I would be shocked if Pantoja does not meet (and beat) Antolin in the semifinals.
I thought Pantoja having to face Moreno then Kara-France put him on the most difficult path out of everyone so far.
 
My prediction

Pantoja
France
----------France
----------------------France
----------Antolin
Ojikubo
Antolin
-------------------------------Shelton
Elliott
Schnell
----------Elliott
-----------------------Shelton
----------Shelton
Candido
Shelton
 
Honestly I think Pantoja is too eager to stand and that will get him in trouble fast against Kai.

I'll take Kai and Shelton in the final
 
I'm not nearly as high on Kai as everyone else seems to be. He may have fast hands, but his grappling will be badly exposed by Pantoja.
 
Pantoja/Kai : i've got Kai. Pantoja seems to love to stand and bang like he did against Moreno. And if he takes it to the ground i think Kai a good enough jiu-jitsu to get back to his feet, then he'll catch him in a stand-up exchange

Hiro/Antolin : Hiro looks like a one-trick pony to me, and even at his craft he's nothing special, he had trouble subbing Zulu who has basically zero ground game. Easy sprawl and brawl to UD win for Antolin like someone said above

Shelton/Candido : really tough to call. I don't know but i think shelton knows candido's gameplan and he proved he can wrestle enough to keep it on his feet. And he has better standup. So i'm favoring Shelton by T'Ko maybe

Danger/Eliott: hard to call too. I think Schnell is a very dangerous guy but he'll have his hands full with eliott at this point. I really don't know about this fight, but i'm leaning with Danger Schnell just because i have to make a choice

Then semi-finals would be Kai/Antolin and Shelton/Schnell

I think Antolin is underestimated and that he'll beat Kai. And that Shelton makes it to the finals too

So i have Antolin/Shelton in the finals. I might be the only one lol
 
Pantoja vs France: Pantoja finds his way to the ground and gets the sub.
Antolin vs Ogikubo: Relatively easy sprawl and brawl win for Antolin
Candido vs Shelton: Very difficult fight to pick. I think Shelton uses his athleticism to keep this on the feet.
Elliot vs Schnell: Another difficult fight to pick. Schnell keeps it on the feet and outboxes Elliot.

Pantoja vs Antolin: Pantoja again finds his way to the ground and gets the sub
Shelton vs Schnell: Schnell sprawls and brawls his way to another competitive win.

Pantoja vs Schnell: Schnell keeps it on the feet and beats Pantoja in a war.


Frankly, it is clear Pantoja now has the easiest road to the finals, and I would be shocked if Pantoja does not meet (and beat) Antolin in the semifinals.

The other side of the bracket is incredibly tough to pick. All four guys are legit, and all with very different skill sets. Shelton's the best athlete, Elliot has the most experience, Schnell is the best striker, and Candido is the best on the ground.

May the fantastic fights continue in what has arguably been the greatest season of TUF ever.
Definitely think that Kai is going to surprise us all imo...
 
I like Elliot but that style is only gonna get him so far. It reminds me of Jardine. Might work on some guys who can't fight an opponent that doesn't follow a rhythm, but he leaves so many openings, a smart fighter will capitalize on them. Alaniz, who IMO was the least skilled guy on the show, caught him hard a few times. I think someone like Kai would tear him apart.
 
I like Elliot but that style is only gonna get him so far. It reminds me of Jardine. Might work on some guys who can't fight an opponent that doesn't follow a rhythm, but he leaves so many openings, a smart fighter will capitalize on them. Alaniz, who IMO was the least skilled guy on the show, caught him hard a few times. I think someone like Kai would tear him apart.

He did fairly well against Dodson though. Historically, his issue has been grapplers. I think the reason for that is that his wrestling is solid so he can always take it there.
 
Pantoja/Kai : i've got Kai. Pantoja seems to love to stand and bang like he did against Moreno. And if he takes it to the ground i think Kai a good enough jiu-jitsu to get back to his feet, then he'll catch him in a stand-up exchange

Hiro/Antolin : Hiro looks like a one-trick pony to me, and even at his craft he's nothing special, he had trouble subbing Zulu who has basically zero ground game. Easy sprawl and brawl to UD win for Antolin like someone said above

Shelton/Candido : really tough to call. I don't know but i think shelton knows candido's gameplan and he proved he can wrestle enough to keep it on his feet. And he has better standup. So i'm favoring Shelton by T'Ko maybe

Danger/Eliott: hard to call too. I think Schnell is a very dangerous guy but he'll have his hands full with eliott at this point. I really don't know about this fight, but i'm leaning with Danger Schnell just because i have to make a choice

Then semi-finals would be Kai/Antolin and Shelton/Schnell

I think Antolin is underestimated and that he'll beat Kai. And that Shelton makes it to the finals too

So i have Antolin/Shelton in the finals. I might be the only one lol
Great rundown. And between Antolin and Shelton who do you think takes it?
 
He did fairly well against Dodson though. Historically, his issue has been grapplers. I think the reason for that is that his wrestling is solid so he can always take it there.

True. It's been a while since I've seen that fight to be honest, I don't have a big recollection of it. Again, I like him a lot, but I fear a style like that only gets guys so far. Good point on his grappling overall.. the bulldog choke was really nice, old school shit.

Thread makes me wanna go back and watch some of his fights. In fact, I have been meaning to watch more of these guys fights from the show overall as a whole. Maybe now that they're down to 8 I will go back and check out these guys some more.

I'm still shocked Page was eliminated in the first round. It seems to me kinda like whenever TUF brings on a vet who you think is gonna blow through guys, he ends up losing early to someone unexpectedly.
 
I think Page's best days are behind him. He's still an exciting guy to have on cards. He fits good on the AXS promotions.
 
Great rundown. And between Antolin and Shelton who do you think takes it?

Well they both are well rounded. Antolin showed he can follow and execute a gameplan to the letter. As for Shelton i think he has the edge in athleticism plus he's an impredictable fighter, he reminds me of a small version of Anthony Pettis with better wrestling. I say it's close but i see Shelton overwhelming him in the third round and getting a finish

Maybe ! ;)
 
Well they both are well rounded. Antolin showed he can follow and execute a gameplan to the letter. As for Shelton i think he has the edge in athleticism plus he's an impredictable fighter, he reminds me of a small version of Anthony Pettis with better wrestling. I say it's close but i see Shelton overwhelming him in the third round and getting a finish

Maybe ! ;)
Shelton is my prediction too. I thought I was clever and the only one, but actually a lot see him winning. Pretty surprising, But he looked like he could handle himself everywhere his last fight.
 
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