just watched arlovski vs marcio cruz for the 1st time. What a weird fight herb dean was talking to them and essentially called a time out while both were in the 50/50 heel hook position. Arlovski then lands a giant punch off of his back rocking cruz and then just keeps hitting him in the back of the head
I remember watching it live. I couldn't believe the power of AA, knocking a guy out while sitting down. Loved it.
It was a little weird to me but then again you could see it in AA's face as soon as the ref was getting to start them back up.
it was marcio's fault, imo. andre waited a second and then punched him in the face. it seems cheap but only because he wasn't ready. andre's armbar victory in his octagon debut against aaron brink was a cheap fence-grab that seems too blatant to ignore, though.
Just thinking about that fight bothers me. Man that was an awful job by Herb. Unfortunate, because the fight wasn't pretty, so who knows how it would've ended.
Herb's always been makin goofy calls. He went from being a ok ref, to really good, to really bad in a really fast span imo.
if i remember correctly the ref got involved because Arlovski landed an illegal heel kick. When he tried to break them up Cruz wived him off because he didn't want to lose position, the Arlovski knocked him out on the reset.
I agree that it was a fucked up situation, but I don't think AA can take any of the blame. That was all Herb Deans fault. Granted, he could have not hit Cruz even though the ref started it, but still, he was merely trying to win within the referee's guidelines, which were fucking weird at that particular moment. If I remember correctly, after the restart, he even paused for a sec like he didn't want to or didn't know if he should, but Herb said fight, so he said fuck it. There was so much sand in the collective sherdog vaginas that night, lol. The Cruz fans were livid. 1) They hated that AA threw the punch when Cruz was unsure of what was going on 2) They hated that he grabbed the fence to take better position while trying to finish 3) They hated that the shots were potentially to the back of the head All of which were the result of Herb Dean being frazzled under pressure during a weird situation.
Yeah, i think you're right. Arlovski was trying to push him off of the ankle lock with his other leg, but push/kicked him in the face.
i thought ref was standing them up, then both fighters said, hey we're doin work here wtf u talkin bout, then the ref was like okay.
I remember the sound the pinch made when it connected. Absolutely brutal, like someone teeing off on a golf ball.
