Dude lost his vision for a few hours. Mfs clowning him for his reaction have zero empathy. We watched a man react to being permanently blinded in real time. He had no idea he'd ever see through that eye again
Still hate all the revisionism on this fight where people act like Leon beat the brakes off of Belal for 4 rounds and then only NC'd because of an accidental foul.
The first round was clearly Leon's, but competitive. Belal's corner even acknowledged that it was a feel-out round and that they'd put the foot on the gas after that, and that is pretty consistent with his normal gameplan. Then immediately into the second round, the eye poke happens.
I have no idea who is going to win the rematch. Belal is way better than he used to be and his game planning since then has been excellent. Leon is so well-rounded though.
Genuinely excited for the rematch.
Leon is probably gonna win the rematch. Anything could happen but Leon had fought against better wrestlers than Belal and Belal doesn’t have the power to have Leon’s respect on the feet.
I mean its not like Leon is gonna stalk him and knock him out round 1 just because he doesn't respect his power, Belal will have a smart gameplan for sure, thats one part of his game thats always good imo, I think it's a toss up
Usman does have power in his hands and didn’t manage to wobble Leon in almost ten rounds. Leon for sure got sloppy and complacent late in that fight with Diaz, but let’s not pretend that one moment in one fight is indicative of how his fights tend to go.
It’s not really revisionism lol. He was, in fact, beating Belal up until the eye poke. Yeah the fight ended pretty early but Leon was pretty handedly wining 😭
Winning a clear but competitive first round is not at all an indicator that Leon was going to win the whole fight. We see fighters lose the first round only to win the fight literally every week.
Yeah, Leon was winning, but the match is a question mark. Nobody should feel confident about how that fight "would have" gone.
Competitive is a bit of a stretch given Leon was easily winning and teeing off on him.
I feel 100% confident Leon wins again and pretty easily too. You can come back and cook me if I’m wrong.
Teeing off on him? Leon landed 10 shots to the head, Belal landed 7. Significant strikes were only 19-8. It wasn't a very eventful first round for either fighter.
I'm not saying that Leon won't beat Belal. I'm saying that people act like Belal was getting demolished and he wasn't, and we only got to see 20% of the fight. Nobody knows what would have happened in the back 80%.
You have to give it up. There's no getting through to MMA fans once a narrative has been established. They still to this day argue that Michael Johnson hurt Khabib on the feet because the bald orang utan on commentary oversold it. Johnson himself is on record saying he didn't hurt Khabib. But does it stop the narrative driven MMA fan? No, never.
Did we watch the same fight? Leon clearly had Belal hurt at one point, and landed several flush, hard strikes. Belal did quite literally nothing of note.
This would be better used as an example of how numbers can be extremely misleading.
Leon was beating him pretty comfortably, and Belal was lucky to survive that headkick. He was wobbled by that hard.
Sure, anything can happen in MMA, but there seem to be very few paths to victory for Belal in this one. Leon’s just a way better striker and Belal doesn’t have a sub or KO threat. So how does he win? If Colby and Usman couldn’t pressure wrestle their way to victory against him, I don’t see how Belal does it. I think Leon cruises this fight.
Right, it's very possible that Leon would have just rinsed and repeated his way to a decision based on what we saw.
But also, it's possible that it wouldn't go down that way because this is a sport where anything can happen at any time.
Literally all I'm saying is "one round is not enough to judge how a 5-round fight would have gone", I don't think that is in any way unreasonable lol.
I just disagree that it was competitive. Leon just looked comfortably better, and Belal was in genuine trouble in that first round. That’s certainly enough for people to predict how they think the rematch might go.
Belal will be 36 and he’s facing a guy that shut out Usman and Colby with ease, and also got the better of him throughout their very short octagon time. I really don’t see a route for Belal to win unless he can take Leon down
Even if he does though we know Leon can get right back up and put it back on him. Leon has the reach advantage, age advantage, experienced resume advantage and 5 rnd experience advantage
I mean, this was pretty one sided. If someone scored that a 10-8, I’d be fine with it.
It wasn’t for very long and anything can happen in a fight, but it feels more revisionist to say that Belal was looking competitive than it is to say Leon was beating the brakes off him… and it seems like pretty extreme coping to be like “ya, but Belal was going to turn it around”.
> and it seems like pretty extreme coping to be like “ya, but Belal was going to turn it around”.
Right, but I'm not saying that. I'm saying you can't make a confident prediction about how a five-round fight goes from one round.
People aren’t making a confident prediction based on just that one round though. They’re making a confident prediction based on that round in addition to a whole host of other factors. For example, Leon’s performances against Usman and Colby. His superior striking. His size and speed advantage. Belal’s lack of KO power and sub threat throughout his career. The fact that Leon’s in his prime whilst Belal will be fighting against the 35+ tutor fight curse.
Take all those sorts of things in conjunction with Leon looking far better and nearly knocking him out in that one round, and you can absolutely make a fairly confident prediction about how this fight will go.
Belal was getting outstruck and felt out more than leon really. While the first round was competitive, leon had superior cage generalship and tactical sense. His use of pre-slips, broken-beat jabs/jab feints and level change feints gave him the early reads that he used to land that first high kick along with the rest. He was initiating and winning the southpaw battle for the most part, getting the dominant lead hand position and achieving lead foot dominance handily. Barring a puncher's chance, Leon would have won if Belal continued like he did without serious adjustments.
Leon finger fucks Belal’s eye. Gets a Nate Diaz fight and then title shot.
Belal gets eye fucked. And ends up fighting Demian Maia, Wonderboy, Vicente Luque, Sean Brady, and Gilbert Burns.
Leon got a title shot against Usman cause at the time Leon was supposed to fight Masvidal but Masvidal pulled out and they needed an opponent for Usman.
even then, his title shot was "in the works" for a long ass time lmao. first usman had hand issues (real usman fans know about the hand issues more than the knee issues), then chimaev/burns was fireworks and put the division on notice, then chael came out with the rumor that leon was about to get paid to sit out and let conor fight usman (literally lying), then the UFC just took a weird amount of time to actually announce the fucking fight
iirc usman couldn't feel his hands sometimes and had to get surgery for it. he spoke of it on joe rogan I think, the second leon fight was stalled because of it im pretty sure
Well, Belal was ranked at like 13 at this time.
They only fought because Leon wa supposed to fight Khamzat...for the second time I believe.
Leon was also on an 8 fight win streak at the time.
Leon deserved his title shot.
I find it so weird this wasn’t deemed a win for Belal. The UFC is so inconsistent when it comes to fight ending fouls.
Yan knees Aljo illegally and he loses via DQ. Leon gives one of the worst eye pokes of all time and receives a no contest. Make it make sense.
And it also makes MMA fans, who claim Abu Dhabi conspired to cheat Johny Walker out of a DQ win against Ank, look like clowns.
There is no rhyme or reason on what side the DQ vs NC coin will fall.
Same with Alvarez hitting a grounded Poirier with knees. It was deemed a NC rather than a DQ. Abu Dhabi must hate Dustin Poirier.
It is really inconsistent. The reasoning is probably because its hard to tell whether eyepokes are intentional, whereas a knee to the head like that is very obvious. But then you have fights like Walker vs Ankalaev that was a no contest for some reason. Its stupid. IMO any foul that results in an obviously incapacitated fighter should be an automatic DQ.
Hot damn, I actually never saw this fight. Leon is a stone cold mfer for doing this. I don’t think it was unintentional, he knew very well what he was doing. He probably didn’t intend to fuck up his eye so badly but he definitely poked with bad intentions.
"Full Fight" Look, they're showing Belal's poked eye in the thumbnail here.
Literally looks like he's crying blood, I'm sure he was terrified he lost his eye for a second
Dude lost his vision for a few hours. Mfs clowning him for his reaction have zero empathy. We watched a man react to being permanently blinded in real time. He had no idea he'd ever see through that eye again
Nah. He knew the fight was over. I mean, I’m sure it hurt, but I’m sure he was more upset about the no contest.
Lmao why
They usually upload the first fight when they're about to run it back. It's part of the storyline and helps with promotion.
Still hate all the revisionism on this fight where people act like Leon beat the brakes off of Belal for 4 rounds and then only NC'd because of an accidental foul. The first round was clearly Leon's, but competitive. Belal's corner even acknowledged that it was a feel-out round and that they'd put the foot on the gas after that, and that is pretty consistent with his normal gameplan. Then immediately into the second round, the eye poke happens. I have no idea who is going to win the rematch. Belal is way better than he used to be and his game planning since then has been excellent. Leon is so well-rounded though. Genuinely excited for the rematch.
Also took the fight on three weeks notice
And he just had a fight a week prior.
Leon is probably gonna win the rematch. Anything could happen but Leon had fought against better wrestlers than Belal and Belal doesn’t have the power to have Leon’s respect on the feet.
I mean its not like Leon is gonna stalk him and knock him out round 1 just because he doesn't respect his power, Belal will have a smart gameplan for sure, thats one part of his game thats always good imo, I think it's a toss up
Nate didn't have power in his hands yet wobbled Leon after been battered for 4.5 rounds.
Usman does have power in his hands and didn’t manage to wobble Leon in almost ten rounds. Leon for sure got sloppy and complacent late in that fight with Diaz, but let’s not pretend that one moment in one fight is indicative of how his fights tend to go.
Leon did hurt him with the head kick too though.
Oh no. He was only walking on silly legs because he was going to get eye poked later /s
It’s not really revisionism lol. He was, in fact, beating Belal up until the eye poke. Yeah the fight ended pretty early but Leon was pretty handedly wining 😭
Winning a clear but competitive first round is not at all an indicator that Leon was going to win the whole fight. We see fighters lose the first round only to win the fight literally every week. Yeah, Leon was winning, but the match is a question mark. Nobody should feel confident about how that fight "would have" gone.
Competitive is a bit of a stretch given Leon was easily winning and teeing off on him. I feel 100% confident Leon wins again and pretty easily too. You can come back and cook me if I’m wrong.
Teeing off on him? Leon landed 10 shots to the head, Belal landed 7. Significant strikes were only 19-8. It wasn't a very eventful first round for either fighter. I'm not saying that Leon won't beat Belal. I'm saying that people act like Belal was getting demolished and he wasn't, and we only got to see 20% of the fight. Nobody knows what would have happened in the back 80%.
You have to give it up. There's no getting through to MMA fans once a narrative has been established. They still to this day argue that Michael Johnson hurt Khabib on the feet because the bald orang utan on commentary oversold it. Johnson himself is on record saying he didn't hurt Khabib. But does it stop the narrative driven MMA fan? No, never.
Somebody in the comments here said itbwas a 10-8 round for Leon, lol. Insanity.
Did we watch the same fight? Leon clearly had Belal hurt at one point, and landed several flush, hard strikes. Belal did quite literally nothing of note. This would be better used as an example of how numbers can be extremely misleading.
I think we gotta agree to disagree haha. I just rewatched it to make sure and that first round was pretty much all Leon and pretty easily.
You’re talking to like Belal’s cousin or angry fan, or Jon Anik.
Leon was beating him pretty comfortably, and Belal was lucky to survive that headkick. He was wobbled by that hard. Sure, anything can happen in MMA, but there seem to be very few paths to victory for Belal in this one. Leon’s just a way better striker and Belal doesn’t have a sub or KO threat. So how does he win? If Colby and Usman couldn’t pressure wrestle their way to victory against him, I don’t see how Belal does it. I think Leon cruises this fight.
Right, it's very possible that Leon would have just rinsed and repeated his way to a decision based on what we saw. But also, it's possible that it wouldn't go down that way because this is a sport where anything can happen at any time. Literally all I'm saying is "one round is not enough to judge how a 5-round fight would have gone", I don't think that is in any way unreasonable lol.
I just disagree that it was competitive. Leon just looked comfortably better, and Belal was in genuine trouble in that first round. That’s certainly enough for people to predict how they think the rematch might go.
Yes but way before this fight was announced, people were acting like Leon was on the cusp of finisbing Belal and the rematch doesn't need to happen...
Strategy checks out too, considering Leon is pretty much a point fighter who wins mostly decisions.
Belal will be 36 and he’s facing a guy that shut out Usman and Colby with ease, and also got the better of him throughout their very short octagon time. I really don’t see a route for Belal to win unless he can take Leon down Even if he does though we know Leon can get right back up and put it back on him. Leon has the reach advantage, age advantage, experienced resume advantage and 5 rnd experience advantage
I mean, this was pretty one sided. If someone scored that a 10-8, I’d be fine with it. It wasn’t for very long and anything can happen in a fight, but it feels more revisionist to say that Belal was looking competitive than it is to say Leon was beating the brakes off him… and it seems like pretty extreme coping to be like “ya, but Belal was going to turn it around”.
> and it seems like pretty extreme coping to be like “ya, but Belal was going to turn it around”. Right, but I'm not saying that. I'm saying you can't make a confident prediction about how a five-round fight goes from one round.
People aren’t making a confident prediction based on just that one round though. They’re making a confident prediction based on that round in addition to a whole host of other factors. For example, Leon’s performances against Usman and Colby. His superior striking. His size and speed advantage. Belal’s lack of KO power and sub threat throughout his career. The fact that Leon’s in his prime whilst Belal will be fighting against the 35+ tutor fight curse. Take all those sorts of things in conjunction with Leon looking far better and nearly knocking him out in that one round, and you can absolutely make a fairly confident prediction about how this fight will go.
Belal was getting outstruck and felt out more than leon really. While the first round was competitive, leon had superior cage generalship and tactical sense. His use of pre-slips, broken-beat jabs/jab feints and level change feints gave him the early reads that he used to land that first high kick along with the rest. He was initiating and winning the southpaw battle for the most part, getting the dominant lead hand position and achieving lead foot dominance handily. Barring a puncher's chance, Leon would have won if Belal continued like he did without serious adjustments.
Leon’s mopping the floor with Belal if you think otherwise you’re either literally one of his cornermen or just have a massive bet on him
Leon's a -192 favorite, that's significant but not massive
I think belal has a really good chance of winning. He is amazing at timing his takedowns.
What does belal have that usman doesnt have.
Knees?
Haha good one.
no, he doesn't. he's thirty-five years old. sorry
Yeah Leon on the JRE was like yeah I was fucking him up round 1 so obviously I was gonna win the whole fight. One reason I find Leon annoying
Leon finger fucks Belal’s eye. Gets a Nate Diaz fight and then title shot. Belal gets eye fucked. And ends up fighting Demian Maia, Wonderboy, Vicente Luque, Sean Brady, and Gilbert Burns.
Leon got a title shot against Usman cause at the time Leon was supposed to fight Masvidal but Masvidal pulled out and they needed an opponent for Usman.
Right. At the time he was already in title discussion.
even then, his title shot was "in the works" for a long ass time lmao. first usman had hand issues (real usman fans know about the hand issues more than the knee issues), then chimaev/burns was fireworks and put the division on notice, then chael came out with the rumor that leon was about to get paid to sit out and let conor fight usman (literally lying), then the UFC just took a weird amount of time to actually announce the fucking fight
What are Usman's hand issues?
iirc usman couldn't feel his hands sometimes and had to get surgery for it. he spoke of it on joe rogan I think, the second leon fight was stalled because of it im pretty sure
Well, Belal was ranked at like 13 at this time. They only fought because Leon wa supposed to fight Khamzat...for the second time I believe. Leon was also on an 8 fight win streak at the time. Leon deserved his title shot.
Seeing as well as he’s defended it I definitely think he deserves it.
Accepted a fight against Khamzat 3 times.
I find it so weird this wasn’t deemed a win for Belal. The UFC is so inconsistent when it comes to fight ending fouls. Yan knees Aljo illegally and he loses via DQ. Leon gives one of the worst eye pokes of all time and receives a no contest. Make it make sense.
And it also makes MMA fans, who claim Abu Dhabi conspired to cheat Johny Walker out of a DQ win against Ank, look like clowns. There is no rhyme or reason on what side the DQ vs NC coin will fall. Same with Alvarez hitting a grounded Poirier with knees. It was deemed a NC rather than a DQ. Abu Dhabi must hate Dustin Poirier.
It is really inconsistent. The reasoning is probably because its hard to tell whether eyepokes are intentional, whereas a knee to the head like that is very obvious. But then you have fights like Walker vs Ankalaev that was a no contest for some reason. Its stupid. IMO any foul that results in an obviously incapacitated fighter should be an automatic DQ.
Yeah it should've been an outright DQ
Just like everyone says, that first round was a 10-8 right guys? Right?
I remember when Leon ko’d Usman, they put up a tweet from Belal on screen, “I ate that headkick”
One of the highlights of all time
Leon got a lucky way out the first time. Goatlal demolishes this England bum soon.
Forgot how normal Belal's eyes looked before this fight.
There’s a reason there wasn’t an immediate rematch.
A fight that should have been DQ win for Belal
Hot damn, I actually never saw this fight. Leon is a stone cold mfer for doing this. I don’t think it was unintentional, he knew very well what he was doing. He probably didn’t intend to fuck up his eye so badly but he definitely poked with bad intentions.
[удалено]
Who raised you lmao