411's The Ultimate Fighter: US vs. UK Report 4.22.09 Episode 4
Posted by Jeremy Lambert on 04.22.2009
The first UK vs. US elimination fight takes place this week and it's a barn burner with a highlight KO. Plus Michael Bisping proves he's a great coach and a prank war starts.
The Ultimate Fighter 9
Team US vs. Team UK
Episode 4
Previously: Frank beat Kyle and Jason beat Robert to round out Team US. Henderson gets to pick the first fight.
Opening Video
Bisping says his team are all hard workers. Mario Sukata (wrestling and submission) and Dave Jackson (thai boxing) are Bisping's assistant coaches. Bisping says there's no way Team US is training harder than Team UK. Team US arrives to train and Damarques tells Team UK that they better work on their jumpers. Is the coaches challenge basketball this season? Damarques still wants to fight Bisping. Gustavo Pugliese (boxing), Cyrille Diabate (muy thai), Heath Sims (wrestling), and Ricardo Feliciana (jiu-jitsu) are Henderson's assistant coaches. Why does he have four and Bisping has two and where is Matt Lindland?
At the fight announcement, Henderson picks Mark Miller (Team US) vs. Nick Osipczak (Team UK). They are both stand up guys. Damarques still thinks Bisping talks too much. This guy either needs to win or lose in the first round.
Bisping missed the Team US qualifying fights so he sits down with his coaches and reviews the tape. Bisping is clearly a student of the game and does an excellent job breaking down Mark and his strength and weaknesses. Bisping works with Nick on his footwork. Nick fought his qualifying fight southpaw so he plans to fight this fight orthodox.
At the house, Damarques finds a Team UK shirt and writes on it with a bleach pen. They then write up rules that say any clothing found in a common area are fair game.
Both Nick and Mark make weight (170). Dana thinks Mark will win.
Team UK arrives at the house and finds the shirt hanging up. They take it down. That's it.
Mark doesn't like gameplans so his gameplan is to go with the flow and roll with the punches. Henderson casually says, "I think he's going to beat the fuck out of the guy." Henderson rules. Damarques finds a pair of Team UK wrestling shoes and decides to write on them. He claims US 2 UK 0. Team UK arrives to train and the shoes belonged to Ross. He says, "I'm going to smash the fuck out of them when I get back to the house. I was playing nice before." Bisping wants his team to not play the childish games and rise above it.
Bisping talks to Nick about the fight and says he watched Mark's fights on YouTube and found out that he has no ground game so the new gameplan is to take the fight to the ground. Bisping is my new favorite coach just because of how much tape he watches.
Welterweight Fight: Nick Osipczak (Team UK) vs. Mark Miller (Team US)
Recap: A very good first round with both fighters landing good strikes in close, getting takedowns, and landing good ground and pound. Nick had a guillotine locked in at one point and Bisping thought Mark tapped. It was a close round but Nick got a takedown at the very end to probably steal the round so he might have stole it with that. The second round was close as well with Nick spending the first half on top and Nick spending the second half on top. The ref stood them up with about a minute remaining and Nick knocked him out with a huge head kick.
Winner – Nick Osipczak, KO, Round 2
The final shot is of Mark puking in the locker room.
Next Week: Dissention on Team US. Team UK bonds. Two fights.
Show Comments: Now that the real show has started, I'm enjoying everything. Guys are starting to establish themselves and Damarques really stands out as a guy you'll either love or hate. I think Bisping is a great coach and I admire his dedication to really helping his guys with gameplans and whatnot. The fight this week was great although neither man looked overly impressive until the highlight KO ending. Very good episode this week.
Finally, I'm now on twitter so if you want to stalk me, I'll stalk you as well. Check it out by clicking here.
Is it any surprise that the US is comprised of immature retards?
Posted By: Pwnage (Guest) on April 22, 2009 at 11:54 PM
"Is it any surprise that the US is comprised of immature retards? "
The country or the team?
Posted By: JunieBrowning (Guest) on April 23, 2009 at 01:16 AM
"Is it any surprise that the US is comprised of immature retards? "
Is it a surprise someone is bashing the US again?
Posted By: USA bashing is so 3 years ago! (Guest) on April 23, 2009 at 01:50 AM
If the UK team keeps the pranks to a minimum then we can see a show focused on training rather than drunken stupidity. Which will make for a much more interesting show.
Posted By: mstrong73 (Registered) on April 23, 2009 at 08:56 AM
UK 1 US 0 - Time to play "Spank the Yank"
Your guys better pick up the pace or you gonna get wrecked
WolfsLair MMA: Bisping/Taylor/Rampage #1
Posted By: Guest#5633 (Guest) on April 23, 2009 at 10:18 AM
Oh noes, they drew on some gear left in the open. How terrible! If you can't tell the difference between that and a drunken rampage you've got problems.
Yeah sure, it's better not to do anything at all, but it's a tradition in locker rooms in every sport to pull pranks. The TUF producers actually encourage people to play pranks and tear the house apart. The fact that there are rules this season shows a far higher level of maturity than anyone had the past 7 seasons or whatever.
I think the US fighters, as usual, for the most part are embarrassing, but at least it's not as bad as before. Bisping talks way too much so it's not like they're innocent themselves.
Posted By: Serp (Guest) on April 23, 2009 at 03:05 PM
I LOVE this season so far. Rob gets beat down like a punk bitch, the fights have been pretty darn exciting, the pranks are fun and light hearted instead of mean dick-ish drunken insanity (Kryztof is King of that, was glad to see him get a win at 97) and it seems like everyone is gonna keep it that way.
And Damarques is fucking hilarious. "I'm here to have fun and smile. I love to smile. Can't you tell?" Hehehe, I knew this guy was gonna be TV Gold. The way Bisping gets under his skin without even trying cracks me up every week.
Gotta agree Bisping is potentially the best coach they've had on TUF yet if he keeps it up.
-Mike
Posted By: RanmaSolo (Registered) on April 24, 2009 at 10:50 PM
I'm a Southerner (you'll never catch me calling myself a Yankie) and I can tell you that Bisping is one of my favorite fighters because he's obviously one of the smartest guys in the ring. Could you imagine a team of Bisping and K-Flo calling a PPV?
Posted By: King Durin (Guest) on April 25, 2009 at 09:33 AM
Damarque Johnson and the rest of the US team better get their game on unless they plan on getting swept in the first round. I am not impressed by Hendo's coaching, I am not impressed by his team's attitude - and I was really not impressed by Miller's performance vs. Ospiczak. While neither was lighting the house on fire, Osipczak probably took Round 1 and KTFOed Miller in the 2nd.
Posted By: woody (Guest) on April 26, 2009 at 11:25 AM
I really wanted to pull for the US team, but after watching this episode, I am more impressed with the UK team. They just seem to be taking this a lot more serious, and Bisping seems like an awesome coach.
Cheerio!
Posted By: mrw420 (Guest) on April 28, 2009 at 12:16 AM
