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TUF fans will recall Dana White let the coaches make the wildcard picks for the first time in TUF history last episode and the fighters selected were Kevin Casey from Team Sonnen and Bubba McDaniel from Team Jones.
Bubba McDaniel
McDaniel trains in Albuquerque but has a daughter back in Texas. He doesn’t get to see her nearly as much as he wants and says he hopes all this goes well so he can hopefully change that.
McDaniel says he feels more pressure to win this fight because he was considered one of the top guys in the house and lost his first fight. Jon Jones said he was very impressed with McDaniel in the training session they had following the wildcard fight announcement. He also talked about how good McDaniel was as a training partner when he was getting ready for his title fight with Shogun Rua.
Fishing for Samman
Josh Samman realizes Bubba was the only person to call someone out on the show and he calls out Jimmy Quinlan. Quinlan likes the idea and said he’d like to fight him because he’s an “expert fisherman”.
Uriah Hall wants to fight Josh Samman though, and Quinlan says he’d actually rather see Uriah fight him because he thinks he’d just “beat the piss out of him”.
Kevin Casey
Chael Sonnen believes Casey underperformed in his first fight and what he wants is not for Kevin to necessarily win, but he wants Kevin to go out and fight to the best of his ability. “If his opponent is better, we can live with that,” Sonnen said. “But we’ve got to see the real Kevin Casey show up and compete.”
Casey believes the last fight was a fluke and says he’s never performed that poorly in his career. Casey said his gameplan is to go hard, overwhelm McDaniel and out-work him.
Casey trains with a protective mask to protect the cut on his head he suffered in his first fight.
Thanksgiving
Sonnen and Jones joined both teams for Thanksgiving dinner. Sonnen gives a speech saying he and Jones will do all in their power to get each of the guys into the UFC. He also said it’s been a real disappointment getting to know what a nice guy Jones truly is. McDaniel is completely miserable watching everyone eat.
Samman thinks McDaniel is going to “destroy” Casey. Hall thinks it can go either way.
McDaniel says he is most worried about “hesitating” again and if he hesitates he will give him the fight. Jones tells McDaniel he has to take the fight to him and make Casey respect him. Asst. Coach Frank Mir asks McDaniel his game plan and he says his game plan is just to go out there and fight.
WILDCARD BOUT: Kevin Casey (Team Sonnen) vs. Bubba McDaniel (Team Jones)
Round 1 – Clinch, Kevin pulls guard. Bubba on top in full guard, butterfly from Casey, gets to his feet. Turns him to the cage with underhooks. Casey wrestles him to the ground and has top control in half guard. Casey tries to pass but McDaniel defends well for a few moments before Casey gets to side control. Bubba gets his feet on the cage, recovers guard. Casey not doing any damage from top so far. Drops an elbow. Stands over Bubba and passes to side control. Bubba gets his back to the cage and stands up. Casey presses him to the cage, Bubba turns him around with a knee to the body, elbow. Casey turns him around, body shot. Knee to body from Bubba. Knee from Bubba. Again. Nice body lock takedown from Casey, lands on top in half guard. Looks for a guillotine before the bell. PMN sees it 10-9 for Casey.
Round 2 – Jones tells Bubba to change it from a jiu-jitsu match to a kickboxing match. Leg kick from Bubba. Clinch, he pushes Casey to the cage. Knee to body. Another knee. Body shot from Bubba, knee from Casey, left hand from Bubba. Couple right hands, uppercut, body shot from Bubba. Casey tries to jump into a guillotine but it only serves to give up side control. Bubba takes top position in half guard, lands some nice body shots. Casey gets full guard. Nice elbow from Bubba. Body shot, elbow. Casey’s head is trapped against the cage and he’s just holding on and getting beat up. Under 2 minutes to go. Body shots and punches and elbows from Bubba. One minute to go. Casey’s corner keeps telling him to open his guard and get up but he’s not even trying at this point it seems. His guard is closed and he rides it out until Bubba stands up before the round ends. Casey needs help walking to his corner. He’s spent. PMN sees it 10-9 McDaniel — it goes to a third…
Round 3 – Despite a lot of goading from his team Kevin Casey refuses to answer the bell for round 3. Dana can’t believe it. After Bubba asks Dana if he will get the finishing bonus, Dana says, “Good question, yes you got it.”
OFFICIAL RESULT: Bubba McDaniel def. Kevin Casey by TKO (retirement) Rd 2 (5:00)
Kevin has to be helped back to the dressing room and has to leave in an ambulance. He said something similar happened to him earlier in his career where he had kidney failure during a fight.
McDaniel said it was great to see him take Kevin’s will away.
Quarterinal match-ups
Dana and the coaches bring in each fighter to see who they want to fight. It doesn’t mean they will each get who they want but they use it to help make the match-ups. Even the coaches don’t know who the match-ups will be until Dana makes the announcements.
And the quarterfinal round match-ups will be:
- Collin Hart vs. Kelvin Gastelum
- Dylan Andrews vs. Luke Barnatt
- Josh Samman vs. Jimmy Quinlan
- Uriah Hall vs. Bubba McDaniel
Two fights on the next show plus a visit from Ronda Rousey!
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[…] Bubba McDaniel’s win over Kevin Casey on episode 9, TUF 17 viewers will recall the quarterfinal round match-ups were announced […]