Yoel Romero and Robert Whittaker was a fun fight, regardless of what led up to it.
We got everything we could have asked for in the Saturday Night rematch between Yoel Romero and Robert Whittaker. Powerful freestyle strikes, quick momentum swings, and an abundance of crisp combinations sculpted an absolute diamond fight to MMA purists and casual fans alike. While I am happy to watch scrappy grapplers fight a chess match over 25 minutes, most people who watch UFC can’t stand that dreary pace that is often a part of most fights. Romero vs. Whittaker II left no such stench in any rounds never mind the fight as a whole. The way things unfolded in terms of action was as pleasing and as entertaining as MMA action can get. All that being said, I was pretty blown away by the decision of judges Sal Damato, Brian Puccillo, and Chris Lee.
Robert Whittaker walked out of Chicago still with his UFC Middleweight Championship and he would have done so win or lose. By rule of UFC and the Illinois State Athletic Commission (ISAC), Romero’s first failed attempt to make weight on Friday (he weighed in at 186 lbs) meant that he would have 2 full hours to lose 1 pound before his final, official weigh-in prior to Saturday’s Main Event. Romero weighed in at 185.2 lbs after his second attempt, ultimately nixing any shot he may have had at snatching Whittaker’s Middleweight Title. Typically it’s irresponsible, undisciplined, and unprofessional to miss weight for a championship fight if you go by the talking heads around MMA but this one is a clear outlier. Yoel Romero got screwed.
American Top Team owner Dan Lambert joined Anik and Florian’s “MMA N Tings” podcast on Tuesday to discuss the outcomes at UFC 225. According to Lambert, the ISAC weigh-in rules permitted American Top Team fighter Yoel Romero another opportunity to make weight after his first failed attempt. These regulations hinge on the fighter being no more than 3 pounds overweight and being deemed medically fit by commissionary doctors to continue the weight-cut, both of which were the case for Romero.
Lambert was pretty cut and dry when speaking about the weigh-in situation. “Yoel Showed up, he was a pound over, they gave him the 2 hours, the doctors took 20 minutes doing his medicals…they said he was fine, we got up to his room, we had an hour and a half left…”, according to Lambert everything was going rather smoothly. “He goes to get in his bath with an hour left…we’re gonna put him in the bath for 10 minutes, then put him in our towels for 10 minutes…he’s gonna be fine…” The weight-cut seemed like an impending success. “4 minutes into the bath, a phone call comes…from a commissioner who wasn’t there…’he needs to come weigh in right now…sorry guys she’s our boss, this is above our pay grade, get out of the tub now or the fight’s off’” Romero absolutely deserved a chance at Whittaker’s belt on Saturday Night.
Round 1 picked up as if it were the same fight as the first between Romero and Whittaker. Only this time, it was Whittaker who attacked with leg kicks early and often. Romero started as he often does in a very open stance, it oddly looked receptive to landing strikes as if Romero is trying to evaluate the game plan of his opponent. Robert Whittaker actually sustained another injury mid-fight this time around but once again it didn’t slow him down one bit, it simply forced him to adjust which he did very well. After breaking his right hand almost immediately in the fight, Whittaker was punching almost exclusively with his left hand from beginning to end. Romero wasn’t exhibiting much power or aggressiveness in this round and Whittaker definitely took the point here edging Romero in significant strikes 33 to 9, strikes from distance at 33 to 9 as well and topped it off with 19 significant leg strikes to close the round out on top in the scorecards.
In the next round, it was much of the same, to be frank. Whittaker was finding great success in his decision to take an orthodox stance in this fight (leading with your left side) even though his left side is very much his power side. Romero adjusted by using a quick-block boxing technique where his stance was open and his right side was being heavily favored in terms of protecting himself. This didn’t work so well and Whittaker punched Romero into what looked like real trouble. Romero’s right eye was split wide open and already swelling pretty severely. While Romero did shore up his defense slightly, he still took 29 significant strikes and 14 of them to the head. Whittaker’s ability to put together crisp punch to kick combos in this round scored him another nod from the judges. Round 2 goes to Whittaker.
The 3rd round was when this fight got real spicy. Whittaker kept attacking Romero’s right side aggressively and continued to find success with left side kick-punch combinations. On top of that, he kept himself pretty clean defensively, avoiding most power shots to this point. Romero’s corner (and probably his super-human genetics too) deserves a lot of credit for how well they managed the cut under his right eye, avoiding any potential of a stopped fight. After a missed takedown, Romero made a witty read on Whittaker, parrying 2 punches and landing 2 of his own to stun The Champ, leaving him woozy and achieving the first knockdown of the fight. Romero exploded, finishing off strong boxing combinations and finding some quick clinch opportunities to land up close strikes, contrary to what we had seen so far in the fight. Whittaker struggled to effectively attack from a safe distance here in this round unlike the first 2 and Romero capitalized, exhibiting his well-known knockout power and winning his first round of this fight despite eating a huge left head kick right before the horn. Whittaker: 2, Romero: 1.
After 3 great rounds, the 4th gave us far and away, the most entertaining and evenly-matched moments of this should’ve-been championship fight. Whittaker appeared to have his feet under him after being rocked in the previous period. Romero began to look a bit tired and benefited greatly from a brief rest after Whittaker hit him with a low blow by unintentionally kicking him in the groin protector. Romero took about a minute to recollect, reigning in a massive wave of boo’s from the packed Chicago crowd. After this breather, both fighters came out ready to blast each other. Whittaker found more success with left combos and continued to move his legs precisely, landing all 34 of his recorded strikes from a safe distance and totally honing in on his power hand connecting consistently. Romero too began to connect on safe strikes and that only escalated when a monster 3 punch combination quickly left Whittaker with jello legs. Romero defended well and stuck to power boxing which paid off when he tagged Whittaker with another huge hook towards the end of the round. The head strikes were 16 to 14 in favor of Whittaker, as well as significant strikes being 34 to 20. The judges were split on this round but the point ultimately went to Whittaker. To me, it could have been a 10-10 round but the momentum swing post low blow should have been enough for Romero to get the point here. In real-time, this round definitely felt like advantage Romero which gave us an end all be all round 5.
And finally, round 5. Yoel Romero looked like a man possessed here. While Whittaker did remain consistent with his distant left side approach, he had a tough time avoiding costly shots in this round. Whittaker did land a nice 2 punch combo early, using his right hand for the first time in the fight since the broken bone he suffered in round 1. This simply did not matter. Romero’s jabs were potent, rocking the Champion and bloodying up his nose pretty significantly and rather early. Romero got a bit creative here, using momentum from spins to sort of explode out of a slow rhythm he had timed perfectly with the defense patterns of Whittaker. It looked similar to things we have seen Jon Jones do in terms of slow step to explosive attack in a split second. Romero destroyed Whittaker with a left hook and knocked him down again. This time the ground and pound looked really dangerous for Whittaker who ultimately protected enough to survive. After getting back on their feet Whittaker was victim to 2 leg trips and a myriad of dirty boxing combos that really hurt him. Romero landed 14 big ground strikes in this round and 18 significant standing head strikes to Whittaker’s 5. This felt like a 10-8 round across the board but was ultimately scored 10-9 unanimously.
We all know Whittaker made out of The United Center with another win over The Soldier of God and with the Middleweight Championship still sitting snug around his waist, and props to the champ, he put together a smart fight and ultimately did enough to win without question. It’s in my personal opinion that this fight should have been a draw at the least, if not a Romero win and I’m not the only one who feels this way. “…In my humble opinion I not lose fight, I not lose weight…” said Romero to Joe Rogan after the decision. This was confusing at first because the details of the weigh-in controversy hadn’t yet been released to us but what it says to me is important. Fighters are always looked down upon for missing weight and I think this got into the head of Saturday Night’s judges when scoring the bout. If a fighter misses weight after fairly attempting to make the cut then, by all means, they don’t deserve any benefit of any doubt. However, we were unaware of the fact that Romero missing weight was not entirely his fault at all. Romero plans to sue ISAC for how the situation was handled. No matter who we were rooting for in the UFC 225 main event, we all got MMA gold and I’m positive Romero wishes he could say the same.
