You liked Costa vs Strickland fight? I personally dont. There were better fights in the card. In their fights I saw that Strickland mostly threw jabs and front kick (leg jab lol). And only in last round fighters switched on fighting mode. For me it was a boring UD by Strickland. In fact, wtf is with Costa? He used to be a brutal 1 round finisher, pumped beast that attacks from very start. Now his fights are long lasting fights, decision>decision>decision...
I'm not saying it was the best fight, but it was decent. I get that some people want to see high-intensity brawls, but this is also a sport, not only a show business, so the primary goal for fighters is to win. And both needed the win. Costa's team knew that going for a brawl will benefit Strickland, so had to come up with a different strategy. The plan wasn't bad but id didn't work.
As for Costa going to the distance more often, it's a general tendency that the higher the level of competition, the harder it is to get a finish. Plus, the more there is at stake, the less risk the fighters are willing to take.
What bothers me is the judge that scored 49-46 in favor of Costa. I mean if you watched the whole fight, you will see that Strickland have the control almost the whole fight. Maybe there are times, but most of the time, Strickland is the one that is landing some huge punches so I wonder who that judge is, and whoever that judge is, I hope that they will not get him anymore because he's a bit bias on that one. After the match, I really thought that it would be a Unanimous decision in favor of Strickland, but I just surprised that it ended up as a Split Decision.
I strongly suspected that the judge in question (Dave Tirelli) simply confused the sides of the scoring sheet and was scoring it the wrong way around. But Strickland without a doubt won the last round and he correctly gave it to him, so I don't know.
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