25-Year-Old Prospect Darren Till Knocks Off Top Contender in Debatable Fashion
Some fights are better when they're confined to our imagination. Such was the case with the main event of Fight Night 130 in the UFC's inaugural trip to Liverpool, England, on Sunday.
Just 24 hours after Real Madrid thumped Liverpool Football Club in the Champion's League final, hometown fighter Darren Till walked to the Octagon accompanied by an arena full of people singing "Sweet Caroline." It had all the hallmarks of the same kind of hot summer night that happened four years ago, when Conor McGregor sauntered to the Octagon in Dublin to deafening roars of his fellow compatriots. This was to be Till's big McGregor moment: a continuation of the ascension of the next big European fighting star.
.jpg?w=256 "Colts Jaguars Football")
The similarities between McGregor and Till pretty much began and ended with a boisterous crowd, though.
For starters, Till had suffered his own setback on Saturday, missing weight by 3.5 pounds, branding the event with a question mark that remained until Till made the required fight-day weight limit of 188 pounds (he weighed 187.3). Till's botched weight cut cast a pall over the event, but it was mostly forgotten when Sunday rolled around. On paper, this was Till's big moment: facing the top-ranked welterweight in the UFC, an opponent he called out, an opponent facing a large disadvantage in both size and power.
Till won a unanimous decision over Thompson, which would be all fine and good except he didn't really win the fight, and it wasn't really much of a fight. Instead, we watched what appeared to be a glorified sparring session between two really fast and accurate strikers. There was a lot of flinching and feinting, but not all that much fighting. There was a lot of skill; there just wasn't any damage being done. It was UFC kata. Choreographed dance-fighting.
The Liverpool crowd, attending their first live UFC event ever, spurred their hometown kid on to victory. Perhaps in more ways than one. They reacted big to everything Till did, even when it was obvious he hadn't done much at all. It gave the whole thing a big-fight feel, and the roars made Till look like a dominant superstar in the making. Except, of course, he wasn't actually doing much of anything at all.
There are hometown decisions in mixed martial arts. Till's victory was the perfect example of home cooking in the fight game. Just three pundits scored the fight for Till; 22 had it for Thompson. Two of the judges sitting cageside in Liverpool scored the fight 49-46 for Till, which is about as bad as a mixed martial arts scorecard can get without bribery or some other illicit activity involved. The judges who issued those cards (Andy Roberts and Paul Sutherland) should be required to take Big John McCarthy's judging course, perhaps repeatedly, until they're able to demonstrate some semblance of knowledge and clarity on the sport.
This wasn't a robbery. Not by any stretch. It was close enough that it was easy to envision Till taking the win. But 49-46 is a farce, as is the notion that a fighter going into their opponent's hometown must somehow perform to an even higher standard than they usually would. A win is a win, regardless of the location. Or at least it should be.
Afterward, Till cut a passionate promo, and I wish I could tell you it was another piece of the star-making puzzle. Except I couldn't hear it at home, and neither could anyone else watching on television; only a few seconds of Till's expletive-filled, energetic interview made it onto the broadcast. This was another big moment wasted simply because Till couldn't avoid using the very few words in the English language that will get you bleeped on television every time. It was silence, with a few words making it through the broadcast.
All of this adds up to a wasted opportunity for a man who, by any kind of measurement, is one of the UFC's top prospects. It's visible to the naked eye. He's got the looks, the charisma and the skill. This isn't to say the UFC has stumbled upon another McGregor, because such a comparison is silly. There's only one McGregor. But it might be that being just Darren Till will be enough to separate him from the rest of the chaff on the UFC's bloated and bulging roster.
But this wasn't the moment he made that leap. The Liverpool faithful seemingly enjoyed every second of Till's performance, but in order to push himself beyond the boundaries of Merseyside and into the minds of fans across the world, Till will need a dash of professionalism and a fight that leaves no question in the minds of onlookers as to who won and who deserved to go home empty-handed.
.jpg?w=480 "Colts Jaguars Football")
