UFC 140 Results: Lyoto Machida Will Become Champion Once Again

It could be easy to call this article a sour-grapes reaction from a Machida fan.  It would be easy to brush this off as a fan stewing over the fact that "his fighter" didn't win.

But there is a real chance that Lyoto Machida could become champion again.

Many people picked Jones to win dominantly, and I admit I wasn't one of them.  Part of it was a bias having practiced Shotokan karate myself.  Another part was the respect I had for Machida as a person and a martial artist.

Another part was that there was real merit to the argument.  Machida has practiced traditional martial arts from an extremely young age.  If there is ever going to be a fighter who could beat Jones just based on experience, it is Machida.

And that still might happen.

In the first round Machida didn't exactly punish Jones, but he did make him look like a mere mortal instead of the demigod he has been presented as.

Machida is an impressive fighter and could learn from the mistakes in this fight.  Some might bring up his second fight with Shogun Rua in which he was definitively beaten, but Machida trained for the wrong fight and paid.  It was another mistake he could learn from.

And Machida will learn from these mistakes.  It's easy to say that at 33 years old time is running out, but he is remarkably well-preserved for that age.  He hasn't been in many wars and he has only lost to the top level of competition.  It's possible he could bounce back.

Of course there is the possibility that Jones will run out of competition at light heavyweight in a few fights and move up, and that could be true too.  Even if he does, and Machida never gets his rematch, he can still prove that he is a great martial artist by winning the title from someone else.

In martial arts every loss is something to learn from.  In fact, they teach the practitioner more than a win ever does.  They show flaws that the fighter didn't even know they possessed and motivate them to remove those weaknesses.

Machida has two ways that he could wear UFC gold yet again.

He could learn from the mistakes made in the second round and iron out a strategy to take the young champion down.  

Or he could fight trying to get a rematch and not make it in time.

Either one deals with something that martial arts tackles, especially Shotokan karate.

The first is finding mistakes and unflinchingly facing them and removing them while also finding ways to beat your opponents.

The second is letting go of mistakes made and being able to move on and sharpen the techniques gained through practice and failure.

Machida does both well, and so it won't belong before fans and detractors see him yet again with his hands raised and a gold belt around his waist to match the black one he has held for most of his life.