We’ll be back to live action momentarily with Brandon “The Truth” Vera against “The Dean of Mean” Keith Jardine…We here at SAVSCI maintain that Jardine is the scariest looking dude in the sport. Jardine desperately needs a win here–he was a real “up and comer” following his victory over Chuck Liddell until he entered the cage at UFC 84 in Las Vegas and was run over by a semi truck named Wanderlei Silva.

ROUND ONE:

Fighters trade punches but the fight quickly goes to the ground and works in Vera’s full guard. Vera is now working for a kimura–he’s a highly underrated ground fighter and now the bloodthirsty Brits boo the ground action. Jardine has a wicked cut on the top of his bald head–like a dude nailed him with an axe and he’s bleeding down Vera’s back. Vera gives up the kimura and Jardine regains his position in his opponent’s guard and rains down some hellacious ground and pound. Vera with an elbow from the bottom right on Jardine’s bloody head. Jardine still scoring with that wicked ground and pound. Fight back to standup now and Vera pushes Jardine back to the cage looking to work some Muay Thai knees. Jardine wants nothing to do with that and separates. Just over a minute left in the round now, Vera with a body kick which Jardine counters with a punch. Jardine doing well avoiding the clinch so far. Low kick by Vera. Big punch by Vera catches Jardine, though he recovers and retaliates in kind. Jardine working a brutal series of punches up against the cage after a missed Vera takedown and Vera took a beating in the final seconds of the round. Good fight so far, evenly contested but we’ll give the edge to Jardine 10-9. Could easily go either way…

ROUND TWO:

Nice combination by Jardine, Vera with a leg kick. Jardine is somehow simultaneously awkward and very technically proficient which almost doesn’t make sense. Vera gets the clinch and lands a couple of nasty knee strikes. Jardine does a good job extricating himself–Goldberg says that Jardine always looks “tired and hurt only he’s not tired and not hurt”. He may have hurt his knee as he’s sort of dragging a leg around and not “bouncing”. Vera is really better off at 205–he’s a lean 215 walking around. Rogan brings up guys like Shane Carwin and Brock Lesnar who have to drop weight to make 265. Wicked leg kick by Vera. Jardine lands a wild punch but doesn’t followe up with :23 seconds left. Jardine definitely favoring his leg but he’s bearing weight OK so we’ll see what the corner has to say about it. Vera’s round 10-9, even 19-19 through two…

ROUND THREE:

Replay shows a push kick/stomp right to Jardine’s knee. He’s a badass and not complaining about it but its obvious why he’s favoring it. Goldberg says that Jardine is smiling because “he knows he’s five minutes away from a big bowl of ice cream” whatever that means. Vera lands a couple of kicks to the hurt leg of Jardine. Jardine still coming forward and throwing punches–looks like Jardine may have just taken an inadvertent low kick but he doesn’t complain and the ref doesn’t stop it. Greg Jackson called Jardine on his “plodding” between rounds but that might be a function of his knee. Bloodthirsty Brits boo again–not sure why, as both guys standing and trading. Kick by Jardine just misses. Jardine goes for a takedown but Vera defends nicely. Jardine lands good punches from the clinch–he’s behind Vera and punching him in the face. Not sure why the bloodthirsty Brits are booing, but they’re at it again. Real tough fight to score so far–fighters trade low kicks as the clock goes under a minute. Nice combination by Jardine–Rogan points out that there’s been “a lot of crazy collisions where its hard to figure out who comes out ahead” and he’s right on the money. Bodyshot by Jardine as the last few seconds tick off–Jardine lands some bombs as the horn sounds and the crowd boos for no apparent reason. Tough, tough round to score–we’ll give round three and the fight to Jardine but it could go either way. 10-9 Jardine, 29-28 he takes the fight on the SAVSCI card…

Here’s the scores

29-28 Vera
29-28 Jardine
29-28 Jardine

Tough loss for Vera but really the fight could have gone either way…