Sherdog’s 2020 Beatdown of the Year

Part of the job

You'll never hear a more honest fight exchange. #UFCJAX pic.twitter.com/EBJgVJmRcx

— UFC (@ufc) May 14, 2020

Editor’s note: The views and opinions expressed below are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Sherdog.com, its affiliates and sponsors or its parent company, Evolve Media.

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Toughness. Resilience. Heart. Every fighter has at least some, but the true greats always seem to have more than average, and legends are often made on the occasions that they allow a fighter to prevail over an opponent with superior physical tools and sharper skills. They are the most universally revered traits in a mixed martial artist, but sometimes it’s possible to have a little too much for one’s own good. That’s where Sherdog’s “Beatdown of the Year” award comes in.

What qualifies a fight for this honor? One-sidedness, certainly. Violence. “Beatdown of the Year” candidates are usually protracted—in fact, seeming to go on too long is one hallmark of a solid beatdown—but not always. Holly Holm’s shocking destruction of Ronda Rousey, in addition to winning Sherdog’s 2015 “Upset of the Year,” was a finalist for “Beatdown of the Year” despite taking less than six minutes, and Conor McGregor’s 40-second steamrolling of Donald Cerrone at UFC 246 received several votes from this year’s panel.

However, this year’s winner is a true classic of the genre: a lopsided, brutal and very lengthy mauling that earned the losing fighter a date not only with the doctor, but the dentist as well. If one sign of a serious beatdown is that it crosses over from the entertaining to the uncomfortable, leading even the most jaded “Just Bleed” fans to ask whether there is any point letting it go on, then this fight passes with flying colors. By the time it was over, the argument had already moved on from whether it should have been stopped earlier, to whose fault it was that it had not been. And in a very appropriate manner for this strangest of years in combat sports, the entire experience was amplified by the production choices the UFC was forced to make in order to put on fights during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ahead of their main-event meeting at UFC Fight Night 171 on May 13, both Anthony Smith and Glover Teixeira were upper-echelon light heavyweight contenders and former title challengers. While the 40-year-old Teixeira was on a three-fight winning streak, conventional wisdom seemed to dictate that the younger, quicker Smith, with his diverse offensive arsenal and elite finishing instincts, would be too much for the rugged veteran. Smith entered the cage as a greater than 2-to-1 favorite, and even the prop bet for Smith to win by finish was solidly in the minus money.

For at least a round, the pundits and oddsmakers seemed to have the right of it, as “Lionheart” took it to Teixeira right away, stinging him on the feet with volume as well as power, and rejecting the Brazilian’s takedown attempts. While Teixeira was never in serious trouble and never stopped throwing his own offense, there was simply much more fire coming from the other direction. By the end of the round, a solid 10-9 for Smith, Teixeira was marked up and bleeding from the nose. The second round began in similar fashion, as Smith’s jab began to raise visible damage on Teixeira’s left eye. Then, in the later moments of the round, Teixeira lit Smith up with a heavy salvo of punches, followed by a body kick. They may have been enough to win him the round, but more importantly, all of a sudden Smith was starting to look very tired.

The third round was a whole different story to the first two. Teixeira smashed Smith’s nose with a big right hand, dropped him a moment later with a left to the jaw, and followed him to the ground. From there, Teixeira’s crushingly heavy top game took over. The rest of the round consisted of Teixeira on top, mostly in full mount, raining down punches and threatening with chokes when Smith turned his back. By the middle of the round, referee Jason Herzog was exhorting Smith to defend himself. Smith complied, at least enough to satisfy Herzog, and he tottered back to his corner after the 10-8 frame with his nose and one ear badly busted.

Smith came out for the fourth round looking much the worse for wear, but was at least steady on his feet. He would not remain that way for long, however, as Teixeira rocked him with a brutal uppercut, mugged him with more uppercuts, and then smothered a desperation single and spun around to take Smith’s back. He let Smith back up, whereupon he landed some heavy punches before taking the battered and exhausted Smith down again. By the time the horn sounded on another easy 10-8 round for Teixeira, it was fair to ask what it was going to take in order for someone to stop the beating, and MMA Twitter seemed to be united in asking exactly that.

Part of the problem, an element of the reason the beatdown was so visceral and horrific, lay in the coronavirus-dictated specifics of the production, and how new they were to everyone involved. UFC Fight Night 171 was just the second card in the UFC’s return after its March hiatus, and the experience of watching fights take place in an empty arena was still shockingly novel. More specifically, it was the experience of hearing them. With fights taking place in a nearly silent venue, fans at home could hear sonic detail that had never been possible before. Trash talk between fighters was clear as a bell. Corner instructions between rounds were so audible that coaches needed to be reminded to keep it down, and several fighters credited color commentator Daniel Cormier for inadvertently providing useful guidance. The same went for the sounds of the fight themselves; every punch and kick, every creak of leather or chain link, came across in stark detail.

It made the third and fourth rounds of Teixeira-Smith sound absolutely brutal, as Smith’s grunts of pain followed every ground strike. There was a sad, almost voyeuristic feeling in hearing Teixeira say, “I’m sorry, Anthony. This is part of the job,” as he pummeled him from back mount in the fourth round, and to hear the muffled response: “It is what it is.” Even worse was to hear Smith in his corner after that round, saying, “I think I’m losing some teeth” to his team. That he would turn out to be correct, and that his team sent him back out for the fifth round anyway, fueled much of the criticism in the aftermath of the fight.

The final round was mercifully short, at least. With nothing left to give at all, Smith went down from the first couple of jabs landed, and with Teixeira in mount and dropping elbows yet again, Herzog called the contest off at 1:04 of Round 5. There was still wrap-up to do: Teixeira had a “Performance of the Night” check to pick up; Smith a couple of teeth, and fans and media would debate the stoppage for weeks to come, but the body of work that would go on to win Sherdog’s “Beatdown of the Year” for 2020 was in the books.