Locked In The Cage 6: Tim Williams’ gameness wins out over Duane Bastress, Abrahim crosses over to MMA, Albert Alvarez makes history
Monday, December 6, 2010 at 12:55AM Charles Cieri 
Wiilliams with 302 BJJ team. Photo courtesy of Megan Lavelle
Each Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fight that goes down in Philly tells us a little something about if and how the local MMA scene is going to succeed. This website was created for that scene - to watch as it comes into focus. We recap the fights, bullshit with the players, ogle the smut along the way but the mission is to witness and chronicle the development of Philly’s local MMA scene, a mission that started at Citypaper’s The SportsComplex blog before the sport was sanctioned in February of 2009 and will continue on this current rickety platform as long as circumstance permits.
For the most part the scene creeps along but, occasionally, progress comes with a massive shift. This brings us to Locked In The Cage 6 (LITC6) which took place Friday night at the Southhampton Armory in Northeast Philly. This was the biggest event to date for the local MMA scene and the implications are abundant. It is fitting that a galvanizing event for the sport should come from the LITC team. Fran Evans and Tara Galvin were responsible for the city’s first fights and have been extremely aggressive ever since. While they have hosted six fights, the other major promotion — Matrix Fights — has chosen to host only three events but with more refined presentation. LITC’s pace may have cost some style points but now lands them in the prestigious position atop the city’s scene.
More should be said about job Evans and Galvin have done, and how significant this event was but, for now, we’ll just touch on the most important points and recap the action along the way.
The most important indicator, a real game changer, was attendance, Evans cloaked it at 2,280 tickets sold, which is about level with my estimates. Even more important than the sheer numbers (easily the biggest local crowd to date) was the fact that the crowd showed up early and stayed late. The key goal for the scene’s sustainability is in reaching the precious peripheral audience and easing ticket-sale dependance from the current key demographic- friends and family of individual fighters. While still far from pulling substantial numbers of the Spike/ VS/ Pay Per View audience out from behind the TV, this fight card spread the burden between Fight Factory/ Balance/ Team Sitan and Semper Fi MMA with support from Daddis FC and Rocco MMA not to mention the die-hards who followed Duane Bastress from Lancaster. The synergy of combining this many individual gyms does more then draw two thousand people, it makes sure they leave talking about an ‘event’ instead of a particular fight. This will push those spectators from simply supporting their camps to supporting the larger scene. And, in time, word will reach the UFC fans looking to get a live show for less then the cost of a UFC Pay Per View event.
The Amateurs
While there was no disappointments aside from a few scratches (Matt Lozano (0-0) Academy of Combative Arts, Joe Lowery (0-0) Daddis FC, Pat Macke (5-2) Rocco MMA and Micheal Hefflefinger (3-3) Blackman MMA), we’ll skip to the highlights for the sake of brevity.
Ian Towey (1-0) Daddis FC v Jamie LaJoie (0-1) Central NY MMA
Towery landed a punch to the face that severely damaged LaJoie’s nose, causing the doctor to stop the fight in the first round.
Nick Mimoso (1-2) Rocco MMA v Eric Albright (5-0) Academy of Combative Arts
Albright earned a decision win with his ground control. Although his few attempts to push for a submission lead him to dangerous reversals, his drive to finish instead of racking up points with ground control is admirable and should earn him another fight soon.
Joe Patishnock (2-1) Reality MA v Adam Roberts (4-1) Rocco MMA
Roberts with Team Rocco
Roberts earns a decision by doing what first put him on our radar, imposing his game with aggression- a well needed bounce back after he looked a little laxed in his last fight. Robert’s talent and progress are apparent but he still needs something else to turn the corner. When his ability to maul on the ground is converted to ending fights early, he becomes a next level fighter.
Rich Patishnock (5-1) Reality Martial Arts v Marius Enache (2-1) Balance Studios
Patishnock recaptured glory for his family and gym by taking a decision win after controlling Enache on the feet and ending the fight standing and throwing strikes through Marius’ open guard.
Harry Dickey (2-2) Revolution MMA v Anthony Chiccone (3-3) Philly Top Team
Dickey earned a decision win. He looked much bigger at 185 pounds then Chiccone who rocks the everyman physique and never looked like he had much of a chance to find a way to win. He did show a lot of heart in surviving some tortuous positions and even reversing out of some spots where Dickey was plainly laying and cranking on Chiccone to try to submit him with pain (not a choke or joint lock). Chiccone’s heart would be better served if he dropped down to 170 pounds.
Tim Ragusa (2-2) Philly Jiu Jitsu v Standley Eugene (4-0) Paramount BJJ
Eugene gets the decision and looks to be coming along on the ground (no surprise- although he has been training less then a year, his coach Brad Court is a Lloyd Irvin blackbelt) but also on the feet. His aggression had smooth consistency as he pushed the whole fight, most notably for submissions. Eugene looks to be close to putting it all together, so it pays to get to know him now.
Pedro Torres (0-2) v Albert Alvarez (1-0) Fight Factory
I first saw Albert Alvarez at the Bellator 33 open tryouts - held at Daddis FC in South Philly about six weeks ago. He bares a striking resemblance to his brother and also took the same path through the North Catholic High School wrestling program. While Alvarez didn’t look bad at the tryouts, he also didn’t stand out.
He looks like this, but with out a belt... for now
The hype around his first amateur MMA fight didn’t reflect that. Having sold a substantial number of tickets on his own, his support group was large, loud and frenzied. They filled the arena with ‘Albert’ chants before he even made it to the ring. My only thoughts revolved around pity. Here was, from my observations, a very green talent whose last name creates extraordinary expectations (his brother is of course top ranked lightweight Eddie Alvarez) to begin with and now a crippling level of hysteria was being heaped on top of his shoulders.
Too much pressure for a 19 year old in his first ever MMA fight.
Well, first appearances don’t mean shit, and for some people, pressure is a motivator. Albert Alvarez is one of those people. He may have faced more pressure then any previous amateur to ever step into the octagon. Amazingly he may have answered this historical opportunity with one of the most mature first fights in the history of the sport. It was a busy six minutes.
All Alvarez’ gifts were apparent within the first minute. He had perfect balance that kept him on his toes and moving in and out of engagements with crisp indirect paths. The side to side movements as he serpentined his way into range merged seamlessly into quick tight combinations. He followed his retreating opponent, sticking shots all the way. When his opponent went to the floor in desperation, Alvarez followed striking relentlessly from the feet down through the open guard of Torres. When he tucked into his opponent’s guard, he passed with ease and threatened multiple submissions. By the time he ended the fight - throwing a huge belly to belly suplex just before the bell- the crowd fervor was at its climax. Eddie Alvarez, in the coaches position, needed to be pushed back into his seat multiple times by the official on the outside of the cage. The tortured look of helplessness that he wore throughout the fight vanished into relief when he erupted out of his seat at the final bell.
Alvarez (Albert) took an easy decision and somehow raised the already impossible expectations surrounding his potential.
The Pros
Eric Purcell (2-2) The 10th Round v Joe Stripling (6-3) 302 BJJ
Much hype has surrounded Joe Stripling’s jiu Jitsu and I can finally say that I see why. He took some heavy shots in the first exchange but recovered well. He even managed to sneak in close to Purcell, head down firing at the body before popping up to throw a direct right hand that landed on the button. However, it was the ground work that earned him the win. In the second round, while in a scramble on the ground, stripling sprung a quick triangle that wrapped up Purcell. Under-hooking his opponent’s leg, adjusting and squeezing, Stripling finished the choke and took the win.
Brian Demuro (4-7) v John Doyle (9-14) Fight Firm
Demuro had some good strikes off the jump but was just overwhelmed by Doyle who closed the distance like a wave. By the time Demuro was fighting off his back Doyle was jackhammering away with huge right hands forcing the ref to stop the fight.
Rami Ibrahim (1-1) Team Sitan v Tom Desmond (0-2) Cessner MMA
Desmond had a very specific game plan and he played it. Ibrahim survived it because of what you could call ‘heart’ or more frankly, an crazy disregard for his limbs. He recaps the fight in his own words here:
Will Martinez (2-2) Semper Fi MMA v Neil Johnson (3-2) Mase MMA
Martinez landed a huge overhand shot with his first attempt that collapsed Johnson. From there Johnson tried to tie up Martinez and recover, he appeared to be getting somewhere when Martinez, fighting from the top of Johnson’s open guard, landed another big shoot that stiffened Johnson and forced the ref to call the fight.
Tim Williams (5-0) Team Balance/ 302 BJJ v Duane Bastress (3-1) Academy of Combative Arts
TIm Williams stalks. Photo courtesy of Megan Lavelle
This is the type of epic fight that could have made this event on its own. Williams is one of the most hyped fighters in Philly and Bastress equally as touted coming out of the Lancaster market. This fight was a huge coup for LITC to get and prompted Paul Miles to design a new championship belt to encourage more fights like this — where two of the best can be brought together as opposed to keeping them insulated and in essence padding their records with lesser competition. The new Mid-Atlantic Championship belt was a great call and Miles deserves tons of props for seizing on this fight as an example of what should be emulated by all promotions in all weight classes (more on this as it develops).
While these two worked their way to career distinction with displays of talent, is was gameness that would decide this fight. Loosely defined, gameness is the ability to disregard injury, odds and other seemingly real (but as gameness demonstrates purely mental) obstacles in order to continue not only to fight, but fight to finish.
The first exchange of the fight was telling, Williams backed down Bastress with strikes and Bastress countered by dropping down and rushing Williams into the cage. As freakishly strong as Williams is, he could only slow down Bastress who is built like a stumpy Ivan Dragoff.
Duane Bastress
Early on, the fight was mostly contested on the ground. Williams had some nice reversals, trips and sweeps but nothing removed Bastress from the dominate position for very long. Williams most threatening position, a heel hook attempt ended in him be dragged halfway across the ring before Bastress freed himself. Bastress on the contrary mauled Williams in a relentless sequence - moving from mount to back control and back again through both positions - extracting a heavy toll within both positions before ending the round by dropping knees on a turtled up Williams. The first round easily went to Bastress
The second round opened with Bastress rattling Williams on the feet with kicks and punches. Bastress was rolling so smoothly that he stood up out of Williams guard and allowed him to stand up. The decision looked good as he pounded with 1-2 combos and really put distance between the two in points.
Williams started to recover from there, gaining more confidence on the feet and even stuffing a desperation shot while bearing down with strikes. He moved from the sprawl to working chokes on a turtled up Bastress. Back on the feet, Williams momentum was lost just before the end of the round when, in a tie-up against the cage, Bastress was able to lift rotate and spike Williams on his head. Had Williams not tucked his head, the drop could have been tragic.
Williams came out for the third round firing with kicks and punches. He succeeded in backing down Bastress who by this point had sustained some significant damage all around his right eye. Williams, looking equally beat-up, kept up the strikes amid cries from his corner to “let the hands go.” However he wondered away from this advice and got locked up with Bastress who ended the round with a crashing hip toss.
As we prepared to see if Williams could continue to steal momentum or if Bastress would return to his early dominance, everyone noticed the doctor lingering in Bastress’ corner. From there, the whisper was made to the ref who waved the fight off and called Williams the winner.
Current reports cite this as a clear doctor stoppage but that is not exactly right and that revelation tells us exactly what decided this fight.
The doctor examining a fighter has a clear decision to make. Can the fighter continue? And does the fighter want to continue? The first question was answered when the doctor examined the eye and didn’t stop the fight. He proceeded to ask Bastress if he could see- in essence, asking him if he could continue. The answer from Bastress was, “it’s up to you.” While this is not a submission, at the same time, it is. The ref took this to mean that he either couldn’t or didn’t want to continue and from there waved the fight off, giving Williams the win.
Lets be clear, this takes nothing away from Bastress. Fran Evans examined him in the locker room out of pure curiosity and said he had never seen anything like it. He reported the eyelid was cut and swollen in a way that most certainly impaired Bastress’ vision. To fight with that type of handicap against someone as dangerous as Williams would have been irrational. He did the smart thing and because of it will continue on to what looks to be a promising career.
Having said that, he was winning the fight but gets the loss. Williams who was losing the fight and just beginning to find his strategy was taking a beating, like nothing he had yet been subjected to. His ability to take this potential setback and not only keep fighting but ratchet up the pace as the fight went on says a lot about the type of fighter he is. He didn’t win this fight because he was bigger or stronger because he clearly wasn’t. While he may have won it because of superior hands had the fight continued, we’ll never know for certain. But it can be stated that Tim Williams has gameness and a drive to compete that sets him apart. He earned much more then the new AMMAC belt; he showed that he has the chin and heart to match and possibly surpass his physical ability.
While indicators of the scene’s maturity racked up during this fight, it also gave glimpses of untapped potential. Evans spoke to this affect in saying that this fight was more then the culmination of five previous learning experiences. Evans also stated that this type of event shouldn’t be a once-a-year experience but the exact opposite: the status quo.
He’s right. One immediate lesson from this fight to that goal is the abolishment of cross state boundaries. Duane Bastress should be the first of many headliners from across the state to come to Philadelphia. Philly talent should of course venture west and north as well, if the interest is there. But judging from the reaction of two thousand plus spectators, that demand does exist here.
The new AMMAC Mid-Atlantic Middleweight strap
Charles Cieri
Joe Stripling v Eric Purcell video is available here:
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