Gilbert Melendez vs Josh Thomson

Photo by Esther Lin/Showtime

by Dr. Octagon, J.D.

This fight was all I needed to see to remove Gilbert Melendez (above) from the discussion of top lightweights. His boxing looked terrible. His wrestling was ineffective. He did his worst damage eye-pokes, while Josh Thomson was landing clean shots that rearranged Melendez’s face. But the judges scored for Melendez, 47-48 and 48-47 (twice).

Thomson, who looked awful while putting on a positively Fitchian lay-and-pray clinic against K.J. Noons, looked great against Melendez, the Strikeforce lightweight champ. We previously expected that Gil would get an immediate title shot whenever he finally moves over to the UFC. Now, it looks like he would have a tough time handling a fighter like Donald Cerrone. 

As I saw it, Gil won the first two rounds and Thomson won the last two. The third round was close as hell, but I gave it to Thomson. Still, it was a reasonable decision from the judges. I’m guessing they differed on round three, since even I might change my mind upon review.[[MORE]]

Announcer Mauro Ranallo referred to the fight as one of the top MMA trilogies of all time. Someone needs to tell Mauro that Strikeforce is now owned by Zuffa and he doesn’t have to pump this BS at all times anymore. Next he’ll be saying that the winner of the Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix is the top heavyweight in the world.