McGee’s UFC Career Begins, Is Jardine’s Ending?

It’s not quite the so-called “circle of life”, but it does appear that one UFC career may be beginning while another is in danger of ending, thanks to the events of the TUF 11 finale last night.

While Court McGee made another quality showing of his skills while submitting the resilient Kris McCray in the second round of their scrap, Keith Jardine dropped his fourth fight in a row, losing a majority decision to Matt Hamill. It sets up quite an opposite set of circumstances for the two, as TUF champions have had remarkable staying power in the promotion (only one, Travis Lutter from the fourth season that brought back former UFC fighters to vie for title shots, has been cut). Meanwhile, it is unheard of for a fighter to have a string of performances like Jardine’s and keep their standing as a UFC competitor.

Jardine seems to have all-but guaranteed at least a temporary exit from the UFC with his fourth straight loss. With just two wins in his last eight fights, he has been permitted to have the kinds of chances that fighters not named Bonnar, Griffin or Liddell rarely get in the promotion. These days, it has become sadly common for fighters to be dropped from the organization after a couple of losses in a row, or two losses out of three fights.

The thing is, Jardine seems to have earned the extra chances through his reputation as a game opponent for anyone who always steps up and fights whoever the UFC needs him to. Sure, he only has four wins in the last four years in the organization, but those four wins are against Chuck Liddell, Forrest Griffin, Brandon Vera and Wilson Gouveia. Obviously, Jardine is a quality fighter.

Meanwhile, the type of success McGee will have in his own UFC career is anyone’s guess. Winning “The Ultimate Fighter” is not the indicator of impending success that it often used to be, due to a somewhat diluted pool of prospects that has led to most of the fighters on the show being very inexperienced. Who can forget Amir Sadollah’s run on the show, which led to his fight on the finale being his first professional fight?

Sadollah’s experience on the show is a lot more representative of the type of fighters likely to emerge from the Spike TV production, which was once filled to the brim with competitors who had many- even dozens- of professional fights under their belt. Names like Forrest Griffin and Joe Stevenson were already familiar to many MMA fans before they were cast on the show. Now, most of the names on each show’s roster are largely unrecognizable to all but those who have trained with the participants or seen them on local shows.

McGee’s skills in particular were more refined than that of his fellow housemates, which is the main reason why he is celebrating today, instead of McCray, Kyacey Uscola, Brad Tavares, or any of the others. Still, he now “graduates” from the house to the real UFC, and in particular a division that is fairly well stacked from top to bottom, like the middleweight division is.

Sure, the UFC will not throw him into deep water right off the bat, but there is only so much they can do to ease him into things, and if he does as well as he likely expects to in his first few fights, he could find himself in there with the likes of an Alan Belcher or Patrick Cote. Only then will we find out whether McGee has what it takes to be a force in the middleweight division, or if he simply had what it takes to win a show mostly filled with other green fighters.

A fighter like Jardine unquestionably has more talent than the vast majority of fighters that are brought into our living rooms through the endless seasons of “The Ultimate Fighter” these days. If he may be on his way out following yet another heartbreaking loss, what does that say for McGee and those who will follow him? It’s undoubtedly a great feeling to win “The Ultimate Fighter”, but the real challenges haven’t even begun yet.

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Tags: Court McGee, Keith Jardine, Kris McCray, Matt Hamill, UFC