Coach Gilbert Melendez not happy with TUF 20 seeding format

LOS ANGELES - Like any good coach, Gilbert Melendez did his job heading into The Ultimate Fighter 20. The former Strikeforce lightweight champion scouted talent and made mental notes on which fighters he preferred to pick when it came time for him and opposing coach Anthony Pettis to draft their teams.

But Melendez was hit with a curveball he wasn't expecting. UFC matchmakers added a wrinkle to the show's format and pre-seeded the women's strawweight competitors from one through 16. If one coach picked the No. 1 fighter, the other coach was given No. 16; if one took No. 2, the other got No. 15, and so on.

Melendez wasn't a fan of the new setup.

"I did not like that," Melendez said at last week's TUF 20 media day. "Considering it's a competition, I'm told its a competition, you lose a coin toss and you get to choose when and who. I only got to choose who."

Further, Melendez didn't necessarily agree with where the fighters were ranked. His only pick among the top four seeds was "Tiny Tornado" Tecia Torres, the third seed. He doesn't dispute her seed, but he has a bone to pick with the notion that Torres' opponent, Randa Markos, should have been ranked as low as the No. 14 spot she got.

"I was happy with my first pick," Melendez said. "But seeing the matchup she got, I knew that Markos wasn't the 14th seed. I knew [Markos] was one of my top-six picks. I saw one video and it had one of my buddies grapple with her. And I know right there that she was top six. I would have had different seedings."

Markos, of course, pulled off the upset of Torres on the season premiere episode which aired Wednesday night, winning a decision in a close fight after an overtime round. Melendez feels her fighter won the bout.

"I totally scored it for Torres," Melendez said. "I thought she controlled things. I thought she got taken down at the end, I thought in the final couple seconds she let Markos advance and she didn't get off on the ground and pound like she did in the second round. That was a tough start for Team Melendez with my number one pick going down, but I thought Tecia won that fight."

Still, even though Melendez wouldn't have set up the seedings the way he did, and felt Torres won, he knew he simply had to regroup and move on.

"I understand it," he said. "You hear one [seed] and you're like, ‘that wouldn't have been my number one pick.' I would have did something different. For that part I wasn't too thrilled about it, but you know, whatever, it's not my show, its theirs, and you roll with the punches."