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Friday fight notes before Super Bowl ’08
By Zach Arnold | February 1, 2008
From Team Link: Alexandre ‘Vaca’ Moreno strengthens Team Link
Team Link, whose stable includes UFC star Gabriel “Napao” Gonzaga, WEC champion Paulo Filho, and Gabriel Gladiator, welcomes Alexandre ‘Vaca’ Moreno. Alexandre ‘Vaca’ is already an accomplished competitor, having won the World Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championship as a blue belt and as a purple belt. Since moving to the USA several years ago, he has taken a number of NAGA titles and is the WFL Lightheavyweight Champion.
Here is some audio from the UFC 81 pre-fight press conference.
Onto today’s many headlines…
- 15 Rounds: Memo to the California State Athletic Commission – part two (writer makes serious allegations against Armando Garcia and does it with no remorse)
- The Press of Atlantic City: Meyrowitz brings new league to A.C. (article has new quotes from Nick Lembo)
- The San Luis Obispo Tribune: Over the Hill – Sport violence is a bane in today’s society (not everyone is a fan of Chuck Liddell in his home town)
- Mike Coughlin: Five Star Radio previewing UFC 81
- Shu Hirata: Obituary on The Godfather, Hiromichi Momose
- MMA Analyst: UFC’s hype machine has gone too far…
- MMA Memories: Charles Jay is ready to investigate MMA
- TKO Xtreme: Shawn Tompkins making a return to MMA competition?
- Fightlinker: Countdown show learns some new tricks
- The Oregonian: Brock Lesnar’s debut gets plenty of circus-like attention
- The Long Beach Press-Telegram: ‘Next Big Thing’ the real thing?
- Kevin Iole: Nogueira looks to add UFC gold
- MMA Payout: Declining bonuses sign of belt-tightening for UFC?
- Total MMA: A busy MMA weekend
- MMA Opinion: Gomi returns, and a career observation
- The Canadian Press: Dana White predicts UFC will draw 22,000 to the Bell Center in Montreal
- Sportsnet (Canada): Jason MacDonald signs new four-fight UFC contract
- Sports Illustrated: Chuck Liddell vs. Shogun coming soon?
- City Pages (MN): The real Brock Lesnar
- The Las Vegas Review-Journal: Frank Mir makes his own breaks
Topics: Canada, Japan, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 15 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
Those are some interesting allegations made in the article on 15rounds.com, particularly the allegation that Garcia informs the sanctioning body heads of judges’ current scores while fights are still taking place. If that charge alone can be verified, that would be a pretty big deal.
Also, I can’t believe how wrong the caption in the picture on the SI article about Chuck Liddell is. First of all, are they saying it’s Chuck’s debut or Tito’s debut in 2006? Secondly, either way, what? ??
My god I hadn’t even gotten to the last sentence. Chuck wants a shot at Quinton Jackson? I mean, maybe he does, but I am pretty sure he got a shot at Rampage, and he grunted like a pig getting run over by a semi. And then I think he got ANOTHER shot, and got knocked out in one round.
I mean, how lazy can SI be?
Even though he’s getting facts incorrect right off the bat in his MMA coverage, it is still notable that S.I. now has L. Jon Wertheim writing about MMA. Wertheim has written a lot of major articles in recent months and years, including covering steroid scandals (ie, the Signature Pharmacy bust and the many famous names that were getting illegal drugs from them).
So it’s good that a notable report is incorrectly reporting simple facts that could be checked via the Sherdog Fight Finder? 😀
Note that I said “notable,” not “good.” 🙂
I wouldn’t get too up in arms, Ben. SI has been a lightweight sports mag for a while now.
Looks like the Liddell-Shogun rumours are gaining some steam.
I’m all for this fight, should be a barnburner. I think Liddell’s gotta come in as the favourite at first glance.
I don’t think Wertheim would be responsible for the captions in his articles so I wouldn’t blame that blunder on him.
MMAMania is now saying that Shogun has confirmed the fight with Liddell in June. I found it interesting that Chuck said he doesn’t want to fight in the UK so I’ll guess that it’s the joint headline fight with Rampage/Griffin, which should be taking place around that time.
MMA Weekly’s top headline: Shogun vs. Liddell.
Looks like it’s going down in June.
I couldn’t be happier.
It’s a weird match-up.
Liddell should be fighting another Top 5er, for #1 Contender.
Rua should be fighting someone in the latter half of the Top 10.
What do you do with the loser of this match?
Mauricio Rua is a Top 5 fighter, I don’t care what any ranking says. Both he & Chuck Liddell were tied for the #1 spot. Liddell lost to Rampage, and Rua was the lone #1 guy. Then when he lost to Forrest Griffin, Rampage became #1.
To me, this is two Top 5 contenders going for a title shot. It is a fantastic fight, but really risky for Rua. If he loses this fight, I see him going down to Middleweight.
Also, Frank Edgar vs. Gray Maynard has been confirmed for UFC Fight Night 13. That card is stacked with talent and good fights. Edgar is the linear LW Champion.
On a side note, Paulo Filho is the linear Middleweight World Champion. There are many rumors of him soon moving up to Light Heavyweight. I assume if he moves up to Light Heavyweight, that the winner of the Anderson Silva vs. Dan Henderson fight takes over the linear position.
I can’t reasonably see Filho making a move to 205. He had enough trouble dealing with the reach of a big 185er and part of his dominance is his brute strength for a 185 fighter. This move really makes no sense for him whatsoever.
I agree. He can’t compete with any of the Top 10 Light Heavyweights in the world. He was short enough as a Middleweight. I think he needs to lay off the weights, and concentrate on slimming his body down. That is his best bet.
Filho is like 5’8″. He needs to lay off the weights and lose (not cut) a lot of weight. Then put him in the UFC welterweight division since he won’t fight Anderson anyway. WEC is supposed to be a feeder. Who cares if they get their stars poached. It’s all Zuffa-owned.
SI has some excellent sports photography. That’s why it’s called Sports ILLUSTRATED, and that’s it’s real strength, along with it’s history of editorials.