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Judges at the UFC show got monitors tonight… but the controversy continues; Update: Spot on Matt Hamill’s back was due to staph infection

By Zach Arnold | June 20, 2010

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From Ben Fowlkes:

Thing on Hamill’s back? Staph infection. He just confirmed it. Going on antibiotics tomorrow, he says. Gotta wonder how the NSAC didn’t catch that. Actually, he may have said it was a “sterilized staph infection.” Was kind of tough to understand him. He said he didn’t know he had it. He didn’t say when he found out about it, though. See, that’s what I wonder. How did he get through medicals with that thing?

From Ben’s AOL report:

The red mark on Hamill’s back was a staph infection that he didn’t know he had. He plans to begin an antibiotic regiment on Sunday, he said as he pulled up his shirt to show off the wound, which resulted in a low groan from the media. “It just winked at me,” quipped Leben.

John Morgan of MMA Junkie:

Keith Kizer just informed me that Matt Hamill’s staph infection was inspected at weigh-ins. Doctor cleared Hamill to fight.

There’s no excuses for the NSAC allowing Hamill to fight with this. None. Another controversy involving Keith Kizer’s crew. This may be worse than Forrest Griffin fighting Tito Ortiz last November with a broken foot.

Think about Court McGee and Kris McCray, who fought in that cage after Hamill’s fight. Think about Keith Jardine, who bled during that fight. This is a major health and safety issue. Staph infections are nothing to mess with.

A few takeaways from tonight’s UFC event from Las Vegas…

Matt Hamill and Keith Jardine had a war. My heart says they both deserve to stick around, but my brain says neither man right now has much of a long-term future if things don’t dramatically change for both men. I have no clue where Hamill goes from here after tonight’s win. As for Keith, there was quite a bit of irony in him losing a point by Herb Dean a week after Dana White called Herb Dean the best MMA referee in the world. There was no way that the eye poke by Jardine was intentional and he didn’t deserve a point taken away. If the point hadn’t been taken away, we’re talking about two scores of 29-27 going to 29-28… meaning the two judges who picked Hamill didn’t give Jardine a 10-8 round? 10, 10, and 9 by two judges scoring in favor of Hamill… I think the fight performance by Keith alone saved his job.

Aaron Simpson was a heavy favorite going into his fight against Chris Leben and he got tagged. I loved how the announcers kept putting over Leben as someone who has matured over the last five years. That failed steroid test never gets mentioned, does it? Leben will always have his fan base and they showed up in Las Vegas tonight. He’s usually the kind of guy tailor-made for these Spike shows. I accept him for what he is. A set back for Simpson.

Jonathan Snowden remarked that the difference in terms of performance of the TUF 11 finalists versus the veterans on the undercard fights was glaring and he’s right. I was expecting a more competitive main event match, but Kris McCray really didn’t put up much of a fight. I have no idea where Court McGee fits in the bottom 20 or so of the Middleweights that UFC has under contract.

Thought it was appropriate of UFC to squeeze in the airing of James McSweeney getting picked apart right after the TUF 11 final. McSweeney was pushed during season 10. He got beat down hard here.

Wonder how many people will notice Joe Rogan’s absence with Kenny Florian working tonight’s show? I thought, overall, he did a smooth job and worked well with Mike Goldberg. He worked tonight’s show in Las Vegas and flew to Edmonton, Alberta to be at the WEC show on Sunday. Same with Bruce Buffer, who seemed very animated tonight.

Why did anyone get excited by the prospect of a Spencer Fisher vs. Dennis Siver fight?

One of the few things that UFC does a poor job of is those split-screen interviews with PPV headliners to hype a fight during the Spike TV shows. They come across as lackluster and really aren’t interesting. Their split-screen with Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin was incredibly useless.

It was amusing to watch Mike Goldberg have to put over a stupid “Guy’s Choice” awards show for tomorrow while at the same time WEC will be airing on Versus. During the enlightening promos, we heard actresses talking about guys masturbating to pictures of them. And then, the cherry on top — Half Pint Brawlers aired right after the UFC show on Spike TV, a show featuring Puppet the midget who once appeared on TNA wrestling to masturbate in a garbage can.

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 14 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

14 Responses to “Judges at the UFC show got monitors tonight… but the controversy continues; Update: Spot on Matt Hamill’s back was due to staph infection”

  1. Mark says:

    They won’t fire Jardine. #1 Dana hates getting rid of well-known TUF alumni, especially one with wins over golden boys Griffin and Liddell. And #2 he’d make up the questionable judging/reffing by not cutting him. But if they did fire Jardine nobody would care. Once his job isn’t on the line anymore he’ll go back to his normal dullness. But at the end of the day, guys from the first 3 TUF casts who are well-known will basically have a job for their whole career.

    That is absolutely disgusting that they let a fighter fight with painfully obvious staph. Revolting. It’s not like the crowd would have rioted if Hamill was pulled off the show, especially since they surely knew a few days in advance for UFC to be able to get a replacement.

    I was totally shocked Leben beat Simpson. I can’t even remember the last time Leben had a good performance, it must have been 2 or 3 years ago. But yeah, keep him on Spike shows. Nobody will pay to see him but he can get the big KO to pop the crowd.

    McCray sucks. McGee won’t be anything but a mid-level Middleweight at best. And that’s just because the division isn’t particularly stacked. But he showed me nothing to point to being a hot prospect. He’s just another generic fighter.

    The whole TUF 11 season was pretty bad. I can’t see any of those guys amounting to much of anything. And the wild card feature which allowed two losers to be in the finals is going to kill people giving a crap about getting invested in the show. That’s one of those television “jump the shark” moments. If they don’t pull that next season the show will have a drop off in interest. People will just wait to watch the finals unless they’re really interested in idiots punching doors.

    Florian >>> Rogan. Rogan has outlived his usefulness. When he came on, he was a semi-celebrity who brought a little bit of credibility to UFC because he was able to get some airtime to put it over on radio shows and his appearances on Conan O’Brien. But now he’s only well-known for the UFC and he’s a crappy announcer. Florian is incredibly professional, doesn’t have a shrill voice, calmly explains situations, doesn’t call everybody who throws a kick “K-1 LEVEL STRIKER~!” and keeps hyperbole to a minimum. That was very refreshing.

    And then, the cherry on top — Half Pint Brawlers aired right after the UFC show on Spike TV, a show featuring Puppet the midget who once appeared on TNA wrestling to masturbate in a garbage can.

    HE WAS JUST MEDITATING~!

  2. Brad Wharton says:

    The point deduction wasn’t due to an intentional foul…isn’t it the case that if a ‘foul’ does damage (so an eye poke, cut or stunning blow etc), intentional or not, a point *has* to be taken? That’s how I understood it and I’m pretty sure Herb was caught on camera saying something to that effect to Keith last night…

  3. 45 Huddle says:

    1. Under no circumstances should a fighter with Staph infection be allowed to compete. End of story. Pathetically bad AC for letting that fight happen.

    2. I thought both the Siver and Hammil decisions were good. Was it because of the monitors? Not sure. But they got them both right.

    3. It seems like half of the people complaining about the level of competition of the TUF fighters…. Are the same ones raving about Strikeforce Challenger series cards and how great the talent is there. No much of a difference really. And people complaining about this card were also raving about the last Strikeforce card for being so exciting. This card was just as exciting. Neither meant much to MMA’s future…. But some people just like to hate on the UFC.

    4. Rogan is still ten times better then Florian. Florian over explains everything. And his voice is too soft. Florian would work perfect for a weekly show. He doesn’t have the voice for the “big events”. And I’m a fan of Florian’s commentating, but lets be real here.

  4. Mark says:

    It’s not that the TUF series didn’t have some ok fights, they did. But you can’t see any of those guys doing anything beyond fighting each other, I can’t see any of them growing to Sanchez, Griffin, Evans, or even Bisping levels. I can’t even remember any of their names besides Yager because he got the most camera time and McGee and McCray because they were in the finals. If one of the other guys walked into my house right now I’d have no clue who they are and I watched most of the marathon 24 hours ago. And that’s the problem with MMA today: to fill cards all promotions are just handing out jobs to guys who really shouldn’t be past regional shows. Everybody is the same, nobody has anything special.

    I don’t watch Strikeforce Chgallengers so I don’t know what their level of n00bs is like, but you’re probably right it’s probably below the level of TUF casts.

    And I’m not blaming UFC for it. The market is just oversaturated compared to the seasons 1, 2 and 3 where they had their pick of the litter. But in 2006 you had IFL, WFA, and tons of small shows pop up to keep fighters busy and now there’s more promotions than ever. Now they’re stuck giving a guy with 2 or 3 uninspiring fights a spot just to fill out a cast.

    But it’s not going anywhere. The ratings are good and UFC will never go back on the Coaches Fight gimmick.

    And I wonder how GSP is going to be this next season. Remember he was the coach in season 4 but was so dull they barely gave him any camera time and Matt Serra was like the unofficial coach. Koscheck will be trying to bait him and GSP will just ignore it.

  5. Bob says:

    First thoughts were, wow they let him fight with a visible staph infection. Perhaps, they covered it over with some of that “second skin” stuff?

    Only caught the last 3 matches, and generally the seemed to be lacking in intensity (except immediately after the eye-poke by Jardine).

    What happened to Aaron Simpson’s conditioning?

    • Brad Wharton says:

      It’s hanging out with ‘Old Vitor’ and Antoni Hardonk’s ‘K-1 level kickboxing’.

      • The Gaijin says:

        Don’t you know that “New, New Vitor” is the “Old Vitor” but better?

        • edub says:

          No, no, no…

          This is the newest, new, new Vitor Belfort. One with the old Vitor’s power, the new Vitor’s speed, the new new Vitor’s “conditioning”, and… Jesus.

  6. Cory says:

    Kizer commented afterwards that the judges monitors were unplugged during the actual fights.

  7. robthom says:

    “This may be worse than Forrest Griffin fighting Tito Ortiz last November with a broken foot.”

    I dont see how those are very comparable.
    🙂

    One is a disgusting contagious festering blood infection, and the other is the wonderful experience of watching that BS’er tito getting shutdown in his (allegedly) long awaited return.
    By a man with a hobbled foot no less.

    Actually, maybe you’ve got a point there.
    tito = Staph infection.

  8. Mr. Roadblock says:

    I don’t know where this idea that fighters get a comprehensive exam before a fight comes from.

    Fantasyland I guess.

    Well, they dont. They need to send in their checkup with blood pressure, their EKG, blood tests and stress test. Then they get the most cursory exam you can imagine on weighin day. It basically consists of making sure that they have a set of arms and a set of legs and that they can fog a mirror.

    Guys fight with staph constantly. Guys fight with torn knee ligaments, torn elbows, broken bones, concussions suffered the week before in camp (or in one case I remember a guy KOd himself snowboarding a week and a half before a fight), and all varieties of illness that would cause people to call in sick to work.

    All the commission cares about is having a paper trail that docs said a fighter was fit if/when he dies in the cage or ring.

    I won’t mention names but I know of a guy who took a fight with a blown elbow a few years ago. He did it so that the company would pay for his elbow surgery. He got put in an armbar and tapped immediately. Then stood up holding his arm. He got his surgery.

    • robthom says:

      “I won’t mention names but I know of a guy who took a fight with a blown elbow a few years ago. He did it so that the company would pay for his elbow surgery. He got put in an armbar and tapped immediately. Then stood up holding his arm. He got his surgery.”

      ^^
      Slick!

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