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As the cross-over between MMA and football expands, so does the media scrutiny on training and drug usage

By Zach Arnold | May 7, 2010

On Friday, the National Football League suspended Brian Cushing for four games due to violating a drug test for performance-enhancing drugs. Cushing, who plays for the Houston Texans and was the 2010 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year, was a big star at USC during his college football days.

Cushing also is one of many NFL players involved in “MMA training” with Jay Glazer and Randy Couture. Glazer released a statement on Friday night about the matter. On Twitter, Glazer put it this way:

I’m waiting to hear from him but as u can imagine I’m absolutely furious. I wanna hear his side b4 I say anything. Right now tho I’m livid.

RT @wondo425: @Jay_Glazer steroids MUST be eradicated from all levels of competitive sport! Put Cushing in his place.> Agreed!!!

Yes, livid about Cushing. Randy Couture and I have a pretty strict policy against cheaters. I need to hear from Brian b4 we make judgment.

RT @bgibbs10: @Jay_Glazer Do you have a policy in place for people within your group that take PEDs?>Yup, we don’t train em.

I guess Brian wasn’t using the 11-minute Randy Couture workout video on his new Body by Jake indoor gym system. Let’s go, princess.

Jay Hieron, who trains at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas, is currently in St. Louis working out and training some of the Rams football players. There are more MMA fighters who are finding work on the side training football players.

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 5 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Evidence mounting that big UFC PPVs on days before big WWE PPVs are causing a big headache for WWE

By Zach Arnold | May 7, 2010

Yesterday, news broke that the number of worldwide PPV buys for this year’s Wrestlemania was 885,000. For WWE, that is a bad sign and an estimated 20% behind what people were expecting. WWE has PPV clearance worldwide in many more markets than UFC does, as UFC is just building up their international business right now with a lot of over-the-air or cable television deals.

Take note of what the trends are with weekends where a UFC PPV is on a Saturday and a WWE PPV is on the next day on a Sunday. Last November, UFC ran on 11/21 with Forrest Griffin vs. Tito Ortiz. The PPV didn’t draw great numbers for UFC, but it did enough damage to WWE’s Survivor Series PPV buy rate. Survivor Series was traditional one of WWE’s “original four” big PPVs. It has now been eliminated. On March 27th, UFC ran their Newark, NJ PPV with Georges St. Pierre vs. Dan Hardy. St. Pierre is the company’s second biggest PPV attraction and dominates the Canadian marketplace. The estimated PPV buy rate for UFC 111 in Newark was a little over 700,000 PPV buys. The next day, Wrestlemania took place and as you will see below in quotes from both Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez, WWE drew below expectations both domestically and worldwide with their PPV buy rate.

Audio quotes:

Dave Meltzer: “In the last six months on PPV. It’s Wrestlemania and Survivor Series and they both came, the guy (on the WWE conference call) goes, the day after ‘a competing event,’ he didn’t use the words UFC. I think maybe he was afraid the words were banned or something, someone was in his headset about to scare him, so he just said “a competing event” and then Vince (McMahon) just was, ‘Absolutely not, the competing event draws from the boxing fans, they do not draw from the entertain fans, we draw from the entertain fans,’ it was like a complete denial of something that was so obvious, the minute I saw that buy rate it was like, ‘Holy shit!” you know, UFC did a lot more of a number, I mean I misread this one bad, you know, and it’s funny because the trending patterns were absolutely right, the trending patterns predicted 515,000 North Americans buys and I was just like, ‘There’s no fucking way’, you know, this is Wrestlemania, this was you know Michaels and Undeteraker was so well-promoted, but you know the thing is that people are going to have there, you know Vince also did blame it on more people, he used the ‘more people getting together and there were just as many viewers as their was in the past’ but you know that’s bullshit.

The thing is people are going to get together, you know buddies are going to get together, and if it’s a weekend with two shows, the buddies are going to get together, they’re not getting together on Saturday night and Sunday night, they’re going to pick and choose and on this one they picked “the other show” and I thought this would be the one show a year, I mean because normally if you’re going to do that, they’re going to pick the UFC.”

Bryan Alvarez: “That is what we said. That’s a very important point, I mean this is what we said going on, that we thought that if there was one show a year where WWE could effect UFC and not vice versa, it was this one, and this one would be an aberration and as it turns out, it was not an aberration at all.”

…

Dave Meltzer: “This one was against a big UFC and when the buddies got to choose like which night they’re going out or are we going to go out and hang out and eat pizza and watch UFC or we going to hang out and watch Wrestlemania, where we missed out was more chose UFC than Wrestlemania. So, that’s the story.”

UFC is attracting many North American professional wrestling fans. The bigger question is whether or not the pattern will remain that these disgruntled wrestling fans look at UFC as a “substitute” or as a “replacement” to watching wrestling on PPV and TV.

Topics: Media, MMA, Pro-Wrestling, UFC, WWE, Zach Arnold | 13 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Dana White: Without Fedor, Strikeforce and Showtime would be nothing

By Zach Arnold | May 7, 2010

Quotes from MMAFighting.com interview with Dana White on Thursday in Montreal

The state of the relationship between Machida & Dana White given that Machida is angry about Dana saying that Shogun won the first fight

“No, we’re cool as far as I know, we’re cool, I’m sure he’s not happy that I scored it that I thought Shogun. Listen, I’m always going to be honest in who I think won and who I think didn’t and that night I couldn’t tell you. I scored that fight twice watching it on TV and I had Shogun winning the fight. You know, it’s not like I have, me and Shogun are boys and we hang out all the time. I have the same relationship with Shogun that I do with Machida, you know, I like them both. I respect them both as fighters and actually, you know, I think Machida is an incredible fighter, I love his style, his Dad is a great guy, nothing against them, I’m just being honest in the way that I scored the fight.”

The first fight in Los Angeles at Staples Center was tough to sell. The re-match should be easier to sell, right?

“Yeah, well I was happy with the results of the fight in LA, too, but you know, the sport has gotten to a place where you know you can come to Canada and headline with two Brazilians. We can go to LA, we can go to England and headline with two Brazilians, especially when you’re talking about these two Brazilians, you know, two of the best in the world in a fight that I think is going to be, I think this is going to be a completely different fight. I think they both, you know, they both learned a lot about each other and neither one of them liked the result. Machida doesn’t like the fact that people think he didn’t win that fight and Shogun doesn’t like the fact that he didn’t win that fight, so I think this is going to be a completely different fight than the first one we saw.”

Will the winner of Quinton Jackson/Rashad Evans face the winner of the Shogun/Machida fight?

“That’s not guaranteed. You know, and I don’t like to make those decisions off the top of my head, you know, we really don’t do that. Listen, I learned a long time ago and I’m sure other companies out there have now, too… You don’t look at the fight and go, ‘Ooh, this guy’s probably going to win, so if he wins and he wins, we’ll do this fight,’ you wait and you see who wins and go from there.”

Will the winner of the Josh Koscheck/Paul Daley fight Georges St. Pierre next for the title?

“Yes, the winner of Koscheck and Daley will face Georges St. Pierre for the title.”

Paul Daley posting photoshops of Koscheck on The Underground Forum and Dana has been spending more time posting on the UG.

“I think this is hilarious but, yeah, I mean, I never get involved in the trash talk between the two guys unless somebody crosses the line and gets stupid, but I’ve always been active on the Underground since day one and the reason I posted the Korean Zombie’s quote yesterday because it’s one of the best quotes that I’ve ever seen and it’s the way that I’ve felt about the sport for a long time. I agree with what he said and it really is, it’s not just Americans, it’s people all over the world. He’s saying the American fans embraced me and not because I was Korean or American or anything else but because of the fight that I put on and I’ve always believed that, no matter what part of the world we go into, it doesn’t matter where a guy is from, it’s how you fight.”

The media perception of Kimbo Slice is that he’s a regular fighter now and not a freak show.

“Yeah, what we’re not turning him into is a freak show. You know, I’m actually… I hate to say when I’m proud of guys, that sounds so condescending, but you know this is a guy who accepted my challenge, had a lot of different options where he could have stayed in the freak show circuit and made a lot of money. He took a big chance coming into the UFC and he’s actually put in the work, the time, and effort, and he’s trying to become a Mixed Martial Artist.”

Impressed with Matt Mitrione?

“Yeah, you know, when you take a guy that comes from another sport and they actually come over into this sport and do well, what I like about Mitrione is Mitrione likes to throw them, man, and he goes in there and he’s one of these guys who’s going to finish or be finished.”

If Kimbo has another boring fight (like he did the last time with Houston Alexander), will he get cut from the UFC?

“Actually, I don’t blame Kimbo Slice one bit for that last fight, all the blame lies on Houston Alexander in my eyes. He, you know, and Houston’s a guy who I like, you know, I’ve always liked Houston and you know we matched him up with Houston because we thought Houston would fight him.

You know, I can never say what’s do or die, I mean he’s got to go in and perform you know and win and we’ll see what happens.”

Thoughts on Fedor signing for another fight with Strikeforce?

“It doesn’t surprise me. These guys have nothing else, you know what I mean? I told you, I don’t know how many times I got to say that Showtime sucks, but you know that’s all they have. They have nothing else. If they would have lost Fedor, I mean they’ve screwed up every other possible thing, everything they’ve done they’ve blown so to not get Fedor would have been huge. I’m sure they offered Fedor a ridiculous amount of money to stick around, you know these guys are throwing a lot of money around. They’re the typical guys who have come up and tried to compete and get into it and just throw dumb money around and do dumb stuff and aren’t going to last long when I think over the last, you know, six or seven years, all the people with all the money they came in, if they would have spent the money the right way could have actually done something for the sport and helped out a little bit. These guys aren’t helping out. Think they’re helping out with Ontario? Think they’re helping with New York? They don’t give a shit about that. They’ll let us forge the way and then they’re going to try to build a business off of what we do, but they can’t even do that right.”

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

CSN Bay Area jobs out Bellator on their Boston telecast

By Zach Arnold | May 7, 2010

We know the pitfalls of doing a deal with Fox Sports Net/Comcast Sportsnet — there are pre-emptions for sports programming. You win some affiliates, you lose some affiliates every week. That happens.

But what if an affiliate as big as CSN Bay Area decides not to air your show and they had no live programming for pre-empting your show? A swift kick to the balls. CSN BA fans were treated to taped programming that included “G-Mag,” which is a SF Giants baseball weekly taped show. CSN BA has aired all previous Bellator events in their scheduled time slot. Instead, Bellator’s biggest show got demoted to the 1 AM time slot.

(On a side note, why does Bellator FC ring announcer Michael Williams sound and feel so similar to IFL ring annoucer Tim Hughes?)

This was Massachusett’s first major regulated MMA event on TV (at least of the “major” promotions) and there was little national press for it. And yet, UFC’s debut in Boston already has good heat and will have explosive heat by show time in August.

ESPN’s MMA Live debut on ESPN2

This was a mostly UFC-oriented show. They know where their bread is buttered. It was largely the same program format as their web broadcast, except with a couple of twists.

There was an interview with Scott Coker on the show and I almost felt sorry for him. His three questions dealt with Fedor re-signing with Strikeforce, Alistair Overeem PED accusations (something Cole Konrad won’t be accused of), and Jake Shields appearing at the (WEC) Zuffa PPV on 4/24 in Sacramento. Coker said that after Fedor’s first fight in SF, his management wanted their fight contract re-worked and he said factors that slowed down the process included “the language barrier” and “(time) distance.” Regarding PED accusations against Overeem, he brushed those aside and said that Overeem trains really hard and does a lot of weight-lifting. Regarding Jake Shields at the Faber PPV, Coker explained that Shields’ contract was “unique” because the Elite XC contract had no “champion’s clause” in it, but there was a period of negotiation going on right now betweens Shields and SF. In almost a half-hearted voice, Coker said that “we’re hopeful” in regards to getting something signed with Shields. He did not sound confident. He sounded defeated.

One of the twists to the MMA Live show was the addition of a Sports Science segment which was focused on the power of leg kicks in MMA and why leg kicks are so important. (I hope that all MMA judges watched this segment, especially the judges from the first Shogun/Machida fight.) Brandon Vera did the demonstration of karate kicks vs. muay thai kicks on a dummy in a cage. The end result is that karate kicks are a third-of-a-second faster than Muay Thai kicks (27% faster overall), but the Muay Thai kicks generate much more power. (Karate kick generated 66 Gs of acceleration, the Muay Thai kick generated 80 Gs of acceleration due to “kinetic linking” which involves energy shooting from the ground into the hips and legs to create a rotational velocity of 2,000 degrees per second with 2,600 pounds of force.)

Overall, there’s going to be a lot of MMA Live shows on ESPN pre- and post- UFC events. It’s definitely a step in the right direction.

Here is the video commercial for Fedor coming to the HP Pavilion on June 26th:

Topics: Bellator, Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Independent World MMA Rankings – May 7, 2010

By Zach Arnold | May 6, 2010

From the office of the Independent World MMA Rankings

May 7, 2010: – The May 2010 Men’s Independent World MMA Rankings have been released. These rankings are independent of any single MMA media outlet or sanctioning body, and are published on multiple MMA web sites, as well as www.IndependentWorldMMARankings.com.

Some of the best and most knowledgeable MMA writers from across the MMA media landscape have come together to form an independent voting panel. These voting panel members are, in alphabetical order: Zach Arnold (Fight Opinion and MMA Memories); Nicholas Bailey (MMA Ratings); Jared Barnes (Freelance); Jordan Breen (Sherdog); Jim Genia (Full Contact Fighter and MMA Journalist Blog); Jesse Holland (MMA Mania); Robert Joyner (Freelance); Todd Martin (CBS Sportsline); Jim Murphy (The Savage Science); Zac Robinson (Sports by the Numbers MMA); Leland Roling (Bloody Elbow); Michael David Smith (AOL Fanhouse); Joshua Stein (MMA Opinion); Ivan Trembow (Freelance); and Dave Walsh (Head Kick Legend).

May 2010 Men’s Independent World MMA Rankings
Ballots collected on May 4, 2010

Heavyweight Rankings (206 to 265 lbs.)
1. Fedor Emelianenko (31-1, 1 No Contest)
2. Brock Lesnar (4-1)
3. Shane Carwin (12-0)
4. Cain Velasquez (8-0)
5. Frank Mir (13-5)
6. Junior dos Santos (11-1)
7. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (32-6-1, 1 No Contest)
8. Brett Rogers (10-1)
9. Alistair Overeem (32-11, 1 No Contest)
10. Fabricio Werdum (13-4-1)

Light Heavyweight Rankings (186 to 205 lbs.)
1. Lyoto Machida (16-0)
2. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua (18-4)
3. Rashad Evans (14-1-1)
4. Anderson Silva (25-4)
5. Forrest Griffin (17-6)
6. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira (18-3)
7. Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal (7-0)
8. Gegard Mousasi (28-3-1)
9. Thiago Silva (14-2)
10. Jon Jones (10-1)

Middleweight Rankings (171 to 185 lbs.)
1. Anderson Silva (25-4)
2. Jake Shields (25-4-1)
3. Chael Sonnen (24-10-1)
4. Nathan Marquardt (29-9-2)
5. Vitor Belfort (19-8)
6. Dan Henderson (25-8)
7. Demian Maia (12-1)
8. Robbie Lawler (17-5, 1 No Contest)
9. Yushin Okami (24-5)
10. Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza (11-2, 1 No Contest)

Welterweight Rankings (156 to 170 lbs.)
1. Georges St. Pierre (20-2)
2. Jon Fitch (22-3, 1 No Contest)
3. Thiago Alves (16-6)
4. Josh Koscheck (14-4)
5. Paulo Thiago (13-1)
6. Nick Diaz (21-7, 1 No Contest)
7. Dan Hardy (23-7, 1 No Contest)
8. Matt Hughes (44-7)
9. Paul Daley (23-8-2)
10. Matt Serra (10-6)

Lightweight Rankings (146 to 155 lbs.)
1. Frankie Edgar (12-1)
2. B.J. Penn (15-6-1)
3. Gilbert Melendez (18-2)
4. Kenny Florian (13-4)
5. Eddie Alvarez (19-2)
6. Shinya Aoki (23-5, 1 No Contest)
7. Gray Maynard (9-0, 1 No Contest)
8. Tatsuya Kawajiri (26-5-2)
9. Ben Henderson (12-1)
10. Tyson Griffin (14-2)

Featherweight Rankings (136 to 145 lbs.)
1. Jose Aldo (17-1)
2. Urijah Faber (23-4)
3. Manny Gamburyan (11-4)
4. Mike Brown (23-6)
5. Bibiano Fernandes (8-2)
6. Hatsu Hioki (20-4-2)
7. Marlon Sandro (16-1)
8. Raphael Assuncao (14-2)
9. “Lion” Takeshi Inoue (18-3)
10. Michihiro Omigawa (10-8-1)

Bantamweight Rankings (126 to 135 lbs.)
1. Dominick Cruz (15-1)
2. Brian Bowles (8-1)
3. Joseph Benavidez (12-1)
4. Miguel Torres (37-3)
5. Scott Jorgensen (10-3)
6. Takeya Mizugaki (13-4-2)
7. Damacio Page (15-4)
8. Masakatsu Ueda (10-1-2)
9. Wagnney Fabiano (13-2)
10. Akitoshi Tamura (14-8-2)

The Men’s Independent World MMA Rankings are tabulated on a monthly basis in each of the top seven weight classes of MMA, from heavyweight to bantamweight, with fighters receiving ten points for a first-place vote, nine points for a second-place vote, and so on.

The rankings are based purely on the votes of the members of the voting panel, with nobody’s vote counting more than anybody else’s vote, and no computerized voting.

The voters are instructed to vote primarily based on fighters’ actual accomplishments in the cage/ring (the quality of opposition that they’ve actually beaten), not based on a broad, subjective perception of which fighters would theoretically win hypothetical match-ups.

Inactivity: Fighters who have not fought in the past 12 months are not eligible to be ranked, and will regain their eligibility the next time they fight.

Disciplinary Suspensions: Fighters who are currently serving disciplinary suspensions, or who have been denied a license for drug test or disciplinary reasons, are not eligible to be ranked.

Changing Weight Classes: When a fighter announces that he is leaving one weight class in order to fight in another weight class, the fighter is not eligible to be ranked in the new weight class until his first fight in the new weight class has taken place.

Catch Weight Fights: When fights are contested at weights that are in between the limits of the various weight classes, they are considered to be in the higher weight class. The weight limits for each weight class are listed at the top of the rankings for each weight class.

Special thanks to Eric Kamander, Zach Arnold, and Joshua Stein for their invaluable help with this project, and special thanks to Garrett Bailey for designing our logo.

Topics: Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 6 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

UFC 113 Quote Notebook: Josh Koscheck on British MMA fighters and Paul Daley on Underground Forum photoshopped images

By Zach Arnold | May 6, 2010

Gareth A. Davies (London Telegraph): Paul Daley sharpens his fistic tools for dangerous wrestler Josh Koscheck
ESPN (UK): Paul Daley says he wants to win MMA belts in multiple organizations besides UFC
Heavy: Paul Daley in-depth interview

UFC promotional video with Paul Daley

“I’ve got faith and I’m definitely going to be #1. I will be the champion of the UFC.”

“Josh Koscheck is not a fighter. Josh Koscheck is a wrestler. Wrestlers don’t like to fight. Wrestlers like to use their athleticism and they like to win. That’s the mentality of a wrestler. Koscheck is coming in to win, I’m coming in to fuck him up really bad. I’ve seen this fight a thousand times over. Koscheck, he is really not ready for this fight.”

“I’ll take 1,000 Josh Koscheck right hands and I’ll guarantee you when I land one of my mine, there will only be one of us standing. Josh Koscheck has never been hit by me. You cannot prepare for someone who can hit you as hard as I can hit you. You can beat me up all night and I land one punch. You’ve got to avoid that one punch for 15 minutes.”

“I’m going in there to do what’s necessary to win the fight and win the fight in the shortest time possible, so I’m sticking to what I need to do to win the fight which is go in guns blazing and smoke people.”

MMAFighting.com with Paul Daley

Has he been told he will get a title shot against Georges St. Pierre if he wins?

“No, I’ve heard nothing. For me it’s just another fight, like I said, I heard nothing, I know there’s Ultimate Fighter rumors as well, there’s the GSP rumors. For me it’s just a holiday and a few weeks of getting drunk after this fight. I don’t know if it’s going to be in Vegas filming for The Ultimate Fighter or whatever, I don’t know.”

Does he like or hate Josh Koscheck?

“I don’t know Josh Koscheck, so, he’s a non-entity for me. I don’t really give two shits about him as a person. As a fighter, he’s good and I respect him. I respect all the fighters that for any organization from the small shows all the way up to UFC.”

What will his strategy by against Josh Koscheck?

“His eyes down on the canvas, face down, ass up. You’ve seen the Countdown (show). I think he’s trying to play mind games to be honest with you by saying he’s going to stand in there and he’s going to wrestle. I think he thinks that worries me that I know he can wrestler, I know he likes to stand a bit, but I’m prepared for everything. I think he’s being a little naive that I’m not and that I’m just going in there just to stand and I’ll forget about the rest of MMA. So, he can say what he wants he wants to do in there, it doesn’t really matter.”

Have your mind games online and offline with Koscheck worked?

“I think he’s a little irritated, you know, a little humiliated. You’ve got this thread on the Internet with over 9,000 views or whatever, it’s probably a little humiliating to see him and Tito Ortiz kissing on some of these photoshops and shit like that, yeah, I’m probably in his head.”

After beating Martin Kampmann, did he expect to be in a co-main event slot on the card this fast?

“I didn’t to be honest with you. I thought I’d have to fight a few more fights on the under card. I was prepared to do that and I still am. I’m not in a rush to get to the title. It would be an option probably after this fight and you know, who knows, I may not take it even as big of an opportunity as it is, you never know, I may say no because I don’t want to as much as I am confident I don’t want to go in there with [unintelligible] things in the back of my head, I’d rather be 100% confident, 100% focused, everything in my personal life and training is 100%, a good structure to my training, that everything’s working how it should be to prepare for such a huge test because once you fall from the top of the mountain, it’s hard to get back up.”

Is he going into the fight with a clear mind?

“Of course, man, just victory, that’s what we do. Once we’re here, it’s just victory for us, man. It’s destined for us to win.”

Will he avenge Dan Hardy’s loss?

“Of course, I’d like to represent my team. I’d like for us to win. We had some wins on the show a few shows back with Andre (Winner) and Ross Pearson so we’ve had wins since that bad and I want to continue that on Saturday.”

UFC promotional video with Josh Koscheck

“I go in there to fight and I go in there to fight and win. Paul Daley has got a lot of heart and he’s been knocking a lot of people out. The problem is, he hasn’t fought anybody like me yet.”

“In the beginning, yeah, I was just a wrestler. Now, I’m a Mixed Martial Artist. I have other weapons. I have more than just a right hand. I have wrestling, submissions, I have takedowns, I have ground-and-pound. If they’re going to stand in front of me and they’re going to let me punch them, then guess what, I’m going to throw a right hand and try to knock them out.

“Don’t be surprised if I come out, stand toe-to-toe, and knock this guy out.”

MMAFighting.com with Josh Koscheck

Was missing the Paulo Thiago booking a good thing in hindsight?

“You know, one of the things that you know come to my mind is you know when one door closes, another one opens and I got an opportunity to step up and you know beat down Paul Daley on Saturday and become the #1 contender, so you know I’m super-excited about that opportunity and you know it’s a great opportunity for me, so…”

What is the history between you and Paul Daley?

“Well I think that you know to be honest with you we shared a dressing room in Dallas and you know we were pretty cool to each other it seemed like in that dressing room, you know maybe just out of respect of one another but after that, as soon as he beat his last guy, Dustin Hazelett, you know he came out and pointed to me and I was like, ‘All right, sweet, so I guess we’re going to have something here’ and that was the history there, so you know now there’s you know he doesn’t like me, I don’t like him, and we’re going to get to settle it for 15 minutes on Saturday night.”

Has Daley crossed the line with his antics?

“Nah, you know that’s part of the game. I mean if you look at guys like Floyd Mayweather, that guy talks, so it’s part of the sport and you know I’m concerned with what I got to do, I don’t really care too much about trash talking, I don’t care what he’s doing, you know, I’m focused on myself you know it’s been a long road to get here and you know I’m not going to let this opportunity slip by.”

Did the thread on The Underground Forum with the photoshopped pictures bother you?

“Nah, it doesn’t bug me, you know what it does it gives me the opportunity to get my face out there a lot more and then I get to beat his ass, so that’s perfect.”

What are your thoughts on Paul Daley as a fighter?

“I’m sure he has (evolved), but has he evolved to the point where I’ve evolved? I don’t think so. I think that he’s still a one-dimensional fighter. I think that his stand up is his only hope and he’s trying to talk me into playing his game and his game plan, that’s not going to happen, you know, I’m focused on what [I’ve] got to do. I have a great game plan for this fight and you know that’s my primary focus is exploiting areas that I think he’s weak and putting him in positions that I think I’m better at.”

What’s the game plan heading into the fight against Daley?

“The game plan on Saturday is to make Paul Daley think, you know, this whole week, what the hell am I going to do? Am I going to stand with him? There’s a good chance of that, you know, I got big balls and I’ve stood with you know pretty much anybody they threw at me so you know he’s got to concerned with that. Am I going to take him down? Yeah, there’s a good chance of that, you know, so right now, it’s still 50/50. Paul Daley’s going to have to sleep the rest of this week knowing there’s a chance he can be on his ass or there’s a chance that I can stand toe-to-toe with him and come Saturday night he’s going to get to find out.”

Has he been told that the winner of Saturday’s fight will get a Welterweight title shot?

“No, you know I’m not really concerned with that. I’m concerned with winning May 8th you know because that determines everything, where I go in my future and who I fight next, so I’m focused on Paul Daley.”

Did he take satisfaction in seeing Dan Hardy lose after Hardy called him a crybaby?

“Oh, definitely, you know he just showed his true colors that he’s a one-dimensional fighter, you know, St. Pierre just took him down over and over and over and he couldn’t do anything about it. So, that’s the game and you know these British guys need to work on their wrestling.”

Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Bellator FC’s big night in Boston and UFC 113 information overload

By Zach Arnold | May 6, 2010

Dan Wetzel says love or hate him, Dana White passionate about his product. He points to White caring about what fans say on his Twitter account.

Tonight is a big night for Bellator FC, as they have a show in Boston at the Wang Theatre with Eddie Alvarez fighting Josh Neer in a super fight along with Cole Konrad (training with Brock Lesnar) on the card. Check out this article from The Minnesota Daily to learn more about Cole and why he’s a big-time prospect. Brent Brookhouse has a preview of tonight’s big event. Steve Cofield says that the reputation of Japanese MMA is on the line tonight with Alvarez. The reputation of Japanese MMA was on the line with Shin’ya Aoki, not with Eddie Alvarez. Alvarez has plenty of experience in the states. Give him more credit than that. Michael David Smith gives up to tonight’s card on paper.

History in the making

30-year old Alex Chambers will be involved in Australia’s first legal female MMA cage bout.

Boxing’s culture in question

Elizabeth Merrill of Outside the Lines on ESPN has a big feature on boxing facing questions about its culture in regards to high-profile fighters dying. The sub-headline: “Four high-profile fighters — Alexis Arguello, Arturo Gatti, Vernon Forrest and Edwin Valero — have died in the past 10 months, raising issues about the sport.”

MMA labeled as “dog fights” in Israeli press

Ha’aretz, which is one of the two big traditional newspapers in Israel (the other is The Jerusalem Post), has an article on a fighter named Shimon Gosh who will fight tonight in an MMA event in Tel Aviv. The paper covers it this way:

Tonight, Gosh will enter the ring in Tel Aviv to take on a Russian opponent in a mixed martial arts event known as a dog fight. His opponent, Mikhail Malyutin, is one of the best fighters in Europe in the under-70 kilo category.

Other news & notes (important material!)

The Las Vegas Sun: Sam Stout ready for a battle at UFC 113 against Jeremy Stephens
The Las Vegas Sun: Johny Hendricks plans a major Welterweight title run in 2001
Gareth A. Davies (London Telegraph): Thiago Alves lucky in more ways than one (details on just how he had the surgery to fix his vein/artery problem)
The Visalia Times-Delta (CA): Olympic silver medalist Stephen Abas successful in MMA debut
The Fresno Bee: Former Fresno State wrestling great Stephan Abas wins MMA debut
The Orange County Register (Carlos Arias): Mike Guymon’s new positive outlook could help in the Octagon
WSOC TV: Rock and Rumble MMA event in Charlotte on May 15th to benefit U.S. military

Topics: Bellator, Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 21 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

UFC 113 Quote Notebook: Mauricio Shogun, Ed Soares, Lyoto Machida, and Yoshizo Machida drinking urine

By Zach Arnold | May 6, 2010

Dave Meltzer (Yahoo Sports): UFC re-matches are no sure thing
Franklin McNeil (ESPN): UFC 113 – Lyoto Machida is more prepared for Shogun this time around

Sherdog interview by Marcelo Alonso with Machida on how Machida is prepared for ‘the worst’

How is training going?

“I’ve been training a lot since the end of last year. In late December and early this year, we began to work out and started some cardio training. Last year I had surgery, and because my arm was in a cast, I did only part of the movement because I was not allowed to use my hand. The specific fight training actually began in January, but I just started using my left hand to punch at the end of January.”

How is recovery from surgery?

“The recovery was 100 percent. I do not feel any pain in my hand, and this is very good because it gives me a lot of confident. I had some years when I no longer had much confidence in my hand because it hurt. Every time I finished a hard training session, it hurt. When I finished a fight, my hand hurt, and with that you start to lose confidence. But now, thank God the recovery is 100%.”

Any change in strategy for the rematch with Shogun?

“I expect a tough fight. He is a tough fighter and it will really be a battle where both fighters will seek to win, but I don’t know how it will go. It could end on the floor, standing or a decision by points. I expect a tough fight because we know each other. The rematch will probably be a fight with both expecting more and everyone waiting to see what new approaches we will bring this time. Preparations are being made for us to not be surprised at the time of the fight.”

Prediction on the fight result?

“It’s a fight that I am prepared for the worst. If it goes to the fifth round, I’ll be prepared. How it will be a tough fight is difficult to forecast. If you ask me, I would like to finish the fight in the first round or as soon as possible. Nevertheless, I’m not thinking in a hasty or reckless way. I am calm to face another battle.”

Would you fight Antonio Rogerio Nogueira or Anderson Silva?

“I am close friends with both, primarily with Anderson as I have less contact with Rogerio. Anderson is a fight that is totally discarded for me. First, Anderson is a very close friend and he fights in a different division. He has no interest in my division and I feel the same. We do our jobs in our divisions and we help each other. With Rogerio, it is different because he has his dreams, his commitments with sponsors and I cannot mess up his way. I have to understand that in a professional way and know that it may one day happen. Nevertheless, it isn’t my will and I believe that it is not his will either. The event, monopoly, growth and professionalism are leading to that side. We must discern this. He would not be a fighter I would like to face, but if the UFC wants, we must accept. If that happens, we’ll deal with our situation. We both have families and dreams. We must look to MMA like a professional sport and try to face it in a better way.

UFC promotional video featuring Machida

“As soon as Dana White offered me the rematch, I accepted right away. After the first, second, third and fourth rounds, I felt like I was winning the fight. Shogun was playing a very defensive game so I kept on with my strategy. I didn’t change what I was planning to do. Any time you have a rematch, there is a little bit of a different feeling. He knows me a little bit, I know him a little bit, we’ve faced each other before. But I’m not coming in expecting him to have the same strategy. Every fight is different. I need to prepare myself for everything and that’s exactly what I’m doing. I won’t leave this fight in the judges’ hands. I will finish the fight. When the Octagon door closes, everyone needs to watch this fight. I will prove that I am the true champion. I’m also going to prove that the Machida era is just beginning and the victory is in my hand.”

UFC promotional video featuring Shogun

“The feeling after the judge’s decision was announced was like someone tore out my heart. What gave me comfort was to see my corner men support me, the crowd behind me thinking that I won the fight. When I went back to the hotel, the amount of care and support I got from the fans, everybody was telling me I won. This gave me some comfort and what matters the most is that I’m going to get a second chance. I was very happy with the offer of a rematch with Machida. I feel very motivated and I’m training very hard. For me it was really a reason to celebrate and I’m going to do my best to come back with the belt this time. I’m looking to make a statement with this fight and win it in a decisive way. I’m a fighter that always fights to finish fights. Everybody that knows me knows that I’m a fighter who’s always looking for the submissions or the knockouts on the ground or knockouts standing up. I’m always trying to finish the fight because I learned that way, I came from a school that thought that way. So this is my style of fight and I’m never going to change it.

“For this fight against Machida, I plan to do the same thing and it really bothers me that people don’t really give value to someone who is pressing the fight. I think people should reward it more because I really don’t understand how a guy that only walks backwards will be more recognized than someone who is pressing the fight and who is really trying to engage and make it a fight.

“Defeating Lyoto Machida is my wish. It’s my dream. It’s my goal and I’ll do everything I can to come back and make my wish come true.”

MMAFighting.com interview with Ed Soares and Yoshizo Machida, father of Lyoto Machida

Does Yoshizo drink urine, why, and what are the benefits?

“The reason why is because it actually is a health reason. And what happens is when you eat and all the food that you eat and you digest, not all of it comes out but when you drink urine in the morning, it helps flush your system out. So, it basically cleans your system every day when you drink your urine.”

Does Lyoto drink urine daily?

“Yeah, I mean, the reason why… Lyoto did drink his urine every day up until you know for this fight but you know the reason he started really drinking his urine is about two or three years ago he had this cough, he would take medicine, take medicine, he wouldn’t get rid of it and he asked his Dad, “What should I do?” and he said, “Hey, drink your urine, that’s what’s going to keep your healthy,” and that’s exactly what he did, he drank the urine and within a few days, a few weeks his cough went away and he didn’t have that problem any more.”

Why does Yoshizo believe in drinking urine?

“It’s like a vaccine you know like you know sometimes when you take a vaccine for a disease, you know you’re taking of the same of what you’re trying to fight against and since the urine comes out of your body then you drink it again, it almost serves like a vaccine.”

Has Ed Soares ever drank urine before?

“I’ve never tried it. My partner’s tried it and he’s tried to make me try drinking it and I, you know, there was a time where they were talking about it and I was like, ‘You know what? I’m going to try it, I’m going to try it’ and I even went and urinated in the cup and it was hot and my partner said, ‘Hey, it’s better to drink it when it’s cold’ and I let it get cold and I looked at it and I just couldn’t bear to do it, I couldn’t bear to do it, but I am interested in it, it’s amazing to me, I just, I just haven’t had the guts to do it, yet.

“If Machida wins, I’ll try my urine. I’ll drink it.”

What does urine taste like?

“[Yoshizo] said that you know just depends, sometimes it’s sweet, sometime it’s salty, it really depends on what you eat. He says that as a matter of a fact, my urine was very clean and I asked him why and he says, ‘I’m not sure, but it was very clean so I drank two cups today.’ He says during the war in Japan, all the Japanese soldiers would drink their urine to help them immune from themselves whatever they were trying to fight. There wasn’t medicine back then so that was their only form of medicine.”

Then, Yoshizo calls everyone’s bluff and says he will drink urine on camera. “if you want, I’ll do it right now and drink some.”

[Yoshizo heads the bathroom. Ed’s partner comes into the interview and explains urine tasting.]

“It all depends what you have eaten the night before, you know, and sometimes if you have a little bit of this salt of course it tastes salty. It all depends but you know it’s just a matter of habit, you know, like right now I mean there’s day where I think right off the fountain (hot).”

“Now he’s just going to wash it down with some water, he’s enjoying himself, and there you have it. Mr. Machida drinking his urine on a Wednesday afternoon in Montreal.”

Mr. Machida had some urine dribble down his chin while he drank the whole cup.

MMAFighting.com interview with Shogun

Do you look at this fight in the same way as the first encounter?

“No, it’s actually another fight, another belt, I certainly have to approach it differently and think of a completely different strategy.”

“I think he will come differently for this fight.”

Why were there not many takedowns in the first fight?

“Actually, I didn’t really try to take him down quite often in the first fight because I was feeling comfortable on my feet so I didn’t feel like I had a reason to rush for a takedown or whatever and regarding what I could differently after analyzing the fight, I think maybe what I can do differently is to be a little more aggressive and get a little more engaged in the fight against him.”

For most fighters, Machida is like a riddle. Did you find him tougher or easier to fight than when you assumed before you first fought him?

“No, Lyoto is a good fighter, a quick fast and agile fighter and I knew that it didn’t really surprise or impress me because I had trained with him for a brief while years and years ago so I knew what kind of skills he could bring to the table. It was pretty much what I expected.”

How do you respond to remarks that “the old Shogun is back” in UFC?

“It doesn’t surprise me because everyone that’s a professional fighter, professional athlete will have to deal with those things forever, I mean, that kind of comparisons and whatever and it doesn’t really bother me because it’s part of my job and we have to deal with it.”

The last time Shogun was in Montreal, he knocked out Chuck Liddell. What are your feelings on fighting in Montreal?

“I have great memories from Montreal and I hope to pay back the care and support from the fans here because the fans here in Montreal and Canada, they are fanatic and rabid for MMA so I hope to be able to give them a good showing.”

Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 9 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Video: Kimbo Slice loves Canada

By Zach Arnold | May 5, 2010

MMAFighting.com interview with Kimbo Slice

How bad was the weight cut for the Houston Alexander fight and did it negatively impact you?

“The weight cut had a lot to do with it man, I get to eat, have my desserts, you know what I’m saying, so you know I’m feeling OK you know what I’m saying, I’m ready to fight, a little anxious you know Saturday’s kind of taking long to get here but when it get to close to that fight you get that way.”

Are you happy with the way preparation went for this upcoming fight against Matt Mitrione?

“Yeah, yeah, I’m comfortable with it, you know what I’m saying. The preparation for every fight is about the same, it’s intense. I peak right before you know the week of the fight, I peak to my highest level of my performance and I’m ready for it.”

Any relationship with Mitrione on the TUF show?

“It wasn’t none.”

Does he like Mitrione?

“I mean, it’s whatever, you know what I’m saying. I don’t like or dislike anybody but the person I’m getting to fight I can’t stand you until after the fight, after the fight we can do whatever but until then, no, I don’t have too many words for you.”

Matt Mitrione KO’d Marcus Jones at the TUF Finale. Is his power and size his strength?

“No, his biggest strength is probably be, I hope it would be his ground game because if he wants to stand and bang, that’s my world.”

If the fight goes to the ground, are you ready for it?

“If I see a submission, if he’s slipping then I’m going to grip. Yeah, if he slips I grip.”

Prediction of the fight outcome?

“You know I don’t predict the fights, you know what I’m saying, but I’m not getting knocked out, I can tell you that.”

Neil Springer (Toronto Sun): Kimbo Slice says ‘I have evolved’
Kevin Iole (Yahoo Sports): Kimbo Slice continues work on his MMA game

Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 1 Comment » | Permalink | Trackback |

UFC 113: Marcus Davis finds himself in a win-or-go-home situation

By Zach Arnold | May 5, 2010

Quietly, Marcus Davis is fighting on this weekend’s UFC 113 Montreal card — and his job is perhaps on the line, too.

Publicly, an accurate reason stated for why his job might be on the line has to do with his fight record in his last five UFC fights: loss against Mike Swick (decision), win against Paul Kelly (submission), win against Chris Lytle (decision), loss against Dan Hardy (decision), and loss against Ben Saunders (KO).

“It definitely weighs heavily on me,” Davis said in an interview with Sherdog last week. “You just don’t know if you’re going to keep your job or not and you know there are guys that have lost a lot of fights and continue to keep their jobs, you know, but… you know guys like Clay Guida for a while there, man, he was losing so many fights but you know he’s an exciting fighter and he puts on good shows and people like to watch him fight. Same thing, you know, Chris Lytle, my buddy Chris, he went on some string but you know Chris lets it all hang out, he bangs it out, so there are guys that keep their job who are that way but you just don’t know with the UFC. Sometimes UFC will just sit a fighter down and say, “You know, listen, we got to release you for a little while. Go out and win some fights and we’ll bring you back.” So you know I don’t want that to happen so I got to go out there and I don’t just got to win but I got to win big and show that you know I want to stay you know employed especially nowadays with the way it is now.”

His big test this weekend on the UFC 113 under card is against veteran fighter Jonathan Goulet, who hasn’t fought in the last 16 months. Let Mr. Davis give you a short preview of coming attractions.

“I’ve worked out with Jonathan Goulet before and I’m not basing anything on that workout and obviously on paper that’s the way it looks and in my head that’s the way it looks but I’m not taking any chances and I don’t think it takes rocket science to think of what you know my fight plan’s going to be and what his fight plan’s going to be and yeah, this fight could be very well be over quickly or it could end up being a long, tedious fight. You know I’m hoping for a quick fight.”

He better hope for a quick fight and he better hope that he is on the winning end of it as well. Goulet is fighting in his backyard in Montreal and the atmosphere is going to be very strong in his favor. As Davis admitted in the Sherdog interview, he has issues sometimes with over thinking and being too hesitant in the cage.

“It’s got to be one of those [fights] where I don’t wait, I can’t wait for him to do something, I got to go out there and I got to make sure to take control of that Octagon immediately and I dictate the pace that I make him fight my fight and I don’t want to get wrapped up and you know what he’s doing and what the crowd’s doing because obviously they’re going to be screaming, ‘Kill the Irish guy!’ or ‘Kill the American!’

“I’m not going to base, I can’t, if I base everything off of what I think Jonathan’s going to do and I go in there and I wait for it to happen and it doesn’t happen, then I’m seeing all the opportunities to capitalize or create opportunity for myself and I think that fighters tend to do it and when fighters go in and they say oh the guy’s going to shoot and they wait for him to shoot, they lose the opportunity to you know punch a hole in the guy, so that’s not what I’m going to do. I’m going to go out there, I’m going to react to the situation at hand, and you know like I keep saying this fight’s going to be about me using footwork, sharp shooting, and throwing hard, heavy heavy punches and then you know if I get him hurt, jump on him and take him out or it’s going to be you him continuously trying to shoot and take me down and kind of grinding out a long fight like that with me just defending take-downs and him trying to keep on my back, trying to cut me.

“I got to be aggressive and I got to be first. In the case of like fighting a Dan Hardy, you got to be aggressive and got to be first whereas I did that, I completely went after and tried to close the distance and I think it was a wrong decision on the Saunders fight so that wouldn’t have been a fight that I shouldn’t have done that, I should have made him, moved around, made him come to me and then had done the in-and-out and my angles and stuff to carry that fight longer. So, yeah, it always depends on who you’re fighting and in this fight with Jonathan Goulet from what I’ve seen and what I’ve watched, he’s usually pretty aggressive and he comes out and he comes out pretty much like open to be hit because he’s just kind of a little wild and is throwing everything that he’s got to try to take him out and I’ve got to be there to make sure that when he does that, I’m there to expose the opportunity to hit him with a hard shot so he ends up walking into it. He’s either going to do that or he’s going to come after me like he did with Luke Cummo or like I thought he was going to do with Duane Ludwig and just come across the ring and shoot immediately and try to take me down on the ground, which actually is kind of like when we did in our sparring. When I sparred with him, which was once again it was right before the Swick fight, it was a while before that, I might have hit him once or twice and then from there on all he kept doing is trying to take me down and he wasn’t successful at it back then, either. I don’t know what’s going on in this head, I don’t know what his plan is, I don’t know if he’s thinking ‘OK, well, we’re going to go out and I’m going to see what happens striking’ or if he realizes that might be a big mistake.

“I can’t hesitate. I got to go out there and immediately establish control of this fight and show him that you know that he’s in a fight, a fight for his life.”

In many ways, Marcus Davis is a big talker and a big character. That’s great for the fight game, since colorful personalities make for great television. He does tend to dramatize things a little bit too much, occasionally.

“In the (Chris) Lytle fight I did hesitate and wait around a lot in the first round because I didn’t think I was going to have… when we went to that fight, Mark Dellagrotte I mean after the fight, that fight, we actually broke down in tears… and it was because he admitted to me that both of us too thought that you know when I walking down to the Octagon that I walking down for a execution. He was with me you know the 24 hours before where I was bed-ridden and I was running to the bathroom and I was anemic and dehydrated and we had the EMTs in my room and then we had a doctor in my room and he just said, you know, he just thought I was going to go out there and get crucified so that first round when I made it through and I sat down on the stool I said you know what, I can do this, I actually feel like I can keep fighting. I was worried that I was not going to have the energy or anything to do that, so, but you know I paid for it in the first round, I was hesitant and then I took over the next two rounds…”

While his free-speaking ways sometimes provides unintentional comedy and lionized stories of confidence, it’s also gotten Marcus Davis in a lot of trouble. While his record in his last five UFC fights is so-so, a real reason his job is in potential jeopardy is due to his mouth. After losing to Dan Hardy by split decision almost a year ago, Davis has been stewing over the loss. He hates Dan Hardy with a passion and Dan Hardy found it amazingly easy to tweak him online, including having Underground Forum members make mock gay magazine pictorials featuring the Irish Hand Grenade’s face on him. Hardy figured out that Davis was a big mark for himself and toyed with his mentally. Gamesmanship is one thing, but everybody knows that Dan Hardy likes to joke around and be a clown occasionally. It’s proved him great so far in his career. So, there really was no excuse for Marcus Davis to get all bent out-of-shape about losing to Dan Hardy.

There was especially no excuse when Davis made crude remarks about Hardy on his Twitter account eight months after the fight happened. Remember this?

@BIGfield948 I hope Hardy dies of aids

Dark&Bad taste-thought it was fitting aftr he did the gay photos towards me which is worse IMO this was words those pics are up for life

Would it have been better if I said hit by a car?

On these remarks alone, Davis likely should have lost his job. So, he got very lucky that his employers didn’t fire his ass. Not only were his remarks stupid and childish, but they were made right after the remarks Frank Mir made on Mark Madden’s radio show in which he said that he hoped that he could beat up Brock Lesnar and cause Lesnar to be the first fight to die do to “Octagon-related injuries.” Mir ended up being told to shut up before the Shane Carwin fight and lost his WEC commentating job. Mir admitted after losing to Carwin that he was distracted by the fallout from his comments on Madden’s radio show. Marcus Davis got off a bit easier — he’s got a chance to save his job if he fights well and beats Jonathan Goulet. But for all intents and purposes, it is a one-and-done situation for Mr. Davis in terms of keeping his job in the promotion. One loss and he’s in big trouble.

To his credit, Mr. Davis says that win or lose, he will continue fighting in Mixed Martial Arts even if it means it’s not in UFC.

“I would continue to fight. I’m not done yet, by any means… I was a pro-boxer and I did all that other stuff for years and years and years, but this MMA game you know everybody says you know that I’m a veteran because I got whatever, my 13th UFC appearance or whatever it is coming up, but… you know you got to look at it like this. I’ve still have only been doing MMA literally since I did the show, The Ultimate Fighter. I wasn’t even training in MMA. I was still a boxer in an MMA sport so I’m continuing to figure things out…”

At the time of his AIDS comment, I said the following:

“Congratulations to Marcus Davis for now permanently ensuring that whenever someone searches his name on the Internet that the phrase “AIDS” will pop up next to it on most of the top search entries in Google.” Type his name into Google and find out for yourself right now.

Not only does Marcus Davis need to re-shape his UFC fight record, but he also needs to re-shape his public image, too. Saturday night is a chance for him to try to push the reset button. If he doesn’t get the job done at UFC 113, he could be unemployed as early as next week.

Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 4 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

UFC talent depth issues and Fedor’s fighting future

By Zach Arnold | May 5, 2010

I thought it was interesting to listen to Dave Meltzer say yesterday that the reason UFC selected Jason Brilz to replace Forrest Griffin in the fight against Antonio Rogerio Nogueira on 5/29 in Las Vegas is due to the lack of available roster depth. Too many shows (Spike, Versus, PPV) has led to conflicts in commitments with certain fighters on certain cards.

The news about Fedor vs. Fabricio Werdum on 6/26 in San Jose left me a little “blah.” The idea, reportedly, is that the winner of that fight will face the winner of the Brett Rogers/Alistair Overeem fight on 5/15 in St. Louis. That seems to be a little bit too long-term booking given the way Fedor’s been fighting these days. Plus, throw in the fact that DREAM already has been planning a triangle series with Fedor, Overeem, and Josh Barnett, and nothing should be taken for granted.

Kevin Randleman, who recently defended Scott Coker’s matchmaking as “pure,” may not fight Roger Gracie after all on 5/15 in St. Louis.

Steve Simmons in The Toronto Sun has an article about Toronto mayoral candidate Rob Ford wanting to bring MMA legislation forth to the area shortly. Speaking of Canadian politics, here’s Georges St. Pierre at Parliament Hill.

I am amazed at how many news wires picked up the UFC PR about Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin being officially booked for their July event. The star power of Lesnar is really huge.

MMA Live will air on ESPN2 this Thursday at 1 AM EST. Check it out.

Hey, a Chris Haseman sighting.

USA Today: UFC 113 – can Machida halt Shogun’s attack before it gets started?
James Brydon (Rogers Sportsnet): Q & A with TJ Grant about UFC 113
The Cleveland Plain-Dealer: Machida-Shogun rematch could raise awareness for sport
Sherdog: Zuffa files suit for ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ domain name (hey, what about Ultimate Gay Fighter?)
The Vancouver Sun: One-on-one with Dana White
Fight Hype: Conference call quotes from Brett Rogers and Alistair Overeem (I got the audio and it was hard to make out what anyone was saying, so I gave up on it)
MMA Disputed: Andrew Simon HDNet Fights CEO interview

Topics: Canada, Media, MMA, StrikeForce, UFC, Zach Arnold | 12 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Eddie Alvarez: My Philly street fights puts Kimbo’s backyard brawls to shame

By Zach Arnold | May 5, 2010

On Eddie Alvarez’s Wikipedia page, someone listed the following under Fight History:

“Extensive street fighting background. Claims to be undefeated in unsanctioned fights.” [5]

The number [5] takes you to Alvarez’s Bellator web site profile which says the following:

Alvarez was born and raised in Kensington, a Philadelphia neighborhood notorious for being overrun with drugs, gangs and violence. To ensure his son’s safety, his father made sure he knew how to fight; he spent hours guiding his hands and hips to show him how to deliver the most power into a punch. At a young age, Alvarez took those lessons to the streets where he toted around two pairs of boxing gloves and challenged older children to fight. These battles took place in crowded city streets where the only breaks in action came when a car drove by or someone got knocked out. Like Rocky Balboa, another Philadelphia native, Alvarez gained respect by beating much larger opponents.

Alvarez made sure to point out during an interview with Sherdog on Monday that he, in fact, does not edit his Wikipedia page and had no idea where that claim came from. However, it’s not an assertion that he’s afraid to run away from.

“I have a lot more street fights than I did MMA fights, way way way more. Yeah, I mean, where I grew up my neighborhood was bad but I didn’t get fights in my neighborhood. I didn’t starting even getting into fights until like High School, maybe a little bit after High School but in my neighborhood there’s never fights, you got to fight and you’ll probably end up shot or dead after the fight so that wasn’t smart to fight in the neighborhood I grew up in but when I got out of High School I started hanging out, a lot of my friends today they still do the same thing I was doing when I was 18, 19, still getting into fights and things like that but it’s passed me, I did a real good job when I was street fighting and Kimbo wouldn’t have had shit on some of the tapes that I could have made when I was getting in trouble when I was younger.”

Alvarez knows a thing or two about bullies, having appeared on Mayhem Miller’s entertaining Bully Beatdown show on MTV. The Bellator Lightweight champion explained what parts of the show are scripted and what parts are real.

“The producers say to you and they say, you can beat him up, go beat him up, they tell me don’t slam too hard, not too hard, you can still slam but don’t because one of the guys got their ribs broke, I think Wilson Reis’ broke one of the guys’ ribs slamming him during the first season and no head kicks. Other than that, you know, show these dudes because the dudes, the guys who go on the show, I mean they’re not kidding, they honestly think they can do well against professional fighters, they do and I’m baffled and I think it should be legal to do what they do on Beatdown because most commissions won’t even let me fight a guy who you know even had a couple of professional fights, you know, the commission wouldn’t let that go, but yet I can fight a bully?”

Most of the time on Bully Beatdown, the “bully” ends up getting his ass kicked. Occasionally, you will see a fighter Thomas “Wildman” Denny (remember him from his fight against Nick Diaz?) who struggles against a scrub. Suffice to say, Eddie Alvarez didn’t want that happening to him on the show.

“I’m more nervous about fighting a bully than I am you know someone like Josh Neer, at least if Josh Neer beats me you know he’s a reputable guy and I could say, you know, oh he’s been in the game and you know this and that, but if this bully catches me I might as well hang it up, so there is… and the fighters would be lying if they say we weren’t a little bit nervous. I’m like shit, I’m going to go in there and handle this guy because if he can put up even a tenth of the fight, this is a lose-lose situation for me.”

Speaking of Josh Neer, the former UFC Lightweight fighter will be fighting Bellator’s Lightweight champion this Thursday in Boston. (TV: Fox Sports Net/Comcast Sportsnet). As Bjorn Rebney recently noted in an interview with The Fight Nerd, booking season one Bellator FC champions in super fights while season two tournaments are taking place is a risky deal. If one of the season one champions lose, it makes future booking that much harder.

Alvarez is perfectly happy with taking fight bookings rather than sitting back and waiting for season two’s tournament to play out — no matter how dangerous the fight is.

“Anybody who’s a veteran like Josh who’s been around a while always a risky fight but you know I’m not fighting because I want to fight shitty… I want to fight guys who want to challenge me and make me put on the best performance that I put on or it’s not even worth tuning in.

“I need to get a fight before the winner of the tournament, I mean that would have left me waiting around for a full year or something waiting for the winner of the tournament and I actually would have liked to fight before this but unfortunately I had to undergo surgery on my meniscus to get that all straightened out before I was able to get back in there. I don’t want to come back injured, you know, and put on a shitty show so I’m 100% now and I think Josh, regardless of who fights, puts on good fights. I’ve seen a lot of his past fights against you know good opponents and he’s a game dude, he sticks around and he throws a lot of stuff so I think it makes for a great fight.”

Alvarez is fighting Neer while coming off of knee surgery to repair meniscus damage, damage that he believes he suffered while fighting extensively last year in the DREAM ring in Japan.

“I fought in the DREAM tournament and I kind of tweaked it there, I just kept… I knew I had to get through the tournament with it so I just kept fighting through it and fighting through it and I just kind of procrastinated with the doctor and then I fought in the Bellator tournament and fought through the injury there as well, I think it was just the wear and tear. I think I just tore it a little bit and I should ahve got a fix when I tore it a little bit. Instead I just kept fighting and fighting and fighting trying to stack up some money, trying to beat some good guys and I got an injury. No biggie, I mean it was a minor, minor setback in what I was trying to do here.”

With the Alvarez family growing, he needs to keep making some money.

“You keep making babies, you got to keep making money.”

Part of making money is winning fights and maintaining a high perception in the minds of promoters and agents. Hey, I could insert a cheap plug in here for the Independent World MMA rankings, but that would be horrible of me to do. Except, of course, if you’re an agent and you represent someone like Eddie Alvarez, who is one of the 5 best Lightweights in the entire planet. Some fighters are complete marks for rankings and other fighters don’t care about them. Alvarez falls in the latter category, except of course when the rankings come into play when it comes to the size of his paycheck.

“I think rankings are no more than a way to negotiate your pay to a promotion when you become a free agent. Other than that, the rankings mean nothing. It doesn’t mean that the #5 guy can beat the #6 guy or the #6 guy can beat the 1st guy, I mean that’s just a way for my manager to say to a promoter, “Hey look my guy’s you know, he’s a high-ranked guy, so this is what he’s worth.” Other than that, they mean nothing, that doesn’t mean I can’t beat BJ, that don’t mean Frankie can’t beat BJ, you know you’ve seen it happen. In the last two weeks, the 1st and 2nd ranked guys got beat by what, the 7th and 10th ranked guys, something like that? It means nothing.”

Where Alvarez ranks amongst the world’s best Lightweights is up for dispute, but Bellator FC boss Bjorn Rebney raised eyebrows when he said that Eddie was in position to be the #1 Lightweight in the world should he beat Josh Neer on Thursday.

I tend to think that 99 out of 100 MMA fans would say that whoever is the UFC Lightweight champion is the best Lightweight in the world, which means Frankie Edgar is #1. BJ Penn, who will re-match with Edgar in Boston, is #2. After that, you can certainly make a case that Alvarez is somewhere in the #3-#5 range, which is pretty great for a fighter outside of the UFC. Plus, it doesn’t help matters that Alvarez lost to Shin’ya Aoki, who got tooled by Gilbert Melendez last month. However, that’s MMAth.

With the fight on Thursday against Josh Neer, Eddie Alvarez is happy to make himself one of the major players in Bellator. Although his options of fighting in Japan for DREAM are still open, Eddie is primarily focused on becoming Bellator’s main ace and building up a promotion in America.

“I actually finished up all my obligations to DREAM with the Kikuno fight, that was my last fight on my contract but I’m still in great relations with Japan, they’re always asking me to come back and they’re willing to take me back whenever that is and I love it there, I love fighting there, but I truly want to build a top organization here in America, I want to help build Bellator. There’s UFC, there’s Strikeforce, and I think there’s room to have 3 or 4 top promotions here in America so I want to help build one of the top promotions and I want to help build it, they’re my main obligation right now so I’m signed with them and I’ll be fighting for them for as much in whoever they want me to fight and until you know they don’t have any fights for me or something like that if they’re going to take a break and I want to keep going then I’m sure Bjorn Rebney, he’s a really cool guy, he’s willing to lend me out here to try to get one of the other big names.”

Whether Alvarez wins or loses against Neer, he will end up facing the winner of season two’s tournament that includes the likes of Roger Huerta. Admittedly, Alvarez hasn’t watched much of the tournament so far.

“If I have a little bit down time I definitely record them and I’m going to get around to watching them. I did see one of the Bellator cards so far, I mean it was a really good card, but to be honest with you, my main focus is Josh Neer, I’m not looking past anyone. i want to beat him, I want to dominate him, and I want to beat him in a dominating fashion and then move on and prove why I’m the top ranked Lightweight in the world and prove why I’m the Bellator champion.”

Alvarez, like many MMA champions, is expected to not only win in strong fashion in each of his fights but also finish off opponents and avoid having fights go the score cards. We know about a lot of the awful MMA judging that currently exists in the business, but the main reason fans and promoters want to see fighters win and win decisively is because it’s more exciting and it leads to bigger paydays. Alvarez has an interesting take on what average MMA fans want to see when they go to a show and what their expectations are from fighters.

“I go back and forth with this as a fighter to be honest with you because I really like watching guys who are exciting, who throw caution to the wind, who look like they’re out and not caring, they’re the guys that I like to watch and they’re the guys I actually watch the sport for. To be honest with you, I don’t think anyone gives a shit if I win or I lose except for me and maybe my family and a couple of my close relatives. So the majority of the people who tune in to watch me are to watch me do something crazy, do something exciting, do something to take risks and make a fight and it’s only a real small, small percentage like maybe 1, 2% of the people watching really care if I win or not and I think the promoter’s feel the same way, the people, the money behind it feel the same way that the win’s not important as putting on a ridiculous fight or a ridiculous show so I think, I don’t know I go back and forth on it. I think you should win and should be able to do it in an exciting, devastating, high-pace, violent fashion. I think that’s the key to being entertaining and being a good fighter is to win and be entertaining, not just to do one or the other and it’s a hard task to do but that’s what we’re paid for, I mean that’s what you go to do.”

Hey, we care, but we also fall into the 1-2% that Eddie is referring to. Now, when we talk about fighters and their ability to finish fights, there are certain fighters who fall into a category of fighting exciting fights for the sake of it (Clay Guida, Jorge Gurgel, Marcus Davis) and then there are fighters who stick to a meticulous game plan and exciting or boring, they are more or less interested in winning at the end of the day (Greg Jackson’s guys). While the bonus system used by promotions such as UFC and Strikeforce can produce “sloppy C-level kickboxing” fights that the fans cheer for, Alvarez thinks that the bonus system is a big reason why you get such inconsistency in the sport in terms of fighter performances.

“Here’s the deal. This is how I feel about the whole thing. If the promoters are going to mad at the fighters about not putting on exciting fights and only worrying about the win and they’re going to get in their face and get mad at a fighter, take away the win bonus. Pay the guy a flat rate, pay him like an athlete, pay him like the rest of these guys. Don’t tell him he’s got to get $500,000 to show up and then whether he wins or not is the case of $1,000,000, you know how shaky, how nervous I’m going to be if the difference between me winning or losing is a million dollars? That’s crazy. I’m going to second-guess myself and maybe not do things that I’d normally do, so pay the man a flat rate, what you feel he’s worth, and then it will take all the pressure off of him and he can go out there and kick some ass.

“I never went into a training camp saying, ‘Oh, I’m only going $30,000 for this one so I’m not going into tonight, I’m not going to work out tonight because I’m only getting $30,000 for this fight.’ A real fighter is going to train to win regardless, it doesn’t matter what he’s getting paid, $1,000 or $100,000, so just pay him for you think he’s worth, don’t tell him he’s worth any less or he’s getting paid less because he lost a fight, that doesn’t mean he trains any less for that fight than the other ones he won.”

With a 19-2 record, Alvarez has won 17 of his fights by submission or KO/TKO. His track record as a fighter is one of a fighter that puts it all on the line and is rarely boring.

“You’ve seen my fights, I’m not a safe playing type of dude. I kind of you know ready, aim, fire type of person. I get in there and start mixing it up and don’t worry about it when I’m in the middle of it.”

With a win on Thursday night, Alvarez will continue to cement his position in Bellator as one of the promotion’s top aces and the face of the #3 company in the North American MMA scene.

Topics: Bellator, Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 3 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

Judging the progression of Bellator FC during season two

By Zach Arnold | May 4, 2010

In an MMA world where news is largely driven by how many events there are going at any particular time, it is interesting to see how the second season of Bellator FC is playing out. After being on ESPN Deportes last year, the promotion is now airing live shows every Thursday on Fox Sports Net/Comcast Sportsnet and those showed are aired in edited versions every Friday at Midnight on Telemundo and every Saturday night on NBC (the old Strikeforce television slot).

In an interview with Matthew Kaplowitz, Bellator FC boss Bjorn Rebney says that the numbers look good so far business-wise.

“Fox Sports Network, we’re the highest-rated national broadcast on Fox Sports Network on both Thursday and Sunday nights and the male demographic 18-54 we have done over 100% increase in terms of attracting that very desirable demographic to that network, so the Fox numbers are very, very strong. We got our NBC numbers back and they’re very strong as well in terms of the late night time slot. We still haven’t received our Telemundo numbers.

“It’s all going well. It’s never going as well as I want it to go, but it’s all going well.”

There’s certainly a different feel and look to this season’s version of Bellator FC — from the production (camera shots, announcing) to the kind of variety of fighters being booked.

“The production’s new, new production team, spectacular fighters, great signings, magical venue alliances with the likes of Mohegan and Madison Square Garden sports properties, I mean just a lot of different, UB.net coming on board, Everlast coming on board with a co-branded line, lots of great stuff happening. The Hornbuckles, the Warrens, the Karakhanyans, the Karls, signings, Huerta, a lot of great fighters. Just a continual step up in terms of the maturation of the brand and development of the brand. So, exciting, really cool exciting stuff. The show is starting to look more like what I saw it in my head looking like two-three years ago. It’s starting to actually, it’s not exactly there yet, but it’s starting to look like what I saw in my head which was really cool, you know.”

Mr. Rebney has played up his tournament format as being unique from other promoters in Mixed Martial Arts. He believes that it gives the fans a true champion and lets the fighters control their own path to success. However, part of the tournament process is bringing in a mix of veteran fighters along with newcomers who could prove themselves to be legitimate stars down the road. It’s a mixture of bringing in name power and building up the Bellator FC brand.

“There’s been some interchangeability,” noted Mr. Rebney in the interview with Mr. Kaplowitz. “I mean Roger Huerta was a great signing for us, Hornbuckle was a great signing, Warren was a great signing, but Ben Askren was a great signing for us and Patricio Pitbull was a great signing and Georgi Karakhanyan a guy I’ve been watching fight in the Southern California fight scene for a lot of years, he can go and he can win 45 so, you know I mean a lot of, it’s just a combo of both of them.”

Last year, the company focused particular on bringing in fighters that would help pull in ratings numbers on ESPN Deportes. This year, the recruiting of fighters has more of a global approach by Bellator management.

“We’ve got this Fox Sports Network audience of 92 million homes and the NBC audience of 112 and then Telemundo is 62 and Mun2 which is 35 million homes, so you know what we wanted to do is when we opened it up to the general market, we wanted to go out and literally just secure the best fighters that were available any place in the world and it didn’t matter if they were from Brazil in Portuguese or whether they were from Poland or whether they were from England or Tennesseee. So, obviously in our first season on Deportes, the focus was really Latino so we put on a lot of effort into recruiting top Latino fighters and ended up with Joe Soto, Eddie Alvarez, Lyman Good, and Hector Lombard. Every single one of our champions ended up being from Latino descent. We haven’t abandoned it but we are surely expanding the breadth of who were out recruiting.”

Part of the recruiting has involved some pretty interesting fighters signings, including the likes of Josh Neer and Hector Lombard, who fought in PRIDE through J-ROCK. Guys like Neer and Lombard are not cheap signings. It is interesting to note that they are fighting sometimes in smaller markets that you normally wouldn’t expect UFC-level talent to be fighting at. Along with the weekly tournament matches, Mr. Rebney is also booking some “super fights” involving the champions from the first season’s tournaments. One of the names booked in a super fight is Eddie Alvarez, who is quickly climbing the ladder as one of the best Lightweights in the world. If someone like Mr. Alvarez was to lose in a super fight, it could certainly complicate booking down the road.

“You got Eddie Alvarez fighting the dentist Josh Neer coming up [on Thursday] in Boston which should be a spectacular fight in terms of those two styles. You got Hector Lombard fighting Paulo Filho on the 13th of May in Monroe, Louisiana on our Thursday night show and then you got Diego Saraiva fighting Joe Soto on the 20th in Dallas, Texas, on the show where the actual Askren-Thomas re-match is going to happen as well. Lyman, just as soon as he’s ready to go physically, we’ll set him up in a super fight as well and then the actual goal being of course the September fight against you know Askren, Thomas, Hornbuckle, or Karl whoever ends up the last guy at 70.”

Mr. Rebney was asked if he thought the booking of the super fights involving last season’s tournament champions could possibly ruin story lines leading up to the tournament championship fights at the end of the season.

“Absolutely and that is more of I’ve said many times part of the time I wear the promoter’s hat and part of the time I wear the fan’s hat and the safe road to pursue would be the road that would Eddie Alvarez sitting back and basically fighting conceivably fighting nobody or sitting back and waiting for the tournament to play itself out… but the fan in me would like to see the Josh Neer/Eddie Alvarez and I don’t think that it’s fair to an Eddie Alvarez or a Hector Lombard or o Joe Soto to put them on the fence for five-six months and have them just sit. The life expectancy of these guys in this game is relatively short. You’re talking about a few years in some instances. I mean some guys are freaks like Randy Couture who are able to fight on and on in an never-ending fashion, but for most guys it’s a pretty short life expectancy. So, to fight a guy twice a year based on that to me is not fair and as a fan I want to see Eddie Alvarez, I want to see him challenged and I also don’t think… Boxing has this ridiculous glass ceiling if you’re not 24 and 0 HBO doesn’t want to put you on or Showtime doesn’t want to put you on a big fight. In MMA, you got a Henderson or you’ve got a Randy or you’ve got different fighters who’ve got records where if they were boxers, they would be opponents and yet they’re amongst the top ranked fighters in the world at their given weight in MMA. MMA doesn’t have that fake glass ceiling. When Eddie fights Aoki, Eddie’s going to win some of the time and Aoki might win some of the time or if Eddie fought Gilbert, maybe Eddie wins x amount of times and Gilbert wins, so it’s a much different dynamic.

“I think that the MMA fans are much more accepting of the fact that when you fight the best and you lose it doesn’t mean that you go back to the back of the pile, it means you’re still a really good high-quality fighter and you lost to another extremely talented fighter.”

Ultimately, the success of Bellator FC will depend on whether or not the public looks at the product as major-league or minor-league. Bjorn Rebney thinks that as business picks up and money starts coming in on a higher scale, it will allow him to offer fighters more money which in turn will bring in higher-ranked talent into the tournament format.

“I think it can because you know we’ve got, and again this is my opinion and it’s subjective, BJ (Penn) was #1 in the world and (Shinya) Aoki was #2 and there’s a good argument that Eddie was typically #3 in that line on most people’s rankings so BJ loses a fight and Aoki loses a fight pretty handily and Eddie is sitting in a position now where he can fight Josh Neer and ultimate establish himself as #1. [Joe Soto’s] ranked in the Top 10 in a lot of organizations so my hope is that we keep doing the tournaments and the breadth of the coverage gets bigger and we’re reaching more households and we’ve got more ability and we’re drawing bigger gates and we got bigger international licensing deals and everything that we’re doing in terms of sponsorship continues to increase, the revenues come in, the dollar figures will get higher for the fighters because that’s the way it should work and ultimately you’re going to be able to draw in even more of the Top 10 ranked fighters in the world to compete. My hope would be that seasons four and five and six it continues to climb and ultimately you see three or four guys in the Top 10 in one of our rankings of eight different guys fighting at 70 or 45 or 55, but that’s incumbent on us because the higher the guys are ranked, the more money that they deserve to make hence we’ll have to make the ultimate prize at the end of three fights bigger.”

Topics: Bellator, Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 10 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

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