The riddle that is UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva's next move is slowly becoming a bit easier to solve. After widespread confusion and semi-disbelief from the news that he turned down a fight with rising contender Chris Weidman, some wondered who could possibly be next. Then one of Silva's managers Ed Soares claims the team is at least open to the idea of Nick Diaz. Wait, what? This whole time I thought that was just grasping and an attempt to stay in the headlines by the Diaz. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I'm not going to pretend I saw it as anything more than that. Whether the UFC picks up the idea is a completely different matter, but credit to Diaz and his team here. As Jamie Yager famously said, 'closed mouth don't get fed'.
As for today's Morning Report, we've got all the news stories related to Silva and who he'll face next with original interviews with both of his managers. We've also got former Bellator featherweight champion and 2006 world champion in Greco-Roman wrestling at 60kg Joe Warren contrasting MMA with sport. Which might be my number one pet peeve. Dive on in, folks.
FIVE MUST-READ STORIES
Ed Soares open to idea of Anderson Silva vs. Nick Diaz. I still believe it's mostly hype, but he does at least keep the door open to the idea of Nick Diaz as a potential opponent. Whether the UFC is open to that is another matter.
Glover Teixeira claims he's going to knock out Rampage Jackson. And you know what? There's a really good reason to believe him.
Olympic Boxer Gets Dropped Six Times in One Round, Gets Judges Nod. Not kidding. You have to see this and the headline says it all.
B.J. Penn and Rory MacDonald enroll in VADA for UFC 152 match. This marks the first time - to my knowledge - two high-level MMA fighters (or maybe even MMA fighters period) have enrolled in this kind of testing regimen.
Gabriel Gonzaga vs. Geronimo dos Santos at UFC 153. You know the cards are getting watered down when a fight like this is taking place under the UFC banner.
MEDIA STEW
Joe Warren is in London to help Ellis Coleman train for the gold medal. He reveals he's got a fight in Bellator coming up in November. He also curiously says 'a fight is a fight' but '[wrestling] is a sport'. Alright, then.
Lyoto Machida discusses his and his family's personal philosophies.
Did you miss any of yesterday's open workout interviews? We've got them all in one place:
Speaking of MMA all in one place, the good folks over at Bloody Elbow are putting out a playlist a day there called the 'MMA Nation's playlist', which features top interviews, fights and other interesting flotsam and jetsam from around the MMA world. Subscribe to the MMA Nation channel. Here's yesterday's:
Here's a fight where a guy taps out, goes unconscious and then comes back to win by TKO. Not kidding:
WISE CHOICE
So,
— Joe Lauzon (@JoeLauzon) August 1, 2012@danawhite said whoever wins most impressively Saturday at#UFConFox gets a shot at@jonnybones... I'm preemptively forfeiting my shot.
IT'S LIKE SHE KNOWS YOU
Dammit! Why does Rihanna have to know the exact stage my relationships are in with each new single?!
— Ronda Rousey (@RondaRousey) August 1, 2012
YES, 'MICHEAL' IS
I watched Micheal Phelps race last night personally I think he's pretty amazing
— Miesha Tate (@MieshaTate) August 1, 2012
INJURY BUG STILL ALIVE
Slash!! Head but from yesterday's training, 6 stitches, no big deal, still 8 weeks out. twitter.com/bisping/status…
— michael (@bisping) August 2, 2012
FANPOST OF THE DAY
Today's FanPost of the Day comes from casey.harts who does his best to analyze the ground game of Lyoto Machida pre-UFC. It's a technique-rich post with tons of gifs and breakdowns, but here's the intro to the post:
Lyoto ‘The Dragon' Machida most commonly known as the man who put Karate on the map in the MMA world, and former UFC Light heavyweight champion, is not a one trick pony. Machida may have incredibly accurate, fast, and precise striking, but he also has a versatile ground game to accompany it. Over the years fans have seemingly forgotten, the trips, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu of ‘The Dragon'. Machida even has a pretty snazzy shot. Many competitors have stated him as being very unorthodox, and hard to deal with in every aspect of MMA, but his confidence and variability make him incredibly dangerous. One of the most common problems strikers have with getting off their punches and kicks with technique and power, is feeling comfortable or safe in their take down defense, and overall ground game. When a proficient striker is not comfortable with their ground game their become very conservative. Machida being a former amateur Sumo wrestling champion, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Black Belt grants him an edge on most opponents. While he is not belted, Machida has very obviously trained in Judo, complimenting the foot sweeps he already implements directly from Karate.
On Machida's Journey to the biggest organization in MMA he would go undefeated never losing a single round. Fighting such names as: Stephan Bonnar, Rich Franklin, Vernon White, BJ Penn, Sam Greco, and Michael McDonald. All without so much as a hint of danger.
In this article we will discuss the grappling tools Machida used in his pre-UFC career to defeat his competition.
The techniques we will discuss:
- Trips/Take Downs
- Passing
- Ground & Pound
- Forearm Choke