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Pat Curran to Face Joe Warren in Bellator Featherweight Title Bout on March 9

Tournament champion Curran receives date for title shot

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Bellator Sets Eric Prindle-Thiago Santos Heavyweight Finals Rematch for March 16

  • January 27, 2012 11:52 am
  • In November, Bellator's heavyweight tournament finals match went to a no contest, after an illegal but accidental low blow by Thiago Santos left Eric Prindle unable to continue. The fight, which will determine the next challenger to face champion Cole Konrad, has now been reset for a March 9 date.

    The bout will take place at Bellator 61, the second show of Bellator's sixth season, and will emanate from Bossier City at the Horseshoe Riverdome in Louisiana.

    At Bellator 59, Santos (10-1, 1 no contest) had Prindle (7-1, 1 no contest) prone on the ground when he landed a kick between Prindle's legs just 84 seconds into the fight. After a five-minute recovery period, Prindle still couldn't continue and the fight was ruled a no contest after the referee determined the blow to be accidental.

    The March 16 event will also host the quarterfinals of a middleweight tournament.

    Those bouts are also set, and the matchups will pair UFC veteran Maiquel Falcao vs. Norman Paraisy, Brian Rogers vs. Vitor Vianna, Vyacheslav Vasilevsky vs. Victor O' Donnell and Giva "The Arm Collector" Santana vs. Bruno Santos.

    Vianna (12-2-1) was a finalist in last season's middleweight tournament, losing a decision to Alexander Shlemenko in the finals.

    Vasilevsky is a notable new entrant to the field, coming in with a 15-1 record and riding a 14-fight win streak. The fight will also mark his US debut.
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MMA Top 10 Featherweights: Any Challenges Left for Jose Aldo?

  • January 20, 2012 08:00 am
  • Esther Lin, MMA Fighting
    Esther Lin, MMA Fighting

    The No. 1 featherweight in mixed martial arts returned to the cage at UFC 142 and needed less than one round to dispatch an opponent who entered the fight undefeated and widely regarded as the No. 2 featherweight in MMA. So where does Jose Aldo go now after defeating Chad Mendes?

    Aldo's camp has indicated he doesn't intend to move up to 155 pounds unless it's to fight for the UFC lightweight title. So that's probably not in the offing. And that raises the question: Are there any challengers left for Aldo at 145 pounds?

    For the identity of some potential opponents for Aldo going forward, check out the latest list of the top 10 featherweights in mixed martial arts below.

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Women's MMA News and Notes: McMann vs. Akano, Fujii Returns, Carano's Future

  • December 22, 2011 02:30 pm
  • Despite a shortage of talent, the interest in women's MMA seems to be stronger than ever, thanks in large part to Cris Cyborg, Ronda Rousey and Miesha Tate. Still, there are other talented women making headlines out there, and they deserve some of our attention too.

    Below is a roundup of news and notes from the world of women's MMA.

    * ProElite has signed an intriguing 135-pound fight for its upcoming card on Jan. 21 in Honolulu, Hawaii. Sara McMann, the 2004 Olympic silver medalist who has compiled a 4-0 MMA record thus far, will meet top-ranked Hitomi Akano on the undercard of the event headlined Kendall Grove vs. Ikuhisa Minowa. The 31-year-old McMann defeated Raquel Pa'aluhi via third-round submission in the first ProElite show back in August. Akano, who famously lost to an overweight Cris Cyborg in an Aug. 2009 Strikeforce bout, enters the fight with an 18-8 record and riding a two-fight winning streak. She recently defeated Roxanne Modaferri via unanimous decision in July.

    * Megumi Fujii (pictured), one of the best pound-for-pound female fighters in the world, has agreed to meet Karla Benitez in the first-ever DREAM women's bout. The fight will take place on the promotion's New Year's Eve show, which is being dubbed "DREAM - Fight for Japan: Genki Desu Ka! New Year! 2011." Fujii (24-1) is 2-0 since suffering the first and only loss of her career to Zoila Gurgel at Bellator 34 last October. Benitez (6-1) will enter the bout looking to get back on track after losing her first pro MMA fight in her most recent bout in October.

    * Speaking of Gurgel, the Bellator 115-pound champion, who underwent knee surgery to repair a torn ACL several weeks ago, tweeted recently that she is healing "ahead of schedule," and if things keep up this way, she could be back in action in approximately five months.

    * "Haywire," starring Gina Carano, will be released in theaters on Jan. 20, so that means expect to see a whole lot more of Carano in the coming weeks. Which leads us to ...

    * Carano is featured in the latest edition GQ Magazine. More on that here. Now, if you're wondering whether Carano will ever fight again, we asked Stephen Espinoza, the new EVP and GM of Showtime Sports, who also used to be Carano's a lawyer, that very question on Monday's episode of The MMA Hour.

    "I've actually been trading calls with Gina," he said. "She's really, really focused on the film, on 'Haywire.' She just smiles and winks. You know her well enough. She's got that sort of mysterious wink once in a while when she sort of says, I don't know, but will sort of wink and you kind of feel like there's something else there. But I know she is, in her heart, a fighter and always has that urge, just like any boxer does or anyone that is really committed to the sport. So if there is any opportunity to do so, I think you could see her [fight again] pretty quickly."

    * It feels like Rousey, who is still pushing for a fight against Miesha Tate at 135 pounds instead of Cris Cyborg at 145, continues to break barriers everyday. For example, she was a guest on Joe Rogan's popular podcast, "The Joe Rogan Experience," on Wednesday, which most MMA fighters can't say, let alone any women's MMA fighters. You can watch/listen to the show here.
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Fighter of the Year: Jon Jones

  • December 21, 2011 10:40 am
  • In October 2010, UFC president Dana White tried to slow down the expectations for Jon Jones. The light-heavyweight talent had just run through veteran Vladimir Matyushenko and the buzz around him had grown to the point where people were trying to project him into the title picture.

    White, though, would have none of it. Jones was going to fight Ryan Bader in early 2011 and still probably have to win another 2-3 fights after that before fighting for the belt, White said. Just three months later, circumstances caused him to reconsider.

    In a perfect storm of a day, Jones blitzed Bader and White discovered he needed a challenger for Mauricio "Shogun" Rua when Rashad Evans got hurt and Quinton "Rampage" Jackson declined the fight on six weeks' notice. Jones got the call and answered the challenge in historic fashion, annihilating Rua to capture the belt and become the youngest UFC champion in history.

    Jones is the easy pick for fighter of the year, but in reality, his 2011 was more than that, arguably the finest single calendar year in MMA history.

    Consider this: he became the first man in history to defeat three former UFC champs in a single year. But he didn't just beat them, he finished each one of them (and choked out Bader for good measure).


    If you like statistics, Jones' dominance over the opposition can be proved numerically. In his four fights, he out-landed Bader, Rua, Jackson and Lyoto Machida by an obscene total of 233 to 56, according to FightMetric.

    Keep in mind, those four came into their respective bouts with Jones with a combined winning percentage of .851, yet Jones won all 11 rounds against them and only Machida had any moments of success.

    It's not easy to select a defining moment for Jones in 2011, but his title victory was certainly a moment of clarity for all the remaining skeptics. From the opening touch of gloves until the time referee Herb Dean pulled Jones away signifying the end, Jones' performance was nothing short of a masterpiece, MMA's equivalent of a perfect game.

    Rua, a vaunted striker who was believed to have the standup advantage over Jones, was simply overwhelmed in every aspect. Jones out-landed him by a ridiculous amount, 102 to 11 by FightMetric's count. He took him down on all three attempts. He passed his guard repeatedly. And finally, he finished the fight for good with a liver punch that crumpled Rua midway through the third.

    Showcasing his versatility, Jones became the first man in a decade to make Jackson tap out when he scored a fourth-round submission in his first title defense. And he saved his most mature performance for last, navigating his way through a rocky first round against Machida before dropping him with a straight left and finishing him by choking him unconscious in the second.

    The year saw Jones jump from prospect to champion in seemingly an instant. Just a few months before 2011 began, White thought Jones wasn't yet ready to fight for the belt, but by the time it was over, White, like everyone else, had been converted.

    "I don't know how you deny the guy anymore," he said. "He's literally walked through everybody. He fought four times this year, probably the nastiest schedule in the history of the company. He's incredible, man."

    And an easy choice for 2011's Fighter of the Year.

    2. Dan Henderson
    When does time run out on Hendo? Judging from his 2011, it won't be anytime soon. The 41-year-old insists he's got a UFC title run in him, and his recent performances suggest he is indeed still a threat to either Jones or middleweight champ Anderson Silva. He started off the year in March by knocking out Rafael "Feijao" Cavalcante to take the Strikeforce light-heavyweight title. Months later, he moved to heavyweight and scored a TKO over Fedor Emelianenko, and he capped off his year by outlasting Rua in an all-time classic at UFC 139.

    3. Ben Henderson
    With dominant wins over Clay Guida, Jim Miller and Mark Bocek, Henderson proved that he belonged in the UFC's lightweight division and that he was a legitimate challenger to current champ Frankie Edgar. Just as impressive as his performance was his quick climb back from disappointment. It was just about a year ago when he lost to Anthony Pettis during the infamous "Showtime kick" match. The victory was supposed to get Pettis a title shot, yet it's Henderson who got there first.

    4. Michael Chandler
    It wasn't a huge surprise when Chandler beat Marcin Held and Lloyd Woodard to advance to the Bellator lightweight tournament finals, but his tournament title win over Patricky "Pitbull" Freire raised some eyebrows, and then Chandler one-upped himself by toppling champ Eddie Alvarez in one of 2011's best fights, a wild back-and-forth classic that Chandler closed out with a rear naked choke win.

    5. (tie) Nick Diaz
    What a wild ride 2011 was for Diaz, who earned early wins over Evangelista "Cyborg" Santos and Paul Daley before vacating his welterweight belt to move over to the UFC. He came to fight champ Georges St-Pierre, but never got the chance after he missed media commitments and the UFC removed him from the bout. As it turned out, St-Pierre ended up getting hurt and would have missed the match anyway, but Diaz decided to take a fight with BJ Penn and smashed him in a way that we've only see GSP do lately, building more anticipation for a possible future bout between the pair.

    5. (tie) Junior dos Santos
    There's no way to keep the new UFC heavyweight champion off this list after he demolished Shane Carwin back in June, and then headlined one of the most important shows in UFC history in November. Sure, the 64-second knockout of Cain Velasquez at the inaugural UFC on FOX show seemed more than a bit anticlimactic, but it also put into perspective just how dominant dos Santos has been. Since signing with the UFC, he has never lost a round.
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Spike TV to Air 'The Ultimate Fighter Fridays' During TUF 15 on FX

  • December 20, 2011 02:49 pm
  • Spike TV announced on Tuesday that beginning Friday, March 2, from 9:00 p.m. to midnight ET/PT it will air highlights from the past fourteen seasons of The Ultimate Fighter. "The Ultimate Fighter Fridays," as they are calling it, will be televised at the same time as TUF 15 live on FX, which debuts March 9.

    The move comes as no surprise as Spike aired UFC programming on its network at the same time as the UFC's debut on FOX and has already announced that it will do the same during the UFC's second show on FOX on Jan. 28.

    Interestingly enough, though, Bellator Fighting Championships, which is owned by Spike TV's parent company, Viacom, will debut its sixth season on MTV2 on March 2, as well. However, according to David Schwarz, Spike TV's Vice President of Communications, MTV2 has not decided which time slot it will use to air Bellator events. That could very well be based on the time slot FX uses to air TUF 15 next year.

    "We have to monetize the library," Schwarz said when asked about Spike's decision to counter UFC programming on FOX. "The UFC prefers that we keep the library and run the library."

    Spike has the right to air old UFC programming for one more year before its contract with the promotion expires. The UFC could buy back the library to prohibit this from happening, but UFC president Dana White has already stated publicly that he is not interested in doing so.

    Spike announced recently that Bellator will move to its airwaves come 2013.
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Jon 'War Machine' Koppenhaver Signs With Bellator as Welterweight Tourney Entrant

  • December 8, 2011 10:10 am
  • Jon "War Machine" Koppenhaver, the fighter who first gained fame on The Ultimate Fighter before his career was sidelined by legal troubles, has signed on with Bellator, fresh off his release from jail and a win in his first fight back.

    Bellator confirmed the signing on Thursday.

    Koppenhaver's signing is actually the second time he's hooked up with the organization. In 2009, he was set to start with the group but was cut before ever actually fighting for them after posting published comments that were seen as threatening to U.S. President Barack Obama.

    That was just one of a series of problems in a topsy-turvy life that has included among other things, serving one year in jail for a felony assault conviction, and briefly performing in adult movies.

    Bellator chairman and CEO said he thought long and hard before bringing Koppenhaver into the fold.

    "Jon's not had an easy road," he said. "And there's no doubt he's made some poor choices, but after having had conversations with him since his release, he really seems to understand where and why things went wrong and wants to make them right. And, when he's focused on nothing but training and fighting, he's a talented and exciting fighter. I hope he's able to turn this second chance into something positive."

    In his fight career, he is 12-4, and has fought once since regaining his freedom, defeating Roger Huerta by third-round TKO in November.

    Bellator did not offer details on when he might debut, but a source close to the fighter told MMA Fighting that he would be included in the upcoming welterweight tournament when their sixth season begins on March 2.
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Bellator Moves to Fridays, Plans Five Spring Tournaments

  • December 5, 2011 11:34 am
  • Bellator FC
    Bellator FC

    Bellator Fighting Championships has decided that going head-to-head with the UFC is a losing battle.

    The No. 2 MMA promotion in America announced that starting with its sixth season in the spring, Bellator's live fights will air on MTV2 on Friday nights. The first Bellator show of Season 6 will take place on March 2, and having the event on a Friday ensures that it won't take place simultaneously with a UFC pay-per-view, as Bellator often did this year.

    However, the decision to move to Fridays may still mean going head-to-head with the UFC, as The Ultimate Fighter will move to a live format with fights on Friday nights on FX next year, and the UFC may also run some Fight Night-level shows on FX or Fuel TV on Friday nights. It's not clear yet whether Bellator and The Ultimate Fighter will air at the same time, but Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney said his promotion views its events as distinct from reality television like The Ultimate Fighter.

    "Our focus was to find the right night, where the largest number of MMA fans could enjoy the show," Rebney said in a statement. "We've been discussing this move with our partners at Viacom for months. When we looked at the alternatives, we agreed that Fridays provided a great night for us to reach MMA fans with our live, real sport, tournament events every week."

    Bellator's Season 6 will feature tournaments in the featherweight, lightweight, welterweight and middleweight divisions, and one more tournament that the promotion has yet to determine. The season is also expected to feature title fights at bantamweight (Eduardo Dantas vs. Zach Makovsky), featherweight (Pat Curran vs. Joe Warren), welterweight (Douglas Lima vs. Ben Askren) and middleweight (Alexander Shlemenko vs. Hector Lombard).

    Other fights planned for Bellator Season 6 include Shinya Aoki vs. Eddie Alvarez and a rematch of the Season 5 heavyweight tournament final, Eric Prindle vs. Thiago Santos, which was ruled a no contest.

    Bellator should have a busy spring with plenty of big fights, but the big question is whether the promotion can differentiate itself from the UFC enough to make MMA fans notice. Moving to Fridays is an attempt to do that.

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MMA Roundtable: TUF 14 Finale, Strikeforce's Future, and More

  • November 30, 2011 11:00 am
  • With season 14 of The Ultimate Fighter drawing to a close and the big finale fight between the coaches drawing near, now seemed like as good a time as any to go head-to-head with my buddy and colleague Michael David Smith over a few of the more pertinent questions of our day.

    Questions like, what's up with Strikeforce? Also, what's up with Bellator? And, if you're not into this TUF Finale business, just what are you into, smart guy? All that -- only, you know, slightly more artfully rendered -- awaits you below. MDS, why don't you start us off.

    1. A big part of TUF is supposed to be hyping the fight between the coaches. Has anything on The Ultimate Fighter this year made you any more interested in Michael Bisping vs. Mayhem Miller than you were three months ago?

    MDS: I'm kind of surprised by how little the Bisping-Mayhem feud has moved the needle because Bisping and Mayhem are both engaging characters who know how to sell a fight. I assume part of the issue is that there's been less promotion for the fight because it's on Spike, and Spike and the UFC have ended their relationship. If this fight were going to be on pay-per-view, as most coach vs. coach fights have been, I'm sure the UFC would be doing a lot more to promote it.

    But the larger issue seems to be that Bisping vs. Mayhem doesn't seem to do a lot for fans in terms of its relevance to the UFC's middleweight division. Both guys are solid fighters, but the winner of this fight will still be behind Chael Sonnen and Mark Munoz in line for a title shot, and if either Bisping or Mayhem did get a title shot, it's not like anyone would pick either one of them to beat Anderson Silva. So it doesn't have the feel of a really important fight.

    Fowlkes:
    While I don't disagree that this fight lacks the promise of an immediate impact on its division, I have a hard time accepting that that's why there's not more heat behind it. Yes, the UFC seemed to choose these two as coaches based on force of personality alone, but didn't that work as well as anyone could have hoped? They laughed, they yelled, they pranked, and they even coached. They had their obligatory tense and borderline violent moments, but they also had some fun. That's got to be better than "Rampage" Jackson sleeping on the mat, right?

    The TUF franchise did its job on this one, at least according to its own abilities, and its stagnant formula. It's the UFC that decided not to go hard in the paint when it came time to push it on fans. Maybe that's a consequence of the brewing feud between White and his soon to be ex-TV partners. Maybe it's collateral damage from a crazy couple of months worth of events. Maybe it's a little of both.

    I just know that this is, on paper, a pretty good fight. I was interested when I first heard about the pairing, and I'm interested now. I can't say that watching them trade expletives or kick through a couple flimsy cardboard doors on the TUF set did a whole lot to get my heart rate up (after fourteen seasons, I've seen all the meaningless property damage and half-bleeped arguments I can take), but so what? It's still an interesting fight, and I still genuinely want to see it.

    2. Bellator's season has come to an end. Do you think MMA fans cared? What do you think needs to happen to make fans pay attention in 2012?

    Fowlkes: Here's an instance where we must resist the temptation to think of MMA fans as one monolithic slab. Did fans care? Sure. Some of them, anyway. Bellator gets a small, though consistent slice of the MMA pie with every event, and that slice is big enough to spread the word when there's an awesome finish or a great fight. And yet, there's another side to that coin. I suspect there's a healthy segment of the MMA fan population that is aware of and maybe even mildly interested in Bellator, but nonetheless doesn't feel the need to watch every weekend because, hey, if something worthwhile happens, it'll be on YouTube in the morning.

    Part of the problem is the Bellator schedule. It's cool to have a fight every weekend as the season plows forward, but it also makes it difficult to convince fans that one fight night is bigger or more important than any other. Oh, there's a Bellator event on Saturday? Well, there'll be another one next Saturday, and the Saturday after that, so no big deal.

    The schedule also makes it difficult for Bellator, as an organization, to focus on building a select few stars. As soon as one show ends, the Bellator crew has to turn its attention to the next one. Meanwhile, the champ in each weight class can either sit around and wait for the next tournament winner, or he can engage in a completely non-sensical non-title bout. Neither is a particularly attractive option for the champ or the organization.

    These are all problems that arise as a result of Bellator's main selling point, which makes them especially difficult problems to resolve. How do you keep the tournament structure without taking the spotlight off your champs for too long? How do you keep a season rolling forward without it feeling routine? I'm not sure I know, but Bellator is going to have to figure it out eventually.

    MDS: I agree with you that there's a problem with the Bellator schedule, but I don't think the problem is that they run every week during their two "seasons." I actually like the weekly format of knowing you're going to have a certain night of the week when Bellator is going to be on, just as I like knowing that The Walking Dead comes on every Sunday while it's in season and Modern Family comes on every Wednesday while it's in season.

    My suggestion to Bellator is they should choose a night other than Saturday. I just don't think it makes sense for a No. 2 MMA promotion to go on Saturday nights, the territory that the UFC has already staked out. To me, that makes about as much sense as a startup football league scheduling its games for Sunday afternoons in the fall.

    I love the tournament format and want Bellator to keep it, but it does create major problems with the champions: What are they supposed to do while they wait around for the next No. 1 contender to emerge from the next tournament? The "superfights" haven't really worked out very well, as Bjorn Rebney himself has acknowledged.

    I think the answer is that the champions should be in the tournaments. You win the Season 5 tournament? Congratulations. You're the Season 5 tournament champion. Now Season 5 is over, so it's time for you to enter the Season 6 tournament. That's what every sport that uses a seasonal format does -- the defending champion goes right back into the mix. And that's what Bellator should do, too.

    3. Strikeforce is back this month with its first non-Challengers show since the Heavyweight Grand Prix semifinals more than three months ago. Do MMA fans still care about Strikeforce? Should they?

    MDS: I don't get the sense that fans care much about Strikeforce. If anything, fans wish the UFC would hurry up and absorb all the best fighters so guys like Gilbert Melendez (who fought only once in 2010 and only once so far in 2011) could fight elite opposition more often. Melendez is defending his title against Jorge Masvidal in the main event, and the overwhelming reaction I've heard has been disappointment that Melendez isn't in the UFC fighting a better opponent than Masvidal.

    The reason I still care about Strikeforce is, more than anything, my affinity for women's MMA. Cris Cyborg vs. Hiroko Yamanaka is going to be a very good women's fight, and if Strikeforce disappears there's going to be an uncertain future for women's MMA.

    But the bottom line is that the UFC is currently stripping Strikeforce for spare parts and will eventually do away with it. Given that, it's hard to fault fans for losing interest in the promotion.

    Fowlkes:
    Well MDS, you just confirmed my suspicion that it's impossible for a dude to type the phrase "my affinity for women's MMA" without it feeling just a little bit creepy for some reason. But okay, I have to agree with the sentiment even if the phrasing conjures images of an evil villain making women fight for his amusement on a secret island somewhere. I would also like to see women's MMA survive, and Strikeforce is the best bet for that right now. Pulling the plug immediately would probably put a lot of very dangerous women out of work, and that's not good for anybody.

    But as for whether fans do and/or should care about Strikeforce in general, I have to say 'not really' and 'probably not.' Sorry, but that's what happens when the UFC pillages your roster, taking almost every significant draw and leaving you with a couple champions who are all but begging to be the next ones sucked up by the UFC tractor beam. The heavyweight GP still has a legitimately compelling final between Daniel Cormier and Josh Barnett, and a middleweight title fight between Luke Rockhold and Tim Kennedy is one I wouldn't sneeze at, but after that it starts to look pretty thin.

    The Strikeforce fighters -- the ones who have options, anyway -- don't really want to be there, and few can even be bothered to maintain the illusion anymore. Everyone knows this thing is running out of road, and nobody particularly wants to be there to ride it all the way to its sad end in a nearly empty arena, with a home audience that's just waiting for Dexter re-runs to come on. Who can blame them? Not me, brother.

    4. December features the TUF Finale, a Strikeforce card and two UFC pay-per-views. What's the best fight of the bunch?

    Fowlkes: Without a doubt, the biggest fight in December is the UFC 141 main event between Brock Lesnar and Alistair Overeem. And I don't just mean big in terms of total combined weight, though there's that too. It's just, from a media buzz/pay-per-view sales perspective, nothing in the coming month can top the combination of Lesnar's name and Overeem's experience. It's smart of the UFC to have that on the night before New Year's Eve, when people will be more likely to stay home and rest their livers anyway, and you have to think the end result will be plenty of eyeballs on that one fight.

    But then, biggest doesn't necessarily equal best. That distinction I save for another fight on the UFC 141 card: Donald Cerrone vs. Nate Diaz. Cerrone's been on a one-man paper-stacking mission this year, racking up win purses and post-fight bonuses like a man in hock to the IRS. Diaz struggled at welterweight, but looked downright scary when he took Takanori Gomi apart as a lightweight at UFC 135. Both these guys have the sort of tough-first mentality that involves taking no crap off of nobody, and when they get in the cage together I expect a technical, though ruthless fight.

    It'll be sort of like a demolition derby featuring half-drunk Nascar drivers: a whole lot of engine-revving and middle finger-waving, no small amount of profanity before, during, and after, and absolutely no regard for safety or long-term repercussions. How can you not like that?

    MDS: Lesnar-Overeem is without a doubt the biggest draw, and I don't know if there's any other fight in December that will give me butterflies in my stomach when the cage door closes like Lesnar-Overeem will. That fight is going to be awesome.

    But for pure entertainment value, I don't think there's a better fight on the docket than Mark Hominick vs. Chan Sung Jung at UFC 140. Remember how often we used to say after WEC cards that there was no promotion putting on great fights as consistently as the WEC? Hominick vs. Jung is exactly the kind of fight that made us love the WEC, with two featherweights who will relentlessly batter each other for 15 minutes or go down swinging if they can't.

    If Hominick vs. Jung is the best fight in December, I won't be the least bit surprised. If it's not, that probably means we're in for an amazing month.
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MMA Top 10 Women: Ronda Rousey Enters the Top 5

  • November 27, 2011 07:19 am
  • Ronda Rousey is the next big thing in women's mixed martial arts.

    The undefeated Rousey, who beat Julia Budd on the Nov. 18 Strikeforce Challengers card, has been running through her competition like few fighters, male or female, we've ever seen: Rousey is 4-0, and incredibly all four of her wins have come in less than a minute, all by armbar. Before turning pro she had three amateur fights, and she won all three of those by armbar in less than a minute, too.

    And so, although she's still new to the sport and still hasn't been tested against the best women Strikeforce has to offer, Rousey makes my Top 5 as we rank the top pound-for-pound fighters in women's MMA. She looks that good.

    What we don't know yet is whether Rousey is more than just a one-trick pony: If she faces an opponent who's able to keep the fight standing, will she be able to hold her own exchanging punches? And although she's not going to face anyone who's on her level as a judo player, will she be able to execute more than just her go-to arm bar if she faces an opponent who's sophisticated enough on the ground not to let Rousey get her arm?

    It remains to be seen. But I think she's a future champion, and I think she deserves her place on the list of the top women in the sport, which is below.

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Dantas Wins Bellator Bantamweight Tourney, Heavyweights Fight to No Contest

  • November 26, 2011 11:11 pm
  • In addition to Kurt Pellegrino's swan song, Saturday night's Bellator 59 event also featured the Season 5 tournament finals in the heavyweight and bantamweight divisions. But while the bantamweight tournament final was a solid fight that crowned a new top contender in the division, the heavyweight fight was a debacle.

    That heavyweight fight, Thiago Santos vs. Eric Prindle, came to a confusing and confounding ending, with a conference including the referee, cageside doctor and athletic commission officials taking much longer than the fight itself. It was ultimately ruled a no contest.

    With Prindle on the ground on his back, Santos kicked him right between the legs, and the referee called a halt to the action for an illegal low blow. After five minutes Prindle said he still couldn't continue fighting, and it was announced that the low kick was unintentional, so the fight was declared a no contest. But it's hard to see how anyone watching the kick could think it was unintentional: If Santos didn't intend to kick Prindle between his legs, what did he intend to do?

    In any event, Santos and Prindle will now have to have a rematch to determine which one of them gets the next crack at Bellator heavyweight champion Cole Konrad. That's a disappointment for Bellator, which was hoping to find itself a good contender for Konrad to fight.

    At bantamweight, Eduardo Dantas beat Alexis Vila by unanimous decision, 29-28 on all three judges' cards, to win the Bellator bantamweight tournament. The fight gave Vila the first loss of his MMA career and improves Dantas to 13-2. Bellator bantamweight champion Zach Makovsky will defend his belt against Dantas next year, and that should be a good fight: Bellator has a fun and exciting bantamweight division, and it's too bad that the bantamweight tournament final was overshadowed by the mess at heavyweight.

    And in a big surprise to begin the MTV2 televised broadcast, the 19-year-old Polish lightweight Marcin Held won a split decision victory over former Ultimate Fighter finalist Phillipe Nover. The fight easily could have gone for Nover, and the decision had the crowd booing. A Held-Nover rematch would make a lot of sense for Bellator in 2012.
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Kurt Pellegrino Loses, Retires at Bellator 59

  • November 26, 2011 11:00 pm
  • The final Bellator Fighting Championships event of 2011 also featured the final fight of Kurt Pellegrino's career.

    Fighting in front of his home-state fans in New Jersey, Pellegrino was defeated in just 50 seconds by Patricky "Pitbull" Freire, and he said afterward that he won't fight again.

    "I started my career in Atlantic City and I wanted to end it in Atlantic City as well," Pellegrino told the fans at Caesar's Atlantic City afterward. "I lost fair and square. I love you all so much. This is the last time you'll ever see me fight again."

    Pellegrino telling the fans (many of whom were his friends and family) that he had lost fair and square seemed to quell their anger at an apparent fast stoppage in his loss to Pitbull. Although Pitbull leveled Pellegrino with a left-right combination and then jumped on top and hit him with several punches on the ground, Pellegrino did still appear to be intelligently defending himself at the time of the stoppage, and the fans loudly booed the outcome.

    A UFC veteran who went 7-5 inside the Octagon, Pellegrino left the UFC on a two-fight losing streak in May, saying he wanted to spend more time with his family. It was a surprise when he returned to MMA to fight for Bellator, but it's not a surprise that he's now saying he's done fighting at the age of 32.
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MMA Top 10 Lightweights: Is Mike Chandler Now in Top 10?

  • November 25, 2011 09:56 am
  • Michael Chandler defeated Eddie Alvarez in what may have been the best MMA fight of the year, winning the Bellator lightweight title. Does that make Chandler a Top 10 lightweight?

    Not on my list.

    I loved the Chandler-Alvarez fight, and I like the 9-0 Chandler a lot. I think he's one of the most talented young lightweights in the sport, and I think it speaks well for Bellator's ability to spot talent that they signed him for their lightweight division. (Chandler fought twice for Strikeforce before Bellator scooped him up, and it was obviously a big mistake for Strikeforce to let him get away.) But while Chandler would be in my Top 20, I just can't put him in my Top 10 yet.

    So what could Chandler do to move into the Top 10? I'd love to see Bellator match Chandler up with Shinya Aoki. The previous plan had been to book an Alvarez-Aoki fight, but now that Chandler is the champ in Bellator, Chandler-Aoki would be more appealing. I'd also like to see Chandler take on Kurt Pellegrino, a lightweight who had a winning record in the UFC and is now set to make his Bellator debut against Patricky Freire. Putting Chandler in the cage with a UFC veteran would give us all a good idea how he stacks up against UFC lightweights.

    Chandler's win against Alvarez was obviously the biggest of his career so far. I want to see him get another big win before I put him in the Top 10.

    The fighters who are in the Top 10 at 155 pounds are below.

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An Offering of Thanks to Some of MMA's Most Generous

  • November 24, 2011 11:15 am
  • Fighting and helping seem a counterintuitive combination, yet MMA is blessed with many giving athletes and personalities who are difference-makers in their communities and the world at large.

    Many of those selfless efforts go undocumented and under the radar, but in the spirit of the holiday season, we've dug up some of the kind works undertaken by the men and women of the MMA world.

    This list is by no means meant to be comprehensive; rather, it is a sampling of some of the acts of generosity that often get lost in the shuffle of the everyday news cycle. And it is a chance to say, Thanks.

    Enson Inoue
    In the wake of the devastating March earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Inoue -- a Japanese-American with long roots in the sport -- was a one-man effort, traveling through the hardest-hit areas and offering assistance to the region's residents in the form of clothing, food and supplies, as well as toys to children. Inoue reportedly drained his own personal savings in an effort to bring relief to every person he could reach.

    The UFC/Dana White
    The UFC's charitable causes are many, though they often go unseen by the public and media. But in January, the promotion ran an event on a US military base for the second time in its history, with all seats free to base personnel, and proceeds from a corresponding online auction as well as donations benefiting wounded veterans through the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund. The event ended up raising $4.1 million for the fund.

    Brian Stann
    The president of Hire Heroes USA, a non-profit group that offers job search and placement assistance to US military veterans, Stann -- a former US Marine and current UFC middleweight -- helps run an organization with crucial importance during a time of economic hardship for many. The group has a special focus on the two demographics statistically most likely to be unemployed: young veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as wounded or disabled veterans.

    Alex Davis, Dan Lambert, Joe Mullings
    In early January, the state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil was hit hard by torrential rains that caused landslides and killed over 800 people. Among the hardest-hit communities was Nova Friburgo, the hometown of well-known MMA manager Alex Davis, along with UFC lightweight Edson Barboza, and others. Davis was in Nova Friburgo at the time and volunteered his time and resources to help, while Lambert and Mullings, gym owners of American Top Team and The Armory, respectively, started Combat Athlete Charities in order to support his relief efforts.

    Brendan Schaub
    When UFC heavyweight Schaub first visited Brazil in June, he was able to see some of the impoverished parts of the country, and he promised to return with some help when he came back to fight in August. True to his word, Schaub delivered several duffel bags worth of training equipment to a local gym in the underprivileged part of Tijuquinha, Brazil just days before his fight with Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 134.

    American Kickboxing Academy
    Many gyms have long roots in their communities and take part in volunteering, and San Jose, California-based AKA is among the more active ones. Among the groups the team benefits is Turning Wheels for Kids, a local organization that provides bicycles to underprivileged kids. Fighters including Cain Velasquez, Cung Le, Gilbert Melendez, Daniel Cormier and "King" Muhammed Lawal have offered up their time to the cause. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, the gym's fighters also recently volunteered time at Martha's Kitchen in San Jose, helping to feed the hungry.

    Jon Jones
    By now, everyone has heard the story of Jones helping to stop a robbery just hours before he won the UFC light-heavyweight champion. But that wasn't his only charitable act of the day. Indeed, he donated his substantial after-party appearance fee to a charity designed to combat children's cancers.

    Jose Aldo
    After every one of his fights, the UFC featherweight champion autographs and auctions off his fight gear to benefit his team's Nova Uniao community program, which is designed to assist underprivileged youth.

    Ben Askren
    After visiting tornado-ravaged Joplin, Missouri, earlier this year, the Bellator welterweight champion secured 300 tickets to Bellator 53 for Joplin residents to give them one night of enjoyment. "It's not a huge gesture. It's not like we're rebuilding their houses, but every small thing helps," Askren said.

    Freestyle Cage Fighting & BlackEye Promotions
    In conjunction with Breast Cancer Awareness month, both Freestyle Cage Fighting (FCF) and BlackEye Promotions ran events on January 1 with proceeds going towards cancer research. FCF's event, titled "Fight Strong for the Cure" ran a nine-fight card featuring all women, while BlackEye's 16-fight card was subtitled "Breast Cancer Beatdown."

    Dan Henderson/Clinch Gear
    The UFC light-heavyweight gave fans a thrill with his recent fight with Mauricio "Shogun" Rua, a fight which was quickly named as one of the best all-time scraps. But Henderson and his Clinch Gear company were also giving back in other ways, pledging to provide a Thanksgiving Day meal to a family of four for every official walkout T-shirt purchased through his website. On Thanksgiving, the company expects to feed over 2,000 families (8,000 people) through the Denver Rescue Mission and San Diego Rescue Mission, and the promotion has been extended through Christmas with additional donations to be made at that time.

    The Fans
    Few sports have a community as tight-knit and passionate as MMA, and even when you argue, you come together when it matters. Fans have generously donated to a countless number of causes. Among the most recent is the Daniel James Miller Foundation. The son of UFC fighter Dan Miller is in need of a kidney transplant and insurance does not pay for the entire procedure. The Foundation was set up in order to fund his treatment, and the family recently released a statement saying they were left "speechless" following the overwhelming support they have received.
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UFC Veteran Maiquel Falcao Recovering From Heart Attack

  • November 23, 2011 12:38 pm
  • UFC 123 competitor Maiquel Falcao remains in intensive care at the Santa Casa de Pelotas hospital in Brazil after suffering a heart attack over the weekend, reports Tatame.

    "Maiquel is still on the Intensive Care Unit and might stay there for few more days, when he'll go through a catheterization," Falcao's manager Marcelo Brigadeiro told TATAME on Wednesday. "He's lucid and improving fast."

    The 30-year-old middleweight competed last month on a local card in Brazil, earning a TKO win in 75 seconds. A week later, Falcao officially joined the Bellator roster.

    "Our sole focus and concern right now is for Maiquel and his family," Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney stated on Wednesday to MMAFighting.com. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family as they go through this ordeal."

    Fighting out of Chute Boxe, Falcao holds an overall MMA record of 28-4, 23 wins by way of (T)KO. Falcao was a victor in his one fight with the UFC, but was released six months later due to legal problems brought on from a 2002 assault charge in Brazil.
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