Unholy trinity: The UFC heavyweight division prospects

The UFC is catching a lot of well deserved flack for their heavyweight division. The critics are quick to point that Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira is atop of the totem poll and yet Dana White has the nerve to call Fedor Emelianenko "not even in the top 5 at heavyweight". Emelianenko decisively beat Nogueira in PRIDE fight championships back in 2005. Meanwhile Randy Couture is still out of the picture and the Donald Trump backed promotion Affliction has their own show featuring almost every top 10 heavyweight in the fight game.

To make matters worse, the heavyweight division will be shutdown for the next few months as Nogueira and number 1 contender, Frank Mir, are coaches on Season 8 of The Ultimate Fighter. Mir is a former champion and phenonmenal fighter, however whether or not he deserves a title shot is questionable. He submitted journeyman kick boxer Antoni Hardonk (that's right, who?) and was on his way to a first round TKO loss when he knee barred Brock Lesnar.

All is not grim. The UFC heavyweight roster boasts three up and coming fighters who could one day become champions. Let's take a look:
1. Cain Velasquez


Reportedly a favorite of Dana White, Cain is a super athletic heavyweight who has pedigree in wrestling from Arizona State. At ASU Cain placed 5th at the 2004-2005 NCAA finals and won a PAC-10 title for wrestler of the year.

Strengths: Wrestling. He has very explosive takedowns and punishing ground and pound. All of his wins have been first round stoppages. He says he has very good conditioning and hands, but if he keeps stopping people in the first round I guess we will never find out.

Weaknesses: Jiu-Jistu. In his recent UFC fight against Brad Morris, Cain looked almost confused on the ground. He had Morris's back at a point and could of pressed for a submission but elected not to. Training with Dave Camarillo at AKA will no doubt help this.


2. Shane CarwinBefore I say anything, take a look at this highlight video of Carwin fighting in various smaller leagues.



Simply put, Shane Carwin is a monster. He is a former DII NCAA wrestling champion and an All American football player. He is undefeated 9-0 in MMA with all his wins coming by first round stoppages.

Strengths: Everything. Carwin is very well rounded with a good boxing game and a decent ground game. His positioning is superb as seen in the video above and he sets up his submissions with very lethal ground and pound. His recent UFC KO over Christian Wellich was highlight reel worthy.

Weaknesses: Untested chin? Carwin I believe will be the next heavyweight champion because he has a very solid game, is relatively young, and has good momentum behind him.


3. Brock Lesnar



Yes I had to put Brock Lesnar on the list. It is true that he is 1-1 in MMA which is by no means a spectacular record. His loss to Frank Mir was still an impressive debut. His takedowns were fast and powerful and he displayed good positioning by switching to side control and landing some very scary ground and pound. Had Mazzagatti not stood them up for some phantom punches, I believe Lesnar would of won that fight in the next 30 seconds. Lesnar has a very solid wrestling pedigree, being a NCAA national champion and this is often overshadowed by his WWE career.

Strengths: Wrestling. Quick shot. Strong ground and pound. Looked OK standing too. Training with Greg Nelson at Minnesota Martial Arts automatically means he has insane cardio.

Weaknesses: Jiu-Jistu. He bought in 3x Mundial champ Rodrigo Comprido to get his jiu-jistu up to speed for his fight against Heath Herring. With good submission defense there is little stopping Lesnar in the UFC. Possibly Brandon Vera could give him trouble standing, but Vera would have to worry about Lesnar's shot first.

Kim Couture will be buried in two coffins

before.

after.

Kim Couture will be buried in two coffins. One for herself and one for her balls. And by balls I'm not implying that she possesses male genitalia but rather I'm commending her for her intestinal fortitude. 15 seconds into her June 20th fight with Kim Rose, Mrs. Couture caught a vicious uppercut which broke her jaw. She didn't get on the floor and start crying as you, I, or Bob Sapp would of. No, Mrs. Couture fought the entire damn 15 minutes and went on to lose a decision. The fight is below:





the (hot) wifey of ex UFC heavyweight champ and all around good guy, Randy Couture has made some comments post fight that disturb me. First of all, in her post fight interview she said that instead of touching gloves at the sound of the bell Rose uppercutted her. This is bullshit. Watching the fight above, Couture comes out in an aggressive ready-to-strike combat stance. The rules of MMA are "to protect yourself at all times." Mrs. Couture failed to do so and paid the consequences.

Recent happenings in the world of MMA that you may not have noticed

Starting things off very literally, with a bang, peep this knock out which happened at Xplosion 17 a European MMA promotion.


Insane doesn't even begin to describe it. In fact, I'm not even 100% convinced that it really happened. That guy timed a god damn cartwheel perfectly and planted his feet squarely on the other guy's "OFF" switch. Lights out for Vladimir.

This is definitely up there with Rampage's KO of Ricardo Arona



Moving on, between Dana White's hugely, awesomely, anticlimactic announcement and the the last episode of the Ultimate Fighter which was actually pretty shocking, awesome, and climatic - some things have happened in the world of Mixed Martial Arts that probably slipped your radar. I feel that it's my duty to bring them to your attention.


Firstly, Brett "the Grim" Rogers has finally been granted permission by Elite XC head honcho Gary Shaw to fight the big bearded black man, Kimbo Slice. Rogers knocked out James Thompson, the same man who beat Slice in their recent fight at Elite XC. Sure the official record states that Slice won by TKO in the third round by busting open Thompson's ear with an overhand right. Let's be honest for a minute, Kimbo ate 79 under answered blows with Thompson on top of him in the second round.

Any referee who isn't blind, retarded, or under Gary Shaw's payroll would of stopped it. So if you are looking to make a quick buck, put a C-note on the Grim to knock Slice back into Miami where he can continue to have street fights with coked out Cubans.

Yea, I'm wearing argyle motherfucker.

Jokes about Hispanics on recreational drugs aside, there was some controversy about this match up early on. Rogers felt he was being treated unfairly because he did not have the star power of Kimbo Slice but had far more legitimate wins under his belt. Most of them by first round knockout. So at a recent press conference, 'the Grim' called out Slice for tapping in his fight against Thompson. Shaw did not initially want to put the fighter together, perhaps because he also thought 'the Grim' will likely put Slice away. The las thing Shaw wants is to have Slice's drawing power diminish due to a KO loss. A visibly angered Slice demanded the match, and so now it looks like it's a go.

As stated before, I personally believe Rogers will KO Slice, but after listening to Nas's "Ether", you don't piss off an already angry black man. Rogers, just don't come back with "Supa Ugly"


Part time fighter and part time Jenna Jameson banger, "The Huntington Beach Bad Boy", known to most as Tito Ortiz plans to bitch slap Dana White at the live Ultimate Fighter Finale this Saturday. Here is what he posted on the underground MMA forum:

"Dana is going to get a SLAP!!! This weekend. I will be front row and walk up and slap him! just watch when I get kick out, you will know why. THIS WEEKEND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dana is my BITCH!!!!"

Big in his words, let's see if Ortiz actually goes through with this. Ortiz was a no show at the boxing match that was supposed to take place between him and Dana, I guess he feels that he needs to get one punch after landing none in his recent bout with Lyoto Machida. Either way, it's in writing now, no excuses unless he says he was stuck inside Jenna and couldn't find his way out. Which is both hilarious and entirely possible.

As an aside, I read on MMAmadness that Tito and Jenna are trying to have a baby. That's fine and dandy, I'm all for porn stars trying to have babies. I wish them the best and hope to God the baby won't have inherit Tito's head. Although if it does, Jenna is the perfect woman to have the baby with. They are the perfect couple.

tits.

Dana White wants to poop on the Affliction party

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I'm a huge fucking tool.

Dana White has confirmed from some very reliable sources that a July 19th show on Spike TV is a go. This is obviously not a coincidence as makers of (shitty) t shirts (that reek of douchebaggary) Affliction has their inaugural show slated to debut on that same date. Affliction has sold their shirts to enough guidos to be able to host a very stacked card featuring almost every top level heavyweight fighter on the card. Of particular interest is Russian heavy weight Fedor Emelianenko who is considered by many as the number one fighter pound for pound in the world. Fedor will be fighting the fighter who is considered the pound for pound ugliest fighter in the world in Tim Sylvia (Yes, I know Tim would beat the shit out of me six ways from Sunday).

I fell off the ugly tree and hit every stick on the way down.
And somehow we won the cold war..

Dana White must have been feeling threatened by this and other match ups on the card, because he bought out the heavy guns. For the May 31st Elite XC show, Spike "coincidentally" aired a documentary on Chuck Lidell. For Affliction, Dana is countering with a free UFC show on Spike TV featuring (the real pound for pound #1) Anderson Silva. Only Silva will be debuting at 205 pounds against James "the sandman" Irvin. Props to both guys for stepping up, especially to Irvin for having balls the size of coconuts. Silva hasn't lost in a long fucking time. The last time he lost, I wasn't even fully potty trained. What's scarier is that he has decimated his recent competition, all by first or second round stoppage.

Silva seen rearranging Rich Franklin's face

The casual MMA fan will probably opt to watch the free Spike show with Silva. Emphasis on the word free. I consider my self a pretty hardcore fan so I will probably divide and conquer, get people over and split the cost for Affliction. The Silva fight probably won't even go past the third minute mark anyway..

Dana White delivers and shocks MMA world with big announcement!

Last week between ranting about Elite XC and cursing Kimbo Slice, UFC president Dana White promised us that he would "blow our [fucking] minds" with an announcement that would shock the Mixed Martial Arts world. Immediately following his announcement, the MMA world was buzzing with rumors. Some were outright asinine (Floyd Mayweather joining the UFC and a proposed super fight with BJ Penn). Others were too good to be true (Dana had signed a network deal with Fox Sports). A few days later Dana went on CBS and denied all of them and even went on to say that his announcement was "so [fucking] left field that no one [at the press conference] would guess it." Below is what White had to say:

"You have no idea some of the stuff that we have planned. I’m going to make an announcement next week that is going to blow people’s minds. That deal is done, but my employees don’t even know yet. I’m renting out a place next Thursday and I’m going to tell them. Then we’ll make the announcement later that day. It’s an indicator of where this business is going over the next five years."

For all anyone knew, White was starting WWE-esque tag team octagon matches. Brock Lesnar and Chuck Lidell vs. BJ Penn and Rampage Jackson. Winning team gets to fight (and lose, probably via first round KO) to Anderson Silva (pictured below).

Anderson being awesome.

Alas, the actual announcement was predictably anti climatic. Ken Iole of Yahoo! Sports reported that current owner of the UFC Lorenzo Fertitta was quiting his day job as president of Station Casinos in Las Vegas to work full time at the UFC alongside Dana White. Below is what Fertitta had to say:

“The problem, if there is a problem, is that the business has gotten so successful, it’s requiring more time, focus and attention,” Fertitta said. “Station Casinos is a business my family and I have built and now it’s a multi-billion dollar company. But the reality is, the UFC has gone through so much growth in the last eight years, my brother and I felt we’d be better in divide and conquer mode. He’ll stay at Station Casinos and take care of that and I’ll come over here and work on the issues involving the UFC.”

Perhaps I am being to harsh. This may not be huge news in the world of Mixed Martial Arts but from a business stand point it's pretty big. Fertitta earned $138 million last year as Station Casinos CEO. That's 138 million Jr. Crispy Bacon Burgers at the BK Lounge. All lameness aside, I compare this to Steve Jobs quitting his job at Apple to work exclusively at Pixar. It's a big deal in business for sure, but as an MMA fan it was a bit of a let down.

Fertitta plans to focus exclusivly on expanding the UFC internationally. India, Brazil, Spain, Japan, Turkey, and the Phillipines were named as countries of possible UFC events. I can't speak for the non third world countries on that list, but of the 360 million Indians in the 18-34 demographic that the UFC wants to target, 350 million earn $1 a day. It would take them a couple months before they could even afford a pay per view..