(We're not sure, but this may be the best translated fighter "documentary" since the one on Mirko Filipovic. Fourteen seconds in and he's declared "one of the strongest guys on the planet." That really sets the tone for what's ahead.)
Though Aleksander Emelianenko and his possibly tainted blood are no longer welcome to fight professionally in the U.S., he’s been surprisingly active in Russia of late. At least, you know, for a guy who may or may not have Hepatitis B. Just last year he beat Ibragim Magomedov and also made his pro boxing debut, and more recently he won the Russian Combat Sambo Championships. Now MMAFighting.com reports that he’s found himself another MMA opponent willing to take the risks for a shot at glory and money, and it’s Swedish fighter and former Olympic wrestler Eddy Bengtsson, who will face Emelianenko in Moscow on April 23.
Bengtsson is 3-1 and he’s only been a pro since 2008, so there are at least two reasons why this fight would have a hard time getting sanctioned in any country that cared for the well being of the individual. But dammit, we can’t hate on Aleks or Eddy for trying to ply their trade. In fact, it’s refreshing to see two guys throwing good sense aside in an attempt to hurt one another.
At the same time, after watching some of Eddy’s fights we're a little concerned that he may get straight-up murdered by MMA’s favorite tattoo enthusiast. Obviously he's a good wrestler, but Emelianenko isn't just some punk he can toss around with ease. He's a big scary dude who has a little bit of experience at this MMA stuff, and Bengtsson really doesn't. See what we mean after the jump.
Rememer the "UFC Primetime" series that premieres tonight? Well, in a continued effort to generate buzz before the first episode, the UFC has put out a couple clips of what they're calling "unseen moments" from the show. Of course, they're not at all unseen now that the UFC has put them on their official YouTube page, but you get the point. It's footage they weren't going to use anyway, and it's supposed to make you want to watch the show, which is in turn supposed to make you want to buy the UFC 111 pay-per-view or pay $25 to see it at a movie theater.
Trouble is, this stuff is painfully boring. We're talking Jim Jarmusch levels of boring here. As in, a two-minute clip of Georges St. Pierre talking about a bet he made with a friend for really uninteresting stakes, followed by him calling that friend and discussing those uninteresting stakes all over again. We realize it's throwaway footage, but damn. I'm supposed to bump "16 and Pregnant" off my DVR queue for this?
After the jump, GSP does some push-ups and drills and stuff. It's exactly as interesting as that sentence makes it sound.
("See? I am friend. Now get in van, please." Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)
Four months after he put Mike Swick to sleep at UFC 109 — thereby going up 2-1 in his one-man assault on the American Kickboxing Academy — welterweight rising star Paulo Thiago will step into the cage at UFC 115 (June 12th, tentatively in Vancouver) against highly regarded contender Martin Kampmann. "The Hitman" is coming off a first-round submission victory over Jacob Volkmann in January, and was slated to take on Ben Saunders at UFC 111, but lost a large piece of his face during training. Coincidentally, Thiago also holds a win over Volkmann, who has been absolutely thrown to the wolves during his brief time with the UFC. (FYI, "Christmas" Volkmann will have his win-or-GTFO match against Ronnys Torres at UFC Fight Night: Florian vs. Gomi on March 31st.)
UFC 115 will be headlined by Chuck Liddell vs. Tito Ortiz, and is expected to feature Mirko Cro Cop vs. Pat Barry, Ben Rothwell vs. Gilbert Yvel, Tyson Griffin vs. Evan Dunham, and Mac Danzig continuing his slow road back to contendership against Matt Wiman.
(We were originally going to run a photo of Colt Toombs at the top of this post, but then we found this photo of his father, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, chilling with the guys from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. We hope you respect our decision.)
Attention MMA FightPicker players: We've had to make two changes to this week's pools. First off, Adam Gabel has dropped out of his King of the Cage Canadian lightweight title fight against Charlie Zak due to concerns about making the 155-pound weight limit. Replacing him will be 6-1 MFC vet Gavin Neil. Sadly, Colt Toombs has also been pulled from his Sportfight 27 match against Roy Bradshaw for unspecified reasons. Bradshaw has a replacement opponent now, but screw it, we'll just get rid of that question entirely. Please revisit your FightPicker pools and make any appropriate changes. Special props to CP reader "kellyman" for giving us the heads-up about this stuff...
(Sometimes the difference between making the cut and staying home is all in how you wear your silly hat.)
The time has come once again for the UFC and Spike TV to scour the land in search of MMA fighters who want to be on a reality show and/or need a place to stay for a few weeks. I refer now, of course, to the open tryouts for season twelve of “The Ultimate Fighter” which, Spike announced today, will be held on April 1 at the Omni Charlotte Hotel in Charlotte, North Carolina.
This time around the UFC is looking for lightweights and light heavyweights, and since our vast readership encompasses everyone from angry pre-pubescent boys to confused retirees who are still trying to figure out where the internet keeps its porn, we figured that somewhere in there we’ve got to have some readers who are aspiring UFC fighters. To help these special members of the Potato Nation achieve their dreams, we’d like to offer some tips for a successful TUF audition. You can thank us after you win that six-figure contract and weird cut glass trophy.
1. Have an Interesting Personal Story
If you haven’t noticed by now, reality TV producers are lazy. They don’t want to have to work too hard to figure out the angle on anything, so make it easy for them. Tell them all about your life of hardship and tragedy. Explain that you want to become a UFC fighter because you promised your dying mother you would. Mention the interesting/quirky job you have. Unless you work as a bouncer or bartender. Trust us, they’ve heard that one already. If all else fails, tell them that you think you might be gay. Or an alcoholic. Or a gay alcoholic. They won’t be able to resist putting you in that house.
(And just like that Bonnar's dreams of being a forehead model went up in smoke.)
We’re not exactly sure what the Combat Sports Authority of New South Wales actually did between the time Stephan Bonnar submitted his appeal and the time they ruled to deny it. One would assume that at some point their decision-making process would have led them to actually view a tape of the fight at UFC 110, which is when they would have seen the accidental headbutt from Krzysztof Soszynski that led to the fight-ending cut. Only somehow it didn’t happen that way. Somehow, even after “a review was held,” the officials reported that they “did not seek to interfere with the referee's decision.” Which means that loss is as permanent on Bonnar’s record as the k-shaped scar probably is on his forehead.
As anyone who’s seen the tape knows, this is the wrong decision. The cut was clearly caused by a headbutt and not a punch, as the referee initially ruled. The ref can be forgiven for making that mistake. The action’s moving pretty fast in the Octagon, as perhaps you’ve noticed, and he didn’t have days to sit around looking at the video and thinking it over. The Combat Sports Authority did, and they still decided to do nothing. Why? Probably because doing nothing is usually easier than doing anything at all, and it's a hard habit to break for a regulatory body.
(Props: Inside MMA via TtoMyJ14)
At Shark Fights 2 in December 2008, Shannon Ritch ended John Wood's night in 15 seconds with a technique that pro-wrestling fans will immediately recognize as a "superkick." Apparently it works in real life, too. This was the last in a four-fight win streak that Shannon had going in 2008, and if you know anything about The Cannon's career, you know what a big deal that is. Fun fact: Ritch's last 26 fights have ended in the first round; he won 10 of those fights.
After the jump: An early highlight from Jens Pulver's vast body of work that you probably haven't seen before.
(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)
The welterweight title fight between Georges St. Pierre and Dan Hardy headlines this month's UFC 111 card (March 27th, Newark), and both fighters will be featured in a new three-part weekly UFC Primetime special which kicks off tonight at 10 p.m. ET/PT on Spike. The UFC hasn't put together a Primetime show since January 2009, when BJ Penn vowed to go "to the death." Hardy probably won't get that dramatic with his trash-talk, but he will be landing his shots:
Primetime gives viewers a behind-the-scenes look at the fighters' training camps — from Hardy's Rough House team in Nottingham to St. Pierre's home base in Montreal — as well as their personal lives. To promote it, the UFC's YouTube account has posted a very short clip of GSP jumping over a bar. Hmm. Well, I wasn't planning on spending $45 to watch Georges beat the crap out of a +500 underdog, but now? Now you've got my attention.
(Can you believe he had no professional training before this fight? Amazing.)
The more the subject gets discussed, the more it seems that the only people who really want to see Jose Canseco fight Herschel Walker in Strikeforce are Jose Canseco and the boys down at Cesar Gracie’s gym. These are the jokers who encouraged Canseco in the first place by inviting him down to train, and now one of them has gone and created a website designed specifically to push the fight (thanks to Cagewriter for the link). The site features a petition that’s aiming for 50,000 signatures (as of the time of this writing, they have a total of 49), and a home page that insists Canseco-Walker will not a be a “joke” of a fight. And what’s their reasoning behind this statement, you ask? There really isn’t any, aside from a list of prominent fighters who "Team Gracie Fighter" has trained thus far, implying that they can turn almost anybody into a legit fighter.
But where this website really goes wrong is by including a poll in the sidebar. By giving visitors the option to vote against the proposed bout that is the raison d'être for the entire website, they’ve opened the door for disaster. Currently, 55% of voters have answered “NO WAY!!” to the question “Do you want to see Jose Canseco fight Herschel Walker?”
You know what that’s called? That’s called democracy in action. The people have spoken.
Few people love the old ‘bad blood’ storyline in MMA more than we do. Truth be told, if it wasn't for intense hatred, we'd hardly ever feel any emotions at all. But there’s a point when the blood just gets too bad, and the fight at last weekend’s Action Fight League “Rock n Rumble 2” event between Ariel Gandulla and Mike Bernhard is a prime example of why we need to maintain some semblance of civility in organized combat. As the announcers let us know at the start of the video, these two have a history together. They used to train at the same school, but a dispute over money has since driven a wedge between them, and now they’re trying to hurt each other for real.
You know the fight's going to be a mess, because it doesn’t even make it through the first thirty seconds before someone takes a shot to the pills. In all fairness, the knee from Bernhard in the clinch seems like it was probably unintentional, or at least it does if you aren’t Gandulla. A few minutes later Gandulla finds himself stuck in side control, and his response is to just go ahead and put his fingers in Bernhard’s eyes. Not a good idea, because Troy Waugh is all over that stuff. He pauses the action, takes a point from Gandulla, and now we’re even. Now we can have ourselves a nice, orderly brawl, right?
If only we could be so lucky. Gandulla hits Bernhard with a shot to groin of his own after the restart, and then things really get ugly. See what we mean after the jump. Trust us, you're going to want to see this.