Cage Talk – MMA – All The Latest Mixed Martial Arts News

Filed under: News, Japan

DEEP has announced five more fights for their 10th Anniversary DEEP 50th Impact event, confirming some of the bouts leaked by ticketing service E-Plus,

Ryo Chonan vs Jung Hwan Cha, Hidetaka Monma vs Yoshihisa Yamamoto, Ryuta Noji vs Hiroshi Nagao, Isao Terada vs Yoshiki Harada and Shoji Maruyama vs Tatsunao Nagakura have all be added to the mega-card with the only change from the leak being Jung Hwan Cha stepping in for the Bellator bound Yoshiyuki Yoshida. Chonan will get a shot at revenge after he suffered a shock KO loss to Cha at Astra back in April.

Shinya Aoki, Ikuhisa Minowa, Kazuo Misaki, Won Sik “Parky” Park, Akira Shoji, Daiki “DJ Taiki” Hata and Kazunori Yokota are among the names that were originally leaked as participants by E-Plus but have not yet been made official.

The full announced and rumored cards after the break.

News

Filed under: K1, News, Japan

K-1 President Sadaharu Tanigawa today revealed two fights for the K-1 World GP FINAL 16 to be held on October 2 in Seoul, South Korea.

Strikeforce Heavyweight Champion Alistair Overeem will face Ben Edwards who tore through this year's Oceania GP, scoring three first round KO's and Jerome Le Banner, who recently claimed the WPMF Muaythai Super Heavyweight World title will take on current K-1 Heavyweight Champion Keijiro "Kyotaro" Maeda.

Bouts for the K-1 MAX Final 16, which is to be held the following day also in Seoul are to be announced this weekend and more Super-Heavyweight GP bouts are to be announced next Tuesday.

Tanigawa was this week quoted as saying that the much needed financial partnership with Chinese investment bank PUJI has been pushed forward to begin at the end of September and so PUJI money will be supporting the Korean Final 16 events.

News Ben+Edwards

Filed under: MMA Videos, Strikeforce, FanHouse Exclusive, Videos

Most combat sports fans know Mauro Ranallo as the former voice of PRIDE FC and/or the current voice of MMA on Showtime and CBS.

But did you know that the Canadian-born Ranallo began broadcasting at just 16 years old or that he was in a hospital battling depression two weeks before his PRIDE debut?

In the latest installment of our Backstage series, we sat down with Ranallo hours before August's Strikeforce: Houston event to discuss the trials and tribulations he's experienced over the past decade and the many highlights, as well as a few lowlights, he's endured throughout his career.

Check out the two-part series below.

News backstage, mauro ranallo

Filed under: News

It will have to change course and move halfway across the country to do it, but Shine Fights’ lightweight tournament will go on as scheduled.

On Saturday, MMA Fighting was first to report the news that the promotion had been denied a license in Virginia for its Sept. 10 lightweight grand prix at the Patriot Center in Fairfax and would be moving the event to Oklahoma.

On Monday, Shine Fights COO Jason Chambers made the move official on his Twitter account. Less than a week before the event, which is scheduled to air on pay-per-view, Shine will move to the First Council Casino in Newkirk, Okla.

News grandprix, jasonchambers, marcusaurelio, Oklahoma, Shine+Fights, tournament, virginia

Filed under: MMA Videos, UFC, WEC, FanHouse Exclusive, Videos

This week's live edition of The MMA Hour features another loaded line-up of guests from around the MMA world:

* Forrest Griffin will stop by to talk about his new book and his road back from shoulder injury.

* Josh Koscheck will discuss his upcoming fight against Georges St-Pierre at UFC 124 and his coaching stint on The Ultimate Fighter.

* WEC lightweight champion Benson Henderson will discuss a potential title fight against Anthony Pettis.

* Manny Gamburyan will weigh-in on his WEC featherweight title fight on Sept. 30 against Jose Aldo.

* Finally, MMA referee Yves Lavigne will stop by to clear the air on last week's Koscheck-GSP interview controversy.

And of course, we'll be taking your calls. Give us a shout at: 212-254-0193 or 212-254-0237.

Download this show and previous episodes of The MMA Hour on iTunes here.

Watch the show below beginning at 1 PM ET.

News Benson Henderson, Forrest Griffin, Josh Koscheck, manny gamburyan, The MMA Hour, UFC 124, Yves Lavigne

Filed under: UFC

I love the fact that Dan Hardy writes a column for his local media outlet, This Is Nottingham. I wish more fighters would sit down at a computer and give us a look inside their mind, though, as Hardy demonstrated with his latest effort, sometimes it doesn't work the way you think it's going to.

The title of today's piece is "Lentz went into hiding for the big fight." It ostensibly deals with Nik Lentz's grappling-centric win over Andre Winner in a slow-paced fight at UFC 118, but a more accurate description of the column might have been: "Too much wrestling in MMA, says guy whose friends keep losing to superior wrestlers."

Hardy's thesis, more or less, is that there are too many wrestlers in the UFC who just want to take opponents down and hold them there, and this is a problem the sport needs to address via rule changes. As Hardy writes in his attempt to preemptively counter the argument that he and many of his fellow Brits simply need to become better wrestlers:

News Andre Winner, Dan Hardy, Kevin Randleman, Nik Lentz, UFC 118

Filed under: MMA Gossip

After failing to get licensed in Virginia, Shine Fights moved Friday night's mixed martial arts card to the First Council Casino in Newkirk, Oklahoma. That casino is on land owned by the Otoe-Missouria Tribe, and therefore the Oklahoma State Athletic Commission has no authority over the event.

But while Joe Miller, director of the Oklahoma State Athletic Commission, can't stop the event, he can speak his mind about it.

News

A low-level mixed martial arts fighter and his former girlfriend were found dead over the Labor Day weekend in what Austin, Texas, police said may have been a murder-suicide.

The bodies of Kenneth Bryan Trevino, 26, and Tiffanie Perry, 23, were found at an apartment Sunday night, according to KXAN-TV. Police told the NBC affiliate that a family member or friend called authorities to warn them that Trevino was suicidal after the breakup of the couple.

News

Filed under: News

After weeks of rumors, Tapout, arguably the most recognizable mixed martial arts apparel brand, has been sold to Authentic Brands Group, the companies announced Monday. The firm also announced it had acquired Silver Star Casting Company, as well as Hitman Fight Gear.

According to its official website, Authentic Brands Group is a "brand development and licensing company" whose goal is "to acquire, manage and build long-term value in prominent consumer brands." Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

News authenticbrandsgroup, charlesmasklewis, dancaldwell, hitmanfightgear, silverstar, tapout, timkatz

Filed under: WEC, News

Alex Karalexis is out of a previously announced fight against Tiequan Zhang at WEC 51 and will be replaced by promotional newcomer Jason Reinhardt.

MMA Fighting learned of the change from sources close to Reinhardt's camp. The lightweight, who trains at the Pat Miletich camp in Bettendorf, Iowa, is 20-1 with just two fights going beyond the first round.

News alexkaralexis, Jason+Reinhardt, Tiequan+Zhang, WEC+51

Filed under: UFC

Forrest Griffin has never missed more than a year of action his entire MMA career, and while that streak will likely end this year, the former champ says he would like to fight once more before the end of it.

"My goal right now is to win a fight before the end of the year," Griffin stated Tuesday to Ariel Helwani on The MMA Hour.

Griffin, who underwent shoulder surgery 14 weeks ago, rated his current shoulder health at "70ish" percent.

News Forrest Griffin, UFC 125, UFC+125

Filed under: UFC

MMA referee Yves Lavigne said he wanted to clear the air regarding some inflammatory quotes attributed to him in a Canoe.com story by Vincent Morin recently, so he put it as plainly as he possibly could.

"I did not give him an interview on or off record," Lavigne told Ariel Helwani during Tuesday's episode of "The MMA Hour." "Those are not my quotes. This is not me. Is that enough?"

Lavigne found himself at the center of the controversy after the story quoted him as saying that UFC welterweight champ Georges St. Pierre will dominate Josh Koscheck in their rematch at UFC 124 in Montreal this December, and that Koscheck was scared to exchange punches with Paul Daley in his last fight in Montreal.

But Lavigne, who's a regular at UFC events and may have likely been slated to work the main event bout in his home province of Quebec, insisted that he never spoke with Morin, nor does he have any idea where the quotes came from.

News Georges St. Pierre, Josh Koscheck, Paul Daley, UFC 124, Yves Lavigne

Filed under: MMA Media Watch

We have a weird weekend in mixed martial arts ahead of us, with two different pay-per-view shows even as the UFC is sitting the weekend out. But if you're a DirecTV subscriber, you have only one fight card available to you: DirecTV is offering Friday night's Shine Fights event, but not Saturday night's Shark Fights show.

DirecTV has decided not to give its customers the chance to purchase the Shark Fights card, which is headlined by Keith Jardine vs. Trevor Prangley. Unsurprisingly, Shark Fights is disappointed.

News

Filed under: UFC, FanHouse Exclusive, News

Stephan Bonnar, the light heavyweight who became an MMA household name after his epic fight with Forrest Griffin on the season finale of the first season of "The Ultimate Fighter," will once again fight on a TUF card.

Sources close to Bonnar's camp confirmed to MMA Fighting on Saturday that he has been offered a fight against Croatian Igor Pokrajac for the TUF 12 finale and has verbally agreed to the bout, though contracts have not yet been signed.

News igorpokrajac, lasvegas, stephanbonnar, theultimatefighter, theultimatefighter12, tuf12, UFC

Filed under: Strikeforce, FanHouse Exclusive

It's just after 6 p.m. in an upscale steakhouse in Houston and already Jason "Mayhem" Miller is yelling at me. Maybe it's not so much at me. More like near me. More like near everyone in the room, and people are starting to notice.

"It's stupid, all these people who are so worried about communism if we get free health care," Miller says, his voice rising far past what most people would consider an indoor volume. "What if the fire department made you go through the same steps as the non-socialist health care system?"

Businessmen in ties glance up from their prime rib dinners at the next table. Any thought they may have had of asking Miller to keep it down vanish when they see the source of the commotion - a rangy, cauliflower-eared 29-year-old with a nose that looks as if it's been broken just for fun on more than one occasion, gesturing spastically as he becomes more agitated.

"Imagine, you call them up and they're like, 'Do you have fire insurance?' And you're saying, 'Uh, my house is burning down right now.' 'Are you PPO or HMO? 'The house is on fire!' 'What's your policy number?' 'Okay, it's, uh, 97JK39W2.' 'What's your group ID?' 'AHHHHHH! MY HOUSE IS GONE!'"

He erupts into his trademark laugh, an almost cartoonishly maniacal cackle that suggests he might be on the verge of either torturing James Bond or simply flipping the table over on a whim. It's the kind of laugh that makes me briefly wonder whether this whole dinner idea, where I would sit down with Miller to learn a little about what makes this enigmatic fighter tick, was really such a brilliant notion.

News Jake Shields, jason mayhem miller, Kazushi Sakuraba, Nick Diaz