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

One of the fast rising prospects in the division, Ryan Bader (11-0) talked about his UFC 119 co-headlining bout against Antonio Rogerio Nogueira (19-3). The two-time Division 1 wrestler says he's confident that his wrestling can neutralize Lil Nog's jiujitsu:

I do feel confident standing with Nog. He has great boxing, and great counter punches. The thing is, this is MMA and with 4 oz gloves on anything can happen. I feel that I hit very hard and have a good chin, so who knows a KO could happen.

He is very good on the ground and I am very good at my wrestling game. I have fought many black belts in my career and train with even more. I have to be smart when I’m on the canvas with Rogerio. He is very slick but I believe my wrestling can neutralize his Jiu Jitsu.

Bader also goes on to say that the Lil Nog's controversial victory against Jason Brilz did show some holes in his game:

I plan on finishing this fight any way I can; whether that is a KO or a TKO from ground & pound. Rogerio is an extremely hard fighter to finish but I am going to go in there and try to do just that... I am going to prepare to fight the best Nogueira that has ever fought. The Brilz fight did show me some holes in Nogueira’s game and some things to consider but I am going to try and go out and fight my fight.

After the jump, Ryan "Darth" Bader talks about the origin of his nickname.

Aaron Simpson was calling me "Darth" in college when he was a coach on ASU's wrestling team. After college I went to Arizona Combat Sports and they started calling me "Darth" without any previous knowledge so it just stuck with me. It is better than "Master Bader" so I will take Darth.

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The smallest state in the country legalized mixed martial arts last October, and almost one year later, Rhode Island is getting its first sanctioned, professional MMA event.

Promoter Jimmy Burchfield's Classic Entertainment and Sports announced the addition of several participants to September 17's "First Blood" at a press conference in Providence today, including unbeaten Olympic judo convert Rick Hawn (8-0). The Sityodtong-trained welterweight notched the biggest win of his career on July 31 when he TKO'd 80-fight veteran Shonie Carter in New Hampshire.

Hawn will face an opponent to be announced, as will 20-year-old lightweight prospect Saul Almeida (7-0), who won Bellator's open tryout in Boston last year and just returned from two months of training with Anderson Silva's Black House team in California.

Headlining the show - which takes place at the Twin River Casino in Lincoln, RI - is Rhode Island's own 155-pound WEC vet Mike Campbell (8-2), who meets Brazilian transplant Magno Almeida (6-0).

Read the full press release after the jump.

R.I. MMA fans to taste ‘First Blood’ in historic show
Campbell-Almeida headline inaugural R.I. MMA show Sept. 17 at Twin River Event Center, RI
 
PROVIDENCE (Aug. 31, 2010) – History will be made Friday night, Sept. 17 when "First Blood"  becomes the first sanctioned, professional Mixed Martial Arts show ever held in Rhode Island.
 
"First Blood," presented by Jimmy Burchfield’s Classic Entertainment and Sports, Inc., (CES) will be held at the Twin River Event Center in Lincoln, RI. All fights feature three, 5-minute rounds.
 
The main event pits arguably New England’s hottest prospect, Providence lightweight Mike "The Beast" Campbell (8-2-0), against undefeated Magno Almeida (6-0), of Wakefield (MA). In an exciting match-up of contrasting styles, Campbell has five knockouts, while five of Almeida’s six opponents have tapped-put.
 
In the co-feature, Bridgewater (MA) heavyweight Lee Beane (7-1-0) takes on Parker Porter (3-1-0), while Wakefield (MA) welterweight Rick Hawn (8-0-0) faces an opponent to be determined.
 
"Fighting is fighting and we know what fans want – fast action, entertainment and competitive matches," CES president Jimmy Burchfield said. "We’re taking the same grassroots promoting and marketing plan we’ve used so successfully for many years in boxing and taking it into MMA. I’ve been studying MMA for nearly three years in order to learn how to build the best team possible. Boxing plays a big part in MMA. Some athletic boxers want to try MMA, some powerful-punching strikers want to box. CES is now in the unique position to offer boxers and MMA fighters opportunities to cross over.
 
"Our goal is to develop MMA fighters and help bring them to the top of the mountain – UFC. We have a good relationship with UFC Vice President of Regulatory Affairs, Mark Ratner, from when he was Executive Director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission. We believe our first show has the potential to be the best show ever in New England in terms of showcasing New England talent. We will have some of the best in action on ‘First Blood.’ We’re thrilled to be having this great show at our home base in beautiful Twin River."
 
Also scheduled to fight on "First Blood" are Cranston’s (RI) Luis "Rock Star" Felix (4-5-0) vs. Joe Dechaves (3-2-0); Woonsocket’s pro-debuting lightweight Justin Switzer vs. Cranston’s Eric Fams; Maine welterweight Glenn Reaves vs. pro-debuting Bill Burley;  Whitman (MA) featherweight John Campbell in his pro debut vs. Kurt Calash, of Middleton (CT); and Somerville (MA) lightweight Jimmy "Jimbo Slice" Davidson in his first fight vs. John Sienna (0-1-1).
 
Also on the card against opponents to be determined are undefeated Framingham (MA) light heavyweight Saul "The Spider" Almeida (7-0-0), Ludlow (MA) lightweight Alexandre "Vaca" Moreno (10-2-0), East Greenwich (RI) and Rhode Island MMA pioneer Mat Santos, along with welterweights Lionel Young (2-4-0), Antwann Penn and Mark Skeltcher. All fights and fighters are subject to change.
 
Tickets for "First Blood," priced at $50.00, $75.00, $125.00, $150.00 and $200.00 (front row) are available to purchase by calling CES (401.724.2253/2254), going online at www.cesboxing.com or www.twinriver.com, at Twin River’s Players Club booth at Twin River, or any TicketMaster location.
 
Contact CES (401.724.2253/2254/www.cesboxing.com) or the Twin River Event Center (877.82.RIVER/ www.twinriver.com) for more information. Doors open at 6:00PM/ET, first bout at 7:30 PM/ET.
 
(Twin River has waived its 18+ rule for "First Blood." Anybody under the age of 18 must be accompanied at all times by an adult and they must enter through the West entrance.)

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I voted for the guy who offered to make her meatballs. The wheelchair Casanova was a close second.

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(Could this be DREAM's swan song?)

For months Fight Entertainment Group (FEG) executives have denied persistent rumors that the Japanese combat sport promotion firm is in trouble. Now one employee who works stateside has finally admitted that there is a crack forming in the facade perpetuated by DREAM and K-1 officials.

Mike Kogan, FEG's U.S. representative today told MMAJunkie that the company is holding its breath while it waits for the results of an audit being done by potential investor, PUJI Capital, which will determine if the organization will receive the funding necessary to resume operations.

According to Kogan, the Japanese investment bank is attempting to raise $230 million for the cash-strapped company, that has been accused of owing hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid fight purses spanning more than three years worth of events.

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"I approached the man and said, "You don't do that. You don't hit a woman." The video doesn't show what happened next, but he said, "F--- you. I'll knock any b---- out I want." The tape also doesn't show that he swung at me two or three times right after that. All you see is me bouncing up and down. He has already swung at me at that point. Then the guy takes off running. I chased him down and you saw what else happened... I can't talk about what exactly happened because it's a legal metter... If the same thing occurred, I would do it all over again. I have no regrets."

Roger Huerta talking to TMZ Live about his Austin, Texas street fight. Transcribed by MMA Mania.

More Bloody Elbow coverage of the Roger Huerta street fight:

• Roger Huerta engages in a street fight in Austin, Texas
• MMA Community: Pro Roger Huerta, Pro Street Justice
•  Will Roger Huerta Get Jail Time or Sued for Street Fight? Did TMZ Libel Roger Huerta?
•  Quote of the Day: Roger Huerta, "I Got the Better of Him"
• Austin TX TV News Coverage of Roger Huerta Fight With 911 Calls, Police Comment 
• Did Roger Huerta Flatten Former University of Texas Longhorn and Atlanta Falcon Rashad Bobino?

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Oh, if only…

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Nate Diaz established a strong foothold in the UFC welterweight division this past Saturday when he submitted Marcus Davis at UFC 118.

It was Diaz's second victory at 170 pounds after serving most of his six-year career in the lightweight class.

And though Diaz wants to avenge his losses there, trainer and manager Cesar Gracie thinks he should stay at welterweight - at least for the time being.

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(Word Life? Nevermind. Cena is brilliant. He can communicate without the use of verbs, adjectives or pronouns.)

Before all the Pro Wrestling fanatics jump all over me for the title of this post, read the quote below, then take a deep breath and think about things in perspective.

Cena, who is a native of Newbury, Massachusetts, was asked about what he thought about the UFC coming to Boston last weekend, likely by an oblivious reporter ,who, like many mainstream scribes, think that MMA and WWE are just variations of the same acronym. Why else would you ask a wrestler to talk about a sport that has as much to do with his profession as hunting does to being a butcher? 

Here's Cena's well thought out reply which likely earned him a bonus from Vince McMahon:

"It's just not something that particularly interests me," Cena told The Boston Globe ahead of UFC 118. "UFC is where boxing was years ago, and I was never really into boxing, either."

In town for last night's WWE "Monday Night Raw" at the TD Garden, Cena said he prefers professional wrestling because it's "regulated entertainment that's safe for anyone to enjoy." And UFC? "It is what it is," he said. "It can be pretty over the top, and it's not something I'd want my children to watch."

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Who’s down for a good ol twitter catfight? Because yesterday Tito Ortiz’s wife (also known as Jenna Jameson) and Frank Mir’s wife (also known as … Frank Mir’s wife) got into a doozy of a twatting match. Here’s how it all started:

Mrs_Mir: does Jenna really talk mma……she should stick to porn well I guess it is kind of grappling lol

JennaJameson: @Mrs_Mir @Leharts you should stick to sucking your fat ass husbands cock…. Oh, and hit the treadmill yourself

Mrs_Mir: your just mad because his cock is the only one you can’t suck….oh yeah and my husband is the MAIN event

From there it goes on and on for a while with the peanut gallery chiming in and lots of the good stuff getting deleted. But really, can it really top Jenna telling Mir’s wife to ‘go suck fat cocks’ and Mir’s wife saying ‘I can’t because you’ve already sucked them all’? Y’all can pretend you don’t care and the trivial affairs of MMA wags don’t concern you, but I love it when they talk about penises.

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The UFC has been talking about China for several months now, and after UFC 118 they wheeled out the exec they hope will put everything together and make the country work for them:

The fight organizer and promoter for the form of sports-combat called mixed martial arts announced that it would be setting up a foothold in Asia. The company didn’t specify where it would set up shop, but its new chief in Asia is Mark Fischer, a former exec with the National Basketball Association Inc., who lives in Beijing.

To manage UFC’s Asian business, the fight group owned by Las Vegas-based Zuffa LLC is turning to Fischer with the hope that some of his magic touch in marketing the NBA can rub off on their fledgling Asian franchise.

Basketball has been one of the few American sports imports to become a winner in China.

Under Fischer’s direction from 2003 to 2008, the NBA managed to ink more than 20 marketing partnerships with leading brands in the country. Tsingtao, for instance, is now the official beer of the NBA in China. The NBA has actually set up a separate corporate entity for its China operations, which was valued at $2.3 billion when it was set up in 2008.

They certainly picked the right guy. Not only was Fischer a key guy in making basketball float while other sports like the NFL flopped, he also looks more like Uncle Fester than Dana White, which means we can spread the Zuffa brass nicknames around.

So what’s next for UFC China? I’ll give you three guesses and the first two don’t count. Did you guess TUF? Congratulations! You don’t have brain damage.

“What we’re starting to do now is we’re working on ways to get the “Ultimate Fighter” in other countries. We’re going to start getting the “Ultimate Fighter” in each of these different countries, and try to figure out, when we have the finales, the finales will be different countries coming together and everybody fights,” White confirmed.

“Once we get this rolling and we get the “Ultimate Fighter” in all these different countries, technology is our friend, there’s more ways to watch this stuff. So people will be able to watch the “Ultimate Fighter” from these different countries too, online or however, but that’s our long term goal.”

Sounds good … for some reason I don’t think new markets would have flocked to see their locals suffer never-ending ass-whumpings by random American homeboys, so keeping them in a separate pocket dimension where they can fight against other newb countries for national pride sounds smart. It’s never good to let those less developed countries know how shitty they are. Next thing you know, they’ll be all like “What, you aren’t covered in flies?” and “Your bread isn’t made of 30% dirt?”

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The first tournament matchup has emerged from Shine Fights' fan-driven matchmaking.

Organization officials today announced UFC veteran Drew Fickett will meet the always-entertaining Charles "Krazy Horse" Bennett in an opening-round matchup of Shine Fights' single-night eight-man lightweight tournament.

Officials also announced that an injured Josh Shockley has been scratched from the field and that a replacement will be announced soon.

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Roger Huerta discusses what went down on TMZ Live after he saw Rashad Bobino coldcock a helpless woman in the streets of Ausitn, Texas:

"I approached the man and said, "You don't do that. You don't hit a woman." The video doesn't show what happened next, but he said, "F--- you. I'll knock any b---- out I want." The tape also doesn't show that he swung at me two or three times right after that. All you see is me bouncing up and down. He has already swung at me at that point. Then the guy takes off running. I chased him down and you saw what else happened... I can't talk about what exactly happened because it's a legal metter... If the same thing occurred, I would do it all over again. I have no regrets."

Earlier this month, former UFC lightweight and current Bellator fighter Roger Huerta reached a whole new level of stardom thanks to a video of him stomping out a wannabe tough guy who inexplicably sucker punched a woman outside of an Austin, Texas bar. The story has been well documented, and while it earned "El Matador" heaps of respect from just about every person on the planet, it also potentially brought upon some unwanted legal issues. Huerta returned to the scene of the crime, not Austin, but TMZ, to talk about the famed incident. He says he has no regrets. Should he? 

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(Props: youtube.com/shosports)

It's not quite Nick Diaz vs. Jason Miller, but Strikeforce is going to do its very best to convince you that Nick Diaz vs. KJ Noons — who's fighting for the title in his Strikeforce welterweight debut! — is the grudge match you've been begging for. And how do they plan on accomplishing that? By staying on message. As you'll see, the famous phrase "Don't be scared, homey" pops up twice in this one-minute hype clip for Strikeforce's next event at San Jose's HP Pavilion on October 9th. Which begs the question: If "DBS,H" is the theme of the night, why not hold the event in Stockton? What, too real for you guys? Violent crime rate too high? Pussies.

At this point, only two other fights have been booked for the Showtime broadcast of Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Noons II. After earning her employers' respect with a slam-knockout of Roxanne Modafferi at the last Challengers card, 135-pound champion Sarah Kaufman will make her next title defense against Marloes Coenen, who was sacrificed to Cris Cyborg earlier this year at Strikeforce: Miami. Also, Matt Lindland will follow up his TKO win over Kevin Casey with a bout against hot middleweight prospect Luke Rockhold (7-1), who has ended all six of his Strikeforce appearances by first-round stoppage, including wins over Jesse Taylor and Cory Devela. Christ, good luck Matt.

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There hasn’t been a lot of UFC Fan Expo information floating around since the weekend, which I’m generally okay with since I’m still bitter about not being there. But if you want to get a feel for all the fun everyone else was having, this video by TheGarv’s Kahl-One does a pretty good job of capturing it. Plus: some highlights from the grappling superfights. Plus: awesome Portishead soundtrack.

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While the number of pay-per-view buys that the main card for UFC 118: "Edgar vs. Penn 2" did is still unknown at this time, the rating for the prelims special that aired live on Spike TV and featured bouts between Andre Winner and Nik Lentz as well as Joe Lauzon and Gabe Ruediger are in, and they ain't pretty.

A series-low 1.1 million viewers tuned in to the UFC 118 prelims special according to MMA Payout.

As MMA Payout asserts, trying to determine the reasons for a successful "Prelims Live" broadcast really does seem to be a bit of a fool's mission. 

UFC 109's prelims broadcast garnered a series-high 1.7 million viewers back in February, but the buyrate for the PPV telecast was right around 300,000. UFC 116 on the other hand, featured prelims that aired on Spike TV and drew 1.3 million viewers. Reports of the Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin headlined event PPV buryrate also came in right around 1.3 million.

So the strength or weakness of the actual PPV card seems to have nothing to do with the prelims success, or lack thereof.

As for the strength of the prelims broadcast when it comes to the actual match ups on the card, well, it's tough to come to a conclusion where that has any relevancy as well.

The aforementioned UFC 109 prelims show featured bouts between Melvin Guillard and Ronnys Torres along with Mac Danzig and Justin Buchholz. Not exactly the strongest prelims lineup there has been.

UFC 111's prelims broadcast meanwhile saw Ricardo Almeida battle Matt Brown as well as Nate Diaz take on Rory Markham. An equal to, or greater than pair of fights in terms of interest in my opinion, though the show only drew 1.2 million viewers.

Your guess is as good as mine, Maniacs. Anybody have a theory, with facts to back it up, as to why the ratings for the "UFC Prelims Live" broadcasts on Spike TV appear to be so unpredictably up and down?

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