Anything MMA, except thumb wrestling

[StillUnknown]

Rampage moving to heavyweight. Hmm....one time special attraction?

he's fighting Lil Nog

[NoCalMike]

Oops.....yep.

[Chachie]

he's fighting Lil Nog

I think Jackson should retire. He looked truly uninspired vs Rashad Evans. Aside from his puncher's chance (which admittedly is huge) he doesn't have the heart to play chess for 3 rounds anymore. Forget about 5.

(I also think the Wolfs Lair has crippled his game.)

[Sebowski]

http://mmajunkie.com/news/19762/quinton-jackson-vs-antonio-rogerio-nogueira-targeted-ufc-119-or-ufc-120-likely.mma

i would rather see him fight Machida

I'd rather see Rampage-Thiago Slva, but Lil Nog will be great. Better than a Machida fight, imo.

[Sebowski]

this event will really tell how big of a ppv draw lesnar is. this is truly a card where everyone is paying for one fight

He is a big draw. I've had friends texting me this week that haven't come over for a ppv in a long time asking me if I still get the fights.

I know I am pumped for it.

Lesnar by GnP

[Sebowski]

Sherdog has lost it's freaking mind! Fedor loses one fight and he's not even in the top 10 but Rashad Evans and Jake Shields are? Seriously? They've lost all respect in my book. They must be on the UFC's payroll. Not to mention the fact he didn't get KNTO like Rashad, beat as soundly as Penn, Machida and Fitch.

[lovetoaster]

(I also think the Wolfs Lair has crippled his game.)

I do too. Rampage used to have a great wrestling game and great takedown defense. These are two things that Wolfslair fighters do not do particularly well. It is not as prevalent in the lighter weight classes, but as a LHW or HW, you better stress these things, and it does not seem like Rampage does anymore.

[NoCalMike]

It could just be because it was just soundbytes and not the entire conference, but listen to the pre-fight press conference on youtube.

Almost sounds like Brock is lining up a reason/excuse for losing a fight that hasn't taken place yet.

And of course Dana has to get in his shot about this being for the "Best heavyweight in the world" nonsense. "I don't care who is overhyping who" riiiight, Dana cause you neeeever been known to overhype fighters.

[#98QBKiller]

I do too. Rampage used to have a great wrestling game and great takedown defense. These are two things that Wolfslair fighters do not do particularly well. It is not as prevalent in the lighter weight classes, but as a LHW or HW, you better stress these things, and it does not seem like Rampage does anymore.

I wish he'd start training again with Juanito Ibarra, that's when he looked his best. I think a different camp could revive his career again. Either way, I like the Lil Nog fight, I'll be pulling for Rampage.

[StillUnknown]

I wish he'd start training again with Juanito Ibarra, that's when he looked his best. I think a different camp could revive his career again. Either way, I like the Lil Nog fight, I'll be pulling for Rampage.

i think Rampage himself is the reason he's never really moved to a top flight camp. he's stated several times, he does not really like to train, by going to these lesser known camps, he can pretty much dictate his entire training schedule.

he has as many physical gifts as any fighter at 205, but he's always been lazy

on a sidenote, Spike TV will be airing the weigh-ins at 7pm(est)

Edited July 2, 2010 by StillUnknown

[#98QBKiller]

I agree with that. I remember reading an old quote from him where he basically said that when he started out, his training just consisted of hitting heavy bags and lifting weights. He said he hated jiu jitsu and relied on his strength and wrestling to muscle his way out of grappling situations.

There's not a lot of guys that could train like that and be successful, even back then. He basically did what Tank Abbott does to this day. Imagine where he could be if he had a crazy work ethic.

[Tweedr01]

I'm really torn between Brock and Carwin. I like Carwin because the guy is just a humble, hard worker, and likes to fight. Brock is the only fighter, scratch that, the only person in sports who I've really liked that has ****y mouth (besides D. Green). I don't really care who wins, I just wanna see a hard hitting fight.

[Chachie]

It could just be because it was just soundbytes and not the entire conference, but listen to the pre-fight press conference on youtube.

Link?

[NoCalMike]

I agree with that. I remember reading an old quote from him where he basically said that when he started out, his training just consisted of hitting heavy bags and lifting weights. He said he hated jiu jitsu and relied on his strength and wrestling to muscle his way out of grappling situations.

There's not a lot of guys that could train like that and be successful, even back then. He basically did what Tank Abbott does to this day. Imagine where he could be if he had a crazy work ethic.

So Rampage is basically the Lennox Lewis of MMA, except since there is actual top level competition in MMA, you can't get by purely on your physical gifts.

Lennox Lewis was known as hating training, and having a hard time getting "up" for fights, and basically won a lot of fights simply because he was taller and had such a large reach on every opponent. Well that and the fact he reigned over one of the weakest HW divisions of all time.

[lovetoaster]

It could just be because it was just soundbytes and not the entire conference, but listen to the pre-fight press conference on youtube.

Almost sounds like Brock is lining up a reason/excuse for losing a fight that hasn't taken place yet.

I don't really think so, although I can see how it could be taken that way. I watched the presser and he did say things like "I am just happy to be here" a few times. But I don't think it was to line up an excuse, I think it was sincere and he was a lot more light-hearted than he has been in the past. He has been through a lot in the last year, but I don't think he is the kind of guy to set up an excuse.

[NoCalMike]

Is anyone else kind of worried that the overall card is not strong enough to support a Main Event that has the potential to be over in 30 seconds?

I mean the countdown show itself only talked about the top two fights, one in which Leben is subbing in for Wandy. I mean Leben in a co-main event? Under the circumstances, fine.

Oh and because the WORLD WANTS TO KNOW....

Arianny Celeste is picking Lesnar by KO.....lol.

Poll on UFC right now has it 51-49 Carwin right now, and each potential scenario has a UFC 2010 highlight made for it, lol.

One of the things fans of combat-sports have to accept is that you can end up spending a lot of money to see a very short fight, which is fine, but usually UFC will try to make the card strong enough so that just in case that does happen, we still feel we got our money's worth. I look up and down this card and I am like....Please Main Event, go to the 2nd Rnd at least!

[StillUnknown]

Is anyone else kind of worried that the overall card is not strong enough to support a Main Event that has the potential to be over in 30 seconds?

I mean the countdown show itself only talked about the top two fights, one in which Leben is subbing in for Wandy. I mean Leben in a co-main event? Under the circumstances, fine.

Oh and because the WORLD WANTS TO KNOW....

Arianny Celeste is picking Lesnar by KO.....lol.

Poll on UFC right now has it 51-49 Carwin right now, and each potential scenario has a UFC 2010 highlight made for it, lol.

One of the things fans of combat-sports have to accept is that you can end up spending a lot of money to see a very short fight, which is fine, but usually UFC will try to make the card strong enough so that just in case that does happen, we still feel we got our money's worth. I look up and down this card and I am like....Please Main Event, go to the 2nd Rnd at least!

i think Dana is banking on the undercard delivering some good fights despite the lack of name fighters.

Sotiropoulis/Pellegrino is the only match that intrigues me beyond the main event. Stephan Bonnar is only still employed by the UFC because dana wont cut him because of his fight with Forrest. the fact that he is on the main card says alot about how weak the card is. it cannot be stated enough, he lost to the zombiefied version of Mark Coleman

Edited July 2, 2010 by StillUnknown

[#98QBKiller]

Good article on the whole Fedor debate:

http://www.mmafighting.com/2010/07/02/dana-white-fedor-emelianenko-and-mmas-revisionist-history/

Dana White, Fedor Emelianenko, and MMA's Revisionist History

By Ben Fowlkes

It must be nice to have a memory as pleasantly selective as Dana White's. It's always there when he needs it, and it never fails to leave him feeling like the smartest guy in the room.

Take the recent upset loss that knocked Fedor Emelianenko from the top spot in the heavyweight division. To hear White tell it, he alone saw through the outsized fiction of Fedor, so it doesn't surprise him to see the Russian fall.

"I've been saying that forever, but the media overhyped this mythological creature that they thought was the number one pound-for-pound fighter in the world, which is just so...it's so asinine and ridiculous," he told MMA Fighting's Ariel Helwani in this video interview.

White went on to claim that he "never believed" in Fedor, which seems odd considering all the time and effort the UFC president spent trying to sign him to a UFC contract. It wasn't so long ago that he referred to his attempts to acquire Emelianenko as an "obsession."

That was apparently all a clever ruse, because now White would have us believe that he knew this Fedor guy was a phony all along. And how did he spot this paper tiger when the rest of us were duped? Simple: the lack of quality competition on Fedor's record.

"My thing with him was, the best fighters in the world are the guys that fight the best three times a year," White told Helwani. "Those are the guys that deserve your praise and deserve to be talked about. This guy won't even fight the best guys in the world one time a year. So to give him this praise...I'm telling you right now, 90% is because, oh, he's not in the UFC..."

This is White's go-to move when it comes time to talk Fedor. He insists that Fedor isn't deserving of our respect because he doesn't fight the best. Of course, if you asked White to tell you who the best are, it's a pretty good bet that you'd get a list of UFC fighters. That's how it works when you're a fight promoter: the guys you can profit from are the only guys who matter.

Of course, when those guys move on, as Andrei Arlovski did, exiting the UFC on a three-fight winning streak, then they become total nonentities.

Apparently it doesn't even matter that Arlovski added knockout victories over Ben Rothwell and Roy Nelson – the latter of whom is one win away from a UFC heavyweight title shot, according to White – before taking on Emelianenko. The mere fact that he was no longer a UFC fighter at the time seems to have made him worthless as an opponent by the time Emelianenko starched him in the first round.

It also doesn't seem to matter that Fedor was slated to take on Josh Barnett – then a top-five heavyweight – before Barnett's steroid debacle derailed the fight. Nor does it matter that not so long ago Emelianenko was aiming for a fight with Randy Couture – then the UFC heavyweight champ – before White and his team of lawyers put the kibosh on it.

Nope, all that matters is that Fedor won't fight the best. Though since the best are confined exclusively to the UFC, at least in White's mind, that's a little like criticizing Georges St. Pierre for fighting Dan Hardy instead of Jake Shields or Nick Diaz.

That's not to say that Emelianenko is beyond reproach. His record does feature such MMA punchlines as Hong Man Choi and Zuluzinho, with middleweight Matt Lindland sandwiched in there for good measure. And yes, his M-1 Global management team has at times seemed like a barrier between Fedor and the dream fights that fans want to see. There's no denying any of that.

At the same time, one surprising loss doesn't cancel out everything else he's accomplished in the sport. He beat Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic back when the Croatian (whose abilities White claims to respect now) was in his prime. He beat Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira twice. Doing so once, and against a declining version of the old "Minotauro," was enough to earn Cain Velasquez an impending title shot in the UFC.

And then there's Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin, who have about half as many fights between the two of them as Emelianenko does in his storied career. Neither of them have faced the kind of steady diet of high-quality competition that Emelianenko did in his Pride days. At least not yet.

That's not a knock on them. They have, after all, faced the best available to them in the time available to them. But, with the possible exception of the Alistair Overeem bout, which still has yet to materialize, didn't Fedor do the same? Didn't he beat everyone he could possibly get in the ring with, and didn't he at least make an honest effort at getting in the ring with a few others?

The truth is that White is simply following the fight promoter's handbook when he disparages Fedor's claim to greatness. If Lesnar, in some alternate universe reality, were to abandon the UFC right now in favor of Strikeforce, White would immediately turn around and denigrate his accomplishments as a mere 4-1 novice who got half his wins against the likes of Heath Herring and Min Soo Kim.

That's how the game is played when you're in White's shoes. There's no harm in him playing it now, and certainly Fedor's recent loss makes it momentarily easier. But the rest of us would do well to take a step back and remember that there's a reason White has such strong opinions about Emelianenko to begin with, and it's not because he's a nobody who never really mattered to begin with.

[#98QBKiller]

Also an interview with Randy about the Toney fight:

GbI7m_PyrF8

[ZoEd]

Sebowski, he made Penn look amateurish. A p4p guy like Penn is touted to be should have found a way to get his hands around his opponents neck, at least once. He was out hustled, out fought and outscored. Penn was beat, fair and square. It's not like he got over zealous and fell into a world class BJJ's guard, consequently getting tapped out. He got beat by a smaller, guy who outclassed him with speed.

[Chachie]

Sebowski, he made Penn look amateurish. A p4p guy like Penn is touted to be should have found a way to get his hands around his opponents neck, at least once. He was out hustled, out fought and outscored. Penn was beat, fair and square. It's not like he got over zealous and fell into a world class BJJ's guard, consequently getting tapped out. He got beat by a smaller, guy who outclassed him with speed.

He got beat, I'll concede that. He was never hurt, never in danger of being submitted or KOed. I was the only person on this board who gave Edgar props before the fight, telling all these guys not to sleep on Edgar so I'm not just blindly defending BJ due to my man crush. I knew Frankie had it in him. (You are free to check the posts in this thread in the days leading up to the event if you like- I was really pushing Edgar's prowess on these guys, who didn't want to listen.) However, he didn't "soundly" handle BJ Penn. He did enough to win without controversy.

BJ's excuses included the Abu Dhabi atmosphere, flying from Hawaii to Saudi Arabia (no easy trip), and some sort of illness. None of these are accepted by me or anyone else but I'm willing to bet on a very different outcome in the rematch.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Chachie

[d0ublestr0ker0ll]

He made Penn look amateurish? Really? An Amateur level fighter...

Frankie was so sharp and looked almost flawless in that fight. He would have embarrassed and destroyed any amateur fighter that night.

Edited July 2, 2010 by d0ublestr0ker0ll

[Chachie]

He made Penn look amateurish? Really? An Amateur level fighter...

Frankie was so sharp and looked almost flawless in that fight. He would have embarrassed and destroyed any amateur fighter that night.

Exactly. As I recall BJ landed sweetly when he threw with conviction. He just didn't seem motivated to make things happen though, which is to Frankie's credit for staying mobile. I suspect BJ didn't just think the judges would rule against him as long as he kept it close. He mailed it in for the first 2 rounds and couldn't figure out how to catch up after that. Typical BJ Penn performance when he doesn't take his opponent seriously or have an angry agenda.

[#98QBKiller]

so I'm not just blindly defending BJ due to my man crush.

Chach loves his bad boys.

[Chachie]

Chach loves his bad boys.

Dammit, 98!

Well I hate bad boy Brock Lesnar.