On the mend from a nagging eye injury, Michael Bisping tells Bloody Elbow he’d be more than happy to face Nick Diaz should he make the move to middleweight.
“I didn’t really mean any disrespect to him, but I heard a rumor off a couple people that he said that he was interested in fighting me, and I know he was talking about maybe coming up to middleweight. He was also talking about retirement; the guy is pretty crazy so you never know what’s true and what’s not.
A reporter from Fighter’s Only told me he had been talking to one of the members from Nick’s camp, and he had said that a fight with Michael Bisping might interest him (Diaz), so I just tweeted that if he wanted to come up to 185, I’d quite happily welcome him to the division.”
Diaz, who announced a tentative retirement in July following back-to-back losses to Carlos Condit and welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre, recently explained to Fighter’s Only that he’s only interested in marquee matchups at this point. “I don’t mind taking fights if its a big fight that people are going to make a big deal out of,’ said Diaz. “If not then its not really worth it to me.”
Bisping was most recently booked to face Mark Munoz at UFC Fight Night 30 later this month in Manchester, England before an uncooperative detached retina forced UFC president Dana White to pull him from the card. With White saying he ‘loves’ the fight, we could all be treated to one of the all-time build ups between two of the sport’s best trash talkers.
5 MUST-READ STORIES
The pawn. Duke Roufus says Ben Askren is being used in some sort of strange political game between Bellator and the UFC. “I feel like at times [Askren]’s being used as a pawn from one promotion to the other, personally,” Roufus said. “I mean, if [Bellator] doesn’t want him, let him go. I would love to see that fight happen, for sure.
Ratner. UFC Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Marc Ratner defends the 10-point must system but admits it has its issues. “Every once in a while, you’re going to get one [decision] that certainly goes against public opinion, but MMA is harder to judge than boxing, in my opinion, because you have to know what’s going on on the ground.”
Cutting. Dave Metlzer warns that the recent death of a Brazilian fighter is not the first, not likely the last, to be attributed to weight cutting. “Everyone does it because everyone else does it. Some are trying to get an advantage. Others are trying to negate the advantage by of their opponent. It’s an endless chicken-and-egg game, whose effects are all negative, but the game will never stop. So then, when both guys do it, they are both miserable the last week, and getting nothing positive out of it.”
Palhares out of ADCC 2013. According to the Abu Dahbi Combat Club’s Brazilian rep, Rousimar Palhares won’t be taking part in the prestigious grappling tournament this year. “I sent him several messages, but he didn’t respond. They wanted him there, but he didn’t reply any of my messages or calls.”
Green Ranger wants some. Jason David Frank, best known for his role on TV’s Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, says he’d like to tango with Anderson Silva and WWE star CM Punk. “I love CM Punk, he’s a really nice guy. But he did say in his panel that he would fight me and you can’t say that in the fighting world if you don’t mean that you’d fight me. Let’s get a contract going!”
MEDIA STEW
Free Fight: Dodson vs. Dillashaw.
Johnny Hendricks plans on knocking out GSP.
Holly Holm’s destruction of Nikki Knudsen at Legacy 24.
with the Jack Slack breakdown.
Felice Herrig vs. Tecia Torres promo.
Andrew Craig’s training vlog.
Rafael Domingos, one of Demian Maia’s top black belts, gets into it with his opponent after the fight is called.
Another quick one from Brazil.
TWEETS
Seems to be some confusion.
@brazenrat @Rampage4real @titoortiz 3
— Bjorn Rebney (@BjornRebney) October 15, 2013
@BjornRebney @brazenrat @Rampage4real 3? I’ve been training for 5rds. Shit.
— Tito Ortiz (@titoortiz) October 15, 2013
‘Sensei Tyson’ has a ring to it.
@MikeTyson @danawhite I will never forget it! Thanks so much!
— Johny Hendricks (@JohnyHendricks) October 16, 2013
Get well soon.
Going under the knife today……hopefully it will all go as planned. If you got a few seconds you can send some kind thoughts or prayers.
— Tyson Griffin (@TysonGriffin) October 15, 2013
Hurt my hand in the Ghita fight but the doctor said It will be fine in no time! #RestTime #Proud… http://t.co/xXIKoaBjph
— Rico Verhoeven (@RicoVerhoeven) October 15, 2013
Terrifying.
Here we go !!! pic.twitter.com/CmLiKEzazX
— Hector Lombard (@HectorLombard) October 15, 2013
Happy teachers day.
Feliz dia dos professores aos meus mestres @dedepederneiras @MarcioPontesbjj e @pedrorizzo1
— Jose ‘Scarface’ Aldo (@josealdojunior) October 15, 2013
Feliz dia dos professores , mestres e mentores … Bruce e Ali my Mentors pic.twitter.com/NNqiXzQOrB
— Anderson Silva (@SpiderAnderson) October 15, 2013
Someone’s awfully popular.
I’ve been back in Cali for 2 days now an still have not been able to put a DENT in the amount of tweets, Facebook… http://t.co/Pqx2nwgEoq
— Ashlee Evans-Smith (@AshleeMMA1) October 15, 2013
Do many fighters make it on juries?
Only 2hrs and 45min into waiting for jury duty and my phone is on 30% battery. This is not going well 😖
— Patrick Healy (@BamBamHealy) October 15, 2013
It’s even better if you diagram it.
Right now I feel very calm and calculated like a experienced assassin on a mission of destiny.
— Diego Sanchez UFC (@DiegoSanchezUFC) October 15, 2013
FIGHT ANNOUNCEMENTS
Announced yesterday (Oct. 15 2013)
Mike Richman vs. Akop Stepanyan joins Bellator 106
FANPOST OF THE DAY
Today’s Fanpost of the Day comes via King’s_Gambit
10 Ways to Save Bellator’s Historic PPV
So, a lot of you have probably seen the news that Bellator’s upcoming HISTORIC pay-per-view super-event has only sold 1700 tickets.
This prompted one BE user to respond by simply posting this:
Titanic-sinking_medium
Now, I’m not sure what nautical vessels and seamanship have to do with MMA, but if the argument this user was trying to make was that this Bellator event WOULDN’T be vastly improved by holding it on a giant cruise ship in international waters, I would have to firmly disagree.
This made me realize though that, yeah, the outlook for the event, commercially, isn’t great. It needs to be improved. Bellator needs to crank that notch to 11. They need to up the ante. They need to make the event truly HISTORIC. They already did this by involving TNA. Well you know what? Fuck that. They didn’t go far enough. Here’s my list of reasons why the event isn’t selling and potential solutions to those problems.
1. Not enough Roy Jones Jr.
Bellator was extremely effective in their hyping their main event….by promoting a completely DIFFERENT, completely fabricated main event for MONTHS prior to the main event announcement. And it worked really well. So clearly, people want more Roy Jones Jr.
Solution: Rampage vs. Tito not big enough? How about Rampage vs. Tito vs. Roy Jones Jr.? That’s right, motherfuckers. Triple threat match.
Anderson Silva vs. Roy Jones Jr? Rampage vs. Roy Jones Jr? The people just want Roy Jones Jr!
…
Check out the rest of the post here.
Found something you’d like to see in the Morning Report? Just hit me up on Twitter @SaintMMA and we’ll include it in tomorrow’s column.