Author: Anton Tabuena

Fight Circus keeps embracing the madness.

It seems fitting that Fight Circus’s next event will happen on April Fool’s Day.

Mixed Martial Arts has a long history of freakshow fights that are more spectacle than sport. In recent years, Thailand’s Full Metal Dojo has not only leaned heavily on that aspect for their Fight Circus brand, they have fully embraced it.

On their next offering on April 1st, they’re reaching back into that JMMA history by bringing in two PRIDE vets in Rampage Jackson and Bob Sapp. Interestingly enough, the pair won’t be in MMA matches or even competing against each other — I guess that would be too basic. Fight Circus got their biggest name star ever, and decided to crank up the weirdness and instead put the pair of vets together, quite literally.

Rampage and Sapp will be tied together and will compete in a Siamese boxing match. Their opponents? Fight Circus promoter Jon Nutt will return to the ring, and will be joined by (err, to?) Bangtao coach Andrew Wood.

Apart from the headliners, Bloody Elbow has also learned about the rest of the madness and festivities Fight Circus has planned for their event in Phuket.

According to promotion officials, the co-main event will be Fight Circus’ first female 2 vs 1 match up, with Lethwei champion Souris Manfredi taking on two Thai fighters.

As Bloody Elbow has learned, the promotion will also debut another insane concept called “the Musical Chairs of Death,” where six contestants play the traditional party game in order to determine three match ups and the type of fights they’ll compete in.

The winner will be able to pick his opponent, who in turn will be the one to choose the discipline they’ll compete in. It’ll be curious to see if this becomes a more traditional fight, or if the promotion’s crazier rulesets would be utilized, such as spinning shit only, kicks only, or only legs vs only arms.

Two of the odd men out from Musical Chairs will then compete in Blindfold Muay Thai, while the remaining two will be in a 2 vs 1 match up against a bigger opponent.

The event will happen at the Illuzion Nightclub in Phuket, Thailand, and will feature other oddities such as “Human Piñata,” Ring girl tug of war, and Grab Driver vs Win Driver. The current planned line up is as follows:

Fight Circus 6 fight card:

• Superheavyweight Siamese Twins Boxing: Quinton Jackson and Bob Sapp vs Jon Nutt and Andrew Wood
• 2 vs 1: Souris Manfredi vs Run THC (Indica & Sativa)
• Human Piñata: Steve Panda Banks “with a sack full of money and prizes” vs Petzilla and five others.
• White Collar Brawl – Road Rage Edition: Grab Motorbike Driver vs Win Motorbike Driver
• Ring Girl 3 vs 3 Tug of War
• Wheel of Violence: Kushal Vyas vs Joel Fratello
• Musical Chairs of Death:

Blindfold Muay Thai: Musical Chairs odd men out

2 vs 1: Walter John Veale vs Two remaining Musical Chairs participants.

Dealer’s Choice: Musical Chairs winner chooses opponent, opponent chooses discipline.

• Old School MMA, 1×10 minute round: Kyoken Tampiyanan vs Campbell Symes
• Slap fight: Bruno Barone vs Peter Haelewyn

Conor McGregor went off on USADA after their recent comments.

Conor McGregor has not yet returned to the USADA testing pool, despite supposedly being penciled in for a match against Michael Chandler, who he is coaching against in the latest season of The Ultimate Fighter.

When recently asked about his plans to return to the testing pool, the former two division champion said he’s not “rushing” it but expects that he’ll only need to pass two tests and can return quickly.

McGregor is seemingly expecting that the UFC would give him an exception as to bypass USADA’s six month testing rule before he can return, but the anti-doping agency has since stated that they don’t want that to happen.

“We do not currently have a meeting set with Conor and, as of today, we have not received notice of his coming out of retirement to compete,” USADA’s announced (full statement here).

“While the rules permit the UFC to make an exception to the six-month rule in exceptional circumstances, when the strict application of the rule would be manifestly unfair to the athlete, our position, which we have made clear, is that Conor should be in the testing pool for the full six-month period.”

This statement seems to have set off McGregor who went off on USADA on social media, calling them a “garbage” organization.

“Usada is going in the bin,” McGregor wrote in tweets that have since been deleted (HT: MMA Mania). “This is my issue. I’ve not lied once. Nor have I tested positive. Ever. I have over 70 clean tests under this program, yet they are consistently coming out after I speak in a manner that makes it seem I am lying. It’s ridiculous. F—k [USADA]. You are in The Bin.

“Over 70 clean tests. Never violated once. I will not be scapegoated by this garbage organization. You are not the be all end all in this equation usada.”

“Oh, USADA,” he sang in a voice tweet. “You came and you gave without taking, but I sent you away. Oh, USADA. You’re in the bin, yeah.”

Late in 2022, McGregor said he wanted USADA’s PED rules changed, and seemingly admitted to using banned substances to “heal” as he left the testing pool.

According to the USADA database, McGregor was last tested in the third quarter of 2021. The former champion has never failed a drug test in his career.

“Don’t say that on your interview!”

There are a lot of things that get said in the Octagon that don’t make it to the actual UFC broadcast.

Fights get uploaded to the UFC Fight Pass library without commercial breaks though, and sometimes it captures interesting moments that most audiences don’t get to see. While browsing those archives, Twitter user @DovySimuMMA was able to notice one such moment between Bruce Buffer and Danish UFC lightweight Damir Hadzovic.

Following his last TKO win back at UFC Fight Night 145, Hadzovic’s opponent Polo Reyes was hurt remained on the ground for an extended period. Seemingly feeling bad about the damage he dealt to his opponent, Hadzovic was seen approaching Buffer while they were on commercial break.

“They don’t pay us enough to do this shit,” Hadzovic was heard whispering to Buffer.

“I know, I know, I know,” the longtime UFC announcer responded. “When you see somebody like this…”

Buffer was then heard calling Hadzovic back. “Just, don’t say that in your interview, okay?”

Hadzovic acknowledged him, and said he won’t do that as he wants to receive a post-fight bonus.

“There you go,” Buffer responded. “I hope you get it.”

Prior to returning from commercial break, Buffer was also heard on the UFC Fight Pass broadcast directing Hadzovic and the referee to “get away from that, I don’t want them to see.”

Buffer was pointing at Reyes, who was still on the ground getting attended to.

“TKO right?” Buffer double checked before the announcement.

“TKO indeed, sir,” the referee responded.

On his post-fight interview, Hadzovic did not mention fighter pay, but alluded to feeling bad about hurting his opponent. He said there was mutual respect and he had “no animosity” towards Reyes, but just wanted to put on a show for the fans.

He did not get a post-fight bonus that night.

Hadzovic has fought four more times since then, now holding a 4-5 UFC record and 14-7 overall.

This is UFC 285 in a few short tweets.

UFC 285 is in the books, and it saw two new champions crowned.

Jon Jones was triumphant in his long overdue heavyweight debut, submitting Ciryl Gane really early and making it look easy. Make no mistake, Francis Ngannou is still the lineal champion and deserves to be ranked higher, but Jones had an impressive return to competition after a long layoff and made quick work of the number two (or three) heavyweight.

In the co-main event, Alexa Grasso pulled off an insane upset as she came back to submit the long dominant champion in Valentina Shevchenko. As she won the belt and ended that historic title reign, Grasso became the third Mexican UFC champion now.

Below, we analyze the pros and cons of each of the key bouts, with a quick twitter thread that’s short and fitting for people’s social media era attention spans:

And that’s about it. For more social media musings, follow me on twitter over at @antontabuena, and of course you should do that for Bloody Elbow’s official twitter account as well.

It’s fight week, and this is what Jon Jones will look like in the cage.

After over a decade of him teasing it, Jon Jones will finally make the move up to heavyweight, as he takes on Ciryl Gane at UFC 285

The former light heavyweight champion spent the last three years pretty much showing off his powerlifting and talking about his physique at heavyweight. During his “bulking phase” Jones said he “can’t wait for you all to see your boy in actual fight shape.”

Fight prep is done and it’s UFC 285 fight week, so it seems like that day has come.

After a portrait shoot wearing his UFC fight kits, we now have a pretty good idea of how Jones will actually look during his heavyweight debut on Saturday.

Below are before and after photos of Jones taking similar studio poses as a light heavyweight during his last bout in 2020, and now three years later as a heavyweight in 2023.

You can also check out more of the studio photos from Jones as a heavyweight below:

Jones, now 35, hasn’t fought since a controversial decision win over Dominick Reyes in 2020. The former light heavyweight champion has a record of 26-1 with 1 no contest, and recently said that he was “chosen by god himself to be an undefeated fighter.”

The highly anticipated fight has been officially announced.

After all the talk and a lot of negotiations, undefeated boxing stars Gervonta Davis and Ryan Garcia are officially set to fight.

Both boxers along with their respective broadcast partners all made the official announcements on social media, noting how the fight will happen on April 22 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Garcia also noted that it will be a joint PPV event with Showtime and DAZN.

With these two young, undefeated, and very popular hard hitters, it’s not only an intriguing bout in the lighter weights, it’s also one of the biggest fights to be made in boxing overall right now.

Garcia is only 24, with the interim WBC lightweight champ also finding success at super lightweight in his most recent bout against Javier Fortuna. That last KO win improved the popular boxer’s record to 23-0.

The also undefeated Davis is 28-years-old, with the former Mayweather protege being known for his impressive KO power after finishing 26 of his 28 opponents.

Both men have each fought at 140 lbs once — Garcia’s last bout in 2022, and Davis’ 2021 win, before he dropped back down to 135 lbs — but this super-fight will reportedly be at a catchweight at 136 lbs.

Although it hasn’t really affected his previous fights, Davis has had multiple legal troubles as of late, involving him pleading guilty to a hit-and-run incident, and a domestic violence arrest that had the accusations later walked back by the woman. Davis is scheduled to be sentenced on May 5, which would be two weeks after this scheduled bout against Garcia.

About the author: Anton Tabuena is the Managing Editor for Bloody Elbow. He’s been covering MMA and combat sports since 2009, and has also fought in MMA, Muay Thai and kickboxing. (full bio)