A little more than three months after their originally scheduled bout fell through, a main-event title fight between the light heavyweight champ and the undefeated challenger Daniel Cormier will finally come to fruition at UFC 182 on Saturday.
Arguably…
A little more than three months after their originally scheduled bout fell through, a main-event title fight between the light heavyweight champ and the undefeated challenger Daniel Cormier will finally come to fruition at UFC 182 on Saturday.
With Jones, Cormier and the remainder of the fighters on the UFC 182 lineup set to hit the scales at the event’s weigh-in in mere hours, the time to make last-second predictions is slipping away.
Here are five UFC 182 predictions you can take to the bank.
Two of the most recognizable names outside the realm of the UFC—Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic and Shinya Aoki—each ended the year in style Wednesday at Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye 2014 in Tokyo.
After landing his patented left high kick on Satoshi Is…
Two of the most recognizable names outside the realm of the UFC—Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic and ShinyaAoki—each ended the year in style Wednesday at InokiBom-Ba-Ye 2014 in Tokyo.
After landing his patented left high kick on SatoshiIshii, the 40-year-old Cro Cop landed a series of punches against the ropes to score a TKO win in the second round of their main event IGF heavyweight championship bout.
Earlier in the night, Aoki pulled off one of the most rarely seen submissions in MMA for the first time in his career when he secured a twister (spinal crank) in the first round of a lightweight tilt against YukiYamamoto.
The former Japanese Olympic gold medalist (judo) Ishii, who fell via TKO (doctor stoppage) to Cro Cop to lose his IGF heavyweight belt at Inoki Genome Fight 2 in August, scored a trip takedown in Round 1. Ishii then peppered Filipovic with punches and elbows in the guard for the remainder of the round.
Ishii notched another takedown in Round 2, only to allow a resilient Cro Cop to eventually pop back to his feet and begin his own offensive assault.
In the later stages of the round, Cro Cop began heaving left hooks and uppercuts that put Ishii on the defensive.
Cro Cop then wobbled Ishii with a high kick in the waning seconds of the round before finishing him off with a vicious set of follow-up punches just as the round ended.
Although the outmatched Yamamoto managed to land a solid knee to Aoki‘s jaw early, just seconds later, he found himself on the ground with the Brazilian jiu-jitsu and judo black belt on his back.
Aoki quickly slapped a figure-four on Yamamoto‘s right leg from the back and then slid his upper body to Yamamoto‘s left, where he began applying the crank to the top of the right side of Yamamoto‘s head. Yamamoto squirmed and resisted a bit before ultimately tapping to the intense pressure on his spinal cord.
Cro Cop earned his 30th career pro MMA win and his 22nd career TKO/KO. Filipovic has also won 23 times as a pro kickboxer, 12 of which came via TKO/KO.
Aoki, conversely, scored his 37th career pro MMA win and his 25th win via submission.
Former The Ultimate Fighter Season 19 contestant Doug Sparks found himself locked in a county jail in Indiana on Saturday after allegedly committing several crimes in Bloomington, per a report by Yahoo Sports.
Sparks reportedly forced an unkn…
Former The Ultimate Fighter Season 19 contestant Doug Sparks found himself locked in a county jail in Indiana on Saturday after allegedly committing several crimes in Bloomington, per a report by Yahoo Sports.
Sparks reportedly forced an unknown woman to stay with him while he sexually assaulted her for several days.
Sparks was detained in the Monroe County Jail on Thursday on preliminary charges of rape, criminal confinement, battery with bodily harm and theft. Sparks is being held on a $250,000 surety-only bond.
The 32-year-old light heavyweight competed on the opening episode of The Ultimate Fighter Season 19: Team Edgar vs. Team Penn, where he lost via a first-round kimura to Patrick Walsh in a preliminary-round fight.
Following his tryout for TUF Season 19, Sparks, wearing a pair of novelty polar bear ears, talked about what drew him to MMA during an interview with Indianapolis Star Sports.
“I always wanted to fight,” Sparks said. “I was born with an innate drive to violence. … I was getting in trouble, when I was around 18 or so, (but) once I saw the UFC…I just saw some highlights like on Sherdog and stuff, and I was like, ‘Now I know what I (want to) do.’ It was the easiest decision I ever had to make.”
Sparks, a resident of Bloomington, went unbeaten in nine amateur fights before turning pro in November 2006. Sparks lost by second-round TKO to UFC veteran Anthony Lapsley in his pro debut at Extreme Combat Challenge: Season’s Beatings.
Sparks followed his loss to Lapsley by reeling off seven straight wins. During that span, Sparks finished every opponent (five submissions and two TKO’s).
In his last bout, Sparks fell to once-beaten middleweight Shaun Asher via unanimous decision at TWEF: Turf Wars 8 in 2012.
Following in his father’s footsteps, Kron Gracie tested his royal Brazilian jiu-jitsu pedigree in a pro MMA bout in Japan, a place where his father Rickson forever solidified his name in the sport’s lore in the 1990s.
And like Rickson did in his first …
Following in his father’s footsteps, Kron Gracie tested his royal Brazilian jiu-jitsu pedigree in a pro MMA bout in Japan, a place where his father Rickson forever solidified his name in the sport’s lore in the 1990s.
And like Rickson did in his first bout in Japan in 1994, Kron scored a first-round submission win in his first fight in Japan.
In what was his pro MMA debut, Kron put his top-flight grappling chops on display and submitted South Korean HyungSoo-Kim with an armbar just 65 seconds into their bout at Real Fighting Championship: Real 1 on Tuesday in Tokyo.
Gracie engaged in a series of small exchanges on his feet with Soo-Kim in the fight’s first 30 seconds. Gracie then jumped guard 33 seconds into the bout, immediately going to work on his potent guard game.
Gracie quickly slapped on a triangle choke, which he turned into a belly-down armbar that induced a swift tap from Soo-Kim.
Along with Nick Diaz and Gilbert Melendez, Gracie prepared in the months leading up to the fight with UFC lightweight Nate Diaz. Nate took to Twitter on Tuesday to congratulate Gracie.
Gracie has won numerous world titles in the realm of grappling and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, including capturing a gold medal at the 2013 AbuDhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling Championships.
Rickson, who’s arguably considered the kingpin of the Gracie family, finished his storied MMA career with an 11-0 mark with 11 submissions. Rickson‘s first two fights occurred in Brazil, and his final nine took place in Japan.
Unlike ancient philosopher Sun Tzu, who immortalized the notion of attacking an enemy’s weakness, Jon Jones and Greg Jackson believe that besting an opponent in his respective area of expertise represents the easiest path to reaching a breaking point.
…
Unlike ancient philosopher Sun Tzu, who immortalized the notion of attacking an enemy’s weakness, Jon Jones and Greg Jackson believe that besting an opponent in his respective area of expertise represents the easiest path to reaching a breaking point.
So when Jones faces arguably his stiffest test inside the Octagon at UFC 182 on January 3, expect the light-heavyweight champ and pound-for-pound king to test second-ranked Daniel Cormier at his strong suit: wrestling.
During an interview over the weekend with MMAFighting.com’s Shaun Al-Shatti, Jones talked about his ability to adapt to his foes’ strengths and his plan to go after Cormier‘s strengths and weaknesses.
I think I focus on it so much, I focus on their strengths so much that I almost adapt it. I become so familiar with what they’re good at that I just almost adapt it into my psychology, into my skillset, and then subconsciously it just starts playing out in the fight. Doing what they do.
I will try to wrestle Daniel Cormier. I definitely plan on making him work extremely hard for any takedowns he’s going for, and I’m definitely going to be looking for takedowns myself. I’m more than capable of taking him down, and I believe in my top game. So I’ll definitely look to attack Daniel at his strengths, and weaknesses.
Jackson, Jones’ head trainer and the co-owner of Team Jackson-Winkeljohn MMA in Albuquerque, New Mexico, explained why he agrees that Bones should attempt to out-wrestleCormier, a two-time former Olympian in freestyle wrestling who was named Team USA’s captain for the 2008 Summer Olympics.
We’re definitely going to try to wrestle Daniel, there’s no doubt. We’re trying to beat him everywhere. The kind of inception of that mentality started actually way back when I was working with Georges (St-Pierre), and he took down (Josh) Koscheck. Sun Tzu always has this thing where he says ‘Always attack your enemies weaknesses.’ But that’s not true. If you have the ability to attack your opponent’s strength, the psychological breaking process is much faster than if you’re just attacking his weaknesses.
Since making his debut with Strikeforce in 2009, Cormier has stuffed each of the 11 shots he’s faced, including three shots from former two-time NCAA Division I All-American wrestler, Patrick Cummins.
Jones denied the first 16 shots he faced in his brilliant UFC tenure before allowing top-ranked Alexander Gustafsson to tally a takedown at UFC 165 in September 2013. Gustafsson, however, finished just one of his eight takedown attempts in that fight.
The unbeaten Cormier has amassed 18 takedowns in his 12 fights since signing with Strikeforce, including three in his last bout against former Olympic Greco-Roman wrestler Dan Henderson.
In his 15 scraps in the UFC, eight of which were light-heavyweight title fights, Jones has totaled 30 takedowns.
Cormier (15-0) improved to 4-0 in the UFC after thrashing former Strikeforce and PRIDE FC champ Henderson at UFC 173 in May. Cormier has piled up a 12-0 record under the Zuffa banner.
Jones (20-1) holds a 14-1 UFC record, with his lone loss coming via disqualification against Matt Hamill in December 2009.
A day before his first fight in over a year, 14th-ranked lightweight Nate Diaz failed to make weight prior to his co-main event bout with third-ranked Rafael dos Anjos at UFC on Fox 13 on Friday in Phoenix.
The 29-year-old Diaz, who TKO’d Gray Maynard …
A day before his first fight in over a year, 14th-ranked lightweight Nate Diaz failed to make weight prior to his co-main event bout with third-ranked Rafael dos Anjos at UFC on Fox 13 on Friday in Phoenix.
The 29-year-old Diaz, who TKO’d Gray Maynard in his last scrap in November 2013, weighed in at 160.6 pounds, according to a report by MMAFighting.com. The weight limit for the lightweight division in Arizona is 156 pounds.
Diaz‘s opponent, the streaking dos Anjos, tipped the scales at 156 pounds. The 30-year-old Brazilian was one of 24 other fighters on the card who made weight.
During an interview with Fox Sports 1 on Friday, per a report by MMAFighting.com, White expressed his frustration with the younger of the UFC’s Diaz brothers.
The Nate Diaz thing is a completely different scenario. The guy is complaining about money, but he’s done tons of things to ensure that he gets fined. He is complaining about the CM Punk deal. … All he’s been doing is complaining, not showing up for stuff, and now he doesn’t make weight and he’s four pounds over. I don’t know what to do with him if he wins. There’s a laundry list of problems there.
The incident marked the first time Diaz, a welterweight during stretches in his career, didn’t make weight. However, during his 2012 lightweight title fight with Benson Henderson, Diaz failed on his first two attempts at making the 155-pound limit in Washington, only to make the weight on his third and final attempt.
Because Diaz, who also didn’t show for the fight’s open workouts, didn’t make weight and dos Anjos did, the Californian will have to forfeit 20 percent of his purse to dos Anjos.
Prior to his win over Maynard, Diaz dropped back-to-back fights, first getting decisioned by Henderson and then getting TKO’d by Josh Thomson four months later.
A winner of his last two bouts, dos Anjos has only tasted defeat once since 2011, a unanimous-decision loss to top-ranked KhabibNurmagomedov in April.
Second-ranked heavyweight Junior dos Santos will also return from more than a yearlong layoff from the Octagon when he faces the fast-blossoming StipeMiocic in the night’s main event.
Cigano hasn’t graced the Octagon since falling to Cain Velasquez in their third fight in October 2013.
Fifth-ranked Miocic has won his last three fights, including a TKO over Fabio Maldonado in his last fight in May.
Two of the most recognizable names outside the realm of the UFC—Mirko “Cro Cop”