Author: kmowatt

Since Chael Sonnen cruised through Nate Marquardt in February (save a few ‘this guillotine really sucks’ moments), the bruising wrestler is being heralded by many, as the dude that will finally push Anderson Silva to his limits. Of course, the real test will come August 7^th, when the two middleweights thrown down at UFC 117 in Oakland.

Now as we’ve ‘reported’ on several times, as always, Sonnen has been doing a damntastic job at selling the fight, reiterating constantly, that as far as getting after Silva he’s the man for the job. Despite Sonnen’s recent win over Marquardt, and his previous two UD victories over Dan Miller and Yushin Okami, it would seem that Silva’s coach Josual Distek, isn’t really buying into this whole ‘okay now Silva’s in for a real fight’ narrative. When asked by Tatame.com to comment on Sonnen’s consistent verbal barrage directed Silva’s way, Distek stated:

“We don’t have anything to say about him, he can say whatever he wants… Paulão was going through a lot of problems when he fought Sonnen (on WEC) and everyone could say so during the fight, but I don’t see Chael Sonnen as a dangerous fighter.”

Bam! Of course Distek is referring to the fact that Paulo Filho wasn’t exactly ‘with it,’ when Sonnen avenged his previous loss to the former WEC champ, although that kind of glosses over the American’s recent wins which were pretty damn impressive so….At any rate, we’re thinking it’s going to be pretty interesting to see how Sonnen fairs at UFC 117, and whether or not Silva busts into more WTF? antics.

Allegations of drug and or spousal abuse aren’t exactly great material for a site that is supposed to put a humorous spin on the world of MMA (granted many of you might be thinking ‘MMA Fix is supposed to be funny?’), but just as we reported on Tito Ortiz getting arrested yesterday, we’re passing along his claims of innocence (in case you’re power just got turned back on and you haven’t heard about this yet).

In response to being arrested for suspicion of felony domestic violence yesterday in Huntington Beach, Ortiz held a press conference last night in North Hollywood, and is denying that he ever laid a hand on his girlfriend Jenna Jameson. Ortiz, who was present naturally with his lawyer, is claiming that Jameson is addicted to OxyContin, and that an alleged relapse yesterday, is what was responsible for the incident.

 To watch the brief press conference head here. Okay, let’s get back to MMA.

The headaches for Strikeforce just keep coming lately; 185lb. champ Jake Shields just worked over the promotion’s latest big name acquisition (Dan Henderson) and could be UFC bound, #1 P4P contender Fedor Emelianenko still isn’t locked up for his next fight, and of course, there was the whole ‘close your eyes little Jimmy” post fight brawl last Saturday….Now to make things even more complicated for the growing promotion, welterweight champion Nick Diaz hasn’t exactly been falling over himself lately, to promote the Strikeforce 170lb. division.

Diaz is set to fight Japanese veteran Hayato “Mach” Sakurai on May 29^th, but in the meantime, that hasn’t stopped him from calling out Georges St. Pierre, who the Cesar Gracie fighter also believes is short on viable contenders. Speaking to Cage Writer recently, Diaz offered this statement, when asked about whether or not Strikeforce has any notable opponents for him:

“No, I don’t. That’s why I’m going to fight in Japan. They don’t have anybody for me. My last fight, they had to bring that guy from [DREAM]. People always talk about Georges St. Pierre, and they say, “Why would he come down to fight you?”  And I say, “Whoa, whoa. Let’s talk about GSP.” He fought Dan Hardy, who got there by beating a guy my brother [UFC fighter Nate Diaz] just beat up.  I was asked to fight Dan Hardy, and I turned down that fight because the guy isn’t popular and he isn’t important. He’s not that good.”

GSP vs. Diaz? We’d sure as hell watch, but somehow we think Shields might face the UFC champ first.

Any true fight fan should be damn excited about tomorrow night’s WEC Featherweight Championship tilt between Jose Aldo and Urijah Faber; in fact, we’re willing to bet one or two donut’s from Monday’s spread that the fight will be extremely entertaining. Of course throwing down yet another $50 bones for a PPV, when the economy is still on its knees scrounging for ciggy buts, is problematic for a lot of people. For other mainstream fans, the WEC doesn’t sound anything like the UFC, so why watch it?

Perhaps it’s because of these reasons that, in case you haven’t noticed, Dana White and the UFC crew have completely taken over hyping tomorrow’s WEC card. White has been doing the media rounds big time, Joe Rogan will do color alongside UFC commentator Mike Goldberg, and oh yeah, the WEC logo hasn’t exactly been plastered on every ad promoting “Aldo vs. Faber.” Not a bad way to trick Joe ‘yeah I like that UFC stuff’ into gathering up his buddies to check it out.

In a recent article from MMA Junkie, White talked about promoting tomorrow’s WEC, and when asked whether or not the WEC brand might miss out because of the promotion’s largely absent logo, he stated:

“No,” White said flatly. “You leave that up to me. I’ll fix that; trust me. I like to think that I know what I’m doing, and we’ll see how this thing goes on Saturday”…”The timing is right for me. Emotionally and mentally for me right now, this fight is really good for me. We’ll find out if the timing is right for people as far as pay-per-view goes.”

Are you guys sure the WEC isn’t getting merged into the UFC? To bet on tomorrow’s card head here.

One can’t help but wonder if because of all the ‘tisk tisk’ rhetoric firing around the internet the last few days, over Saturday’s post fight brawl, if the magnitude of Jake Shields’ UD win over Dan Henderson is getting a little overlooked. It may have not been the kind of performance that will win over thousands of mainstream ‘ultimate fighting’ fans, but for people that can appreciate the finer points of MMA (you know, like the importance of passing guard); Shields demonstrated again that he’s one of the world’s best.

Of course what also made last weekend’s bout so important is that Shields is entering free agency. In other words, the guy who felt like maybe Strikeforce wanted him to lose Saturday, just cruised through the organization’s second largest signing ever (next to Mr. Fedor Emelianenko of course). Not exactly the kind of way you want your middleweight champ to possibly exit…Well, speaking to All Headline News, UFC President Dana White once again wasn’t shy about expressing his interest in signing Shields (if you’re surprised by this, pick up a ball, perhaps you’d like to bounce it):

“Jake Shields is definitely going to leave Strikeforce,” said White, “and he’s definitely coming to the UFC.”…..”They never respected Jake Shields, who is their champion,” White continued. “They didn’t even have him in their commercials for the fight. Then the fight happens and Jake Shields wins.”

So…GSP vs. Shields sometime in 2010 er?

Strikeforce has announced today that jiu-jitsu instructor and “hip-hop artist” Kevin Casey will take on the highly regarded vet Matt Lindland, at the promotion’s upcoming May 21^st event in Portland, Oregon. Now, as far as we know, the card has yet to be named by Strikeforce, but for those of you who are familiar with both of these gentlemen, you’d probably agree that “Polar Opposites” has a nice and accurate ring to it.

Casey, who used to study under the guidance of jiu-jitsu demi-god Rickson Gracie, is the L.A. resident who is responsible for this video, which continues to victimize eyeballs and eardrums on YouTube. He’s also buddies with “MTV reality series superstar” Spencer Pratt, something Strikeforce evidently deemed as necessary to include as part of the bout’s official announcement today. Just going on a limb here, but we’re thinking that Lindland and his crew (which includes Chael Sonnen), probably don’t know, or don’t give an eff about Pratt. Other people probably care though…right?

Which brings us to Lindland; an Oregon conservative that ran for public office as a Republican, who would probably elect to wear a lumberjack jacket with the sleeves cut off to a wedding if given the choice. That’s not to say that he couldn’t ring the necks of 99% of the people on this wonderful planet. Being a former Olympic Silver Medalist in Greco Roman wrestling, as well as a decade plus MMA vet, kind of helps in that department.

Differences aside, it should be an interesting bout, but we’re thinking Lindland has a good chance at ending his two fight losing streak.