Georges St-Pierre has been the UFC Welterweight kingpin for quite some time. GSP’s last loss occurred in 2007 in one of the biggest upsets in UFC history.St-Pierre admitted he was not focused on his training and would vow to reclaim his title. After ru…
Georges St-Pierre has been the UFC Welterweight kingpin for quite some time. GSP’s last loss occurred in 2007 in one of the biggest upsets in UFC history.
St-Pierre admitted he was not focused on his training and would vow to reclaim his title. After running through Matt Serra to get his belt back, GSP began a run of dominance that has landed the Canadian at the No. 2 Pound for Pound list in MMA.
Since then, GSP has become one of the UFC’s top PPV draws as well. He’s also signed endorsement deals with companies outside the MMA market such as Gatorade and Under Armour.
So why should the UFC be hoping for a Carlos Condit upset on Oct. 29?
If it’s free it’s for me.As Dana White loves to point out, people love free fights and the UFC is happy to deliver the goods. From Melvin Guillard’s impressive performance to the Ultimate Fighter Season 14 finale, the UFC will have given fans 11 chance…
If it’s free it’s for me.
As Dana White loves to point out, people love free fights and the UFC is happy to deliver the goods. From Melvin Guillard’s impressive performance to the Ultimate Fighter Season 14 finale, the UFC will have given fans 11 chances to watch the best in the world.
This list is composed of events that have already happened along with some that have yet to occur. When ranking these I not only looked at the quality of the fights, but also the impact the event had or will have.
UFC 135 has passed and left us feeling like its bark was louder than its bite. One of my favorite shows to watch is Pardon the Interruption. If you’re not familiar with the show, two sports journalists debate popular topics of the day. In the mid…
UFC 135 has passed and left us feeling like its bark was louder than its bite.
One of my favorite shows to watch is Pardon the Interruption. If you’re not familiar with the show, two sports journalists debate popular topics of the day. In the middle of the show the two men engage in a “game” of sorts.
One of the games is called “Report Card.” The hosts are asked to give a letter grade on certain sports topics for day ranging from F-A. In the spirit of PTI, I’ll give the main card fights for UFC 135 a report card.
Jon Jones is a great fighter. There’s no questioning that. There is some questioning as to some fans’ ideas that Jones should be put up against Anderson Silva. Following Jones’ beat down of Quinton Jackson, the post-fight press conference s…
Jon Jones is a great fighter. There’s no questioning that. There is some questioning as to some fans’ ideas that Jones should be put up against Anderson Silva.
Following Jones’ beat down of Quinton Jackson, the post-fight press conference seemed to be abuzz about the possibility of Jon Jones and super fights. Even Dana White admitted that he and Jones have had discussions about Jones moving up to heavyweight.
Pump the breaks please.
Jones has defended the belt once, and while I admit his destruction of Mauricio Rua and his dominant win against Rampage are impressive, the UFC should be under no pressure to put Jones in any kind of super fight.
I do not want to discredit Jones’ win at all, but when you consider that many analysts (and the UFC hype machine) believed Rampage offered nothing but a punchers chance against Jones, is his performance so impressive it warrants a fight against Silva?
I think not.
Jones still has plenty of fights at 205. Rashad Evans is next in line of course, and while Evans is shorter than Rampage, he offers more tools to attack Jones with. Arguably for the past few years, Evans has been the best at 205 and he will do his best to make fans believe he is the one to dethrone “King Jones.”
Although a few fights away from a title shot, young prospect Phil Davis and former champion Lyoto Machida offer some stylistic matches. Davis is untested on the big stage, but he has shown glimpses of brilliance as evident by the “Philmura” against Tim Boetsch.
Machida’s style of in and out strikes could force Jones to leave his reach advantage. We saw last night that Jones has the awareness not to trade shots on the inside—but what if someone were to make Jones do the chasing?
I’m not saying Davis (9-0) or Machida are the answers to the Jon Jones riddle. I’m just saying that before people get carried away with Jones vs. Silva or Jones in the heavyweight division, let him first clear out his own division.
For every Anderson Silva or George St. Pierre, there’s always a Chael Sonnen or Matt Serra who reminds fans that on any given night any man can be beaten.
He’s the guy you love to hate but can’t take your eyes off of. His name is Jon “Bones” Jones and he is the future of MMA according to some pundits. He has provided fans with some spectacular highlights in his UFC bouts. He seemi…
He’s the guy you love to hate but can’t take your eyes off of.
His name is Jon “Bones” Jones and he is the future of MMA according to some pundits. He has provided fans with some spectacular highlights in his UFC bouts. He seemingly has no weakness as is evident by his impressive, unorthodox method of striking combined with his impressive wrestling ability.
Jones also presents a rare talent in the MMA world. The ability to make people pay $50 to watch him succeed and fail. People have become so entranced by his personality as of late, his pre-fight interviews almost mean as much to fans as his performance in the cage does.
The last man I can remember being hated and liked by so many people at the same time is Tito Ortiz.
Ortiz burst onto the scene with a 31-second knock out of Wes Albritton, but that is not the moment he became a star. After beating Guy Mezger, Ortiz donned a shirt that read, “Guy Mezger is my *****”.
This caught the ire of Mezger’s coach, Ken Shamrock and thus, one of (if not the first) the UFC’s “mega feuds” was born.
Although most fans believed Shamrock was no match for the powerful Ortiz, many believed Chuck Liddell was Ortiz’s kryptonite.
Liddell had arguably faced tougher competition but the title fight between the two never materialized. This lead fans to believe Ortiz was ducking Liddell to keep his belt.
The situation became even more blurred when Ortiz claimed that he and Liddell were friends and wouldn’t fight each other while Liddell replied that there never was a friendship.
Ortiz’s cocky attitude while avoiding his toughest challenge made him one of the more disliked fighters of his time.
Eventually Liddell and Ortiz did meet in the cage and the results went the way most fans pictured it. Ortiz struggled to wrestle Chuck to the ground and Liddell blasted Oritz with one of the most thunderous combinations seen inside the Octagon.
Jones didn’t go overboard to gain attention like Ortiz did, but he still has a collection of moments that culminated into a big one.
The first event took place following a UFC on Versus event. Jones was speaking in the post fight show and admitted that he would fight teammate Rashad Evans if Dana White wanted him to. His reasoning was that he did not want to get fired.
Jones must’ve completely forgotten that Jon Fitch, Josh Koscheck and Mike Swick are all still employed by the UFC.
Immediately after hearing this, Evans, who had been a self proclaimed good friend with Jones, became angered at the young prospect.
Evans’ subsequent knee injury allowed Jones to slip into Evans’ place against then champion Mauricio “Shogun” Rua. It was this match that provided fans with ammo in the anti-Jon Jones crusade.
Before the fight, Jon Jones began signing autographs, “Jon Jones Champion 2011.” Fans became turned off of Jones and his “forced” humble attitude.
Following the destruction of Rua, fans were foaming at the mouth for the prospect of Jon Jones vs. Rashad Evans in a title fight. The two men engaged in a war of words that involved their coaches and even some racial barbs.
The mega match was not to be however as Jones pulled out of his fight, citing the need for hand surgery. Evans, who had waited over a year to receive his title shot, was forced to take a fight against young prospect Phil Davis.
After a replacement for Jones’ was found, his manager released a statement saying Jones wasn’t going to do the surgery after all. Worse yet, Jones’ manager said it was an old injury that Jones had been fighting with since his college days.
Almost overnight, the blogosphere became lit up with “Jon Jones is scared of Rashad Evans” theories. Although not as clear as the Chuck Liddell vs Tito Ortiz predictions were, a large group of fans believe Evans has the tools to defeat the seemingly invincible champion.
Many fans and fighters are picking Jones to beat Quinton “Rampage” Jackson this Saturday night at UFC 135, which means Evans would be next in line for a title fight. Regardless of the predictions, fans are going to tune in to see Jones dominate another world champion or to see him be knocked unconscious.
The real winner in this situation, as was the case with Chuck and Tito, is the UFC. If Jones wins, they have their mega fight with Jones vs. Evans. If Jones loses, they could still conceivably make Jones vs. Evans while at the same time have the ability to recreate one of their more successful PPVs with a Evans vs Rampage rematch.
Nick Diaz manages to say he’s not making excuses, while at the same time making every possible excuse for the fallout from UFC 137.In an interview wit mmajunkie.com, Diaz wants to point the finger everywhere but at himself. DIaz’s explanation was juven…
Nick Diaz manages to say he’s not making excuses, while at the same time making every possible excuse for the fallout from UFC 137.
In an interview wit mmajunkie.com, Diaz wants to point the finger everywhere but at himself. DIaz’s explanation was juvenile as usual,
“If I’d have known the fight was going to be off, I would have [expletive] gone to the press conference, or I would have told somebody, ‘Hey, if I don’t make it to this stupid [expletive], I’m not fighting”.
Diaz is not a 12-year-old child who needs to be told what to do. This isn’t a case of, if you go mow the lawn, you can have your allowance for the week. Diaz knows that Dana White doesn’t play around when it comes to his company and shouldn’t have tried to play the same games he got away with former Strikeforce CEO, Scott Coker.
If Anderson Silva, arguably the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world can be threatened with being fired, why did Diaz think he could get away with not playing his part in promoting UFC 137?
Later in the interview, Diaz claimed he didn’t even know there was going to be a press conference that day. Press conferences are trivial these days with the Internet, but to Dana White and the UFC, they’re still considered valuable tools with connecting to the media.
Diaz may have skipped out on some medical testing in Strikeforce, but the UFC is an entirely different league.
As White said at the press conference, “I asked him to play the game a little.” Diaz instead chose to take his ball and go home.
Following the debacle of the Diaz-Mayhem rivalry that never materialized, Diaz’s reputation is starting to falter. For being someone who never backs out of a fight, Diaz has seemingly managed the feat twice.
But instead of accepting that it was his fault (or his camp’s if he truly didn’t know), Diaz goes on to blame Georges St. Pierre for the fight falling through.
So GSP takes part in the media functions, allows a UFC television and production crew to follow him around for a few weeks and accepts a fight against someone who hasn’t fought for the UFC in years, and it’s his fault.
“I really don’t appreciate this mother [expletive] sitting there at that press conference and laughing at me,” Diaz said. “That’s some real bitch [expletive]. He’s sitting there laughing like its funny or something.
If I saw Georges on the street and called him a bitch, I bet you he wouldn’t do [expletive]. I bet you if I walked up and gave him a slap, I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t do [expletive]. But you can’t do that to me. That’s not how it works for me. That’s something to fight about.”
You’re right, Nick. GSP probably wouldn’t do anything if you slapped him on the street. Not because he isn’t tough or because he’s afraid of your Stockton background.
It’s because he’s a mixed martial artist.
He knows what it takes both inside the octagon and outside to become a champion. The time spent sparring is just as valuable to the time spent in front of a microphone to UFC brass.
Nick DIaz is no doubt an excellent fighter. But if he wants to be more than just the “street thug,” he needs to grow up.
Although he isn’t trying to make these little excuses, DIaz has filled the blogosphere with reasons why he lost his title fight.
Here’s a tip for Diaz: If he wants to find the real reason he “doesn’t have the commitment to be a champion,” as GSP put it, all he needs to do is look in the mirror.
Jon Jones is a great fighter. There’s no questioning that. There is some questioning as to some fans’ ideas that Jones should be put up against