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Bellator 126 Results and GIFs: Halsey Destroys Shlemenko, Held Dominates Freire

The whistling of Conor McGregor‘s hypetrain heading into UFC 178 made it easy to forget about Bellator 126. However, as always, CagePotato has you covered with a Bellator recap post.

Here’s a rundown of the fight card, with GIFs courtesy @ZProphet_MMA.

In the opener, Mike Richman knocked Ed West OUT COLD. Richman had control of the stand-up throughout the fight. He masterfully cut off the cage, forcing West to literally run from him at points. Late in the first round, West couldn’t run anymore. Richman landed a massive two-punch combo while West was against the cage that sucked the life out of him. See the GIF after the jump.

The whistling of Conor McGregor‘s hypetrain heading into UFC 178 made it easy to forget about Bellator 126. However, as always, CagePotato has you covered with a Bellator recap post.

Here’s a rundown of the fight card, with GIFs courtesy @ZProphet_MMA and Fansided.

Then came wrestling standout Bubba Jenkins against Thiago Meller. The fight was all Jenkins, who lived up to his grinder reputation and smothered Meller for the full 15 minutes of the fight. But it wasn’t just “lay and pray.” Jenkins punished Meller throughout the fight, making his face look like hamburger meat. Meller, to his credit, almost caught a guillotine a couple times. The Z-man (that’s what we’re calling him now) didn’t post any GIFs of this fight.

In the co-main event famed Polish prospect Marcin Held met Bellator mainstay Patricky “Pitbull” Freire in the next fight. Held put on an incredible performance. Save for a couple minutes in the first round, Held controlled the entire fight. Held’s wrestling always seemed to be deficient in his last few fights, but his improvements in that area were apparent as he took down Freire repeatedly. Once the fight went to the ground, Held maintained dominant positions and controlled the scrambles. He even opened up a nice cut underneath Freire’s eye. He won a unanimous decision win. Check out the GIF of an insane takedown he landed in the first round:

The main event was a title bout between middleweight champ Alexander Shlemenko and challenger Brandon Halsey. It was the least competitive bout of the night. Halsey dragged Shlemenko to the mat, took his back, and choked him out in under a minute. If MMA were Mortal Kombat, this would be a “Flawless Victory.”

Here are the complete results of the card:

Main Card

Brandon Halsey def. Alexander Shlemenko via submission (rear naked choke), Round 1, 0:35.
Marcin Held def. Patricky Freire via unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 30-26).
Bubba Jenkins def. Thiago Meller via unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 30-27).
Mike Richman def. Ed West via KO (punches), Round 1, 2:44.

Preliminary Card

LaRue Burley def. Raymond Pina via submission (guillotine choke), Round 2, 0:22.
Clifford Starks def. Jacob Ortiz via technical submission (guillotine choke), Round 2, 0:52.
Nick Rossborough def. Ryan Martinez via TKO (injury), Round 1, 5:00.
Joe Taimanglo def. Michael Parker via unanimous decision (30-26, 30-27, 30-27).
Dan Charles def. Stuart Austin via knockout (punches), Round 3, 0:18.
Derek Campos def. Estevan Payan via knockout (punch), Round 1, 0:31.
Brandon Girtz def. Benny Madrid via TKO (punches), Round 1, 0:57.

Hunt vs. Nelson: Woefully Incomplete Video Highlights

(The video is so shitty the embed code wouldn’t even work in our CMS. So instead here’s a link to the video and a picture of a bro-hug. / Photo via Getty.)

You know what’s bullshit?

When a website promises “full fight video highlights” and offers so much less than that.

We present to you these headlines:

Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Full Fight Video Highlights.

UFC Fight Night: Hunt vs. Nelson Full Fight Video Highlights.

Video: Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Fight Video Highlights from UFC Fight Night 52.

Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Fight Video Highlights.

Watch the video we linked above and tell us those headlines are accurate.

(The video is so shitty the embed code wouldn’t even work in our CMS. So instead here’s a link to the video and a picture of a bro-hug. / Photo via Getty.)

You know what’s bullshit?

When a website promises “full fight video highlights” and offers so much less than that.

We present to you these headlines:

Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Full Fight Video Highlights.

UFC Fight Night: Hunt vs. Nelson Full Fight Video Highlights.

Video: Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Fight Video Highlights from UFC Fight Night 52.

Mark Hunt vs. Roy Nelson Fight Video Highlights.

Watch the video we linked above and tell us those headlines are accurate. Yeah they’re kind of accurate. Mark Hunt is in the video. Roy Nelson is in the video, too. There’s some face punching. Then some anchor is like “oh yeah and there was a knockout.” Umm, maybe SHOW US the knockout? Because if you don’t show us the end of the fight, it’s not really a video highlighting the “full fight,” is it? It’s a video without the most important part of the fight.

Look, we’re not upset about the SEO. We GET IT. As a mid-tier MMA blog that lacks press credentials, we understand the drive to generate clicks better than most. We’ve arguably done some questionable or sordid things for the almighty page view, but never anything quite this insulting. As we put it on Twitter last night, people crap on CagePotato for being sub-legit, but at least we never straight-up LIE to people.

The above headlines are pretty much lies.

Something like “Hunt vs. Nelson Full Fight Video Highlights: Not the Part You Care About, But Please Click Anyway,” would better describe the video in question.

We’d love to be rebellious show you the actual highlight of the fight via GIFs and Vines, but Zuffa’s lawyers are among our most avid readers. So instead we posted a link to the “full fight highlights” video at the top. It’s a video lacking the only part of the fight you really want to see: The knockout. You’ll have to order Fight Pass if you want to see the full thing. Or, you know, hunt down an illegal GIF somewhere on the Internet. I’m sure that’ll be really difficult to do…

Since we can’t show you a UFC knockout, how about we post an actual important highlight from Bellator 125‘s main event featuring Melvin Manhoef:

That’s what a highlight looks like, MMA media. Let’s stick to informing readers rather than blatantly misleading them for a few pathetic clicks.

Anthony Johnson Issues Apology but Maintains He’s Innocent of Domestic Violence

(Photo via Getty)

Anthony Johnson has responded to the recent allegations of domestic abuse.

After Bloody Elbow posted the story, Johnson apologized on his Facebook page and absolved himself of guilt. He wrote the following:

I want to apologize to everybody for my language yesterday. It really sux being accused of something I didn’t do. So plz forgive my reaction to the whole situation. My day will come that I can prove I’m innocent. Thank you for the support! Without the fans and my close friends/family I wouldn’t be able to function. I love you all….

In case you didn’t read the account of Johnson’s alleged abuse on Bloody Elbow, here’s the rundown:

(Photo via Getty)

Anthony Johnson has responded to the recent allegations of domestic abuse.

After Bloody Elbow posted the story, Johnson apologized on his Facebook page and absolved himself of guilt. He wrote the following:

In case you didn’t read the account of Johnson’s alleged abuse on Bloody Elbow, here’s the rundown:

Johnson allegedly hit is wife in 2012 and knocked out two of her teeth. More recently, his wife met with police. The police report claimed she was frightened of Johnson. She said she has had “several other verbal altercations” since the incident in 2012. She also believes she’s receiving threatening text messages from Johnson’s friends. Johnson’s wife also says she has a video of him hitting her.

We recommend you read the whole story here.

The UFC suspended Johnson indefinitely once the news broke.

“We are aware of the situation involving Anthony Johnson,” the UFC said. “As a result, we are suspending him indefinitely. We are using a third-party law firm to conduct a formal investigation and once we have more information, we’ll determine whether further course of action is necessary.

Johnson’s suspension is no surprise in light of the recent domestic abuse scandal that’s plagued the NFL (and even the UFC to a lesser extent with the firing, re-hiring, then re-firing of Thiago Silva).

If video surfaces of Anthony Johnson abusing his wife, it’s safe to say he’ll be out of the UFC for a long time. More updates on the story as we get them.

And Now He’s Retired (And Likely Blacklisted): Wanderlei Silva Retires and Buries the UFC

Wanderlei Silva has retired after a storied career in mixed martial arts.

It’s just a shame he had to do it after a drug test scandal and before he was set to appear in front of the NSAC.

What made it worse–or better depending on your perspective–is that Silva trashed the UFC in his 13-minute retirement video (which, by the way, he says “isn’t a goodbye,” for whatever that’s worth).

Here are some of his most poignant lines:

Wanderlei Silva has retired after a storied career in mixed martial arts dating back to 1996.

It’s just a shame he had to announce his retirement after a drug test scandal and before he was set to appear in front of the NSAC.

What made it worse–or better depending on your perspective–is that Silva trashed the UFC in his 13-minute retirement video.

Here are some of his most poignant lines (transcribed by MMAjunkie):

Unfortunately, this organization took away my desire to fight. I can’t do this anymore. With a heavy heart, I come here today to declare I am stepping down from the ring. After today, Wanderlei Silva will not fight again. My career is over because I don’t have a stage to perform where the athletes get the proper respect.

Fair enough. Let’s see what else he said:

They told me I had to fight on that date [at UFC 175] and offered me a bunch of money. They would pay me extra to fight on that date. So I asked myself, if they had the money, why didn’t they offer it to me before? They always hold on to the money, so they always underpay the athletes. But they do have the money. I said, ‘Sorry, but I won’t take this money because I won’t be in a condition to perform the way my fans expect of me.’ We had another meeting after that and they kept pressuring me. I said I could only fight at the end of the year. They opened their eyes wide: ‘Only at the end of the year?’ I was not in the physical condition to fight on the July card.

Then Silva went on a bit of a tangent. He cited the UFC’s treatment of Renan Barao at UFC 177 (read: not paying him a cent) as yet another reason he was upset. He said the UFC over-worked Barao and made him train every day for six months due to the way he was booked. He said they “bashed and mocked” Barao once his body collapsed after all the training. He also took issue with the fact that Dana White and “the media” allegedly called Barao a “kid” (which he’s right to complain about; it annoys the shit out of us too). Here’s some more of his rant:

This makes me angry and makes me look at the sport in a different way. They are taking away my desire to fight. I don’t feel like fighting anymore when I hear these statements. … That’s the minimum a fighter deserves. If you’re not going to give them money, you should at least give them respect. The few fighters who have a name are forced to fight all year long, because they want to make 50 events a year.

Furthermore, he charged the UFC of “wearing down the athletes” and that there was a terrible binary in the UFC: Accept every fight the UFC gives you, even if you’re hurt, or you’re “worthless” to the company. He said the UFC is making “rivers of money” while only giving “crumbs” to the athletes.

So, yeah. He’s definitely on Dana White’s shit-list now.

Silva makes some good points in his rant, but it’s all just a veneer. He ran from a drug test, and now he’s trying to run from any form of punishment. And burying the UFC during the video, while understandable, just seems like a cheap way to retire on some kind of non-existent moral high ground.

“I’m not retiring because of drug test reasons. I’m retiring because the UFC is EVIL!”

It’s unfortunate to see one of the greats go out like that. It’s even more unfortunate that the UFC will likely respond with erasing Silva from MMA history.

Silva retires with a 35-12-1 (1) record. Hopefully his legacy as one of MMA’s most aggressive and exciting fighters (as opposed to merely athletes) will survive the further ugliness that’s sure to come.

But even if it doesn’t, look on the bright side: When all of Silva’s fights are deleted from Fight Pass, you can still watch him wreck people in IVC.

Bellator 125 Live Blog – Main Card Results and Commentary

Bellator 125 can be summed up in two words: MELVIN. MANHOEF.

The feared Dutch striker/laughable Dutch grappler makes his return to the American MMA scene tonight in the main event of Bellator 125. He’ll face off against Bellator mainstay and respected striker Doug Marshall.

Other cool things about Bellator 125: Brian Rogers will be fighting Rafael Carvalho. Touted (though slightly derailed) prospect Goiti Yamauchi is up against Martin Stapleton. There’s also Javy Ayala fighting Raphael Butler in a heavyweight bout–which means it’ll either be awesome or terrible.

Keep hitting refresh once the card starts at 9:00 pm EST for updates!

Bellator 125 can be summed up in two words: MELVIN. MANHOEF.

Keep hitting refresh once the card starts at 9:00 pm EST for updates!

Martin Stapleton vs. Goiti Yamauchi

Round 1: Yamauchi paws with some jabs then throws a knee. Stapleton catches the knee and takes him down. Yamauchi is going for an omoplata right now and he might actually get it. Stapleton is defending it well so far. The omoplata is still going on, and then Yamauchi uses this to sweep Stapleton and now he has his back with a body triangle locked in. Yamauchi is trying for the rear naked choke but it seems to be too much on the chin. Stapleton slips out of the choke but Yamauchi still has his back. Yamauchi goes for another choke but this one is on the chin as well and Stapleton gets out. Stapleton gets his back to the mat and manages to get back to half guard. Yamauchi passes very quickly. As Stapleton tries to scramble away, he gets his back taken again. Yamauchi tries another rear naked choke and gets it this time! The fight is over.

Javy Ayala vs. Raphael Butler

Round 1: Butler gets rocked with a left hand immediately and then gets pressed up against the cage. I have a feeling we’ll be here for a while. Ayala lands some knees to the thighs. Ayala is cut bad, not sure what cut him because he didn’t really take many shots. Ayala literally picks up Butler, throws him to the ground, takes his back, and chokes him out with a rear naked choke. Imagine the least technical way for that sequence to happen and that’s what it looked like.

Brian Rogers vs. Rafael Carvalho

Doug Marshall vs. Melvin Manhoef.

Here are the results so far:

Main Card

Javy Ayala def. Raphael Butler via submission (rear naked choke), 1:03 of round 1.
Goiti Yamauchi def. Martin Stapleton via submission (rear naked choke), 4:37 of round 2.

Preliminary Card

Matt Ramirez def. Oscar Ramirez via submission (armbar), 0:42 of round 1. Chris Honeycutt def. Aaron Wilkinson via TKO (punches), 4:45 of round 2.
Julio Cesar Neves def. Poppies Martinez via TKO (strikes), 2:16 of round 1.
Jonny Bonilla-Bowman def. Art Becerra via split decision (28-29, 29-28, 29-28).
Jesse Juarez def. Ron Keslar via unanimous decision(29-28, 29-28, 29-28).
George Zuniga def. Granson Clark via TKO (punches), 0:34 of round 1.

Christy Mack Discusses Her Condition and Posts Photos of Her Healing Face

(Mack at a gala supporting victims of domestic abuse. / Photo via Getty)

There’s rarely any “good” new when discussing domestic violence. There’s only varying shades of terrible.

Today, we have a story that’s the least horrible thing we’ve had to write about the War Machine/Christy Mack saga. Mack posted an update on her Twitter account. She’s still in as rough shape as anyone could expect after being nearly killed, but is in much higher spirits and is starting to feel like herself again.

Get the full text of her update after the jump.

(Mack at a gala supporting victims of domestic abuse. / Photo via Getty)

There’s rarely any “good” new when discussing domestic violence. There’s only varying shades of terrible.

Here’s the full text of her update:

I’ve had several dentist visits to make eating more comfortable and make my smile look more normal. I still have a few more dental visits to go. I’ve had my eyes checked and made aware that I’m very lucky to have my vision where it is, since the muscle is tethered by the fragments from the blowout fracture in my left eye. My multiple nose fractures will be fixed in the next couple of months. While they’re fairly symmetrical, my nose is shifted on the inside and out causing breathing issues (I also make everyone feel how my bones stick out on the left side because it feels so weird). My top lip will regain movement in less than six months … looking forward to using straw again.

My liver seems to be alright. I was admitted back to the hospital shortly after I was released the first time for some minor treatment, but I did not have surgery. While my face is starting to look decent again from the swelling going down, it is still not my own. Cutting what was left of my hair off, and losing 15 pounds (which is a lot when you’re 5’1″) made me feel even further away from myself. It’s hard to look in the mirror every day and see someone you do not know.

After having make up done and dressing up for yesterday’s charity event, I feel much better about how I look now. It made me feel more normal and beautiful for the first time in a very long time. The event that I went to was for Face Forward. A non-profit charity that funds surgeries for women and children that have been in horrible situations that require them to have reconstructive surgery. They are not funding me, my surgeries are being donated by other doctors. I met many wonderful people and look forward to working more with them in the future.

She also posted pictures detailing the recovery process:

As we wrote earlier in the month, War Machine faces life in prison without the possibility of parole. Courts ordered him to be held without bail. He’ll return to court in October.