Despite his one-minute loss to Junior dos Santos last November, Cain Velasquez remains one of the best heavyweights in the world.Actually, I’d say he’s the best overall heavyweight in the world, despite no longer holding the title. After all, anybody c…
Despite his one-minute loss to Junior dos Santos last November, Cain Velasquez remains one of the best heavyweights in the world.
Actually, I’d say he’s the best overall heavyweight in the world, despite no longer holding the title. After all, anybody can get clipped with the kind of punch Velasquez did. The loss doesn’t diminish his skills in the slightest.
I’m a realist. I knew I wasn’t going to go through my career undefeated. That’s how this sport is. People lose. Even the best guys lose. I knew as soon as it was over, I had to pick myself back up and keep going forward. I do have some extra motivation now, for sure, but I wish that for that night things had gone differently and that the fans had gotten the fight they came to see.
That’s a smart line of thinking for any fighter in the game. The level of talent in the game today far surpasses, at least from an overall sense, the kind of heavyweight talent that existed back when Fedor Emelianenko was running up his undefeated record. You can be a dominant heavyweight and still run into someone with the power to put you on your back with an errant punch behind your ear.
Velasquez still has the best wrestling pedigree in the UFC’s heavyweight division, at least until Daniel Cormier makes his way over from Strikeforce. He also has brutal punching power, speed and a gas tank that will enable him to fight forever without getting tired.
I have a feeling Frank Mir‘s going to find this out the hard way when he faces off with Velasquez at UFC 146 in May.
Close your eyes and picture a professional fighter. What do you see? Jacked muscles? Cauliflower ears? A scowling leathery face that has been hardened from years of eating punches? While no two fighters look the same, there is a bit of a mold that thes…
Close your eyes and picture a professional fighter. What do you see? Jacked muscles? Cauliflower ears? A scowling leathery face that has been hardened from years of eating punches? While no two fighters look the same, there is a bit of a mold that these guys seem to step out of.
This is a list of 10 professional fighters who don’t fit the standard mold. Be it their generally chipper demeanor or their less-than-chiseled physique, but if you had never seen a lot of these guys in action before, you would never guess that they cause pain for a living. These are athletes who, if you encountered in a bar, you might actually feel as if you could kick their ass. If you didn’t know better, these professional punishment providers could pass as tax attorneys, eye doctors or the opening act for Larry The Cable Guy.
Just for fun, I’ve decided to throw in some Hollywood Casting Agent magic. If these fighters went to a casting agency, looking for work in film, their appearance would greatly determine what role they landed. I’ve taken a guess at which part some of these fighters would receive.
I remember clearly the first time I ever met James Toney.I was in Boston to cover UFC 118, and Toney was facing Randy Couture in his first (and only, it turns out) fight in the UFC.We went down to the convention center for open workouts on Wednesday. W…
I remember clearly the first time I ever met James Toney.
I was in Boston to cover UFC 118, and Toney was facing Randy Couture in his first (and only, it turns out) fight in the UFC.
We went down to the convention center for open workouts on Wednesday. Workouts are usually held at at a gym or even a hotel, depending on the size of the event in question. Six or eight of the main-card fighters gather and pretend to be enthused by hitting pads so that the photographers in attendance can take their photos, while the reporters wait for them to finish up with the routine so we can ask them questions.
Workouts this time were held at the same place as the Boston Fan Expo, right there in the Octagon that you see if you’re a fan walking around on the weekend. It was a nice setup.
And luckily Toney was in a fantastic mood. Which is to say that he was not in a fantastic mood.
After witnessing him verbally berate and threaten Ariel Helwani—which you can see on Ariel’s interview with Toney—I asked one of his crew members if I could get a few minutes of his time. I didn’t even really want to put Toney on camera. Just a few simple questions, spoken into a tape recorder.
James was standing behind the crew member. After I asked the question, he leaned around and said, in that charming English-but-not-English way of his, that I could kindly go jump off a bridge. Only he didn’t say those words, and he didn’t do it kindly.
I say all of this to make a point: When James Toney says stupid things, we shouldn’t be surprised. He’s a scary, imbalanced and possibly mentally insane individual. I hope Rampage Jackson considers this when he hears what Toney has to say about him these days:
That’s what you get for being a slave to the white man. Don’t be scared. Step up and speak for yourself. That’s why I got paid the million-and-a-half dollars and am still getting paid by the UFC. You know what I’m sayin’? The highest paid fighter ever. You feel me, fat boy? Me. And you been there…what, twenty years and you’re getting paid pennies? While I make millions?
Let’s run Toney’s statements through the Truth Machine, shall we?
1. James Toney did not get paid a million-and-a-half dollars by the UFC. He was paid $500,000. Perhaps he got confused and was off by a mere million dollars. Who knows.
2. The only payments Toney still gets from the UFC are royalties from the sales of UFC 118 and other disc sets where his fight is included. These don’t amount to much.
3. James Toney is not the highest-paid fighter ever. I’d wager that he wasn’t even the highest-paid fighter on that card, because I guarantee you that Randy Couture made much, much more than his reported $250,000 due to the way he dispatched and embarrassed Toney.
I love Toney just as much as the next guy. He’s fun to listen to because he’s absolutely insane and you never quite know what he says. But let’s be sure and not take things like this seriously.
Hard to believe we’re already rounding the quarter pole of 2012. And here I sit; still haven’t finished the novel, still haven’t gone sky diving, still haven’t taken the Forrest Gump tour. Box of chocolates, Forrest? How about a box of disappointments?…
Hard to believe we’re already rounding the quarter pole of 2012. And here I sit; still haven’t finished the novel, still haven’t gone sky diving, still haven’t taken the Forrest Gump tour. Box of chocolates, Forrest? How about a box of disappointments?
One thing I have been able to accomplish, though, is watch a lot of MMA. And now I present a list of the 20 best MMA moments of the year, 25 percent of the way through 2012.
A year ago Zuffa LLC dropped an absolute bomb on the MMA world: they were buying Strikeforce, the biggest competitor to their crown jewel, the UFC. No one saw it coming, and aside from some underwhelming explanations about competition and others trying…
A year ago ZuffaLLC dropped an absolute bomb on the MMA world: they were buying Strikeforce, the biggest competitor to their crown jewel, the UFC.
No one saw it coming, and aside from some underwhelming explanations about competition and others trying to move in and buy the promotion, there was never a huge amount of reasoning given for the purchase.
It more or less amounted to “we do MMA, we wanted Strikeforce, we bought it.” People in the know likely understand that attitude to greater depths than the average fan sitting on his couch, but at this stage of the game it matters far less than it did a year ago.
Zuffa owns Strikeforce. That’s where we are.
But where are they? It’s impossible to know for sure, but the hints are there to suggest that they’d rather not own Strikeforce, but it’s the hand they’ve been dealt (dealt to themselves?) and it’s the one they’re going to play.
The relationship with Showtime, broadcaster of Strikeforce, was incredibly rocky from Zuffa’s perspective. When they made the purchase, Dana White openly hated the suits running the cable subscriber and wasn’t shy about sharing it. It was getting better for a while, but White wanted more control of production and Showtime wanted him at arm’s length.
That’s not a bad thing, because it’s inevitable the charge would be to move Strikeforce closer to the UFC in terms of look and feel, and that’s not a good idea for a promotion that is still—at least technically—standing on its own two feet.
Still, it’s a headache that White and his Zuffa partners didn’t need. They’ve got the UFC to run, right in the middle of it’s biggest year since 2005, no less.
There have been other headaches as well, some far greater than the given example.
The Strikeforce Grand Prix was a veritable circus of the occult, with guys leaving mid-tournament to join the UFC, falling to injury or being completely debunked as the stars people thought they were.
A messy, hostile debate with Golden Glory Fight Team led to some of the more marketable stars in both Strikeforce and the UFC being released. Alistair Overeem and MarloesCoenen were the biggest names on the chopping block, and Overeem only rejoined Zuffa after leaving his team. Coenen is still without meaningful work and hasn’t fought since.
It all stemmed from Strikeforce, and while it wasn’t the biggest issue in MMA history, it was a headache that otherwise would have been avoided.
It’s not all bad, however. Perhaps important enough to trump the consistent, minor pains caused by running Strikeforce, is the influx of talent to the UFC from it’s adopted sister.
Overeem and Fabricio Werdum led a charge of heavyweights jumping ship, while Nick Diaz did the same at welterweight. It’s expected that Josh Barnett and Daniel Cormier will be en route soon as well, which will only pad the heavyweight class further.
However, even that ability to move guys back and forth may be cause for headaches. Many have asked why Diaz or this collection of heavyweights have made the jump, while guys like Gil Melendez and Tim Kennedy are left jonesing for regular fights in the stripped down Strikeforce.
There’s tremendous pressure from fans, a lack of viable options for matchmaking with the top-end talent of Strikeforce, and no one wants to leave the UFC to go over there and fight in an event they likely see as second rate.
Again with the headaches.
There’s no question that the Strikeforce acquisition has provided plenty of problems for Zuffa. Probably more than they even expected. Looking at some of the more prominent issues here—only listing what we know of, and even then it’s not the whole list—it’s clear there are many days Dana and the Fertittas wish they’d just let someone else take the thing.
But you know what? That doesn’t make it a mistake.
The whole goal when Zuffa bought the UFC was to create a global sport, a brand where all of the best martial artists in the world are in one place. With that goal as a sole focus, there’s no way purchasing Strikeforce can qualify as a mistake, because the purchase brought them a huge step closer to making that dream a reality.
Nobody said it was easy, and nobody needed to. Zuffa knows better than anyone how tough the MMA business is. Problems and concerns be damned, there’s no one in the world better equipped to make it work with Strikeforce.
For anyone else, by now the purchase would have been confirmed as a mistake. For Zuffa, it’s just one more mountain to climb.
Jon “Bones” Jones burst on to the MMA scene in April of 2008, and henceforth has wrecked shop on the light heavyweight division. At 23, he became the youngest ever UFC champion when he destroyed Mauricio “Shogun” Rua at UFC 128,…
Jon “Bones” Jones burst on to the MMA scene in April of 2008, and henceforth has wrecked shop on the light heavyweight division. At 23, he became the youngest ever UFC champion when he destroyed Mauricio “Shogun” Rua at UFC 128, and he hasn’t looked back since.
He presently has the prestige of No. 3 ranked fighter in the MMA stratosphere, and is fast closing in on long-time reigning pound-for-pound kings Anderson “The Spider” Silva and welterweight titlist Georges “Rush” St-Pierre.
That said, with age and time (to hone his skill set) on his side, he now has the opportunity to surpass the aforementioned combatants and go down in MMA folklore as the greatest of all-time.
However, there are a number of things he has to accomplish before he can reach that lofty height.
Despite his one-minute loss to Junior dos Santos last November, Cain Velasquez remains one of the best heavyweights in the world.