Frankie Edgar | UFC Betting Sites - The Best MMA Online Bookies

Ben Henderson Open to UFC Title Shot or Clay Guida – Then ‘Everybody’

Filed under: UFC, News

Ben Henderson isn’t the type to call someone out.

But he is, apparently, the type to call everyone out. Not yet 48 hours removed from what he called the biggest win of his career – and that includes winning and defending the WEC lightweight title – Henderson kept his options for what’s next wide ranging.

“I want to fight everybody,” Henderson told host Ariel Helwani on “The MMA Hour” on Tuesday. “Literally. I want to beat everybody on the 155-pound roster in the UFC. I want to smash everybody. I want everybody put on notice. I’m not coming for a belt. I’m coming to beat you.”

Henderson was a slight underdog Sunday against Jim Miller, who had built up the UFC’s longest winning streak outside champions Anderson Silva and Georges St-Pierre with seven straight victories. But after surviving some first-round submission attempts from Miller, Henderson turned on the heat and dominated the fight, even winning 30-26 on one judge’s scorecard.

UFC president Dana White had intimated that Miller was in line for the next title shot if he took out Henderson. With that scenario off the table after Sunday night, White and matchmaker Joe Silva have a decision on their hands, and Henderson could be at the heart of it.

The former WEC champ, who lost his title in December to Anthony Pettis after Pettis delivered his now-famous kick-off-the-cage to Henderson’s face, sees no reason why he shouldn’t’ get the next title shot after Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard rematch on Oct. 8.

“My job is to fight,” Henderson said. “I will say if Dana, Lorenzo (Fertitta), Sean (Shelby) and Joe give me a title shot, I will take it and I will have a great performance. But if it’s not a title shot, that’s fine too. Going against the No. 1 contender, after you have that sort of performance against the No. 1 contender, what else is there? Not a close decision, not squeak by … what’s the next logical step? There’s the winner of the title fight.”

Some of the other names in the lightweight division that have gotten traction are Clay Guida, Melvin Guillard and Donald Cerrone. Guillard has won five straight, but already has a fight booked against Joe Lauzon at UFC 136, the same night Edgar and Maynard rematch for Edgar’s belt. Cerrone just beat Charles Oliveira to see his streak reach five – three in the UFC after winning his last two WEC bouts. Guida is coming off a unanimous decision win over Pettis, who was the top contender until the Edgar-Maynard draw put him in a holding pattern that Guida spoiled.

Guillard, Guida and Cerrone are all members of the Greg Jackson camp and aren’t likely to fight each other any time soon. So the fight that has been mentioned the most is between Guida and Henderson, with the winner getting next crack at the belt.

“If you think about it, Guida beat the No. 1 contender in Pettis, and I beat Jim Miller who was No. 1 contender,” Henderson said. “So I guess it does make sense for him and I to match up. I have no problem with that. Guida, we know, will fight anyone. But why fight someone if you can get the next title shot? Why take an extra fight if you can get the title shot?”

Guida may be thinking the same thing – why fight Henderson, risk a loss and get sent to the back of the pack the way Henderson did to Miller and Guida did to Pettis? Which means that they’re both likely just waiting for the UFC to make a decision.

Tuesday, also on “The MMA Hour,” Henderson’s agent, Malki Kawa, said he sees no reason his client shouldn’t just be next in line. Though Henderson has only won two straight fights, both in the UFC, his only loss since 2007 came to Pettis in December, and it was a fight that likely was decided by Pettis’ kick in the final minute of the fight. Had Henderson won the fifth round, he would have walked away with a split decision win instead of a unanimous decision loss.

“I think he deserves a title shot,” Kawa said “My philosophy is, Jim MIller was the No. 1 contender. To me, (Henderson) beat up the outright No. 1 contender. He didn’t just beat the guy in a close fight – he dominated this guy. He separated himself from a lot of guys.”

Henderson said he prefers more time than most in between fights so he can actually find the areas he needs to improve and work on them. And thanks to some elbows to Miller’s head, he’ll be waiting on the results of an X-ray, too. If he is to get the next lightweight title shot, he’ll likely have plenty of time to wait. Assuming the winner of Edgar-Maynard comes out of that fight reasonably healthy, his first defense is not likely until early 2012 at the soonest.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

Filed under: UFC, News

Ben Henderson isn’t the type to call someone out.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

Wednesday Morning MMA Link Club

(Deja vu all over again all over again: Frankie and Gray strike a familiar pose at the UFC 136 press conference. Photo via MMAMania)

Some selected highlights from our friends around the MMA blogosphere. E-mail [email protected] for details on how your site can join the MMA Link Club…

– Nate Marquardt Calls BJ Penn a Cry Baby Idiot Pothead (BleacherReport.com/MMA)

– ‘UFC 136: Edgar vs Maynard 3’ Conference Call Highlights (MMA Mania)

– Shawn Tompkins’ Sudden Death Leaves ‘Huge Void’ in Las Vegas Fight Scene (MMA Fighting)

– ‘UFC Undisputed 3’ Gameplay Trailer (LowKick)

– Fight Nerd Cinema: South Korea’s ‘Champion’ Movie Review (TheFightNerd)

– Underrated Joseph Benavidez Awaits Another Shot (NBC Sports MMA)

– Dana White: Yushin Okami is Best Fighter to Ever Come From Japan (5thRound)

– Start This Morning Off by Watching Skinny Kids Get Beat up by Alistair Overeem (MiddleEasy)

– Jon Fitch Cleared for Competition, UFC 139 Match Against Hendricks Rumored (Five Ounces of Pain)

– David Williams: A Statistical Look at Fedor Emelianenko’s Place in MMA History (FightOpinion)

– Brazilian Reporter Gifts Chael Sonnen a Brazilian Flag (MMA Convert)

– CNN to Air Replays of ‘Mayweather-Ortiz 24/7’ (MMA Payout)

(Deja vu all over again all over again: Frankie and Gray strike a familiar pose at the UFC 136 press conference. Photo via MMAMania)

Some selected highlights from our friends around the MMA blogosphere. E-mail [email protected] for details on how your site can join the MMA Link Club…

– Nate Marquardt Calls BJ Penn a Cry Baby Idiot Pothead (BleacherReport.com/MMA)

– ‘UFC 136: Edgar vs Maynard 3′ Conference Call Highlights (MMA Mania)

– Shawn Tompkins’ Sudden Death Leaves ‘Huge Void’ in Las Vegas Fight Scene (MMA Fighting)

– ‘UFC Undisputed 3′ Gameplay Trailer (LowKick)

– Fight Nerd Cinema: South Korea’s ‘Champion’ Movie Review (TheFightNerd)

– Underrated Joseph Benavidez Awaits Another Shot (NBC Sports MMA)

– Dana White: Yushin Okami is Best Fighter to Ever Come From Japan (5thRound)

– Start This Morning Off by Watching Skinny Kids Get Beat up by Alistair Overeem (MiddleEasy)

– Jon Fitch Cleared for Competition, UFC 139 Match Against Hendricks Rumored (Five Ounces of Pain)

– David Williams: A Statistical Look at Fedor Emelianenko’s Place in MMA History (FightOpinion)

– Brazilian Reporter Gifts Chael Sonnen a Brazilian Flag (MMA Convert)

– CNN to Air Replays of ‘Mayweather-Ortiz 24/7′ (MMA Payout)

UFC 136 Press Conference Video

Filed under: UFCTwo UFC champions will be on hand at the UFC 136 press conference on Tuesday, and we’ll have the live video right here at MMAFighting.com.

With UFC 136 less than two months away, UFC lightweight champion Frank Edgar, UFC featherweight …

Filed under: UFC

Two UFC champions will be on hand at the UFC 136 press conference on Tuesday, and we’ll have the live video right here at MMAFighting.com.

With UFC 136 less than two months away, UFC lightweight champion Frank Edgar, UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo, along with Gray Maynard, Kenny Florian and UFC president Dana White, will take part in the press conference at the Toyota Center.

The press conference begins at 2 p.m. ET and the video is below.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

MMA Top 10 Lightweights: Who Deserves the Next Shot?

Filed under: DREAM, UFC, Strikeforce, Bellator, Rankings, LightweightsThe UFC’s lightweight division is such a shark tank that it’s incredible that Jim Miller won seven fights in a row against 155-pounders in the Octagon, and won all of them convincing…

Filed under: DREAM, UFC, Strikeforce, Bellator, Rankings, Lightweights

The UFC‘s lightweight division is such a shark tank that it’s incredible that Jim Miller won seven fights in a row against 155-pounders in the Octagon, and won all of them convincingly. Even if you’re not fighting the cream of the crop, you’re going to run into trouble at some point when you’re fighting UFC lightweights.

Trouble is just what Miller ran into at UFC on Versus 5, when Ben Henderson hammered him for three rounds on the way to a unanimous decision victory. The Henderson fight was Miller’s chance to earn the next shot at the lightweight title, but instead he gets dropped in the rankings, and it’s back to the drawing board for the UFC, which needs to figure out who’s next for the winner of the upcoming Frankie Edgar-Gray Maynard fight.

So who will it be? We take a look at some of the contenders as we rank the Top 10 lightweights in MMA below.

Top 10 Lightweights in Mixed Martial Arts

(Editor’s Note: The fighter’s rankings the last time we ranked the lightweights are in parentheses.)

1. Frankie Edgar (1): The lightweight champion defends his title against Gray Maynard at UFC 136, and one way or the other, we can all hope for a decisive ending so that some new blood can fight for the lightweight strap.

2. Gray Maynard (2): One of the frustrating things about the lightweight division is that we’re going to go two full years with only three men competing for the belt: First Edgar beat B.J. Penn, then he beat Penn in the rematch, then Maynard and Edgar fought to a draw, and now they’re preparing for a rematch. There’s a long line of good lightweights waiting for a title shot.

3. Gilbert Melendez (3): Unfortunately for Melendez, he’s still stuck with Strikeforce, defending his belt against Jorge Masvidal next. Masvidal is a fine fighter, but he’s a step down for Melendez. The sooner Melendez is in the UFC, the better.

4. Clay Guida (6): Edgar, Maynard and Melendez are pretty well established as the Top 3 in the world, but watching the Ben Henderson-Jim Miller fight had me re-assessing the rest of the lightweight division, which is a big jumble of good fighters who are hard to separate from each other. I settled on Guida as the next-best of the bunch because of his current four-fight winning streak, in which he has looked particularly dominant, and especially for his impressive win over Anthony Pettis, who in turn had an impressive win over Henderson. If Kenny Florian or Diego Sanchez were still in the lightweight division, I’d rank either one of them ahead of Guida, as they both beat Guida before his current four-fight streak began. But as it is, I have Guida next in line at lightweight, and probably next in line for a title fight.

5. Anthony Pettis (9): The further we get into the world of the post-UFC-WEC merger, the more impressive it seems that Pettis was the WEC’s lightweight champion. When Pettis beat Henderson to win the WEC lightweight belt, we didn’t know that Henderson was capable of beating a Top 10 UFC lightweight like Miller. Now that we do know, it’s reasonable to re-assess Pettis’s standing in the lightweight division, and that’s what I’ve done in moving him into the Top 5.

6. Ben Henderson (NR): The best thing about Henderson as a fighter? His physical strength, especially in his lower body. He uses those tree trunk thighs to drive right through his opponents, and he completely overpowered Miller — something no one has ever done before.

7. Shinya Aoki (4): Aoki is going to have a tough time staying up high in the lightweight rankings if he doesn’t start beating higher-quality competition. The two guys he’s beaten this year, Rich Clementi and Lyle Beerbohm, are fine, but they’re nowhere near the level of opponents he’d be fighting in the UFC. I still think Aoki is a Top 10 lightweight, but I wish I could see him prove it in the Octagon.

8. Melvin Guillard (8): Guillard is currently on a five-fight winning streak, and if he makes it six in a row against Joe Lauzon at UFC 136, he’d have a good chance of earning the next shot at the Edgar-Maynard winner. It’s hard to believe now that Guillard was once viewed as an example of a guy who had thrown away his talent: Now he’s 7-1 since making his UFC return three years ago, and on the verge of a title fight.

9. Jim Miller (5): Miller is a great jiu jitsu practitioner who’s always looking for a submission, but what he found against Henderson is that he just wasn’t strong enough to deal with a bigger man pounding away at him from the top. He might want to consider a move to featherweight.

10. Eddie Alvarez (7): The longer Alvarez goes without fighting significant competition, the harder it’s going to be for him to stay in the lightweight Top 10. Alvarez is 7-0 since signing with Bellator, which is impressive, but none of his seven opponents is even close to the Top 10. And the last time he did face a Top 10 opponent, Shinya Aoki, he was submitted in 92 seconds. I’d love to see Bellator put Alvarez in the cage with someone who can really let him prove that he’s one of the MMA elite, but the reality is that won’t happen any time soon.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

UFC on Versus 5 Results: Ranking the Top 10 UFC Lightweights

Eight months ago, the lightweight division seemed to be overflowing with top contenders ready for a shot at the title.Now that UFC on Versus 5 over, the title picture looks a little more clearer with two exciting crossovers from the WEC now looking for…

Eight months ago, the lightweight division seemed to be overflowing with top contenders ready for a shot at the title.

Now that UFC on Versus 5 over, the title picture looks a little more clearer with two exciting crossovers from the WEC now looking for a shot at the belt.

Last night, Donald Cerrone made a huge impression on the lightweight division, knocking out rising prospect Charles Oliveira three minutes into the first round. Former WEC champion Ben Henderson also looked great, ending Jim Miller’s seven fight win streak.

As all eyes now turn to Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard’s rematch in October as the excitement only continues in the stacked lightweight division.

Here’s how the last night’s winners stack up against the top 10 lightweights in the UFC.

Begin Slideshow

Ben Henderson, Donald Cerrone Ponder Top UFC Lightweight Contender

Filed under: UFC, NewsMILWAUKEE – It all could have been so simple. Then Ben Henderson went and messed everything up.

The former WEC lightweight champ won his second straight in the UFC, dispatching Jim Miller – one of the most vocal critics of the W…

Filed under: UFC, News

MILWAUKEE – It all could have been so simple. Then Ben Henderson went and messed everything up.

The former WEC lightweight champ won his second straight in the UFC, dispatching Jim Miller – one of the most vocal critics of the WEC’s lightweights at the time of the merger with the UFC – with relative ease on Sunday night.

But Henderson’s win over Miller in the co-main event of UFC on Versus 5 did more than just make a statement about the quality of the former WEC 155-pounders. (Donald Cerrone shared the victory stage with Henderson after improving to 3-0 in the UFC in 2011.) It eliminated Miller and his seven-fighting winning streak, which would have reached eight had he beaten Henderson, as the easy choice for the next No. 1 contender in the UFC’s lightweight division.

Instead of a clear-cut top pick to face the October winner of the Frankie Edgar-Gray Maynard rematch, there’s a tight pack at the top – including Henderson and Cerrone. But Henderson, for the most part, said he would leave that top contender decision in the hands of the UFC and let his win over Miller do the talking for him.

“I just want to make sure I get my hand raised and I’ll do my talking inside the cage,” Henderson said. “But what do you guys think? (I beat) the No. 1 contender, and that kind of a performance? You tell me. What does Dana (White) think? What does Joe Silva think? What does Sean Shelby think?”

Henderson told MMA Fighting at the post-fight press conference he believes there are several fighters clamoring to get the shot now that Miller has to go back to Square One, including Cerrone and his teammates at Greg Jackson’s camp in Albuquerque, N.M.

“Jackson’s camp has some tough 155-pounders,” Henderson said. “I think the top guys are (Clay) Guida, (Melvin) Guillard, probably myself. But whoever. Whatever.”

Cerrone took a quick shot at Miller’s criticism of the WEC lightweights before saying he believes Henderson should be next in line for his domination over the previous presumed top contender.

“We’re not the little brother, right? I think the little brother just beat up the big brother. It feels good for the WEC boys to be back on Versus making it happen,” Cerrone said. “I think Ben is next – unless he wants to fight me. That would be the only other thing.”

A Cerrone-Henderson matchup next would not be out of the question, though the UFC might not want to pair up two of its newest stars-in-the-making so soon. Henderson and Cerrone have fought twice before, each time with the WEC’s lightweight belt on the line. Cerrone’s last two losses have come at the hands of Henderson – once by decision for the interim title, and once by guillotine in their rematch.

Cerrone saw his winning streak hit five with a quick and dominant TKO against Charles Oliveira, one of the UFC’s most highly touted young talents. His five straight wins now stand right next to Guillard’s five straight, though two of Cerrone’s came to close out his WEC career.

Guida has four straight wins, including an upset of former WEC lightweight champ Anthony Pettis in June. Other fighters with four straight in the division include Nik Lentz and Jacob Volkmann, though neither have been as high profile as Guida.

Guillard is scheduled to fight Joe Lauzon at UFC 136 on Oct. 8 in Houston, the same night as the Edgar-Maynard rematch. Guida does not yet have his next fight scheduled.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments