(Admire it, Potato Nation. Admire it like a beautiful April morning.)
Alexander will be taking on fellow UFC washout Gilbert Yvel, who made the drop to light heavyweight in his last bout and scored a first round submission via strikes win over Damian Dantibo. The victory was his first since dropping three straight to Junior Dos Santos, Ben Rothwell, and John Madsen in his short lived UFC run. We managed to find a video of the fight and added it below. Warning: turn down your speakers.
(Admire it, Potato Nation. Admire it like a beautiful April morning.)
Alexander will be taking on fellow UFC washout Gilbert Yvel, who made the drop to light heavyweight in his last bout and scored a first round submission via strikes win over Damian Dantibo. The victory was his first since dropping three straight to Junior Dos Santos, Ben Rothwell, and John Madsen in his short lived UFC run. We managed to find a video of the fight and added it below. Warning: turn down your speakers.
*Checks ear piece* I am being told that the above video is not from Gilbert Yvel’s most recent fight, but is in fact a video of a 2004 fight in which he KO’d a referee. My apologies. HERE is Yvel’s light heavyweight debut.
In retrospect, those two videos were actually quite similar.
Perhaps we’re in the minority here, but we are really looking forward to this one, if only because it is the kind of fight that has a 90% chance of ending via uber violent KO. Who you got for this one, Potato Nation?
To be certain, Gilbert Yvel, a mixed martial artist with more than 50 professional matches on his resume, isn’t the type of man to back down from a fight. While Yvel has made a living off the fight game for more than a decade, the former UFC heav…
To be certain, Gilbert Yvel, a mixed martial artist with more than 50 professional matches on his resume, isn’t the type of man to back down from a fight.
While Yvel has made a living off the fight game for more than a decade, the former UFC heavyweight contender insists that he has been a fighter since well before he ever entered a ring.
“I got into a lot of fights in my younger years,” Yvel said with a laugh. “I realized that I was born to fight when I was in my mama’s belly—I was boxing and kicking [laughs]. When I walked out of there, I was fighting the nurses—I was fighting everybody. I was born to fight.”
Some 15 years ago, Yvel discovered mixed martial arts and, since that fateful day, is yet to look back.
Since making his professional debut in early-1997, Yvel has registered 36 professional victories—including wins over Semmy Schilt, Gary Goodridge, Cheick Kongo, and Pedro Rizzo—and is regarded by many as one of the most exciting heavyweights in the sport.
After being signed by the UFC in late-2009, Yvel subsequently lost his first three—and at this point his only three—matches in the Octagon, a fact that doesn’t sit well with “The Hurricane.”
“Everyone loses, but losses are very tough to deal with in this sport,” Yvel said. “I hate to lose—I seriously hate to lose. I wasn’t made to lose, so I can’t believe that I lost three in a row.”
After his most recent match—a first-round loss to Jon Madsen at UFC 121—Yvel, citing personal reasons he prefers not to discuss, took a brief hiatus from professional competition. It didn’t take too long, however, for Yvel to return to the gym.
“I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my life. I didn’t really do anything during my time off from the sport,” Yvel said with a laugh. “I sat on the couch playing video games and watching movies until I got the urge to go to the gym again.”
“I was done with it for a moment. It’s hard to explain, but fighting is my life. I started to itch, again. I can’t sit on the couch all day—I mean, it’s pretty good to sit on the couch all day—but I just love going into the gym, sparring, and beating people up. That’s what I love. I realized that fighting is what I want to do,” Yvel said. “Fighting is what I do. This is my passion and I love it.”
Since returning to his academy, Yvel’s passion for mixed martial arts has been re-ignited and, after dropping over 30 pounds from his heavyweight-frame, is eyeing a run as a light-heavyweight.
“I’ve done a lot of cardio, I’m eating healthy. I’m down to 230. In two weeks I’ll be down to 220 and then I hope to get to 215 and, from there, cut down to 205 and destroy all of the light-heavyweights,” Yvel said. “I’m very excited to get back to action.”
Moving forward, Yvel has his sights set on making a serious run in the UFC’s light-heavyweight division—a prospect that only excites the 35 year old mixed martial artist.
“This will be the best Gilbert Yvel that people have ever seen,” said Yvel, who claimed he was tentatively scheduled to fight a yet-to-be-determined opponent in early-December. “I’ve got a few more good years in me and I want to go out with a bang. I want to be back in the UFC. I want the opportunity to show the world what’s up.”
“A UFC championship would be the best thing ever,” Yvel said. “I would cry—I would definitely shed a lot of tears. I would cry like a little girl. I watch these guys on TV and they cry when they win and I’m like, ‘C’mon, man,’ but I would cry like a little baby.”
Regardless of what he accomplishes in the sport—Yvel half-joked that he would be more than happy with earning fifty million dollars in mixed martial arts pay days—the fact that “The Hurricane” is back in the game at all is enough to satisfy the former Pride FC heavyweight at this point.
“I can’t look back on my career in five or 10 years and think that I didn’t give it everything that I had. I can still do way more,” Yvel said from his home in Las Vegas, Nevada. “If I wasn’t going to come back to the sport, I would always be wondering, ‘What if I did that?’ or ‘What if I did this?’ I need to do it right now and then in five or 10 years look back on my career and smile and be happy.”
You might know Tony “Kryptonite” Lopez from MTV’s Bully Beatdown show, hosted by Jason “Mayhem” Miller. Or, you might know him for the work he has done inside of the MMA ring. Regardless of how you know him, Tony Lopez is stepping up to the plate and f…
You might know Tony “Kryptonite” Lopez from MTV’s Bully Beatdown show, hosted by Jason “Mayhem” Miller. Or, you might know him for the work he has done inside of the MMA ring.
Regardless of how you know him, Tony Lopez is stepping up to the plate and fighting an amazing three times in only a 15-day span. To think, this is an era where the majority of fighters compete only three times in a single year and Lopez is attempting this feat in just barely over two weeks.
Now, you might be thinking to yourself that he must be fighting some really unknown fighters, but that is where you are mistaken. All but one of his opponents are widely known to the majority of MMA fans while the combined record for his three opponents is 92-29. If Lopez is successful against all three, he could land a contract from a major MMA organization.
For those of you who do not know Tony Lopez, he is a veteran of the sport and was the “King of the Cage” Heavyweight and Light-Heavyweight Champion. Lopez has the rare distinction of holding both titles simultaneously while going on a remarkable 16 fight win streak.
Lopez has a record of 24-7, beating fighters such as Kyle Kingsbury and Joey Beltran along his journey as a mixed martial arts fighter.
Here is a look at the fighters that Tony Lopez will be facing in his 15-day stretch.
Filed under: UFC, FanHouse ExclusiveUFC heavyweight Ben Rothwell and Andrei Arlovski aren’t friends, exactly. Not in the strictest sense of the word. They spent a little over ten minutes in the ring together back in July of 2008. Since then the two hea…
UFC heavyweight Ben Rothwell and Andrei Arlovski aren’t friends, exactly. Not in the strictest sense of the word. They spent a little over ten minutes in the ring together back in July of 2008. Since then the two heavyweights haven’t talked much.
Still, Rothwell said, it was a strange feeling watching the latest stop on Arlovski’s precipitous decline last Saturday night. Watching his former foe laid out on the canvas after getting knocked out by Sergei Kharitonov in the first round of the Strikeforce Grand Prix, he felt sick to his stomach, though he’s not entirely sure why.
“Seeing him knocked out like that, it makes me feel bad,” Rothwell said. “I couldn’t even be like, hey, awesome knockout. It’s like seeing that happen to a friend, and I don’t even know Andrei all that well. I just know him from when we fought, and before he was really cool to me and after he was really cool to me. I haven’t really talked to him since, so I don’t know why I feel that way, but you just have that kind of connection with someone you fought a war with. I don’t want to see him like that.”
Filed under: UFC, NewsNo matter the sport, the great ones always seem to hold on a bit too long. Emmitt Smith closed out his football career as a struggling tailback for the Arizona Cardinals, Babe Ruth hit .181 in his last year for the Boston Braves a…
No matter the sport, the great ones always seem to hold on a bit too long. Emmitt Smith closed out his football career as a struggling tailback for the Arizona Cardinals, Babe Ruth hit .181 in his last year for the Boston Braves and Michael Jordan clanged jumpers off the iron for the lowly Washington Wizards.
The last memory of Chuck Liddell in the Octagon is also likely to be a sight that most fans would rather not remember. After a spirited round in which he showed more variety to his offense than he’s shown in years, it all came crashing down around the legend. Despite his newfound diet and his hard work, the lasting image of Liddell from UFC 115 was like the few that had come in the fights directly before it: Liddell falling backwards, his head bouncing backwards to the mat as he fell unconscious. This time the punch came from Rich Franklin, putting a close on the event, and likely Liddell’s career.
Asked if it was the end for the UFC Hall of Famer, UFC President Dana White answered directly.
Filed under: UFCThis is the UFC 115 live blog for Ben Rothwell vs. Gilbert Yvel, a heavyweight bout on tonight’s pay-per-view from the General Motors Place in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
Rothwell (30-7) and Yvel (36-14-1) are both looking for their first U…
This is the UFC 115 live blog for Ben Rothwell vs. Gilbert Yvel, a heavyweight bout on tonight’s pay-per-view from the General Motors Place in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
Rothwell (30-7) and Yvel (36-14-1) are both looking for their first UFC victory in their second UFC fight. Yvel lost by first-round TKO to Junior dos Santos at UFC 108 in January. Rothwell lost to Cain Velasquez at UFC 104 last October.
To be certain, Gilbert Yvel, a mixed martial artist with more than 50 professional matches on his resume, isn’t the type of man to back down from a fight.
UFC heavyweight 
No matter the sport, the great ones always seem to hold on a bit too long. Emmitt Smith closed out his football career as a struggling tailback for the Arizona Cardinals, Babe Ruth hit .181 in his last year for the Boston Braves and Michael Jordan clanged jumpers off the iron for the lowly Washington Wizards.
This is the