Before the fight, Jamie Varner told MMAFighting.com, “I know this guy is a very, very beatable guy. I’m bigger, I’m faster, I’m better in every position. I’m not too worried about what he brings to the table. If I go in there and perform to even half what I’m capable of, I should walk away with the W.” As you can see from the fight video, Jamie Varner was actually being pretty humble while assessing his opponent’s skills. After putting up nothing resembling a fight, Jolly was taken down and knocked out by the first punches that Varner landed.
It’s good to have you back, Jamie- even if most fans hadn’t even noticed that you left.
Before the fight, Jamie Varner told MMAFighting.com, “I know this guy is a very, very beatable guy. I’m bigger, I’m faster, I’m better in every position. I’m not too worried about what he brings to the table. If I go in there and perform to even half what I’m capable of, I should walk away with the W.” As you can see from the fight video, Jamie Varner was actually being pretty humble while assessing his opponent’s skills. After putting up nothing resembling a fight, Jolly was taken down and knocked out by the first punches that Varner landed.
It’s good to have you back, Jamie- even if most fans hadn’t even noticed that you left.
In other action, Paul Daley followed up on his impressive pre-fight trolling of the MMA media with a less impressive unanimous decision victory over fellow UFC castoff Luigi “The Italian Tank” Fioravanti at last night’s Ringside MMA 12. Daley had Fioravanti in trouble numerous times during the fight, but was unable to finish the American Top Team prospect. Daley told fans after the fight that he planned on taking some time away from competition. Considering that he’s fought seven times in the past year, I can’t exactly say I blame him.
So what impressed you the most last night? Varner’s quick thrashing of a local prospect? Daley’s victory against a competent opponent? Varner’s haircut? Daley’s troll job? Or perhaps it’s just the amount of questions I crammed into this paragraph.
Filed under: HDNetJust four weeks after announcing his retirement from mixed martial arts following a disappointing loss, Jamie Varner returned to the cage on Friday night and won a first-round knockout victory over Nate Jolly.
Just four weeks after announcing his retirement from mixed martial arts following a disappointing loss, Jamie Varner returned to the cage on Friday night and won a first-round knockout victory over Nate Jolly.
The fight lasted just 1 minute, 10 seconds, and it was a mismatch: The fighters clinched, Varner used a trip-takedown to get on top of Jolly on the ground, then he simply unloaded a barrage of punches that knocked Jolly out. Jolly barely put up a fight.
Varner credited his coaches for convincing him not to retire, and for getting him into better shape for this fight than he was for his loss last month.
“If it wasn’t for the guys standing behind me,” Varner said, “those are the people who really believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself.”
Varner’s victory was the final fight in an XFC card that featured a great story on the undercard: Mikey Gomez stepped into the cage and fought just hours after his father died, deciding to go through with the bout as a tribute to his dad. Gomez looked great, showing off a nice bit of Brazilian jiu jitsu to fight his way out of an arm bar attempt from Mike Bernhard only to transition into a dominant position and end up forcing Bernhard to tap out to a rear-naked choke.
In other XFC action:
— Carmelo Marrero beat Scott Barrett by unanimous decision in a sloppy, ugly heavyweight fight.
— Marianna Kheyfets turned Molly Helsel’s face into a bloody mess in the process of winning a unanimous decision in a women’s 125-pound fight.
— Reggie Pena beat Josh Clark by unanimous decision.
— Nicolae Cury forced Elijah Harshbargar to tap out to an arm bar at just 1 minute, 27 seconds of the first round.
— John Mahlo beat Bruce Connors by unanimous decision, 30-27 on all three judges’ cards.
It might go down as one of the shortest retirements in the history of the sport. One month ago, after losing a decision to late replacement Dakota Cochrane at a Titan Fighting Championships event, Jamie Varner took to his Twitter to tell fans that he’d…
It might go down as one of the shortest retirements in the history of the sport. One month ago, after losing a decision to late replacement Dakota Cochrane at a Titan Fighting Championships event, Jamie Varner took to his Twitter to tell fans that he’d had enough.
“I gave fighting another shot I need 2 thank u guys 4 ur support! But I just don’t have it anymore. Love u all but ull never c me fight again,” Varner wrote.
A short time later, that message was removed. Shortly after that, Varner was back in the gym, preparing to have another go at it Friday night at an XFC event on HDNet. Maybe it just goes to show that you should never say never, even on Twitter.
“I think, honestly, I just made an emotional decision and an emotional remark,” Varner told MMA Fighting this week. “I feel like I didn’t perform very well in that last fight. The guy just overpowered me. He wasn’t very good. I was much better than the guy, but I just got controlled. I didn’t like that feeling, and I just thought maybe it was time for me to hang it up.”
Of course, the former WEC lightweight champ didn’t hold that opinion for very long. Once he started to think about it, Varner decided that maybe his passion for the sport hadn’t evaporated after all. Maybe he’d just been hit with a few bad breaks, one right after another.
For starters, he said, his original opponent was pulled from the lineup just a few days before the bout. Then the replacement, Dakota Cochrane, couldn’t make the lightweight limit, so Varner had to fight at welterweight despite the fact that he’d already completed the bulk of his weight cut to get down to 155 pounds.
After getting overpowered by a bigger opponent, Varner said, frustration briefly got the better of him. Hence the tweet.
“Then I took a week off, came home to talk to my trainers, and they were like, ‘You shouldn’t have even taken that fight.’ It wasn’t in my weight class, and too many factors played into that. Maybe I was a little overtrained, too. Who knows? But I prepared for one guy, got a completely different guy, and then it wasn’t even in my weight class. I’m a lightweight. I have no business fighting a welterweight.”
But it wasn’t just a sober analysis of the need for weight classes that got Varner back in the cage so fast. Before the loss to Cochrane, he’d already signed to fight Nate Jolly on tonight’s XFC event, so retiring would mean backing out of his contract, which he wasn’t prepared to do, he said.
“XFC has been doing a lot of marketing, been doing a lot of social networking promoting this fight. The show must go on. Whether I have a good day or a bad day, the show must go on. I made a commitment, and I’m a man of my word.”
If that sounds like a man who’s feeling a little worn down, that’s not too far off. Two fights in the span of a month will take a toll on anyone, especially when one of those fights is a surprise move up in weight that you never planned on making. But for Varner, the retracted retirement proclamation was also at least partially driven by a general sense of fight fatigue.
“I’ve been doing this sport for ten years,” Varner explained. “I started training when I was 17, had my first fight when I was a senior in high school. I’ve been at it a long time. I started wrestling when I was 14, started boxing when I was 11. That’s a long time — 13 or 16 years — of competition and cuts and all that.”
At 27 years old, an age when most people are still working on getting established in a career, Varner is feeling the effects of his. Once the fight with Jolly is in the books, win or lose, he plans to take some time away and re-evaluate things. Maybe he’ll take a couple pro boxing matches, he said, or do some grappling tournaments just to get the competitive juices flowing again.
Not only has his recent run of fights had him feeling like he’s been “non-stop dieting,” it’s also left him “a little burnt out,” he said. But against Jolly he sees a good opportunity to get the taste of that last defeat out of his mouth, so at least he can take some time off with a win under his belt.
“I know this guy is a very, very beatable guy. I’m bigger, I’m faster, I’m better in every position. I’m not too worried about what he brings to the table. If I go in there and perform to even half what I’m capable of, I should walk away with the W.”
Whether he decides to stick around in the sport or just keep on walking afterwards, we’ll have to wait and see.
(And he sticks the landing on the celebratory backflip! Props: notohous)
It looks like the end of the line for Jamie Varner. The former WEC lightweight champion fought in the main event of Friday night’s Titan Fighting Championships 20 show in Kansas City, and lost a unanimous decision to a 9-1 Nebraska-based prospect named Dakota Cochrane. Cochrane came into the fight on just three days’ notice, replacing Varner’s original opponent Alonzo Martinez — who was pulled from the fight due to legal troubles — and won all three rounds on all judges’ scorecards.
After the fight Varner tweeted, “I gave fighting another shot I need 2 thank u guys 4 ur support! But I just don’t have it anymore. Love u all but ull never c me fight again.” Shortly after, he deleted the message, so who knows. The loss increases (decreases?) Varner’s record to 1-1-4 over the last two years. No matter what the future holds, Varner can be secure in the fact that he was once responsible for the greatest victory dance in the history of MMA.
(And he sticks the landing on the celebratory backflip! Props: notohous)
It looks like the end of the line for Jamie Varner. The former WEC lightweight champion fought in the main event of Friday night’s Titan Fighting Championships 20 show in Kansas City, and lost a unanimous decision to a 9-1 Nebraska-based prospect named Dakota Cochrane. Cochrane came into the fight on just three days’ notice, replacing Varner’s original opponent Alonzo Martinez — who was pulled from the fight due to legal troubles — and won all three rounds on all judges’ scorecards.
After the fight Varner tweeted, “I gave fighting another shot I need 2 thank u guys 4 ur support! But I just don’t have it anymore. Love u all but ull never c me fight again.” Shortly after, he deleted the message, so who knows. The loss increases (decreases?) Varner’s record to 1-1-4 over the last two years. No matter what the future holds, Varner can be secure in the fact that he was once responsible for the greatest victory dance in the history of MMA.
Things didn’t fare much better for Strikeforce vet Brett Rogers, who is a free man while awaiting sentencing on his domestic-assault case. Fighting in Friday’s co-main event, Rogers dropped a split decision to UFC/Bellator journeyman Eddie Sanchez. Sanchez snapped a two-fight losing streak, while the Grim falls even further into irrelevance. Rogers has now lost four out of his last five fights, the lone victory being a gassy decision win over Ruben “Warpath” Villareal last October.
Also, some dude named Andrew Whitney opened the show by putting another dude named Laramie Shaffer on his highlight reel. Video is at the top of the post, in case you haven’t figured that out yet. Full results from Titan Fighting Championships 20 are below…
Filed under: NewsJamie Varner says he’s had all he can stand, and he can’t stand any more.
After a unanimous decision loss to Dakota Cochrane on Saturday night at Titan Fighting Championships 20, Varner said via Twitter that he intends to retire from…
Jamie Varner says he’s had all he can stand, and he can’t stand any more.
After a unanimous decision loss to Dakota Cochrane on Saturday night at Titan Fighting Championships 20, Varner said via Twitter that he intends to retire from mixed martial arts.
Varner left the Titan cage bloodied after a 30-27 sweep by Cochrane, who took the fight on just two days notice, and moments later Tweeted his announcement. But a little while later, the Tweet was removed from Varner’s timeline.
“I gave fighting another shot I need 2 thank u guys 4 ur support! But I just don’t have it anymore. Love u all but ull never c me fight again,” Varner said initially on Twitter before the message was removed, indicating the fighter may have reacted rashly after his loss to Cochrane, a heavy underdog in the fight.
A message left for Varner by MMA Fighting seeking comment was not immediately returned.
Varner (17-6-1, 2 NC) now has just one win in his last six fights, a submission of Tyler Combs in Jeff Curran‘s XFO promotion in May. That was his first bout after being cut from Zuffa and the WEC last December, and it came in a temporary move to welterweight.
Varner won the WEC lightweight title against Rob McCullough at WEC 32 in February 2008 and defended it twice against Marcus Hicks and Donald Cerrone. The Cerrone fight was a split decision that ended because of an illegal knee from Cerrone – and touched off one of the most heated rivalries in MMA history.
But injuries suffered in that fight kept Varner out for nearly a year. And once he returned, it’s been mostly downhill.
Varner lost his WEC lightweight title to Ben Henderson at WEC 46 in January 2010. He returned six months later, but settled for a draw with Kamal Shalorus. And in a highly anticipated rematch with Cerrone, he was dominated in a 30-27 sweep.
Varner then took a fight with Shane Roller at WEC 53, the final show in the promotion’s history – and in his backyard in Glendale, Ariz. But he was submitted in the first round and Zuffa cut him loose.
Varner started his career 11-1 with a pair of no contests, mostly in his native Arizona, before signing with the UFC in 2006. His UFC debut was a submission loss to Hermes Franca at UFC 62. At UFC 68, Varner submitted Jason Gilliam, then signed with the WEC, where he would win the lightweight belt in his second fight in the promotion.
Just four weeks after announcing his retirement from mixed martial arts following a disappointing loss, 
It might go down as one of the shortest retirements in the history of the sport. One month ago, after losing a decision to late replacement Dakota Cochrane at a Titan Fighting Championships event, 