Tag: Keith Jardine

Roger Gracie to Make Middleweight Debut Against Keith Jardine in July


(And for my next trick, I will enter a state of comatose using only a roided man’s fists and sheer determination.) 

On the heels of a devastating one-punch knockout at the hands of Muhammed Lawal in September, it looks like Roger Gracie will make his moderately-anticipated middleweight debut at an upcoming Strikeforce event in July. Rejoice. Across the cage from the Jiu-Jitsu phenom will be none other than UFC veteran and member of the undead army, Keith “The Dean of Mean” Johnson Jardine. Jardine has had a rough run of things as of late, dropping six of his last nine including a recent ill-fated title bid against Luke Rockhold in January.

But a matchup with Gracie is one that Jardine stands a better chance of winning than any fight in recent memory, believe it or not. Jardine has never been submitted in professional competition, and Gracie’s complete lack of the kind of striking game that has felled Jardine in the past might just make for a victory over a big name that has eluded “The Dean” since his UFC 89 split-decision win over Brandon Vera. In fact, the closest Jardine has even come to scoring an upset victory in recent years was his Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Daley performance that saw him fight to a majority draw with the heavily favored Gegard Mousasi.

Though it was previously reported that Gracie was on his way up to the UFC, those rumors were quickly squashed by UFC President Dana White, who stated, “[expletive] that [expletive] you [expletive] [expletive] Samuel L. Jackson [expletive] smartphone [expletive] hotspacho [expletive].” Something like that. *

In other fight booking news…


(And for my next trick, I will enter a state of comatose using only a roided man’s fists and sheer determination.) 

On the heels of a devastating one-punch knockout at the hands of Muhammed Lawal in September, it looks like Roger Gracie will make his moderately-anticipated middleweight debut at an upcoming Strikeforce event in July. Rejoice. Across the cage from the Jiu-Jitsu phenom will be none other than UFC veteran and member of the undead army, Keith “The Dean of Mean” Johnson Jardine. Jardine has had a rough run of things as of late, dropping six of his last nine including a recent ill-fated title bid against Luke Rockhold in January.

But a matchup with Gracie is one that Jardine stands a better chance of winning than any fight in recent memory, believe it or not. Jardine has never been submitted in professional competition, and Gracie’s complete lack of the kind of striking game that has felled Jardine in the past might just make for a victory over a big name that has eluded “The Dean” since his UFC 89 split-decision win over Brandon Vera. In fact, the closest Jardine has even come to scoring an upset victory in recent years was his Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Daley performance that saw him fight to a majority draw with the heavily favored Gegard Mousasi.

Though it was previously reported that Gracie was on his way up to the UFC, those rumors were quickly squashed by UFC President Dana White, who stated, “[expletive] that [expletive] you [expletive] [expletive] Samuel L. Jackson [expletive] smartphone [expletive] hotspacho [expletive].” Something like that. *

In other fight booking news…

Coming off a brutal knockout loss of his own to Dan Henderson in December of 2010, Renato “Babalu” Sobral will return to the ring for the first time in nearly two years at OneFC’s “Destiny of Warriors” event, which goes down at the Stadium Negara in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on June 23rd. After signing with OneFC in December of 2011, Sobral was expected to face Melvin Manhoef and his explosive shins at OneFC 3, but pulled out of the bout to participate as Wanderlei Silva’s wrestling coach on The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil. Sobral is currently 36-9 in MMA competition, most recently sandwiching a win over Robbie Lawler between a pair of KO losses to Gegard Mousasi and Henderson, the former of which cost him the Strikeforce light heavyweight title.

Sobral will be facing a game opponent in Tatsuya Mizuno, who holds notable victories over Melvin Manhoef and Trevor Prangley and has only gone to the judges scorecards once in his professional career. Mizuno is coming off an arm-triangle submission victory over Ilima Maiava at the mediocre-but-improved ProElite 3 event back in January.

Who you got for these, Potato Nation?

*OK, it went nothing like that. There was no interview. We apologize for deceiving you. 

-J. Jones

8 Fighters Who Need to Spend Some Time with Steven Seagal

Ever since Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida knocked their respective opponents out with Aikido’s signature front kicks to the face, Sensei Seagal’s phone must have been ringing off the hook.The thing is, one man, even a great man like Steven Seagal, on…

Ever since Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida knocked their respective opponents out with Aikido’s signature front kicks to the face, Sensei Seagal’s phone must have been ringing off the hook.

The thing is, one man, even a great man like Steven Seagal, only has so much time to coach internationally renowned fighters. Amid a string of obligations including acting commitments in 46 straight-to-DVD movies and the policing of America’s most dangerous streets, Seagal can squeeze in only those competitors who truly need his help.

Luckily for the master, we’ve narrowed down the candidates, selecting eight fighters desperately in need of some education.

The following slides showcase competitors in dire straights, highlighting those individuals who, without knowing a series of fairly impractical wrist-locks, may find themselves fighting irrelevancy in the MMA world.

What would we do without Steven? Let’s hope we never have to find out.

@MMAZeitgeist

Begin Slideshow

Dropping a Weight Class to Save Your Career: The Good, The Bad, And the Ugly



(Phil Davis: The UFC’s leading producer of new middleweights.)

By Ben Goldstein

“When in doubt, drop a weight class” — that’s been the mantra for many MMA fighters who have hit rough patches in their careers. Of course, shaving 10-20 pounds off your body is no guarantee of future success, and it occasionally leaves fighters worse off than when they started. Following a week that saw Demian Maia, Dan Miller, and Nik Lentz all decide to seek their fortunes against smaller opponents, we decided to round up a few notable fighters who revitalized themselves at a lighter weight, and a few that became cautionary tales for weight-dropping. Read on, and let us know which UFC fighters should consider taking the weight-class plunge…

The Good

Dominick Cruz

After racking up a 9-0 record — not to mention belts at lightweight and featherweight for the Total Combat promotion — Dominick Cruz challenged Urijah Faber for the WEC featherweight title in March 2007. Unfortunately, Cruz fell into a guillotine choke and tapped at the 1:38 mark of round 1. Cruz addressed the setback by dropping to bantamweight the following year, and has since gone on another 9-0 run at 135, collected the WEC and UFC bantamweight belts, and exacted revenge against his arch-nemesis, the California Kid. We’ll see if he can make it two in a row against Faber in June, but for now, it seems that dropping to bantamweight was the best move of Dominick’s career.



(Phil Davis: The UFC’s leading producer of new middleweights.)

By Ben Goldstein

“When in doubt, drop a weight class” — that’s been the mantra for many MMA fighters who have hit rough patches in their careers. Of course, shaving 10-20 pounds off your body is no guarantee of future success, and it occasionally leaves fighters worse off than when they started. Following a week that saw Demian Maia, Dan Miller, and Nik Lentz all decide to seek their fortunes against smaller opponents, we decided to round up a few notable fighters who revitalized themselves at a lighter weight, and a few that became cautionary tales for weight-dropping. Read on, and let us know which UFC fighters should consider taking the weight-class plunge…

The Good

Dominick Cruz

After racking up a 9-0 record — not to mention belts at lightweight and featherweight for the Total Combat promotion — Dominick Cruz challenged Urijah Faber for the WEC featherweight title in March 2007. Unfortunately, Cruz fell into a guillotine choke and tapped at the 1:38 mark of round 1. Cruz addressed the setback by dropping to bantamweight the following year, and has since gone on another 9-0 run at 135, collected the WEC and UFC bantamweight belts, and exacted revenge against his arch-nemesis, the California Kid. We’ll see if he can make it two in a row against Faber in June, but for now, it seems that dropping to bantamweight was the best move of Dominick’s career.

Tim Boetsch

As physically imposing as Tim Boetsch looked at light-heavyweight, the powerful wrestlers at the top of the division (see: Matt Hamill, Jason Brilz, Phil Davis) always foiled his momentum up the UFC ranks. Last year, the Barbarian made the decision to drop to 185, and hasn’t sacrificed an ounce of his power in the process. Decision wins over Kendall Grove and Nick Ring proved that he belonged in the middleweight mix, and his extraordinary comeback win over Yushin Okami at UFC 144 earned him a high-profile match against Michael Bisping — another fighter who found greater success dropping from light-heavyweight to middleweight.

Jacob Volkmann

You don’t have to agree with his politics or sense of humor, but you can’t argue with success. Volkmann was thrown into the deep end when he arrived to the UFC as a welterweight, suffering defeats against Paulo Thiago and Martin Kampmann. Tired of being manhandled by larger men, Volkmann dropped to 155 and has since gone on a 5-0 run, with wins over Efrain Escudero, Danny Castillo, and Antonio McKee.

Mark Munoz

Mark Munoz’s head-kick loss to Matt Hamill was the first defeat of his career, but like Dominick Cruz, Munoz took it as an immediate sign to test the waters further down the scale. As a middleweight, he has compiled an impressive 7-1 record, most recently stopping Chris Leben in the main event of UFC 138. Though an injury pulled Munoz from a fight against Chael Sonnen at UFC on FOX 2, his next fight could have him knocking on the door of a title shot.

Continue to the next page for the *not* so good…

Strikeforce Deathwatch: Rockhold vs. Jardine Live Gate Totals a Meager $68,805


(This is when we’d normally tell you to keep your chin up, Keith, but that seems to be what got you here in the first place.) 

Perhaps this might not come as a shocking revelation to most of the Potato Nation, but Strikeforce is in some bad shape. Like, Bubba on the beaches of Vietnam kind of shape. Let’s put it this way, if we were gambling men, and someone were taking bets on its probable death, we’d bet everything we own on death.

What are we jawing on about? Well, the Nevada State Athletic Commission just released its figures for “Strikeforce: Rockhold vs. Jardine” today, which took place at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 7th, and the live gate for the event totaled LESS THAN HALF OF WHAT ROBBIE LAWLER WAS PAID TO FIGHT. As ridiculous as it may seem, Lawler did manage to knock out Aldan Amagov with the power of his testicles alone, so the somewhat exuberant compensation he received seems fair in this case. But boy does it not look good for Strikeforce.

Hauling in an abysmal 68,805 dollars, “Rockhold vs. Jardine” achieved a final attendance of just under 2000 (1992) with only 927 tickets sold. The other 1,065 tickets were comped, and 727 tickets remained unsold. The total fighter purse for this event was an even $566,000.


(This is when we’d normally tell you to keep your chin up, Keith, but that seems to be what got you here in the first place.) 

Perhaps this might not come as a shocking revelation to most of the Potato Nation, but Strikeforce is in some bad shape. Like, Bubba on the beaches of Vietnam kind of shape. Let’s put it this way, if we were gambling men, and someone were taking bets on its probable death, we’d bet everything we own on death.

What are we jawing on about? Well, the Nevada State Athletic Commission just released its figures for “Strikeforce: Rockhold vs. Jardine” today, which took place at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 7th, and the live gate for the event totaled LESS THAN HALF OF WHAT ROBBIE LAWLER WAS PAID TO FIGHT. As ridiculous as it may seem, Lawler did manage to knock out Aldan Amagov with the power of his testicles alone, so the somewhat exuberant compensation he received seems fair in this case. But boy does it not look good for Strikeforce.

Hauling in an abysmal 68,805 dollars, “Rockhold vs. Jardine” achieved a final attendance of just under 2000 (1992) with only 927 tickets sold. The other 1,065 tickets were comped, and 727 tickets remained unsold. The total fighter purse for this event was an even $566,000.

To look at this through an even dirtier windowpane, along with Robbie Lawler, Luke Rockhold and a juiced up Muhammed Lawal also cleared more than the live gate. Hell, Tyrone Woodley made nearly that much to take a fifteen minute nap on Jordan Mein. Again, it’s not necessarily mind-blowing, but those are Challengers numbers, people. Blame it on the UFC snatching up all their champions and the lack of big name fights as a result, or do what we do, and blame everything on the combination of Mauro Ranallo and Frank Shamrock. In either case, nothing short of a heart transplant is going to save this old man; all we can do now is offer him a hospital bed at a discount price, so to speak. Forget the Ronda Rousey death pool, chances are Strikeforce won’t even be around long enough to promote that match-up. We give ‘em 6-8 months, how bout you?

Speaking of shitty numbers, the UFC 142 Prelims, which were the first to air on FX last Saturday, only pulled in 880,000 viewers, which was lower than any “Prelim” episode to air on SpikeTV in the special’s history. UFC 141, on the other hand, managed to reel in over 1.8 million viewers, despite the fact that both FX and Spike are delivered to roughly the same number of homes (around 100 million). Though this can be partially attributed to the fact that most casual fans have yet to become aware of the transition in networks, the numbers are still disappointing to say the least. Let’s hope the UFC’s full event debut on FX this Friday brings in some more/new fans, because we do not need to go back to watching three hours worth of fights on Facebook. Sorry, Jimy.

And hey, speaking of the UFC on FX, make sure to join us Friday night for our liveblog of the event, which will feature more than it’s fair share of whiskey fueld rants courtesy of yours truly. See you there.

-Danga

Strikeforce: Rockhold vs. Jardine Draws $68,805 Live Gate

Filed under: Strikeforce, NewsStrikeforce gave away more tickets than it sold at its Jan. 7 “Rockhold vs. Jardine” event at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.

According to figures released Wednesday by the Nevada athletic commission, the e…

Filed under: ,

Strikeforce gave away more tickets than it sold at its Jan. 7 “Rockhold vs. Jardine” event at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.

According to figures released Wednesday by the Nevada athletic commission, the event sold 927 tickets for a live gate of $68,805. A total of 1,992 were in attendance, 1,065 of which watched for free. Meanwhile, 727 tickets were left unsold.

As previously reported, the total fighter payroll was $566,000.

The previous event, “Melendez vs. Masvidal,” fared better, drawing an attendance of 2,995 for a $154,075 gate. The amount of tickets sold/papered at the Dec. 17 event in San Diego were undisclosed. The fighter payroll for “Melendez vs. Masvidal” was $580,000.

“Rockhold vs. Jardine” was the first Strikeforce card under the promotion’s new deal with Showtime. The main card was televised on Showtime and the preliminary card aired on Showtime Extreme.

 

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Luke Rockhold: Did He Jump the Gun Last Saturday Night?

Last Saturday, Strikeforce had their first event of the year headlined by a Middleweight Title match between newly-crowned champion Luke Rockhold and “The Dean of Mean” Keith Jardine, who was making his debut at Middleweight. The match ende…

Last Saturday, Strikeforce had their first event of the year headlined by a Middleweight Title match between newly-crowned champion Luke Rockhold and “The Dean of Mean” Keith Jardine, who was making his debut at Middleweight. The match ended up lasting longer than most expected, going 4:26 into the first round when Rockhold won by TKO due to punches.

After the match, Rockhold was asked about who he wanted to fight next, original opponent Tim Kennedy or a rematch with Ronaldo Souza. Rockhold immediately dismissed both ideas saying that he should be fighting the best of the best and that the UFC should send someone to Strikeforce to prove how good he is.

Now while that is all fine and well in a sense of promoting yourself in fighting better quality opponents to showcase your talents, Rockhold has to be careful of getting what he wishes for.

In the past few years, fighters have made a name for themselves off of a big win or two, talked themselves up as the next big thing and ultimately got outclassed by the opponents that they felt they could handle. Some of those fighters include Chris Leben before his fights with both Brian Stann and Anderson Silva, where he ended up knocked out in both fights, Dan Hardy who got dominated by Georges St. Pierre which led to his current four fight losing streak, and Jardine, who talked himself up as the next big thing only to get knocked out in 48 seconds by Houston Alexander.

Granted, Rockhold has a lot more skill and better technique than those fighters, but he needs to pace himself. Yes, he had a dominant title defense, but his challenger wasn’t expected to win by anyone’s estimates. Jardine only found himself in title contention because original participant Tim Kennedy got injured in training. Ronaldo Souza is in the same boat as well, and Robby Lawler was currently on a losing streak (including a recent loss to Kennedy).

Before getting the title shot, Jardine was 3-6-1 in his previous ten fights with five of those losses coming in one long streak. He was lucky to get the draw against Gegard Moussasi as Moussasi would have won if not for his illegal upkick. With that, Jardine was not the best fighter to take on the champion, but a win is a win, and Rockhold should feel good about defending his title.

For Rockhold to dismiss the rest of the competition in the Strikeforce Middleweight division is jumping the gun a bit. While he may definitely be in the top 10 Middleweights in the world, he still has a bit that he can prove in Strikeforce. Before he gets too ahead of himself, Rockhold should really face off against high-caliber Strikeforce fighters like Tim Kennedy and Ronaldo Souza again before taking a step up with the higher-ranking UFC Middleweights.

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