It was recently announced that former UFC star Ken Shamrock will be launching his own bare-knuckle boxing promotion, Valor Bare Knuckle. The promotion’s inaugural show is set to go down on September 21 from the Bears Casino in North Dakota. Shamrock released a statement shortly after the news became official. Here’s what he had to […]
It was recently announced that former UFC star Ken Shamrock will be launching his own bare-knuckle boxing promotion, Valor Bare Knuckle.
The promotion’s inaugural show is set to go down on September 21 from the Bears Casino in North Dakota. Shamrock released a statement shortly after the news became official. Here’s what he had to say:
“I fell in love with bare knuckle in the first no-holds barred UFC promotion in 1993. There is nothing like bare knuckle. You have to be much more accurate with your strikes, and you have to train with a specific strategy in mind. Bare knuckle has always been my favorite way to compete because it is simply fighter against fighter, no more and no less. There is something pure and uncomplicated about that.”
No fights have been officially announced for the September 21 show. However, former UFC champion Mark Coleman took to his official Facebook page and revealed he’ll actually be fighting Shamrock on the card:
“Ken and I are finally going to share the Ring! BKB . I will no longer have to answer if I fought The Great Ken Shamrock! Good luck my friend. ?”
Also, Coleman’s longtime friend training partner Wes Sims took to social media as well, suggesting these fights will be taking place on the card as well:
Mark Coleman vs Ken Shamrock
Wes Sims vs Tra Trauma Telligman
Branden Hinkle vs Vernon White
Phil Baroni vs Mikey Burnett
Nick Nutter vs Pete Williams
Sims added that, “And talks to get Guy Mezger, Mark Kerr and others on the card. I’m stoked. Lion’s Den vs Hammer House BKB.”
What do you think about Shamrock facing Coleman in bare-knuckle action?
Former UFC champion Mark Coleman claims that he was the victim of sexual misconduct from a now-deceased Ohio State team doctor.
The doctor is being accused of sexual misconduct against more than 100 former students. On Thursday Coleman released a statement on the matter. He initially implicated Republican congressman Jim Jordan, a former Ohio State assistant coach. Coleman first claimed Jordan had knowledge of the abuse and was doing nothing to stop it.
“There’s no way unless he’s got dementia or something that he’s got no recollection of what was going on at Ohio State,” Coleman said. “I have nothing but respect for this man. I love this man. But he knew as far as I’m concerned.”
Coleman subsequently changed his tune on the matter to CNN, backpedaling on his accusations against Jordan:
“Maybe I spoke without thinking,” Coleman said. “This has absorbed my life. Since I’ve said that, it’s consumed me 24 hours a day, and I didn’t like the way it was heading, the direction it was heading.”
“I was angry and said words that I shouldn’t have said,” Coleman said. “He may have known about some locker room banter because we did joke about it in the locker room, but I don’t know of anyone ever reporting it to Jim Jordan directly.”
“I’m clarifying (the earlier statement) because it’s been on my mind for a long time and I feel guilty that this happened, and I wanted to clarify it,” he said. “Not change it. I said what I said.”
Coleman is the first UFC heavyweight champion in mixed martial arts (MMA) history. He’s also a former Olympian and an NCAA Division I Wrestling champion. Coleman announced his retirement from fighting in 2013 after not having fought for three years.
Jordan recently took to Twitter to attack CNN for attempting to slander his name as he seeks to replace Paul Ryan as Speaker of the House:
Now @CNN is contacting all 100+ of our former staff and interns asking for dirt on me. Getting desperate! How can you ever trust such #fakenews?
Aside from the fighters themselves, surely one of the most iconic figures in MMA’s history is ‘Big’ John McCarthy. Involved in the sport since its inception, McCarthy has not only refereed an astronomical number of fights over more than two decades in the cage but has also had a major hand in helping shape the rules […]
Aside from the fighters themselves, surely one of the most iconic figures in MMA’s history is ‘Big’ John McCarthy.
Involved in the sport since its inception, McCarthy has not only refereed an astronomical number of fights over more than two decades in the cage but has also had a major hand in helping shape the rules that provide the foundation for the sport today.
Throw in the fact that he also served for many years as a police officer in Los Angeles, and it’s clear that McCarthy has many stories to tell, and with the 55-year-old recently stepping aside from his refereeing duties to commentate for Bellator, now seems like a perfect time to recall some of the most memorable tales from his legendary figure.
Investigating O.J. Simpson For Alleged Domestic Violence
When ‘Big’ John McCarthy joined the Los Angeles Police Department in 1988, he soon found himself at the door of a famous celebrity – O.J. Simpson.
Perhaps foreshadowing an infamously grisly incident still to come, the 24-year-old McCarthy had been called to Simpson’s house on Melrose Avenue to investigate a claim of domestic abuse by the former NFL star’s wife, Nicole Brown Simpson.
She alleged that Simpson had hit her during an argument, but there were no visible marks on the alleged victim and McCarthy had a hard time believing that one of his sporting heroes could be capable of such an act.
McCarthy warned the couple that they could both go to jail for their accusations, and they both decided to drop the matter.
At the time the young, naïve McCarthy believed he’d done the right thing, but six years later he watched on in horror as Simpson was arrested on suspicion of murdering his wife and another man.
”I know it wouldn’t have made a difference if we’d arrested him that day, but I never forgot how I’d been swayed into thinking Simpson was somehow better than the rest of us,” McCarthy admitted in his autobiography.
MMA can be a cutthroat business, and as fiercely competitive as fighters are inside of the cage, it’s sometimes the people operating behind the scenes who are the most ruthless of all. Never is that statement more true than when it comes to managers, and to prove the point, in this article we’ll look at […]
MMA can be a cutthroat business, and as fiercely competitive as fighters are inside of the cage, it’s sometimes the people operating behind the scenes who are the most ruthless of all.
Never is that statement more true than when it comes to managers, and to prove the point, in this article we’ll look at 10 UFC stars from both the past and present day who came to the realization that their worst enemy wasn’t the fighter standing opposite them in the Octagon, but rather the person they had entrusted to look after their career.
Mark Hunt
Heavyweight star Mark Hunt detailed a troubled business relationship with ex-manager Dixon McIver in his biography, ‘Born To Fight’ in 2015.
In it, Hunt recalls how he essentially became an overnight millionaire when he won the K-1 World Grand-Prix in Japan back in 2001, and soon after McIver talked him into loaning him $300,000 as bridging cash for an exciting business opportunity he was investing in.
However, time passed and the money wasn’t returned, and meanwhile, Hunt was becoming more and more disgruntled with the way Mciver was handling his business affairs.
In the end, McIver stopped answering his repeated calls demanding his money back and so Hunt became suspicious that the money he’d loaned him may have been used to pay off other debts instead, though he couldn’t prove it.
Hunt still associated with some old friends from the wrong side of the tracks at the time and they suggested putting McIver in the trunk of their car until he agreed to pay up what was he was owed!
As tempting an offer as that was, Hunt decided to seek legal representation.
His lawyers soon came to the conclusion that Hunt wasn’t going to get the full amount back from McIver, and so on their advice he eventually accepted a deal that would see him recoup $170,000 – though in the spur of the moment during a tense face-to-face meeting, ‘The Super Samoan’ also demanded McIver give him the expensive watch he was wearing on his wrist that day to sweeten the deal.
This weekend’s (Sat., October 7, 2017) UFC 216 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, features yet another interim title fight when Tony Ferguson takes on Kevin Lee for the second-place strap in the feature bout. And it’s not even the first time that the promotion has tried to make a placeholder title for […]
This weekend’s (Sat., October 7, 2017) UFC 216 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, features yet another interim title fight when Tony Ferguson takes on Kevin Lee for the second-place strap in the feature bout.
And it’s not even the first time that the promotion has tried to make a placeholder title for the lightweight division that Conor McGregor has kept in limbo, as the promotion attempted to book Ferguson vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov back at March’s UFC 209 only to see it fall apart when ‘The Eagle’ couldn’t make weight. Add that to the interim light heavyweight, middleweight, and featherweight belts that have been essentially manufactured in the last year-and-a-half, and you can easily surmise why the UFC is having one of their worst years ever in terms of pay-per-view (PPV) sales in 2017.
But it’s not just the UFC’s fault; no, champions holding out for ‘money fights’ and just outright picking and choosing their match-ups has lead to an era where it’s just hard for new UFC owners WME-IMG to build any momentum, and the days when champions defended their belts successfully – and often – in order to build the necessary rapport to become big stars seem to be absent from the sport right now (other than Demetrious Johnson, and we’ve seen how that has worked out). Champions aren’t what they used to be, and whether it’s bad luck or MMA simply evolving to create more parity, a true superstar is tough to come by right now.
What’s apparently not, however, is a fly-by-night champ who fails to live up to the hype and circumstance that carrying the gold brings. While it seems easy to find such fighters throughout the last few years of MMA, there have also been some truly bad champs in the older days of the UFC as well. These fighters from the present or past had enough to get to the mountaintop, so they are or were elite, but they just didn’t deliver when they got there.
Check out our 10 worst champions in UFC history:
Holly Holm:
A decorated multi-time world boxing champion, Holm came to the octagon amidst a ton of fanfare in 2015. After two incredibly lackluster decision wins over Raquel Pennington and Marion Reneau, Holm went on to shock the world when she kicked Ronda Rousey into oblivion at November 2015’s UFC 193 from Australia.
The MMA world was suddenly her oyster, but instead of holding out for a rematch with Rousey that legitimately could have been the biggest fight in UFC history, ‘The Preacher’s Daughter’ decided to make her first title defense against Miesha Tate at UFC 196 the following March. After a tentative, safe four rounds in a fight she was probably winning, Holm was choked unconscious in the fifth round after Tate took her down.
From there, Holm went on to lose a one-sided decision to recent title contender Valentina Shevchenko in her next fight, but she still got a title shot nevertheless when she met Germaine de Randamie for the featherweight title in one of the worst fights of the year at February’s UFC 208. She lost via controversial decision, but has since rebounded by knocking out an overrated and ineffective Bethe Correia this June.
She never made any title defenses and has lost three of her last four fights, but Holm us rumored to be facing Cris Cyborg for the featherweight belt in her next bout. Welcome to today’s UFC, ladies and gentlemen.
As the UFC’s longtime color commentator, Joe Rogan is well known for his infectious enthusiasm, passion and deep knowledge of mixed martial arts (MMA), and is highly respected by both fighters and fans alike. However, having called thousands of fights over the course of his 15 years in the hot seat, not to mention also having
As the UFC’s longtime color commentator, Joe Rogan is well known for his infectious enthusiasm, passion and deep knowledge of mixed martial arts (MMA), and is highly respected by both fighters and fans alike.
However, having called thousands of fights over the course of his 15 years in the hot seat, not to mention also having one of the most successful podcasts on the internet, it’s inevitable that he’s ruffled a few feathers along the way.
In this article we’ll look back at some of the most memorable examples of MMA stars lashing out at Rogan after something that he’s said or done over the years.
Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson
Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson has never been afraid to speak his mind, and so when he had a problem with Rogan questioning the lack of kicks in his striking game, he let the whole world know about it.
“I just want to tell [Rogan] to shut the f*** up,” ‘Rampage’ ranted during a 2012 interview with Fighters Only. “Let’s see you do it. Let’s see you come in here and kick this mother-f***er who wants to take you down. Shut the f*** up.“
’Rampage’ also claimed he’d “beat the sh**” out of Rogan if they fought, while also accusing him of being so biased towards Jiu-jitsu specialists during fights that he, “might as be playing the rusty trombone.”
Rather than engage him in a war of words, Rogan wisely opted for the diplomatic approach after spotting Jackson backstage at a UFC event.
“I always want you to know that, if I ever say anything it’s never out of disrespect,” Rogan told him. “I like you and I root for you and I always thought you were a cool guy.”
To his credit, ‘Rampage’ then admitted he’d been wrong to call him out for doing his job and they put the matter behind them.
