Matt Hamill, who achieved widespread fame and admiration as a successful hearing-impaired fighter, will return to pro MMA this year after signing with the World Series of Fighting promotion.
The news came Wednesday night via Ariel Helwani of MMAFightin…
Matt Hamill, who achieved widespread fame and admiration as a successful hearing-impaired fighter, will return to pro MMA this year after signing with the World Series of Fighting promotion.
Hamill will compete in a four-man tournament to determine the inaugural WSOF light heavyweight champion. Also in the bracket is Thiago Silva, the controversial fighter who has also signed with WSOF and who defeated Hamill by unanimous decision in October 2013. As it happens, that was the last professional fight in the UFC or elsewhere for both men.
Silva will face another UFC veteran, Ronny Markes, in the tournament’s semifinal round. Hamill will take on an as-yet unannounced opponent.
Last July, Hamill, now 38, retired from the sport, citing a “nagging injury.” However, in December Hamill tweeted that he was coming out of retirement and seeking a fight.
It’s time for The Hammer to get back into the ring and offer some payback! http://t.co/pyPxCPKCQG
Hamill originally targetedBellator and a rematch with Quinton “Rampage” Jackson for his return fight. But that never materialized. Like a bout with Jackson, however, a matchup with Silva would give Hamill the opportunity to avenge a previous loss.
Hamill (11-5) earned legions of fans for his success in college wrestling and later in MMA. He was a formidable and heavy-handed wrestler during his heyday in the late 2000s, defeating notables like Tito Ortiz, Mark Munoz and Keith Jardine.
He also has the strange distinction of being the only man to ever technically defeat Jon Jones, though he only did so because Jones was disqualified for throwing illegal elbows.
In 2010, a movie, The Hammer, was made about Hamill’s life.
At the tail end of his UFC run, Hamill looked thoroughly unimpressive, even during rare victories. Diminished by time and injuries, Hamill was a shell of his former self, particularly against younger, more complete mixed martial artists.
It remains to be seen whether Hamill’s health or fighting game will have improved during his retirement. Either way, Hamill’s return to active competition will likely draw interest in various quarters of the MMA and non-MMA public.
(“F*ck yeah I’ll watch this again!” — Nobody, ever. Photo via Getty.)
We have lamented at length about Matt Hamill‘s decision to unretire the *first* time and the uninspiring results it garnered, but alas, it appears the TUF 3 alum simply refuses to listen.
That sounded wrong. What I meant to say was that our words have fallen on…goddammit, this was a terrible analogy to use.
Matt Hamill is un-retiring, again, despite recently retiring from MMA (again) due to “a nagging injury” that forced him out of his expected WSOF debut in May. And not only that, but now he’s calling for a rematch with Rampage Jackson in Bellator over Twitter.
“@scottcoker I want a fight with @rampage4real. The Hammer is coming back and want to come to @bellator,” tweeted Hamill last night.
Eesh. Where do we begin…
(“F*ck yeah I’ll watch this again!” — Nobody, ever. Photo via Getty.)
We have lamented at length about Matt Hamill‘s decision to unretire the *first* time and the uninspiring results it garnered, but alas, it appears the TUF 3 alum simply refuses to listen.
That sounded wrong. What I meant to say was that our words have fallen on…goddammit, this was a terrible analogy to use.
Matt Hamill is un-retiring, again, despite recently retiring from MMA (again) due to “a nagging injury” that forced him out of his expected WSOF debut in May. And not only that, but now he’s calling for a rematch with Rampage Jackson in Bellator over Twitter.
“@scottcoker I want a fight with @rampage4real. The Hammer is coming back and want to come to @bellator,” tweeted Hamill last night.
It’s a lofty request to say the least. Not only does a fight between Hamill and Jackson make absolutely zero sense no matter how you slice it, but considering the plodding suckfest that was their first encounter back at UFC 130 (which saw Jackson emerge victorious via UD), it doesn’t even seem like something fans would want to see again. Seriously, does anyone remember how sluggish and ineffective Hamill looked that night? Come to think of it, “sluggish” and “ineffective” would be two great ways of describing how Hamill looked in his fights against Roger Hollett and Thiago Silva after coming out of retirement for the first time.
This is not meant as a knock against Hamill, cruel as it may seem, but rather a call to reason. I can only begin to understand what drives a once prominent fighter to step back into the cage despite every warning sign that he shouldn’t, but rather than fall back on the same tired speech about why someone in Hamill’s inner circle should be stepping in and preventing this from happening, I think I’ll just list some facts:
– Matt Hamill is 38 years old.
– He has not fought since October of 2013
– Less than a year ago, Hamill cited “a nagging injury that never healed and has worsened with time” as the reason for his second retirement. An injury that has apparently healed through some sort of magic.
– Hamill is 1-3 dating back to 2011, and is 0-1 against Rampage Jackson.
– It is very likely that Bellator will take him up on his offer.
That last fact is perhaps the most depressing of them all.
Sad but foreseeable news today, as TUF 3 alum, UFC star, and inspirational figure Matt Hamill has called it quits on his MMA career for a second and hopefully final time.
First and foremost, I would like to thank my most loyal fans for standing by me throughout my 10 year career with MMA… All good things must come to an end and I am saddened that the time has come for me to hang up my gloves permanently due to a nagging injury that has never healed and has worsened with time. The memories have been good….
Sad but foreseeable news today, as TUF 3 alum, UFC star, and inspirational figure Matt Hamill has called it quits on his MMA career for a second and hopefully final time.
First and foremost, I would like to thank my most loyal fans for standing by me throughout my 10 year career with MMA… All good things must come to an end and I am saddened that the time has come for me to hang up my gloves permanently due to a nagging injury that has never healed and has worsened with time. The memories have been good….
His recent woes aside, there’s no denying the impact Hamill had on the UFC, its fans, and the deaf community during his MMA career, which saw him score wins over Keith Jardine, Tito Ortiz, Mark Munoz, Jon Jones (technically), and Michael Bisping (not technically but c’mon). Having had the brief opportunity to train with Hamill prior to his fight with Rich Franklin at UFC 88, I can personally attest to the quality of his character and would like to wish him the best of luck wherever the road takes him.
Show Hamill some love one final time in the comments section.
Ultimate Fighter Finale cards weren’t always so garbage-ass. On December 5th, 2009 — four years ago today — the TUF 10 Finale went down in Las Vegas, with a lineup featuring Jon Jones (before he became light-heavyweight champion), Frankie Edgar (before he became lightweight champion), Kimbo Slice (who was one of the most popular figures in the sport at the time), as well as Roy Nelson, Brendan Schaub, and Matt Mitrione. Today, a UFC card with those names would be sold as a pay-per-view, and it would probably do pretty damn well*. In 2009, this was just another free show on Spike TV, a cable channel that everybody knew how to find. Damn…we just didn’t know how good we had it back then.
Maybe you remember Nelson’s nasty one-shot KO of Schaub at the event, and maybe you remember the 15-minute wheezefest that was Kimbo vs. Houston Alexander. But the reason that the TUF 10 Finale remains infamous four years later is because of a bullshit little rule known as “no 12-to-6 elbows,” which may very well be the most arbitrary and baseless rule in MMA history. Essentially, MMA fighters are allowed to crack each other’s skulls wide open with their ‘bows, either standing or on the ground, but if your elbow is moving vertically downward, you might as well be a villain in a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie. My goodness, somebody could actually get injured with those things.
Jon Jones, who was 22 years old at the time, had earned a prime spot on the TUF 10 Finale main card thanks to his 3-0 run in the UFC light-heavyweight division, which included a hilariouslymadcap decision win against Stephan Bonnar, and a second-round submission of fan-unfavorite Jake O’Brien. This was the pre-backlash Jon Jones, a guy who was universally beloved for his dynamic wrestling ability and his improvisational striking, which he picked up (as the legend goes) from watching YouTube videos. Matt Hamill was supposed to be just another stepping-stone in Jones’s quick rise to the top — a recognizable TUF-guy for him to squash. And that’s exactly what happened, even though Hamill wound up winning the fight on a technicality.
Ultimate Fighter Finale cards weren’t always so garbage-ass. On December 5th, 2009 — four years ago today — the TUF 10 Finale went down in Las Vegas, with a lineup featuring Jon Jones (before he became light-heavyweight champion), Frankie Edgar (before he became lightweight champion), Kimbo Slice (who was one of the most popular figures in the sport at the time), as well as Roy Nelson, Brendan Schaub, and Matt Mitrione. Today, a UFC card with those names would be sold as a pay-per-view, and it would probably do pretty damn well*. In 2009, this was just another free show on Spike TV, a cable channel that everybody knew how to find. Damn…we just didn’t know how good we had it back then.
Maybe you remember Nelson’s nasty one-shot KO of Schaub at the event, and maybe you remember the 15-minute wheezefest that was Kimbo vs. Houston Alexander. But the reason that the TUF 10 Finale remains infamous four years later is because of a bullshit little rule known as “no 12-to-6 elbows,” which may very well be the most arbitrary and baseless rule in MMA history. Essentially, MMA fighters are allowed to crack each other’s skulls wide open with their ‘bows, either standing or on the ground, but if your elbow is moving vertically downward, you might as well be a villain in a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie. My goodness, somebody could actually get injured with those things.
Jon Jones, who was 22 years old at the time, had earned a prime spot on the TUF 10 Finale main card thanks to his 3-0 run in the UFC light-heavyweight division, which included a hilariouslymadcap decision win against Stephan Bonnar, and a second-round submission of fan-unfavorite Jake O’Brien. This was the pre-backlash Jon Jones, a guy who was universally beloved for his dynamic wrestling ability and his improvisational striking, which he picked up (as the legend goes) from watching YouTube videos. Matt Hamill was supposed to be just another stepping-stone in Jones’s quick rise to the top — a recognizable TUF-guy for him to squash. And that’s exactly what happened, even though Hamill wound up winning the fight on a technicality.
For four minutes, Jones out-struck, out-worked, and out-shined Hamill, at one point rag-dolling him to the mat in the slickest foot-sweep takedown outside of a Lyoto Machida fight. From there, Bones engaged the Finishing Sequence, launching punches and elbows at his near-helpless opponent. The fight was effectively over by then, but Hamill continued to defend himself, desperately covering his face with his arms. Slightly frustrated, Jones tried a different angle, blasting his elbows straight down into Hamill’s face. It was then that Steve Mazzagatti jumped in — but it wasn’t to award Jones the TKO victory.
Noticing that Jones had begun throwing the dreaded 12-to-6 elbows, Mazzagatti paused the action and pulled Jones off of Hamill, who made no attempt to get off his back. (As we later learned, Hamill suffered a broken shoulder when he was tossed to the mat.) Mazzagatti asked Hamill if he could continue. Hamill, who has been deaf since birth and was momentarily blinded by his own blood, was unresponsive. Instead of bringing in a doctor and sign-language interpreter to clear Hamill’s vision and communicate with him, Mazzagatti immediately stopped the fight, and handed Jones a loss by disqualification.
Jones’s attempt to appeal the loss was shot down, as these things usually are. Luckily, the shoddy enforcement of a shoddy rule didn’t slow down his momentum. The UFC moved forward with Jones’s career like the “loss” never happened, building him up in main-event fights on their UFC on Versus series — where he smashed Brandon Vera and Vladimir Matyushenko, both in the first round, both with legal elbows. Jones has been a pay-per-view poster boy ever since.
If not for Jon Jones’s disqualification loss at the TUF 10 Finale, he’d be 20-0 overall and 14-0 in the UFC — an unbeaten run that would give him the second-longest win streak in UFC history, behind only Anderson Silva (16). Instead, he’s riding a 10-fight win streak and is still stuck in 3rd place behind Georges St. Pierre (12). But keep in mind that Jones is still only 26 years old and has only been fighting professionally since April 2008. Seven more wins? As long as he doesn’t jinx himself, that’s totally doable.
* Jones’s last PPV outing didn’t exactly blow the doors off, but Kimbo Slice could probably outdraw half of the UFC’s champions to this day.
(Who saw this coming? We did, that’s who. Photo via Getty.)
Until his initial retirement back in August of 2011, Matt Hamill was considered by most to be a perennial contender at 205 lbs., a fierce grappler with ever-improving striking and a positively inspirational member of the deaf community. While the latter accolade still remains true two years and one unretirement later, the former have seemingly (and sadly) all but vanished in Hamill’s recent octagon appearances.
I was ready to make this decision after UFC 130 but my friends, family coaches and most importantly my daughter encouraged me to give it one last chance. My career has been plagued by injuries starting with The Ultimate Fighter and disrupted my training ever since.
There hasn’t been even one training camp where I’ve been able to train without training around an injury. I have not been kind to my body and it has nothing left after 28 years of non stop competition. It’s time to finally give it a rest.
I have fallen in love with the sport of Mixed Martial Arts and I will continue to coach at our gym Mohawk Valley MMA along side my teammates and help the next generation of fighters make it to the UFC.
You see, that’s the thing that has irked us most about Hamill’s decision to unretire (and we’ve mentioned this before) — his retirement, this statement, was just so, appropriate. Hamill seemed self-aware, he seemed content, and most of all, he seemed comfortable with the legacy he had left behind while understanding that his time — as a fighter, at least — had come and gone. It was a mature, thoughtful decision not often reached by most combat sports athletes, let alone MMA fighters. It was closure.
Less than a year after making said decision, Hamill recanted on it. And now, rather than retire with the aforementioned sense of closure, it appears that Hamill has been released by the UFC following his disheartening loss to Thiago Silva at Fight Night 29. God only knows what lies in store for “The Hammer” now.
(Who saw this coming? We did, that’s who. Photo via Getty.)
Until his initial retirement back in August of 2011, Matt Hamill was considered by most to be a perennial contender at 205 lbs., a fierce grappler with ever-improving striking and a positively inspirational member of the deaf community. While the latter accolade still remains true two years and one unretirement later, the former have seemingly (and sadly) all but vanished in Hamill’s recent octagon appearances.
I was ready to make this decision after UFC 130 but my friends, family coaches and most importantly my daughter encouraged me to give it one last chance. My career has been plagued by injuries starting with The Ultimate Fighter and disrupted my training ever since.
There hasn’t been even one training camp where I’ve been able to train without training around an injury. I have not been kind to my body and it has nothing left after 28 years of non stop competition. It’s time to finally give it a rest.
I have fallen in love with the sport of Mixed Martial Arts and I will continue to coach at our gym Mohawk Valley MMA along side my teammates and help the next generation of fighters make it to the UFC.
You see, that’s the thing that has irked us most about Hamill’s decision to unretire (and we’ve mentioned this before) — his retirement, this statement, was just so, appropriate. Hamill seemed self-aware, he seemed content, and most of all, he seemed comfortable with the legacy he had left behind while understanding that his time — as a fighter, at least — had come and gone. It was a mature, thoughtful decision not often reached by most combat sports athletes, let alone MMA fighters. It was closure.
Less than a year after making said decision, Hamill recanted on it. And now, rather than retire with the aforementioned sense of closure, it appears that Hamill has been released by the UFC following his disheartening loss to Thiago Silva at Fight Night 29. God only knows what lies in store for “The Hammer” now.
Although Hamill insisted that he had *finally* recovered from the nagging training injuries that had affected him for years upon returning to the sport in early 2012 (sound familiar?), his “comeback” performance against Roger Hollett — who holds the distinct honor of being brought in as a late-notice injury replacement for himself — at UFC 152 spoke quite to the contrary. The fight was tough to watch for a multitude of reasons, the most damning of which being Hamill’s sloppy, tired performance against a similarly gassed fighter he would have rolled through less than a year prior.
We tried writing off Hamill’s performance as the result of ring rust, but don’t we always with guys we generally wish the best for? When he was paired with Thiago Silva at Fight Night 29, however, we reacted with legitimate fear. To borrow a much-overused phrase, Hamill had nothing left to prove. Likewise, the beating he was surely set to endure would only tarnish the legacy he had worked so hard to build.
It was by the grace of God that Silva showed up in as poor of shape as he did, because we can only imagine what he would have done to Hamill had he put a good training camp in. Within two rounds, Hamill was literally staggering around the octagon as a result of Silva’s leg kicks, his hands on his hips, too tired to even return fire. While happening upon a replay of the fight at a bar some two days later, my father could only muster to me that “the white guy looks like he just stumbled out of here and into that ring.” It was a surprisingly accurate assessment.
Of course, the obvious counter to my long-winded lament is, “Who are you to decide when a fighter should retire?” And I have no counter for your counter, other than to simply ask, ”Have Hamill’s past two fights done anything to *improve* your image of him?” Were the last couple paychecks he received worth the abuse and humiliation?
I write this as a fan, Matt. I write this as someone who has followed your MMA career from the beginning. Hell, I write this as a fellow human being. Please, see this as a sign. See this as a sign to be the exception to the rule, as you have been your entire career, and retire (again) before you inflict anymore unnecessary punishment on yourself. Because the last thing this sport needs is another fighter who simply refuses to accept his mortality.
Oh yeah, and it looks like David Mitchell and Nandor Guelmino have been fired as well. Their career eulogies are forthcoming.
(Kim vs. Silva: The moment of impact, and the aftermath. / Photos via Getty)
I wouldn’t call yesterday’s UFC Fight Night event a great card, necessarily — the headlining bout was predictably slow, and the main card broadcast dragged in the middle thanks to the light-heavyweights. Still, there were enough violent, surprising, and awful moments at UFC Fight Night 29 to make it worth discussing. So let’s talk about the interesting stuff first, and work our way down to the crap.
Rousimar’s heel-hook was the only submission on the card, and would be worthy of a $50,000 Submission of the Night bonus even if there were other subs to compete with. Instead, the UFC decided to withhold the SOTN bonus due to Palhares’s “unsportsmanlike conduct,” and UFC President Dana White claimed that Palhares would receive an additional punishment for his actions. Palhares previously received a 90-day slap on the wrist** for holding a heel-hook against Tomasz Drwal at UFC 111. Maybe the next punishment will be severe enough for him to actually pay attention.
* By the way, when Palhares showed up in the cage, he almost looked like the old Palhares again. Ah, the miracle of rehydration.
(Kim vs. Silva: The moment of impact, and the aftermath. / Photos via Getty)
I wouldn’t call yesterday’s UFC Fight Night event a great card, necessarily — the headlining bout was predictably slow, and the main card broadcast dragged in the middle thanks to the light-heavyweights. Still, there were enough violent, surprising, and awful moments at UFC Fight Night 29 to make it worth discussing. So let’s talk about the interesting stuff first, and work our way down to the crap.
Rousimar’s heel-hook was the only submission on the card, and would be worthy of a $50,000 Submission of the Night bonus even if there were other subs to compete with. Instead, the UFC decided to withhold the SOTN bonus due to Palhares’s “unsportsmanlike conduct,” and UFC President Dana White claimed that Palhares would receive an additional punishment for his actions. Palhares previously received a 90-day slap on the wrist** for holding a heel-hook against Tomasz Drwal at UFC 111. Maybe the next punishment will be severe enough for him to actually pay attention.
* By the way, when Palhares showed up in the cage, he almost looked like the old Palhares again. Ah, the miracle of rehydration.
While Palhares’s victory was the most savage stoppage on the card, it certainly wasn’t the most surprising. That honor goes to Dong Hyun Kim, who was getting soundly lit up by Erick Silva until Kim ended the fight with a blazing overhand left in round two. Of course, this fight wasn’t without controversy either. Earlier in the round, Kim blatantly grabbed the fence to avoid being taken to the mat by Silva. The ref warned him about it — but didn’t pause the action or deduct a point — and the next thing you know, DHK uncorked a one-hitter quitter. Basically, it was the greatest use of an illegal fence grab since Jose Aldo did the exact same thing against Chad Mendes at UFC 142. All together, now…”YOU SHOULD ALWAYS CHEAT IN AN MMA FIGHT.” Kim is now on a three-fight win streak in the welterweight division, and earned the first Knockout of the Night bonus of his UFC career.
So let’s talk about those light-heavyweights, huh? Thiago Silva managed to save his job by beating Matt Hamill via decision, but it wasn’t pretty. Hamill started aggressively (as he often does), before fading later in the fight (as he often does). To a large extent, you can credit that to Silva’s relentless leg kicks, which jolted Hamill around the cage and stole much of his mobility. By the end of round three, Hamill was just looking to be put out of his misery. Every leg kick from Silva had him stumbling around in a circle, and Hamill was too exhausted to even stay upright, leaning over at the waist several times with his head completely exposed to further abuse. Silva landed strikes at will, but couldn’t find the strength to deliver a merciful death-blow, which suggested that Silva might have been pretty gassed himself. When the final bell sounded, Thiago Silva had staved off the reaper of unemployment, and Hamill proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he should have stayed retired.
Speaking of fighters who faded deep into the fight, Raphael Assuncao and T.J. Dillashaw earned UFC Fight Night 29′s Fight of the Night bonuses, despite the fact that the third round was eerily quiet, with both fighters (but especially Dillashaw) seemingly losing interest in attacking. Dillashaw started off as the aggressor both on the feet and on the mat, and managed to take the Brazilian’s back for a portion of the round. But Assuncao shifted the momentum in the second frame, landing more of his shots and bloodying the face of Dillashaw.
Just when Dillashaw should have picked up the pace in the decisive final round, he took his foot off the gas, steadily walking toward Assuncao but not really doing anything productive. Outside of a few counter-punches, Assuncao seemed to be cool with riding the clock out as well, which he did en route to a split-decision win. The crowd booed the lack of activity during round three, and yet this was officially the best fight on the card. Hmm. Personally, I would have given that honor to Kim vs. Silva — who doesn’t love a comeback knockout? — but maybe the UFC wanted to spread the bonus money around a little more.
Jake Shields‘s split-decision win over Demian Maia was impressive in theory, but not particularly fun to watch. We have to give Shields props for going into enemy territory and out-grappling a grappler who was supposed to be better than him. And he absolutely did that, securing more dominant positions against Maia and abusing the Brazilian with punches and elbows from the top whenever the opportunities presented themselves. The question is, will a methodical 25-minute ground battle do anything to raise Jake’s stock in the welterweight division? Short answer: Hell no. There are too many exciting contenders currently clogging up the top of the 170-pound ladder, and once again, Shields proved that his fights are not required viewing. Seven bouts into his UFC career, he’s still looking for his first stoppage victory, and he’s never been worthy of a Fight of the Night bonus. Being a great fighter means nothing if the fans and the promotion don’t care.
As for Fabio Maldonado vs. Joey Beltran…ugh, what can you say, really? Some ugly brawls are fun to watch, some are just ugly. Maldonado proved that even in victory, he can’t avoid getting his face torn to shit, and that he’ll make it a close fight even when he doesn’t have to. Beltran proved that he might not even be a Bellator-caliber fighter, although we’ll leave that to Viacom to decide.
Main Card
Jake Shields def. Demian Maia via split decision (48-47 x 2, 47-48)
Dong Hyun Kim def. Erick Silva via KO, 3:01 of round 2
Thiago Silva def. Mat Hamill via unanimous decision (30-27 x 2, 29-28)
Fabio Maldonado def. Joey Beltran via split decision (29-28 x 2, 28-29)
Rousimar Palhares def. Mike Pierce via submission (heel hook), 0:31 of round 1
Raphael Assuncao def. T.J. Dillashaw via split decision (29-28 x 2, 28-29)
Preliminary Card
Igor Araujo def. Ildemar Alcantara via unanimous decision (29-28 x 3)
Yan Cabral def. David Mitchell via unanimous decision (30-27 x 3)
Chris Cariaso def. Iliarde Santos via TKO, 4:31 of round 2
Alan Patrick def. Garett Whiteley via TKO, 3:54 of round 1
