Tag: Maximum Fighting Championship

Undefeated prospect pumped up to make exciting first impression at MFC 32

Press Release – Diego Bautista doesn’t fear his opponent or entering hostile territory for his debut in the Maximum Fighting Championship.

Bautista (7-0) will look to keep his undefeated record intact in his first venture under the MFC banner when he tangles with Ryan ‘The Kid’ McGillivray (11-5-1) at MFC 32: Bitter Rivals. Their welterweight showdown will be a highlighted matchup on the HDNet Fights card emanating from the Mayfield Conference Centre in McGillivray’s home town of Edmonton, Alberta, on Friday, Jan. 27 (check local listings for channel designation).

Though this will be Bautista’s first opportunity in the MFC, the Anaheim, California, product isn’t lacking for confidence in what he’ll bring to the table.

“I’m going to make an exciting impression,” said Bautista. “it’s going to come down to what I know how to do and what I’m capable of doing.

“I’ve got a good ground game and I like to stand and bang too. If he wants to take it to the ground, I’ll go and I’ll punish him and I’ll finish it. I’m too determined to not finish the fight.”

And even though McGillivray holds nine submission wins, including five via armbar and another by kimura, Bautista scoffed at the notion the he’ll need to adopt a submission-heavy defense.

“He’s not going to get my arm,” touted Bautista. “He does have a good ground game so I’m going to try and stand and bang, but if he goes to the ground, I”ll be very willing to go. I’m not scared of that at all.”

A former college baseball standout, Bautista immersed himself into mixed martial arts just three years ago. The 26-year-old father of four has racked up four victories inside the first round, all of which came in less than three minutes. Bautista has also registered a pair of wins via knockout.

Tickets for MFC 32: Bitter Rivals are going fast, and are available exclusively through the MFC Ticket Hotline at (780)-504-2024.

Press Release – make its much-anticipated debut on TSN2 with the premiere airing of MFC 31: The Rundown on Saturday, November 12.

MFC 31: The Rundown will air on TSN2 at 7 p.m. ET/5 p.m. MT/4 p.m. PT this Saturday (check local listings for channel designation). An encore presentation will air on Sunday, November 13 at 3:30 p.m. ET/1:30 p.m. MT/12:30 p.m. PT.

MFC 31 is the first event in a multi-fight agreement between the Maximum Fighting Championship and TSN2.

“I’m extremely pleased to have the Maximum Fighting Championship launch on TSN2,” said MFC Owner/President Mark Pavelich.

“Fight fans across Canada are going to see the first-class production and presentation that the MFC is very proud, not to mention the outstanding lineup of fighters from MFC 31 who put on terrific performances including Kajan Johnson, Adam Lynn, and Mukai Maromo.

“I am delighted that our partnership with TSN2 is getting under way, and very excited about all the future events that will be seen.”

The MFC 31: Rundown card features the outstanding lightweight roster of the Maximum Fighting Championship including the showdown between “The African Assassin” Mukai Maromo and “The Persian Warrior” Sabah Fadai, the Knockout of the Night performance by Adam Lynn against Curtis Demarce, and “Ragin” Kajan Johnson’s tremendous showing against Richie “Hell Boy” Whitson.

The Kid’ comes home to the MFC
Ryan McGillivray marks return at Bitter Rivals in January

Press Release – Ryan McGillivray has returned to the place where his career was launched.

Coming off his appearance on The Ultimate Fighter: Season 14, “The Kid” has signed on to once again be a key figure in the Maximum Fighting Championship’s welterweight division. McGillivray (11-5-1) will make his return to the organization at MFC 32: Bitter Rivals taking place on Friday, January 27 at the Mayfield Conference Centre in Edmonton, Alberta.

“There were a lot of factors in my decision to be back in the MFC,” explained McGillivray, who has 12 fights in the MFC ring on his resume.

“I got tired of dealing with the people in other organizations. I just want to fight and the MFC is the best platform for me to do that.”

McGillivray’s opponent on the HDNet Fights card will be announced shortly, though the 25-year-old, who will be fighting in front of a partisan hometown crowd, already has his eye on a few names including those in the hunt for the MFC welterweight crown.

“You’re only as good as your last fight. Dhiego Lima and Sheldon Westcott are both doing very well, but come January I’m going to show where I belong amongst them,” noted McGillivray, who boasts nine victories via submission but is determined to show an improved overall attack.

“My stand-up has never been better. I was never known as a stand-up fighter. I’d look to take it to the ground. Now I think I’ve got a vastly underrated stand-up game.

“I learned a lot of tricks being on the show and training down at (Greg) Jackson’s. I think I’ve improved 10-fold.”

McGillivray, whose career began with a five-fight unbeaten run, has dropped just one of his last five bouts. While part of that success has come from those improved striking skills, a major element has been McGillivray’s change in mental approach. The ever-jovial personality is still there, but added in is a clearly much deeper desire to compete at an elite level.

“I’m fighting more desperately,” declared McGillivray. “Fighting has always been a part of my life, but it’s now become how I feed my daughter Peighton, pay my bills, and make my living. I think that says a lot. It’s become much more important to me.

“It’s my business and I want to increase my value. Fortunately it’s my life … it’s what I do for work and it’s what I love. It’s really given my life deeper meaning and I’m fighting with a lot more emotion.”

Tickets for MFC 32: Bitter Rivals are on sale now and available exclusively through the MFC Ticket Hotline at (780) 504-2024.

Press Release – Jamie “The Ghost” Toney may be best known for his toughness. Let’s face it, the man has been stopped only twice in over 20 professional MMA fights. He’s had literally no amateur experience and very limited access to professional training as he started his fighting career. That being noted, fans may soon know him best for another reason. The Bas-Rutten-trained welterweight is also becoming a reality television star. That’s right, but don’t worry, he won’t be sliding around in mustard, solving gigantic crossword puzzles, or forming fake alliances with ditsy bikini models. It’s not that kind of reality TV. Instead, he’ll be hunting sharks in the depths of the ocean, stalking goats across hot lava rock terrain, and taking down wild boars.

Toney shot his new show, Project Dominion, recently, and the show will be airing on Wild TV and the Outdoor Channel starting December 26th. The show takes a group of travellers and drops them into various environments around Hawaii to hunt, fish, and travel. Viewers will see Toney along side Peter King, a former top-5 surfer in the world, and Dennis Deutsch, a private school principle who is an expert at anything to do with water and fishing. In talking about his show, Jamie Toney expresses the intensity of the experience, “It was unreal. They taught me how to surf, we hunted axis deer, we went cliff jumping and free diving, and we even caught sharks! If you can do it in Hawaii, we did it.”

Not everything went smoothly for the fighter and his crew during filming, however. Jamie almost lost a 3 round decision to the waves. “I almost drowned when we were out there,” explained Jamie, “There were 6’ swells that day. The water was rough…I was getting fatigued.” Despite the setback, the fighter jumped right back into action hunting wild boars.

Jamie made it to the MFC on a balanced record of victories by strikes and submissions, and he didn’t forget about wrestling practice while adventuring in Hawaii either. “I ended up wrestling a boar. I ran in behind it, grabbed its legs, wrestled it to the ground, and held it while the guide talked about it on camera.” The boar wasn’t in the mood for any lay and pray, however, it got up, turned around, and charged the guys. To find out what happens next, fans will have to check out the show.

His development stalking prey comes naturally to this veteran who started hunting from his early childhood. “My dad, he showed me how to hunt. It was something we bonded over. There’s a lot of things me and him don’t have in common, but hunting was something we could share together,” reminisces Toney, “My first gun that my dad bought me for Christmas was a 243.” These days, Jamie Toney has stepped up his firepower, “My favourite gun, which I own back in West Virginia, is a .300 Win Mag. When you shoot something with it, it goes down.”

Opponents better make no mistake. Toney explained he isn’t getting soft just because he’s out adventuring in Hawaii, “Patience and preparation are key in MMA and in hunting. Scouting a fighter is like hunting a bear. I need to know what a bear does, where it likes to roam, what it eats, and all its habits. Patience is essential in both. In hunting, if you make a wrong move, you scare off whatever you’re hunting. In fighting, making a wrong move can cost you the fight.”

As a fighter and a hunter, Jamie is a respectful man. His support for the sport runs deep in his blood, and he reached out to everyone in corporate North America during his interview with the MFC, “It’s really hard to work and be a full-time fighter. If there are companies out there open to it, they should get on board and sponsor some of these guys. If they can help out, help them out – especially these guys out there training hard. If I’d had sponsors early in my career, it would have been a totally different story on some of the outcomes of my fights.”

For a fan looking for a real dude to support in a fight, look no further than a respectful IBEW union electrician with his own adventure hunting show and a fighting style that makes him one of Bas Rutten’s favourite mixed martial artists. In talking about his upcoming fight at MFC 32, Toney sounds confident, “I go into every fight expecting to finish, and I don’t see this fight any other way. I’m going to finish this because that’s what I expect to do and what I train to do. It’s nothing against Cody. I’m not talking smack. That’s just the plan.”

On January 27th, fans can see how well Toney’s plan works during MFC 32 at the Mayfield Event Centre in Edmonton. You don’t hunt sharks or wrestle wild boars without some grit to back it up, so when Jamie steps up to face Cody Krahn, fans have to wonder who should be more concerned – his prey in the wild or his prey in the ring.

Press Release – The Maximum Fighting Championship launches what will be its biggest and boldest schedule in organization history with the announcement of its first event for 2012 – MFC 32: Bitter Rivals.

MFC 32: Bitter Rivals will take place on Friday, January 27 at the Mayfield Conference Centre in Edmonton, Alberta, and emanating live on HDNet Fights. The main card’s live broadcast airing throughout North America on HDNet gets underway at 10 p.m. ET/8 p.m. MT/7 p.m. PT (check local listings for channel designation).

Tickets for MFC 32 are on sale now and available exclusively via the MFC Ticket Hotline at (780) 504-2024.

The lineup for MFC 32: Bitter Rivals is already taking shape with three main-card bouts announced by MFC Owner/President Mark Pavelich.

In the co-main event, MFC lightweight champion Antonio “Mandingo” McKee puts his title on the line against No. 1-ranked challenger Brian “The Bandit” Cobb. The other co-main event will pit long-time MFC fan favorite Dwayne “D-Bomb” Lewis against Brazilian striker Wilson Gouveia in a light-heavyweight battle that will be the MFC’s first five-round, non-title superfight.

“The fans of the Maximum Fighting Championship want action, they want exciting fights, and they want to be impressed by the fighters – just like I do,” said Pavelich. “These co-main event fights are set up to provide all of that.

“When he’s pressed into a corner, Antonio McKee comes out fighting, and there’s no way in the world that Brian Cobb will let McKee just coast through this fight. Cobb wants the belt and he is going to go after it. It’s going to be up to McKee to decide if he’s willing to fight to keep it.

“And the MFC has no fighter who’s more combative, more eager to settle into the pocket and throw down than Dwayne Lewis. Both he and Wilson Gouveia are looking to get on track after long layoffs so there’s no better way to figure out who’s for real than to let them smash their way back into the mix.”

McKee (26-4-2) has won 12 of his last 13 fights, and will be defending his MFC crown for the second time. The Lakewood, California, product claimed the MFC lightweight title at MFC 20 with a unanimous decision over Derrick Noble, and then defended the belt in one of the most impressive efforts of his decorated career. McKee, angered by many of his opponent’s pre-fight comments, notched the third TKO of his career finishing Luiz Azevedo only 3:11 into their bout at MFC 26.

Cobb (19-6) is on quite a roll of his own as he gets his first MFC title shot. The Bakersfield, California, native has won four straight including an exhilarating triumph in his organizational debut at MFC 30. Cobb turned the tables on opponent Drew Fickett and racked up a scorching TKO victory just 4:44 into the first round. A holder of 12 submission victories, Cobb has also registered key career wins over Kazunori Yokota and Diego Saraiva.

The MFC 32 superfight features the return of Lewis (12-7), the pride of Fort McMurray, Alberta, who is unquestionably one of the MFC’s all-time great crowd-pleasers with 13 appearances under the organization’s banner. Lewis rode a seven-fight winning streak into his title fight at MFC 28, but he fell short via a third-round TKO against Ryan Jimmo. Lewis boasts seven career knockouts including sensational first-round finishes against Mike Nickels and Marvin Eastman.

Gouveia (12-8), a holder of seven submission and four knockout wins under his belt, makes his long-awaited return from injury following his loss to Jimmo at MFC 25. The Brazilian, who now fights out of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, has a number of big-name victories on his resume including first-round stoppages of Jason MacDonald, Jon Fitch, and Carmelo Marrero.

Also signed to the MFC 32: Bitter Rivals card is a showdown between fighters who are both coming off stellar performances at MFC 31. In an explosive lightweight affair, hometown rising star “The African Assassin” Mukai Maromo (6-2) will meet former U.S. Marine Adam Lynn (17-8).

Maromo, who has won three straight, scored the Knockout of the Night at MFC 30 with a quick finish against Scott Cleve, and then put on a fantastic performance for his Edmonton fan base in a thrilling three-round decision over Sabah Fadai.

Lynn enters MFC 32 boasting a six-fight winning streak highlighted by his Knockout of the Night outing at MFC 31 when he floored Curtis Demarce just 1:38 into Round 1. The San Clemente, California, product holds six knockouts on his career resume.

The remainder of the main card along with the undercard will be announced in the near future.