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Jamie Varner Calls Controversial Split Draw “Bogus”

Hate to sound like a broken record (guess saying ‘skipping cd’ is also rather dated….), but if you didn’t see last night’s WEC broadcast, yup, sh-ts gotta change. Once again the lil bro of the UFC put on one damn entertaining event (one Fix staffer actually wept tears of joy during the Mark Hominick / […]

Varner

Hate to sound like a broken record (guess saying ‘skipping cd’ is also rather dated….), but if you didn’t see last night’s WEC broadcast, yup, sh-ts gotta change. Once again the lil bro of the UFC put on one damn entertaining event (one Fix staffer actually wept tears of joy during the Mark Hominick / Yves Jabouin bout…). The main event tilt between former WEC lightweight champion Jamie Varner and wrestling powerhouse Kamal Shalorus was also thrilling, that is until the judge’s decision was announced, bringing that aforementioned record to a screeching halt.

Now Shalorus certainly didn’t get blown out in the fight; he was aggressive, constantly pursuing Varner while blasting the Arizona fighter’s with kicks. On the other side, Varner landed far more often, and on a couple of occasions, he rocked the Iranian with hard punches and may have been a shot or two away from finishing the fight. One other, rather, glaringly important detail, in his frequent attempts to brutalize Varner’s lead leg, Shalorus ended up kicking the former champ’s ‘it can only do so much’ protective cup, not once, not twice, but thrice. Shalorus was deducted a point for the ‘yeesh’ infractions. So, considering Varner won the first two rounds, the deducted point to Shalorus, win for Jamie right? Wrong-o. Judges scored it a 29-27, 27-29, 28-28, draw….

Speaking after the bout, Varner, who actually was somewhat reserved by his usual ‘outgoing’ standards, had this to say about the decision (thanks to MMA Fighting):

“I think that was bogus,” Varner said. “I definitely feel I won the fight.”

You’re not the only one.

Matt Hamill Reveals he had Broken Hand, Staph Infection, in Bout with Keith Jardine

So unless you were dipping real hard into bath tub gin last night (just to reach out to our ‘fiscally challenged’ readership that can’t afford ‘corporate’ alcohol), you likely noticed the ‘WTF is that?’ mark on Matt Hamill’s lower back, during the broadcast of the TUF 11 Finale. It certainly captivated our interest here for several moments, but as the fight turned into one damn, entertaining and somewhat gory slugfest, naturally our attention to that specific detail wandered.

Now, if you didn’t see last night’s card, yes, you missed out, and you may also be unaware that Hamill outscored Keith Jardine for the MajorityDecision victory (and FYI-Court McGee tapped out Kris McCray to become the latest “Ultimate Fighter”). While Jardine’s face was a bloody mess by the fight’s end, Hamill also took his share of lumps during the tilt, including an inadvertent thumb in his right eye that cost Jardine a point. After the bout, Hamill appeared to be completely spent while talking to color man Kenny Florian, and according to a report from MMA Junkie, there’s some pretty good reasons for that. Not only did the light-heavweight break his hand in the first round, get poked in the eye, and fight a gruelling three round fight, remember that odd looking mark?

“I have a staph infection,” Hamill said. “I’ll get put on antibiotics tomorrow.”

Yeah, that’s nasty, real nasty, and apparently doctors decided before the fight that the infection would not punt the bout. Oh yeah, the Junkie report also added that Hamill limped into the post-fight presser; now that’s one hard fought win no?

Alistair Overeem Says Bout with Fedor Emelianenko Has to be Next

Next weekend Fedor Emelianenko will gun for his second Strikeforce win against Fabricio Werdum, and when you have a dude whose last loss occurred when people still used the term ‘Y2K’, it’s pretty understandable why almost everyone is expecting Fedor to win. This despite the fact, that, sorry “Last Emperor” die-hards, the Russian has looked beatable […]

Next weekend Fedor Emelianenko will gun for his second Strikeforce win against Fabricio Werdum, and when you have a dude whose last loss occurred when people still used the term ‘Y2K’, it’s pretty understandable why almost everyone is expecting Fedor to win. This despite the fact, that, sorry “Last Emperor” die-hards, the Russian has looked beatable in his last couple of outings against Brett Rogers and Andrei Arlovski.

Of course, if Fedor does win next Saturday, then one would think (and pray) that Strikeforce will make the logical and fiscally promising choice, and roll with Emelianenko vs. heavyweight champ Alistair Overeem. Especially in light of the fact that finally, newbie fans who don’t follow MMA abroad, actually got to see who this so-called Overeem was when he beat down Rogers last month in St. Louis (it was the Dutch fighter’s first fight in North America since 2007). Overeem recently spoke with MMA Bay, and had this to say about who Fedor should fight next, provided he takes out Werdum.

“My number one priority is to defend my belt at Strikeforce and keep fighting as much as I can. For me the fight with Fedor makes the most sense. If Strikeforce has the number one fighter in the world then it’s crazy that its belt holder (me) is not fighting him. I know the fans want it so therefore I want it. I would love to fight the man that’s considered by most people the best in the world.”

We agree Alistair. Not putting together Overeem vs. Emelianenko- that’s effin crazy talk. To bet on the June 26th Strikeforce head here.

Kamal Shalorus Credits Power to Life on the Farm

(photo credit: Dave Mandel / Sherdog.com)
The MMA gods have blessed us with a ton of fights this week, last night there was the Strikeforce show in L.A., tonight, Bellator’s welterweight tourney concludes, and then this weekend, the omnipresent Zuffa will grant us a UFC and WEC on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Sweet. Looks like re-painting the […]

(photo credit: Dave Mandel / Sherdog.com)

The MMA gods have blessed us with a ton of fights this week, last night there was the Strikeforce show in L.A., tonight, Bellator’s welterweight tourney concludes, and then this weekend, the omnipresent Zuffa will grant us a UFC and WEC on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Sweet. Looks like re-painting the bomb shelter will have to wait a few days.

Sunday’s WEC, which will take place in Edmonton, Alberta, will be headlined with a lightweight tilt between former champ Jamie Varner and the undefeated Kamal Shalorus. It’s an interesting bout, as Varner needs a win to keep himself within striking distance of a rematch with the new champ Ben Henderson, while a win for Shalorus, might just get him a crack at the title. While Varner is pretty well known, Shalorus hasn’t been fighting on the big stage very long- things to know- he’s Iranian, he comes from an accomplished wrestling background, and, he’s as strong as an ox…(thanks to MMA Fighting for the quote).

“I know some athletes who developed their strength through technology,” Shalorus said in an interview with MMAFighting.com. “Not me. I got it working with my hands, working in the field all day, working with the animals. We had sheep, goats, horses — I’d have to build a barn for the animals, I’d have to work in the garden and then go chop down a tree, I’d have to go into the mountains to get something. It was a hard workout. I would often think to myself while I was working that this would also help me with my wrestling.”

Kamal, you just made Matt Hughes’day….

John Hackleman Devastated by Chuck Liddell’s Latest Loss

The MMA world continues to wait out any word from Chuck Liddell, as to whether or not the legendary fighter will finally call it quits, after getting KO’d once again, this time by Rich Franklin, at UFC 115. Of course, Dana White (once again) is saying Chuck’s time in the UFC is done, but as […]

The MMA world continues to wait out any word from Chuck Liddell, as to whether or not the legendary fighter will finally call it quits, after getting KO’d once again, this time by Rich Franklin, at UFC 115. Of course, Dana White (once again) is saying Chuck’s time in the UFC is done, but as each day goes by with no word from Liddell, kind of makes you think as to what’s going on behind the scenes no?

It’s more than likely that Liddell’s received a thousand voice mails / texts/ emails asking what his next move is, and thus far, he’s not sharing (maybe he’ll respond to message by pigeon?). Well in an interesting interview by SI’s Josh Gross, with Liddell’s long time trainer John Hackleman (yes, the dude with glasses who’s always rocking the sleeveless shirt on TUF), he had this to say about his friend’s latest loss.

“You can’t make someone quit,” Hackleman said. “But definitely when I looked down at him in the cage, my stomach … it just didn’t feel good.”

“Looking down at him cut like that, broke my heart,” said the trainer, fighting off tears.

Hackleman also said in the interview that he thinks the former champ realizes he has nothing to prove, really doesn’t need to fight anymore (meaning dude’s filthy rich) and that he’ll probably hang up the gloves. Guess we’ll see. To check out Hackleman’s take on the situation, including how Chuck’s “”warrior mentality” took over at UFC 115, head here.

Robbie Lawler Admits to Relying on KO Power “Too Much”

If you didn’t have a chance to catch last night’s Strikeforce card in L.A., well, your life will continue, naturally, but it’s just a tad incomplete. Okay, maybe not as incomplete if you were to miss Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin, but still, you should do some rectifying pronto…The card had some damn entertaining fights […]

If you didn’t have a chance to catch last night’s Strikeforce card in L.A., well, your life will continue, naturally, but it’s just a tad incomplete. Okay, maybe not as incomplete if you were to miss Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin, but still, you should do some rectifying pronto…The card had some damn entertaining fights and the main event tilt between Robbie Lawler and Renato “Babalu” Sobral certainly didn’t disappoint.

Now anyone that has followed the career of Lawler, knows that he’s pretty skilled at crumpling dudes into unconscious piles of humanity with just one punch. Lawler was getting brutalized by Melvin Manhoef in his last fight, until, well, see above. In his bout with Sobral last night, Lawler never managed to land one of his trademark punches, and afterwards, the HIT Squad fighter conceded that perhaps he was looking for the home run shot too much (thanks to Sherdog for the quote).

“I thought I was going to knock him out — plain and simple,” said Lawler. “It was inevitable that (I was going to) put my hands on him and knock out him out and it just never happened… When you can knock people out, sometimes you rely on that a little too much, I think.”

Although Sobral’s face looked like it had been caught under a rugby scrum, the UFC vet landed plenty of kicks and punches to the body of Lawler and probably had the edge in cage control. In other words, if Lawler had scored more often, things would have been different. To read more of Lawler’s thoughts on the fight head here.