Tag: MMA

What Should Dana White Do with Gilbert Melendez?

There are many in the MMA fraternity who would call Gilbert Melendez the best lightweight in the world. But Melendez is not a happy man. Last week Strikeforce announced that he would defend his lightweight title against Josh Thomson…for the third tim…

There are many in the MMA fraternity who would call Gilbert Melendez the best lightweight in the world. But Melendez is not a happy man. Last week Strikeforce announced that he would defend his lightweight title against Josh Thomson…for the third time.

There is some justification for the decision to pair the two again: Both are 1-1 in their previous encounters and a rubber match could decide the better fighter once and for all (P.S., it’s Melendez). However, the matchup also reflects the paucity of viable challengers for Melendez who now sits frustrated in an organisation struggling to contain his talents.

In an interview with MMA Junkie Radio last week, Melendez was philosophical.

“I was hoping for something better, for some top talent, and it didn’t work out,” he said of his third match against Thomson, adding he wanted, “Something to raise my stock.”

“You want to be the #1 guy, and right now, it seems like it’s put on hold for a minute… I’ve just got to have fun, do what I do, and stay focused on kicking butt.”

Last March when Zuffa bought Strikeforce, most assumed that Melendez would be quickly snapped up by the UFC, hot on the heels of fighters such as Nick Diaz. Melendez was coming off a first-round TKO victory over Tatsuya Kawajiri and was on a five-fight winning streak. But Dana White told him to wait.

At the time there were promises made to “El Nino” that Zuffa will make sure he has top-level opponents, perhaps some cross-over matches with UFC lightweights, but a year on, that hasn’t materialised.

After his win over Jorge Masvidal last December, Melendez was quick to vocalise his impatience with his paymasters.

“I’m proud to be a part of Strikeforce, and Showtime’s amazing,” Melendez said. “But you know what? They need to bring some guys over here to challenge me.”

Many names have been put forward—Anthony Pettis, B.J. Penn, Gray Maynard, Jim Miller—but none have materialised.

With notable wins over Clay Guida and Shinya Aoki, Melendez is clearly in a different league to the rest of the lightweight division in Strikeforce. His talents are being wasted and he knows it.

But Strikeforce has a contract with Showtime and Zuffa has to honour it. Just last December, Zuffa extended that contract until 2014. Melendez himself extended his own contract with Strikeforce on the back of promises of dream matchups. But Melendez is still left looking through the UFC shop window, with his nose pressed up against the glass, wondering what he has to do to get the challengers he deserves.

Much will depend on what Zuffa wants to do with Strikeforce. The UFC has already raided a slew of its talent, including its entire heavyweight division, and the promotion’s website right now is nothing but a landing page.

All this suggest that Zuffa is ready to wind down operations at Strikeforce which could mean, that over the next two years, there is unlikely to be a fresh injection of lightweight talent for Melendez to face. And that’s a waste of a talent.

#RallyForGilbertMelendez!

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Jon Jones vs. Rashad Evans: 5 Bold Predictions for Title Bout

Fight fans love to see a contest when both opponents greatly appreciate and admire each other. This is not that fight. Even though fight experts have this pegged as a relatively easy win for the champion, this bout between Jon Jones and Rashad&nbs…

Fight fans love to see a contest when both opponents greatly appreciate and admire each other. This is not that fight.

Even though fight experts have this pegged as a relatively easy win for the champion, this bout between Jon Jones and Rashad Evans will feature more than its fair share of surprises.

The war of words between Jones and Evans has been fast and furious, and some of the talk between these two could even make Muhammad Ali blush. Real or manufactured, the verbal battle has caught the attention of many fight fans, and when the two lock up for the Light Heavyweight Championship this Saturday, it will be must-see.

On paper, Jones has everything in his favor. Youth, size and reach are all huge advantages for the man they call “Bones,” but don’t make the mistake of discounting the skill level of Rashad Evans.

Evans is a legit wrestler with excellent takedowns and competent stand-up, and he should be Jones’ biggest challenge to date. Besides a sizzling rivalry finally coming to fruition, here are some of the surprising things to look for in this weekend’s showdown.

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UFC Ultimate Insider’s Counterpunch: Jon Jones vs. Rashad Evans (Part 2)

Before UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and former champion Rashad Evans face off inside the Octagon this weekend at UFC 145, the two former teammates face off in the second part of Counterpunch. The long-awaited grudge match will give Evans a …

Before UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and former champion Rashad Evans face off inside the Octagon this weekend at UFC 145, the two former teammates face off in the second part of Counterpunch.

The long-awaited grudge match will give Evans a second chance at winning a title, something that he has been waiting more than two years for. When he defeated Quinton Jackson at UFC 114, the title shot was on the line, but he decided to sit out and wait for then-champion Mauricio “Shogun” Rua to heal from injuries.

When Evans and Rua were scheduled to face each other at UFC 128, Evans got injured and was replaced by Jones. Jones would dominate Rua to become the youngest champion in UFC history and set up the match between himself and Evans.

After Jones suffered an injury that delayed the bout, Evans decided to fight anyway while waiting for Jones to heal up.

Evans has fought twice since the Jackson fight, defeating both Phil Davis and Tito Ortiz. His latest bout in January saw him win a dominant five-round decision against Davis.

Jones sealed off one of the most impressive years for any fighter when he took out former champions Jackson and Lyoto Machida after defeating Rua and Ryan Bader. He finished every one of them.

The pay-per-view event will be broadcast live from the Philips Arena in Atlanta, Ga.

Other bouts on the card include Rory MacDonald vs. Che Mills, Brendan Schaub vs. Ben Rothwell, Michael McDonald vs. Miguel Torres, Mark Hominick vs. Eddie Yagin and Mark Bocek vs. John Alessio.

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‘Rally for Mark Hunt’ Final Thoughts: Sure Was Fun While It Lasted

I have impeccable timing. A few days ago I wrote about why I had decided to join the “Rally for Mark Hunt” movement. A day later, one single day later, it was reported that Dana White had effectively handed down a death sentence to the caus…

I have impeccable timing. A few days ago I wrote about why I had decided to join the “Rally for Mark Hunt” movement. A day later, one single day later, it was reported that Dana White had effectively handed down a death sentence to the cause and proclaimed that Mark Hunt would not be replacing Alistair Overeem no matter how hard fans rallied.

So now I’m putting up a post that is one-third response and two-thirds “it was fun while it lasted,” hence the name of the article. Three days later.

As I said: impeccable timing. Nevertheless, let’s begin.

Would it have been so bad if Hunt challenged for the UFC heavyweight championship? I don’t think so. If I go into specifics we’ll be here all day and we’ll skew far away from the good-natured intent of this post.

But just off the top of my head: Brock Lesnar, three-fight win streak, a vocal and passionate fan following, styles make fights, Frank Mir sucks against strikers, something something, Overeem cycles horse meat.

Feel free to debate any of those points at your leisure, I’ll more than likely join in on the conversation. But, for now, let’s move on to the core argument of this little blurb:

Sure was fun while it lasted, wasn’t it?

Admit it: We like arguing. Sports fans argue, but MMA fans tend to take things to the next level. You know you secretly love it. I know I do.

And while some of the debate and some of the threads turned really nasty and hateful on both sides, for the most part I really enjoyed both reading and discussing the pros and cons of Hunt getting a shot at the UFC heavyweight championship.

Also, let’s not forget how, for the briefest of instances, a large section of the MMA world stood united under the “Rally for Mark Hunt” banner.

This extended way past just a bunch of fans trying to get their voice heard. Popular MMA Web sites featured prominent news stories covering the growing movement. Several pro fighters gave their thoughts (mostly of support) through Facebook and/or Twitter. Even NickTheFace, the be-all and end-all when it comes to UFC hype videos on YouTube, posted a “Rally For Mark Hunt” video.

So, yeah—it was a whole hell of a lot of fun while it lasted.

And I hope that’s what we all take away from this situation, in all honesty. Yes, I do think it sucks that White responded to such an interesting and engaging movement with one single sentence. Yes, I do think UFC fans should feel slighted that White more or less swept all this under the rug.

But even if we didn’t accomplish our goal of getting Hunt to replace Overeem, we still accomplished something important. Despite being some of the most polarizing, opinionated, argumentative fans in all of sports, for the briefest of moments we were united as one.

And I’m damn proud of that.

I hope you are, too. I don’t regret jumping on the “Rally For Mark Hunt” bandwagon. I can even laugh at myself and realize how funny it is that a day after I jump on the bandwagon and give my big rallying cry, we finally got our answer: a big, loud “not happenin’.”

But no regrets, so I’ll say it again: It sure was fun while it lasted.

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UFC 145: Knowing Jon Jones Will Win, Yet Hoping Rashad Evans Upsets

This Saturday, the latest in an ever-longer line of UFC superfeuds gets its chance to reach a conclusion.By now, you’ve probably heard all there is to hear and read all there is to read when it comes to UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones ta…

This Saturday, the latest in an ever-longer line of UFC superfeuds gets its chance to reach a conclusion.

By now, you’ve probably heard all there is to hear and read all there is to read when it comes to UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones taking on former teammate and former UFC light heavyweight champion Rashad Evans. My prediction for this fight is actually quite simple, and yet it honestly startled me the first time I saw it written on my screen: I know with as much certainty as is possible that Jon Jones will win, but nevertheless I hope Rashad Evans pulls off the upset.

Let’s start simple. A while ago I completely botched a prediction and said Vladimir Matyushenko would beat Jon Jones. Of course, what ended up happening was that Jones utterly destroyed “The Janitor” in what had to have been one of (if not the!) most humbling losses of Matyushenko’s professional career.

Immediately following that fight, I made a promise to never again bet against Jon Jones.

I admit that, in hindsight, maybe I jumped onto the bandwagon too early and too eagerly. Back when people thought Jones was a talented up-and-comer amongst a field of talented up-and-comers, I was already more or less calling him “The Chosen One” and predicting that he would break “the curse” of UFC light heavyweight champions losing their belts in their first few fights since winning the gold.

Nevertheless, I have kept that promise, and it has served me well.

Which brings us back to the first part of the equation. With as much certainty as possible, I know Jon Jones will win. He’s going to do what he does best—he’ll find a hole in your game, no matter how small you may think it is or how small it actually really is, and he’ll exploit it; and then he’ll exploit it so well that he ends up finishing you in highlight-reel fashion.

That’s what he does. That’s what he’ll continue to do.

That’s what’s going to happen to Rashad Evans.

And yet…I hope Evans wins. Thanks to all the pre-fight hype leading up to this fight (in too many articles and videos to list) I just can’t shake the fact that the talk of Jones being “fake” may be truer than I ever wanted to believe.

Rashad Evans may not be the nicest person. To be frankly honest, a lot of the time he can come off as a self-assured, cocky jerk, but at least that’s the real Evans we’re looking at and listening to.

When it comes to Evans’ beef with Jones, it’s realer than real. I’ve heard the conviction in Evans’ voice when he talks of how he helped build Greg Jackson’s camp and how he helped train Jones, only to end up betrayed by both. Maybe that’s not the whole story—I’m almost certain that it’s not—but Evans believes it with such ferocity and tenacity and speaks with such brutal honesty that you at least have to respect him for being completely open about how he feels about the situation.

However, Jon Jones just feels like an enigma to me right now. And I only like it when a fighter’s style is an enigma, not his/her personality. Maybe it’s my own sense of insecurity and even a bit of jealousy, but more and more now, every single time I hear Jon Jones talk I keep feeling like it’s not the “real” Jon Jones talking.

I’m not saying Jon Jones will swerve us all and go from Hulk Hogan to Hollywood Hogan overnight, but I think he’s either hiding something or not saying all that he really wants to say.

Am I living in a fantasy world here? Maybe. I’ll admit it. I don’t feel ashamed about that, either. I’ve been wrong before, I’ve even been wrong about Jon Jones in particular before.

Nevertheless, and this is a point I raised in my recent Mark Hunt article, the heart wants what it wants. And the reason I love this sport is because anything can happen.

So for one fight, I’m stepping outside of the bandwagon. However, I still believe Jones is a phenomenal fighter. I still consider him one of the best fighters in the UFC right now. I’ll even go one step further and say I think Jones will more than likely be the greatest MMA fighter of all time once all is said and done.

I say all that so I can leave you with this: Jon Jones will more than likely defeat Rashad Evans, but I love a good underdog story.

War Rashad.

All day every day.

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UFC 145 Fight Card: Rory MacDonald vs. Che Mills Head-to-Toe Breakdown

After an impressive victory over Mike Pyle at UFC 133, up-and-coming Rory MacDonald has missed nearly one year of competition due to injury. On Saturday, the promising Canadian will attempt to remind fans why he is a future welterweight star by defeati…

After an impressive victory over Mike Pyle at UFC 133, up-and-coming Rory MacDonald has missed nearly one year of competition due to injury. On Saturday, the promising Canadian will attempt to remind fans why he is a future welterweight star by defeating English opponent Che Mills.

With a dominant victory over Chris Cope in his UFC debut, Mills will try to steal MacDonald’s momentum by picking up a sixth consecutive victory at UFC 145. Though a bit older than MacDonald, the 29-year-old Mills is also a very talented young fighter who stopped Marius Zaromskis twice before signing with the UFC.

Let’s take a look at which fighter has a better chance of winning this fight and moving one step closer to becoming a title contender in the welterweight division.

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