Speculation continues to mount surrounding a potential showdown between UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St-Pierre and Strikeforce Welterweight Champion Nick Diaz at UFC 140 this December in Montreal. MMAWeekly even reported that the fight could be an…
Speculation continues to mount surrounding a potential showdown between UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St-Pierre and Strikeforce Welterweight Champion Nick Diaz at UFC 140 this December in Montreal. MMAWeekly even reported that the fight could be announced as early as this coming week for the event.
But is that what Zuffa actually wants, or is it just a product of the current lackluster situation within the welterweight division?
The UFC 127 main event between Jon Fitch and BJ Penn was supposed to essentially set the No. 1 contender for St-Pierre’s crown, but a draw and subsequent injuries prior to the rematch have put the kibosh on that.
When St-Pierre took care of business against Diaz’s training partner and friend Jake Shields at UFC 129, fans and experts alike began calling for the champion-versus-champion contest.
But why?
Sure, Nick Diaz has shown that he can beat up quality fighters like Paul Daley, but that is really the only top-25 welterweight who Diaz has fought since leaving the UFC in 2006 following his third straight loss.
Diaz is on a 10-fight win streak, but the competition just hasn’t been anywhere in the same atmosphere that it would have been if he were in the UFC. Is it that Nick Diaz is making them look that bad, or is it that he’s just a big fish in a small pond?
Whatever the case, this is simply the UFC’s only option at the moment for a logical opponent for their welterweight champion.
Dong Hyun Kim and Carlos Condit could make for quality opponents down the road, but they will be fighting one another at UFC 132 in July. Even then, there’s no guarantee that either fighter will be ready to fight the champion, especially by the end of 2011.
Jon Fitch and BJ Penn obviously still have a score to settle between one another.
Josh Koscheck and Jake Shields got dominated by St-Pierre in their opportunities.
There just isn’t anyone else other than Nick Diaz.
But given all of the negativity that surrounds Diaz, it’s just extremely hard to imagine that the world’s top mixed martial arts promotion wants him as its welterweight poster boy.
Diaz is abrupt and abrasive in interviews, he’s a rumored pothead, he isn’t a proven pay-per-view draw, he complains about his contract despite having signed it himself and he has even shown the desire to quit the sport of mixed martial arts entirely.
Imagine what a train wreck it’d be for the UFC if Diaz won the Welterweight Championship and then retired with the title to go into professional boxing. Or worse yet, what if he kept the title and boxed, only to get knocked out in embarrassing fashion by a mid-level opponent?
But realistically, Georges St-Pierre is a massive favorite in a fight against Nick Diaz. If Zuffa were to keep the UFC and Strikeforce titles separate, as rumored, imagine what a loss would do for Diaz and the Strikeforce title’s credibility. Especially if he gets lit up like almost all of St-Pierre’s recent opponents.
There would still be those who would defend Diaz as a top welterweight, but it’s hard to promote that when he has only beaten one guy (Daley) who is even arguably a top-10 welterweight in the past five years.
Zuffa might as well take the title and bury it in the desert because no one would care any longer.
The UFC is simply stuck between a rock and a hard place, and Nick Diaz is the only fighter they have that could realistically sell a big fight with Georges St-Pierre.
“GSP isn’t down to fight me,” Diaz told MMAFighting’s Ariel Helwani in an interview last year.
I’m not sure that’s the case, but perhaps St-Pierre realizes what other people seem to be neglecting—the only real positive outcome of a GSP-Diaz fight is a one-night pay per view payoff.
And there’s no guarantee that the buy-rate would be anything spectacular anyway.
Below is part II of my interview with UFC Heavyweight Frank Mir. To read part I click here. The subject of Zuffa’s recent purchase of Strikeforce came up and what that meant for the current crop of UFC heavyweights and Strikeforce’s big men…
Below is part II of my interview with UFC Heavyweight Frank Mir. To read part I click here.
The subject of Zuffa’s recent purchase of Strikeforce came up and what that meant for the current crop of UFC heavyweights and Strikeforce’s big men. There has been a lot of talk of super-fights since the acquisition was announced, but what is the reality of any of those potential matchups coming to fruition?
“It now means that pretty much every single top 10 heavyweight is under one promotion. I have been with the UFC since 2001 and there was the argument about which organization had the better group of heavyweights, the UFC or Pride,” said Mir.
“Then those guys came over and I beat Nogueira and Mirko and got to lay those arguments to rest in my mind. Strikeforce has a pretty solid group of fighters and the argument started between our guys and theirs. I said if their guys are better why are we getting paid more, now that the UFC bought Strikeforce maybe we can find out which organization has the better group of fighters. I look at Overeem as their top guy and I feel as though I would be his best matchup in the UFC. Guys like Brock, Cain and Carwin would expose his weakness which is his wrestling.”
“He has good submissions and is obviously a solid striker so if we fought there would be a lot more action than if he fought one of the wrestlers,” Mir said. “The three guys I mention would look to keep him down and control him to avoid his striking. There’s not a lot of room to move around so if Brock wants to take him down he is going to have a good shot at doing so. Overeem is a K-1 champion and has a really good guillotine, but I think I’d be a really good matchup for him.”
According to Mir, the purchase of Strikeforce will be a lot like when the UFC bought the WEC. With the different television contracts, there wasn’t really any guys jumping back and forth between promotions, Showtime will want to keep their contracted fighters on their cards.
“I think it’ll be a really long time before we see any guys crossing paths simply due to the contracts their guys may have with Showtime. Versus wanted to keep the WEC guys on their network so it was either you were going to fight for the WEC or for the UFC, not both,” Mir said candidly.
“Unless a guy gets cut from one organization, I doubt you will see guys’ crossing over.”
With the departure of Randy Couture to retirement following his loss to Lyoto Machida at UFC 129, I wrote about who could possibly step up and take on the role of ambassador for the organization and the sport.
Is Mir the type of guy who can see himself fighting into his 40’s and helping the UFC educate the average person about MMA and the athletes that fight for them? “I was able to meet, talk and train with Randy on several different occasions,” said Mir.
“I’m glad he made it out of the Octagon without any serious injuries, there comes a time when everyone has to hang it up. I’m impressed with how he went out, he chose a really difficult opponent to face in Machida. He took on one of the top guys in the world who is difficult match-up for anyone.”
“This is the type of guy who does a great job avoiding all of Randy’s strong suits. I thought Randy looked awesome during the first round; I whispered over to my wife and said if he keeps this up he might not retire! I feel bad when I complain my back hurts, yet here is this guy who is much older & is moving around the ring like he’s in the prime of his life,” offered Mir.
“Someone forgot to tell him he’s not in his prime anymore.”
Many people have alluded to Couture as a freak of nature, but Mir feels as though that statement takes away from what really separates Couture from the rest of the pack. His hard work, dedication and his desire to improve each and every time he fights.
“Labeling him as a freak of nature could discourage other people from following in his path. Randy is determined, if you look at his record, it’s not like he is 30-0, he has gone up against some guys and hit some bumps in the road,” Mir explained.
“When he loses he goes back in the shop, he is driven to improve on what went wrong. If he was a freak of nature he would have gotten it right the first time and never had to work at it. What makes him so dangerous is his will power, you can be stronger and faster than another man, but when you have a guy like Randy coming after you with a mindset of I’m not giving up until one of us is no longer here. That’s what Randy embodies, he has that attitude of you can knock me down, but I am never going to quit.”
Mir is still relatively young and besides being injured in a horrific motorcycle accident that cost him the UFC Heavyweight Championship, he has managed to stay relatively healthy. A lot of that has to do with hard work, luck and genetics, but for Mir, as long as his body is willing, he doesn’t see an end in sight.
“I would like to fight into my 40’s, I’ve heard a quote that says retirement after the game is the rest of your life,” jokingly said Mir. “I’ve been doing this professionally for over 10 years now. A lot of my development as a man has taken place inside the Octagon. I was doing this before I had kids, before I was married so everything I have done since then has been done as a UFC fighter.”
“Barring any bad injuries I will keep fighting, I want to maintain a certain quality of life,” Mir explained.
Couture was seen as an icon, a hero; that is why he had nicknames of Captain America and The Natural. While Mir probably won’t be confused with Couture in that regard, he does see himself filling the role of ambassador and being a spokesman for the organization.
“I think that I have a good understanding of people and I am quick with words. I get aggravated sometimes when people have a misconception of how dangerous our sport is,” Mir said confidently. “I ask people if they watch football and they’ll say yes, so I tell them that this will be an argument because they have already shown me that violence is not an issue for them.”
“A guy running down the field weighing 240lbs with 4.4 speed is in the top one percentile of athletes in the world. He hits into another player with his helmet and not only is that a lot more painful than what we are doing it’s a lot more dangerous. When a fight is over I get up and I may have a few knicks or bruises, but they heal. I hear stories about football players being so injured they have to pee inside water bottles because they can’t get up to go to the bathroom.”
“If we all put Gi’s on and bowed before we fought, people would say that’s awesome. Well we are still fighting the same style, with the same punches, kicks, knees and submissions. I am always trying to educate people on the truth and the facts about our sport,” Mir said. “
If I encounter a guy who is a complete pacifist then I can understand where he is coming from and I won’t try to win him over.”
When I told Mir that my six-year-old son was in his second year of BJJ and that some friends of mine had become critical of my decision to place him in a combat sport at that young of an age, he really got animated and defended my decision to allow my son the chance to compete at such a young age.
“The most important thing he is learning is that every day he claps hands with someone and rolls with them he may be a little bit nervous, but he is handling a situation that he probably would rather not be in,” Mir explained.
“He is already learning skills that will crossover into life when he goes on interviews and goes to college. He is learning how to face adversity head-on when he faces another six-year-old who is trying to hold him down he will learn the difference between what is real fear and what is not.”
“These are things that can only be taught in sports, they can’t be taught inside a classroom you can’t allow these kids to be too comfortable. When you do you are creating a generation of kids who just want to play video games and watch MTV all day long. Are these the type of kids we want leading our country or enrolling in the military? Hell no, I know I don’t.”
I asked Mir about what was the best way to find an instructor who was legitimate and who really cared about the kids he was training. “A guy can be really strict as an instructor, but if he really cares about his students and that they do well it’ll show right away. The only time an instructor is strict, but comes off as an asshole is when he really doesn’t want to be there. That’s when I have to question why he wants to be a teacher.”
“It doesn’t matter if your kid is in Tae-Kwon Do, Karate or BJJ; it is teaching him about discipline and how to face their fears head on. You are doing a great service by putting your child into any martial art. It is teaches them social skills and about themselves in ways that nothing else can. This will help him how to deal with anxiety. Martial arts has helped me out in all my endeavors, it helped me deal with my fears and I can walk in front of a camera and talk to people.”
The UFC has gone from having 2,800 people in attendance at UFC 1 to 55,000 at UFC 129. From 86,592 pay-per-view buys for the first event to 1.6 million for UFC 100. There were once no rounds, no time limits, and hardly any rules. Since the days that Ro…
The UFC has gone from having 2,800 people in attendance at UFC 1 to 55,000 at UFC 129. From 86,592 pay-per-view buys for the first event to 1.6 million for UFC 100. There were once no rounds, no time limits, and hardly any rules. Since the days that Royce Gracie was submitting people who had no idea what Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu was, there have been a few fighters that have catapulted the sport to where it is today and will continue to do so in the future.
With the super fight between Anderson Silva and Georges St-Pierre seemingly off the table, Chael Sonnen’s career hanging in limbo and Nate Marquardt throwing in the towel at middleweight, there is no clear-cut contender at 185 lbs. to challenge t…
With the super fight between Anderson Silva and Georges St-Pierre seemingly off the table, Chael Sonnen’s career hanging in limbo and Nate Marquardt throwing in the towel at middleweight, there is no clear-cut contender at 185 lbs. to challenge the winner of the Silva vs. Yushin Okami title fight at the upcoming UFC 134, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
That means there’s a lot at stake for both Damian Maia and Mark Munoz in their upcoming fight at UFC 131 in Vancouver, British Colombia on June 11.
A win would put either Maia or Munoz at the top of the middleweight heap, and an impressive win could mean a shot at the title.
For Maia (14-2) a title shot would be a chance at retribution for what happened in his first and only title fight at UFC 112, the organization’s debut show in Abu Dhabi, UAE.
As it now stands, Maia’s championship fight against Silva is one of the biggest debacles in UFC title fight history, causing a furious Dana White to storm out half-way through the match.
Few held Maia accountable for the bizarre events that took place that night, but there were many who felt that Maia didn’t belong in the cage with Silva in the first place. Maia got the nod after original number one contender, Vitor Belfort, pulled out due to injury.
That night, Silva, for whatever reason, chose not to engage with Maia. He spent much of the fight taunting and mocking Maia, who was left frustrated as he awkwardly stalked Silva around the cage.
Silva won a unanimous decision, doing enough to win the fight. As for Maia, although he did win somewhat of a morale victory by earning the respect of fans for trying to make it a fight, one would imagine he would’ve just as soon taken home the belt.
If Maia beats Munoz on June 11, he might get another chance to do just that.
Mark Munoz (10-2) has quickly established himself as a rising star in the middleweight division. His last win, a 54 second drubbing of C.B. Dollaway at UFC Live: Sanchez vs. Kampmann, might be his most impressive to date.
Munoz dropped Dollaway with a heavy right and then secured the stoppage with some ground and pound. The win pushed Munoz up the ranks of the middleweight division and into a matchup with Maia, one of the division’s top fighters.
Munoz’ only loss at 185 lbs. was a split decision to Okami, a guy who is now fighting for the belt.
Munoz has shown he can compete with the best in his division, but a win over Maia would help make his case as a possible contender.
What makes this matchup exciting for the fans is the different skill sets that each fighter brings to the cage.
Munoz follows in the tradition of fighters such as Dan Henderson and Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson, powerful wrestlers who would just as soon knock you out on your feet.
Like Henderson or Rampage, Munoz has the power in his hands to end a fight. He also has the wrestling chops to take the fight to the ground, where he is able to dish out some brutal ground and pound.
Maia is an elite grappler. There are few fighters at middleweight who have any interest in going to the ground with Maia, Munoz included.
Maia submitted the first five opponents he faced in the UFC, picking up ‘submission of the night’ honors for four of those fights, which is a UFC record.
However, compared to his mastery and finesse on the ground, Maia’s standup is still quite basic. He has made noticeable strides in his striking technique, but it is still the weakest aspect of his game.
Going into his fight against Nate Marquardt at UFC 102, Maia was undefeated in his MMA career, having gone 11-0, with 10 finishes, but it only took Marquardt 21 seconds to hand Maia the first loss of his career.
Maia left his chin open while moving in to throw a strike and Marquardt dropped him. It is the only time Maia has been stopped in his MMA career, but it’s not the kind of mistake he can afford to make against the heavy-handed Munoz.
Munoz is going to want to use his wrestling to keep this fight standing. Spending any time on the ground with Maia is simply flirting with disaster. Despite Munoz’ dangerous ground and pound, he does not have the grappling to hang with Maia on the mat.
As for Maia, the effort he has made to improve striking has been noticeable in his last few bouts, but this is not a fight for him to showcase his progress. Munoz poses a serious threat on the feet, being only one punch away from ruining Maia’s night.
Maia is only going to want to use his striking to set up take downs. Once on the ground, Munoz’ offense will be nullified as he will focused on defending submissions and fighting for survival.
The question is which fighter is going to impose his will? Can Maia take the fight to the ground and make Munoz fight for survival, or will Munoz be able to use his wrestling to frustrate Maia and bust him up with standup?
When the Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix tournament was announced, many fans and experts thought that one fighter stood out like a sore thumb—and not in a good way. That fighter was Minnesota native Brett Rogers. Despite an 11-2 mixed martia…
When the Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix tournament was announced, many fans and experts thought that one fighter stood out like a sore thumb—and not in a good way. That fighter was Minnesota native Brett Rogers.
Despite an 11-2 mixed martial arts record, Rogers came into the event as the biggest underdog among the eight original contestants.
Not only was he the least experienced fighter in the field, but he was facing one of the most experienced and skilled men in the tournament in the first round, in Josh Barnett.
Rogers started off his career on an impressive nine-fight win streak, ending every fight by knockout. Then a surprising victory over Andrei Arlovski in June 2009 earned him a shot at the world’s number one heavyweight, Fedor Emelianenko, later that year.
Like any fighter in the world would have been at that time, Rogers came into the bout as a major underdog. But his performance shocked even the most skeptical of anti-Fedor fans.
Rogers avoided the early submissions, but took it to Emelianenko on the feet before landing some big shots on the ground.
Though he ended up getting knocked out in the fight, many would argue that Rogers was actually getting the better of Emelianenko in the fight up until that point.
The next fight was easily the most damaging of Rogers’ career, as he took a violent beating from Strikeforce Heavyweight Champion and favorite to win the Heavyweight Grand Prix tournament, Alistair Overeem.
In a fight where Rogers landed just one punch according to CompuStrike, he was overwhelmed by a flurry of punches just 3:40 into the first round.
While Rogers bounced back, winning the first decision of his career against Ruben Villareal, many are still viewing him as a huge underdog in this first-round contest against perennial top heavyweight, Josh Barnett.
As a fourteen year professional, Barnett absolutely has the experience to defeat a relatively inexperienced fighter like Brett Rogers. But there’s a lot more that goes into winning a mixed martial arts contest than just knowledge of the sport.
One of Rogers’ advantages in this fight will be his natural size. At 6’4” with a 81.5 in reach, “Da Grim” is one of the larger heavyweights in the division.
While there are certainly smaller fighters in the division than Josh Barnett, he stands a considerably smaller-than-Rogers at 6’3” with a 76” reach. He will also likely be conceding around 20-25 pounds at fight time.
Reach advantages have been known to be some of the biggest difference makers in fights over time and a five-inch difference is nothing to sneeze at. Barnett will need to get inside on Rogers or risk the possibility of eating punches from a distance all night long.
In addition, the ground game may actually be an overrated difference in this fight. Barnett is absolutely more experienced in fights that go to the ground, but Brett Rogers showed us a surprising amount of composure and ability to break loose when he fought Fedor Emelianenko.
It should come as no surprise to viewers, but it will anyway, if the fight goes to the canvas and Rogers is able to neutralize Barnett’s normally very effective ground game. He did it against Fedor, so why not Barnett?
But as most would guess, Rogers’ punching power is likely to be the most important factor should he be able to defy the odds and move on to Round 2 in the Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix.
Brett Rogers has some of the heaviest hands of any fighter in all of mixed martial arts. This is where “Da Grim” has to be considered most dangerous to any opponent.
Barnett has been solid on his feet throughout his career, but he has also shown that he can be knocked out and picked apart with punches in the past.
If “The Babyfaced Assassin” isn’t careful, he could find himself eating some serious leather before he wakes up staring at the lights.
Mike Reilly and the coaches at Ambition MMA will have their man ready. There’s a reason that Brett Rogers made this tournament, and it’s not just because he has an awesome mohawk.
Rogers has defied the critics before and will be ready to do it again on June 18 at Strikeforce: Overeem vs. Werdum.
Just about a year ago, at UFC 114, former UFC light-heavyweight champion Rashad “Suga” Evans defeated his arch nemesis Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, also a former titleholder, in a fight that would determine the No. 1 contender to the 205-pound belt, held…
Just about a year ago, at UFC 114, former UFC light-heavyweight champion Rashad “Suga” Evans defeated his arch nemesis Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, also a former titleholder, in a fight that would determine the No. 1 contender to the 205-pound belt, held at the time by an injured Mauricio “Shogun” Rua.
After earning his title shot, Evans chose not to take another fight and risk his contender status while waiting for Rua to heal, even fully well knowing the Brazilian-bred champion would be out for an extended period of time.
When Rua was finally ready to compete after a 10-month layoff, Evans injured himself in training, and in his place to fight for the belt was his teammate at Greg Jackson’s Submission Academy, the budding superstar Jon (Bones) Jones, who took the fight on only six weeks’ notice.
Jones ended up defeating Rua in devastating fashion at UFC 128, and since teammates have not traditionally fought each other in the UFC, Evans was forced to leave Jackson’s camp to cash in on his title shot—even though he was a pioneer of the club and Jones had only been there for a few years.
The bout between Jones and Evans was set to take place this August at UFC 133 in Philadelphia, but Jones pulled out, citing the need to get surgery on his injured hand. Since Evans had been without a fight for over a year, he decided to take a fight against undefeated, fast-rising contender Phil “Mr. Wonderful” Davis instead of waiting yet again for an injured champion to return.
But after further consideration, Jones decided to elect not for surgery, instead saying he would be ready to return to the cage this fall.
However, the UFC decided not to pull Evans from his fight with Davis, and now Evans will have to beat a tough fighter in order to retain his contender status. With Jones scheduled for a September-October return, it is up in the air now who he will make his first title defence against, since the UFC announces title fights months in advance in order to promote them.
One suggestion has been to match Jones up with the flamboyant Jackson if he defeats the surging Matt Hamill at UFC 130. But how do you give Jackson a title shot before Evans, considering Evans already defeated him in a fight that was supposed to determine the No. 1 contender? It just doesn’t make sense.
Another idea has been to match up Jones with Lyoto “The Dragon” Machida, the former champion who is fresh off knocking 48-year old MMA legend Randy “The Natural” Couture into retirement with a brutal flying front kick at the UFC’s biggest event ever, UFC 129. This doesn’t make sense either since before the knockout Machida was on the bubble, having been decisioned by Jackson at UFC 123 last November and before that being knocked out by Rua and losing the light-heavyweight title at UFC 113.
Although Machida’s drubbing of Couture was an exciting and memorable moment in the annals of MMA history, it is not enough to overshadow the fact that he lost consecutive fights in the calendar year before it. Evans, on the other hand, has only lost one fight—in his whole career.
If this all seems complicated, that’s because it is, even though it doesn’t really have to be. The solution to this mess is obvious: Pull Evans from his fight with Davis. Although this is the main event of UFC 133, the UFC can replace it with a featherweight title fight between Jose Aldo and Chad Mendes, a fight that has been rumored to take place on the card as the co-main event but hasn’t yet been made official.
The dilemma with is that it doesn’t make sense to have a title fight on the undercard to a non-title fight headliner, even if it is featuring a more recognizable star in Evans. The UFC can solve this problem by scrapping the Davis-Evans fight altogether and having Evans wait another month or two extra to make his return to the Octagon against Jones.
The backfire to this plan is that it would mean Evans would have been out 16 or 17 months since his last fight, and he would likely suffer from ring rust when he finally does fight Jones. But the upside for Evans is tremendous, since he would have his title shot and not have had to unnecessarily risk losing it to Davis, who himself could use time off after having had five UFC fights in the past 13 months.
The fans win too by getting the fight they desperately want to see, since the feud between Evans and Jones has risen to a boiling point lately through their nightclub run-ins and online Twitter feuding. It makes sense for the UFC as well since the fight between Jones and Evans will surely be a financial boon to the company if the current hype level is any indication.
Evans has earned his title shot against Jon Jones. Dana White, make it happen.
Speculation continues to mount surrounding a potential showdown between UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St-Pierre and Strikeforce Welterweight Champion Nick Diaz at UFC 140 this December in Montreal. MMAWeekly even reported that the fight could be announced as early as this coming week for the event.