Tag: Ronda Rousey

Strikeforce Challengers 18: Rousey Bends an Arm, Mazzagatti Blows a Call, Sun Rises in the East and Sets in the West

D’Alelio vs. Rousey by heretherhere

If the best indicator of future performance is past behavior, the outcome of last night’s battle between Ronda Rousey and Sarah D’Alelio was written on the wall. Rousey, an Olympic medalist judoka, entered the cage with two pro and three amateur bouts under her black belt, all having ended via submission in under a minute. Referee Steve Mazzagatti sports a panoply of blown calls and poor decisions that have earned him the dishonor of being labeled one of MMA’s worst referees. When lightening fast submissions meet questionable decision making, get ready for the fireworks.

The trouble started for D’Alelio the moment the bell rang; Rousey switched up her takedown attack feverishly until she succeeded in bringing the fight to the mat just eighteen seconds into the bout. The trouble started for Mazzagatti about eight seconds later, when he stopped the fight based on a rumor he’d heard that D’Alelio had verbally submitted. The truth is that that Rousey was more than capable of making D’Alelio tap and tap quickly, and her odds of escaping that armbar were slim. But it doesn’t look like Mazzagatti stepped in because D’Alelio tapped verbally or otherwise, or because she was in immediate danger. Rousey stops torquing the arm and turns toward Mazzagatti to inform him that D’Alelio had cried out “Tap! Tap!”, and though we haven’t heard his side of the tale it looks like he takes her word for it and ends the fight. D’Alelio claims to have yelled “Wahahaaahaa!” in response to the pain, but that she never wanted out of the fight. D’Alelio could call for a rematch, but the end result would probably be the same. As for Rousey, how about a fight with Kyra Gracie?

Get full results and gifs of Rousey’s near-wardrobe mishap at the weigh-ins and Derek Mehman’s gruesome cut after the jump.


(Video Props: heretherhere)

If the best indicator of future performance is past behavior, the outcome of last night’s battle between Ronda Rousey and Sarah D’Alelio was written on the wall. Rousey, an Olympic medalist judoka, entered the cage with two pro and three amateur bouts under her black belt, all having ended via submission in under a minute. Referee Steve Mazzagatti sports a panoply of blown calls and poor decisions that have earned him the dishonor of being labeled one of MMA’s worst referees. When lightening fast submissions meet questionable decision making, get ready for the fireworks.

The trouble started for D’Alelio the moment the bell rang; Rousey switched up her takedown attack feverishly until she succeeded in bringing the fight to the mat just eighteen seconds into the bout. The trouble started for Mazzagatti about eight seconds later, when he stopped the fight based on a rumor he’d heard that D’Alelio had verbally submitted. The truth is that that Rousey was more than capable of making D’Alelio tap and tap quickly, and her odds of escaping that armbar were slim. But it doesn’t look like Mazzagatti stepped in because D’Alelio tapped verbally or otherwise, or because she was in immediate danger. Rousey stops torquing the arm and turns toward Mazzagatti to inform him that D’Alelio had cried out “Tap! Tap!”, and though we haven’t heard his side of the tale it looks like he takes her word for it and ends the fight. D’Alelio claims to have yelled “Wahahaaahaa!” in response to the pain, but that she never wanted out of the fight. D’Alelio could call for a rematch, but the end result would probably be the same. As for Rousey, how about a fight with Kyra Gracie?


(Gif courtesy of Zombie Prophet)

Full Results (via MMAJunkie.com)

OFFICIAL MAIN CARD RESULTS

  • Joe Duarte def. Jorge Gurgel via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)
  • Nate James def. Danillo Villefort via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)
  • Pat Healy def. Eric Wisely via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 30-27)
  • Ronda Rousey def. Sarah D’Alelio via submission (armbar) – Round 1, 0:25
  • Derrick Mehmen def. Roy Jones via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 29-28)

OFFICIAL PRELIMINARY CARD RESULTS

  • Gian Villante def. Keith Berry via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
  • Nah-Shon Burrell def. Lukasz Les via TKO (strikes) – Round 2, 2:09
  • Mike Bronzoulis def. Chad Leonhardt via TKO (strikes) – Round 3, 1:30
  • Milton Vieira def. Sterling Ford via technical submission (brabo choke) – Round 1, 4:49

Ronda Rousey Beats Sarah D’Alelio; Steve Mazzagatti at Center of Controversy

Filed under: Strikeforce, NewsFormer U.S. Olympian Ronda Rousey won her first Strikeforce fight in short order Friday night, beating Sarah D’Alelio with an arm bar in just 25 seconds. Unfortunately, Rousey’s performance isn’t what everyone will be talk…

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Ronda Rousey continues her sizzling start to MMA.Former U.S. Olympian Ronda Rousey won her first Strikeforce fight in short order Friday night, beating Sarah D’Alelio with an arm bar in just 25 seconds. Unfortunately, Rousey’s performance isn’t what everyone will be talking about.

Instead, the story of the fight was that referee Steve Mazzagatti stopped the fight even though D’Alelio didn’t tap out.

Rousey used her world-class judo technique to take D’Alelio down and sink in an armbar at the start of the first round, but D’Alelio seemed poised and ready to fight off the arm bar, and she did not tap out. Surprisingly, Mazzagatti stepped in and stopped the fight anyway.


Afterward, Rousey and D’Alelio offered differing accounts of what happened: Rousey claimed that D’Alelio verbally submitted by saying, “tap, tap.” D’Alelio said she did no such thing. Mazzagatti did not give a post-fight interview to explain what happened.

UFC President Dana White has called Mazzagatti the worst referee in MMA, and Mazzagatti has been widely derided by MMA fighters, media and fans. This incident will do nothing to change that.

 

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Get Loaded at Lunch, the Weekend Starts NOW

What up Nation, it’s your boy ReX and the weekend is almost upon us. I’m going to assume that you’ve already given up doing any actual work for the rest of the day, so let’s grab some lunch and talk about our plans.

I don’t mean plans like your girlfriend wants to make, like going out for tapas and enjoying Crazy, Stupid, Love either. Although, i will sort of be asking all you bastards for a date night…

Inside: i want to play a game, judo news, my god this Rousey, and a couple of quick previews for the Zuffa shows this weekend. Come on in and let’s get loaded.

What up Nation, it’s your boy ReX and the weekend is almost upon us.  I’m going to assume that you’ve already given up doing any actual work for the rest of the day, so let’s grab some lunch and talk about our plans.

I don’t mean plans like your girlfriend wants to make, like going out for tapas and enjoying Crazy, Stupid, Love either.  Although, i will sort of be asking all you bastards for a date night…

Inside:  i want to play a game, judo news, my god this Rousey, and a couple of quick previews for the Zuffa shows this weekend.  Come on in and let’s get loaded.

 

Who’s That Octagon Girl?

 

This beauty made her Octagon debut in October, 2006 at UFC 64.  Name her.

 

Strikeforce Challengers 18 is on Showtime Tonight

The main event features two TUF alums with funnyman/gameplan master Jorge Gurgel against Joe Duarte.  Duarte is more of a kickboxer, and lost via submission to Phillipe Nover (though the loss doesn’t appear on his official record), so all Gurgel has to do is showe off a little of his BJJ. We predict that this will not happen.  Should be a fun, competitive fight.

Meanwhile, Pat Healy is fighting Eric Wisely, and after his upset victory over Lyle Beerbohm, he’s not really happy about fighting some dude making his promotional debut. He’s not happy with his workload either, so look for Healy to make a statement in this fight — things may not go well for Wisely.

The fight with the biggest buzz is actually the women’s division fight featuring “Rowdy” Ronda Rousey — her face and videos are all over the damn place. With only 2 pro fights, Rousey is getting a lot of hype and a lot of attention, and a spot on the main card gives her a chance to grab the spotlight. Not that Sarah “The Randleman” D’Alelio is going to make it easy on her, as she’s no slouch on the ground herself.  Expect boxing in the first round, and an armbar in the second.

Here’s the full card:

Jorge Gurgel vs Joe Duarte

Nate James vs Danillo Villefort

Pat Healy vs Eric Wisely

Sarah D’Alelio vs Ronda Rousey

Roy Jones vs Derrick Mehmen

Prelims:

Nah-Shon Burrell vs Lukasz Les

Keith Berry vs Gian Villante

Mike Bronzoulis vs Chad Leonhardt

Sterling Ford vs Milton Vieira

 

Did You See This?

Keiko Fukuda made news this weekend, when the 98 year old received her 10th dan in Judo, one of four people (and the only woman) to have received the highest degree of mastery in the gentle art.  Fukuda, born in 1913, started studying at 21 under Jiguro Kano.  Yes, that Jiguro Kano.

Props to DSTRYRSG for the video.  If you can’t get enough of technique videos, those guys got you covered.

 

UFC Live Versus on 5 on Sunday

We’ve already previewed this card a bit, but it’s worth mentioning again.  Hungry undercard guys on a free fight card usually do something fun to get noticed, and this is a very solid card from top to bottom.  Oh, and i’ll be liveblogging the fights Sunday night, for the first time ever.  It’s going to be awful.  Come early and bring your rotten tomatoes.

Dan Hardy vs Chris Lytle

Ben Henderson vs Jim Miller

Donald Cerrone vs Charles Oliveira

Duane Ludwig vs Amir Sadollah

Facebook Fights:

C.B. Dollaway vs Jared Hamman

Joseph Benavidez vs Eddie Wineland

Ed Herman vs Kyle Noke

Ronny Markes vs Karlos Vemola

Alex Caceres vs Jim Hettes

Cole Miller vs T.J. O’Brien

Danny Castillo vs Jacob Volkmann

Edwin Figueroa vs Jason Reinhardt

 

Ronda Rousey Makes Me Feel Kinda Funny

Note:  i’m no journalist, and i don’t pretend to be objective all the time.  i think Eddie Alvarez is way underrated, PRIDE was awesome, and this Rousey chick is really cool.  She Tweeted some pics yesterday, and i hope my wife isn’t reading this.

i’m just saying, she needs to stop flirting with me is all.

 

Who’s That Octagon Girl?

It’s Anne Rivera.  We’ve seen Octagon Girls come and go, but isn’t it nice to look back every once in a while?

Kick off your weekend now, and let’s start talking about fights.  And don’t let that captcha get you down.  Fuck that captcha.  Comment twice as much and show that stupid captcha who’s boss.

ProTip:  To make an omega symbol: hold down Alt on your keyboard, punch in “234″, and let go of Alt.  Boom.  Now you don’t have to throw your laptop in rage.  Or you could just refresh the captcha.  Whatever works.

[RX]

Video: Is Ronda Rousey the New ‘New Face of Women’s MMA’?

(Props: mmasavvy)

As a competitive judoka, Cali-bred Ronda Rousey earned a bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics and a gold medal at the 2007 Pan Am Games. As a budding MMA fighter, she has won all five of her fights (2 pro, 3 amateur) by submission, all in less than a minute. Now training with Team Hayastan in Santa Monica, Rousey makes her Strikeforce debut tomorrow night at Strikeforce Challengers: Gurgel vs. Duarte in Las Vegas, where she’ll face Sarah D’Alelio. So yeah, it’s time for you to start paying attention to this woman.

As she explains in the above video, women’s MMA needs another visible competitor to fill the vacuum left by Gina Carano. (Uh, hello?) Even though people haven’t seen her standup yet, she feels she’s better than D’Alelio on the feet, and if their fight lasts more than a minute, hey, that’s cool too. Is another women’s MMA star about to be born? After the jump, a glimpse of the kind of ferocious ground-work that Ronda could be showing off tomorrow…


(Props: mmasavvy)

As a competitive judoka, Cali-bred Ronda Rousey earned a bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics and a gold medal at the 2007 Pan Am Games. As a budding MMA fighter, she has won all five of her fights (2 pro, 3 amateur) by submission, all in less than a minute. Now training with Team Hayastan in Santa Monica, Rousey makes her Strikeforce debut tomorrow night at Strikeforce Challengers: Gurgel vs. Duarte in Las Vegas, where she’ll face Sarah D’Alelio. So yeah, it’s time for you to start paying attention to this woman.

As she explains in the above video, women’s MMA needs another visible competitor to fill the vacuum left by Gina Carano. (Uh, hello?) Even though people haven’t seen her standup yet, she feels she’s better than D’Alelio on the feet, and if their fight lasts more than a minute, hey, that’s cool too. Is another women’s MMA star about to be born? After the jump, a glimpse of the kind of ferocious ground-work that Ronda could be showing off tomorrow…


(Ronda Rousey vs. Taylor Stratford, 1/7/11)

Olympic Judoka Ronda Rousey Signs with Strikeforce

When fans booed the first women’s MMA match promoted by Zuffa, most of us assumed we were witnessing the beginning of the end for women’s MMA under the Zuffa banner. Strikeforce allowing their women’s middleweight champion Chris “Cyborg” San…

When fans booed the first women’s MMA match promoted by Zuffa, most of us assumed we were witnessing the beginning of the end for women’s MMA under the Zuffa banner. Strikeforce allowing their women’s middleweight champion Chris “Cyborg” Santos to become a free agent seemed to confirm that. However, it seems that Strikeforce still intends to keep women’s MMA around for the time being. On Friday, Strikeforce announced that Olympic judoka Ronda Rousey will be making her promotional debut on the prelims of the July 30 Fedor vs. Henderson card against 4-1 Sarah D’Alelio.

At 24 years old, Rousey is a very interesting prospect. She became the first American woman to earn an Olympic medal in judo, winning a Bronze medal at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. She celebrated this by becoming a vegan. Seriously. She is currently 2-0 as a professional MMA fighter, with both fights ending in under a minute by armbar. For that matter, all of her amateur fights ended that way as well. To say the least, the odds are pretty good that her fight against Sarah D’Alelio won’t last too long.

Video of her June 17 fight against Charmaine Tweet after the jump.