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Parallel Universe: What if Some of MMA’s Biggest Training Camps Were Wrestling Stables?

(“When you need me, I’ll be there, ’cause we’re BEST FRIENNNNNNDS….” Photo via WWE)

Comparing mixed martial arts to professional wrestling tends to draw the ire of many am MMA fan. While former WWE and UFC world champion Brock Lesnar eventually earned the respect of UFC fans by putting on dominant performances, he was originally greeted with a less than warm reception. Fellow former WWE world champion CM Punk signed with UFC to less than open arms and is expected to compete in his first MMA bout later this year (or early 2016). Pro wrestling and MMA also crossed paths once again last month, when UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey made a special appearance at Wrestlemania to help Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson run off Triple H and his wife Stephanie McMahon.

All of this interplay between pro wrestling and MMA lately got me thinking; How do some of MMA’s top teams compare to great pro wrestling stables of the past and present? MMA fans are well aware of Rousey’s “Four Horsewomen,” which consists of Rousey and her teammates Shayna Baszler, Jessamyn Duke and recent Invicta FC signee Marina Shafir. The group is big pro wrestling fans and while I’m personally not a fan of the name, they’ve wasted no time promoting themselves.

So which pro wrestling stables would I compare to current MMA teams? Here are a few of my suggestions…

The post Parallel Universe: What if Some of MMA’s Biggest Training Camps Were Wrestling Stables? appeared first on Cagepotato.

(“When you need me, I’ll be there, ’cause we’re BEST FRIENNNNNNDS….” Photo via WWE)

By Chris Huntemann, Columnist

So which pro wrestling stables would I compare to current MMA teams? Here are a few of my suggestions:

MMA: Team Jackson-Winkeljohn/Wrestling: New World Order (nWo) – Team Jackson-Winkeljohn in New Mexico is probably the most well-known team in all MMA, and at its peak, the nWo was the most famous wrestling stable of its time (and maybe of all time). The nWo was home at different times to such high-profile wrestling personalities like “Hollywood” Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, “Macho Man” Randy Savage, X-Pac/Syxx and Sting. Meanwhile, Team Jackson-Winkeljohn has almost a who’s-who of MMA on its roster, including UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones, Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone, Travis Browne, Carlos Condit, Diego Sanchez, Keith Jardine, John Dodson and Leonard Garcia.

Who at Jackson-Winkeljohn could play the roles of the nWo’s original trio: Hogan, Hall and Nash? If I had to venture a guess:

– Hulk Hogan = Jon Jones

– Scott Hall = Donald Cerrone

– Kevin Nash = Carlos Condit

MMA: American Kickboxing Academy/Wrestling: The Dangerous Alliance – American Kickboxing Academy boasts a roaster comparable to Team Jackson-Winkeljohn, including UFC heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez, Daniel Cormier, Luke Rockhold, Khabib Nurmagomedov and Josh Thomson. At its peak in WCW, the Dangerous Alliance consisted of “Ravishing” Rick Rude, Bobby Eaton, Larry Zbysko, Arn Anderson and “Stunning” Steve Austin. While the group never boasted a world champion like AKA does with Velasquez, the Dangerous Alliance was among the greatest group of wrestling talent ever assembled – much like AKA is right up there among the best MMA teams from top to bottom.

MMA: Team Cesar Gracie (“The Scrap Pack”)/Wrestling: D-Generation X – The antics of D-Generation X are known and loved by pro wrestling fans worldwide. From its original iteration of Triple H and Shawn Michaels to the grouping of Triple H, X-Pac and the New Age Outlaws to going back to Triple H and Michaels in its final days, DX were rebels without a cause who loved to thumb their noses at authority.

Likewise, Team Cesar Gracie has its own pair of rebels in the Diaz brothers, Nick and Nate. The team also consists of Gilbert Melendez and Jake Shields, among others. The Diaz brothers have caused UFC president Dana White many a headache throughout their careers and fans love the brothers for their antics inside and outside the cage.

MMA: Team Alpha Male/Wrestling: The Filthy Animals – The Filthy Animals in WCW were one of the very few stables in all of pro wrestling to consist of cruiserweights, or “smaller” wrestlers – Billy Kidman, Rey Mysterio, Juventud Guerrera and Eddie Guerrero. Similarly, Team Alpha Male consists entirely of fighters from the UFC’s lighter weight classes – bantamweight champion T.J. Dillashaw, Urijah Faber, Joseph Benavidez, Chad Mendes and Danny Castillo. The Filthy Animals were thick as thieves during their WCW run, and Team Alpha Male is one of the more tight-knit teams in all of MMA.

MMA: Blackzilians/Wrestling: The Nexus – The Blackzilians are a fairly new team in MMA, coming together in 2011 and boasting talent including Rashad Evans, Vitor Belfort, Anthony Johnson and Michael Johnson. The Nexus also took the pro wrestling world by storm in 2010 and included young talent like Wade Barrett, Ryan Reeves (Ryback), Justin Gabriel and David Otunga. The Nexus tangled with some of WWE’s biggest names, including John Cena and CM Punk, who both at one time were also members of Nexus – in Cena’s case, unwillingly. The Blackzilians have yet to taste gold, unlike the Nexus, but Anthony Johnson gets his chance to bring a belt to the team when he faces Jon Jones for the UFC light heavyweight title at UFC 187 in May.

Of course, I didn’t list some of the other famous teams in MMA, including American Top Team, Team Quest and Xtreme Couture. Conversely, there are wrestling stables I didn’t mention, such as the Four Horsemen, Nation of Domination, Ministry of Darkness or The Corporation. Agree or disagree with my comparisons? Have some of your own? Leave your thoughts in the comments below, or drop me a line!

The post Parallel Universe: What if Some of MMA’s Biggest Training Camps Were Wrestling Stables? appeared first on Cagepotato.

Let the Great Fallout Begin: Nate Diaz Leaves Team Cesar Gracie Management

(Ronaldo Souza’s alligator dance: You’re doing it wrong. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.)

Well, well, well, isn’t this peculiar.

When Nick Diaz starting lobbing accusations of negligence at his own team during the UFC 158 post-fight press conference last month — a team that prides themselves on a wolfpack-like sense of loyalty if nothing else — we initially wrote it off as little more than the fleeting words of a man grasping at straws to save his MMA career. Nick’s attitude regarding his most recent retirement only drove this notion home. That being said, it was hard not to at least speculate that Diaz’s longtime coach/manager/muzzle, Cesar Gracie, could be at least partially responsible for the Stocktonian’s ongoing troubles over the years. Dana White seemed to agree, calling Gracie “a dick” who “plays bullshit games.”

And indeed, it appears that even the members of Team Cesar Gracie are starting to grow tired of his shit, as it was recently announced that former lightweight title challenger Nate Diaz has left the team — managerially, at least — for greener pastures (via MMAMania):

According to a report from Ariel Helwani on Tuesday’s (April 9, 2013) edition of “UFC Tonight” on FUEL TV, the Stockton, Calif., native has enlisted the management services of Mike Kogan, who heads Real Talk Entertainment, representing notable names such as UFC heavyweight Roy Nelson and former Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Muhammed Lawal, among others.

(Ronaldo Souza’s alligator dance: You’re doing it wrong. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.)

Well, well, well, isn’t this peculiar.

According to a report from Ariel Helwani on Tuesday’s (April 9, 2013) edition of “UFC Tonight” on FUEL TV, the Stockton, Calif., native has enlisted the management services of Mike Kogan, who heads Real Talk Entertainment, representing notable names such as UFC heavyweight Roy Nelson and former Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Muhammed Lawal, among others.

As noted by several sources currently reporting on Diaz’s defection, Nate will still train with Cesar and friends, but that will be where their professional relationship begins and ends moving forward.

While we imagine that most sane people would recognize that Nate is simply protecting his best interests (don’t worry, we’ve got you covered), if his brother thought Team Gracie was being neglectful before, just imagine how they’re going to treat Nate now that he’s essentially deemed them too incompetent to continue managing his career.

Let the great Team Cesar Gracie fallout begin…

–J. Jones

Oh Snap! Caio Terra is “a Formidable Force at a Teenage Girls’ Pajama Party,” According to Cesar Gracie

We reacted the same way.

It wasn’t surprising to see Cesar Gracie fire Caio Terra for helping nemesis Carlos Condit, but it was sort of odd that Gracie had so little to say about it. Never one to shy away from calling someone out, it was strange to see Cesar post a half-assed rant on Facebook about the firing and be done with it. Fortunately, he was asked to address the firing on this week’s edition of The MMA Hour, and by the time he shows up on the show, he does not disappoint.

The segment started off with Areil Helwani asking some pretty standard questions about Nate Diaz’s upcoming title fight, but things get interesting when he plays Terra’s explanation for his decision to train Condit and then asks Gracie for a reaction. Believe it or not, Cesar Gracie does not threaten to slap Helwani for instigating fights, but instead opts to give an articulate response detailing the finer points of Caio Terra’s bitchassness. Via MMAFighting.com:

“He must be happy, because this is literally the most publicity he’s ever received. ” Gracie remarked. “He a jiu-jitsu guy, he doesn’t have any kind of MMA anything.”

We reacted the same way.

“He must be happy, because this is literally the most publicity he’s ever received. ” Gracie remarked. “He a jiu-jitsu guy, he doesn’t have any kind of MMA anything.”

“Being the champ at 125 (pounds) with the gi pretty much makes him a formidable force at a teenage girls’ pajama party, or something like that. It’s not a loss to us whatsoever in the MMA scene. Honestly, he’d never won anything before he came on our team, so he should be thankful. You know, people like that, they here come from Brazil, they’re a dime a dozen down there. Trust me. They’re all over the place, these little dudes running around and they’re pretty good at jiu-jitsu. He comes out here in what, 2007, 2008, something like that, and he’s won all his world championships since he’s been on the team. And his first opportunity, he goes and does something stupid like that.”

Gracie then attempts to explain his point to Helwani by using his favorite sports team in an analogy, and although the explanation works well in theory, the fact that Helwani’s favorite football team is the Buffalo Bills just makes everything come off as a cheap pop.

“You’re one of the owners of the Buffalo Bills, or whatever, and you find out the Buffalo Bills’ coach is going to another team to train them and give them the playbook. What happens to him? What does the Buffalo Bills’ owner do when he finds out one of his coaches is going to go do that? Guess what? He’s terminated. He’s immediately terminated and there’s not even a discussion.”

Clearly Cesar Gracie has not watched a Bills game since the early 1990s, but I digress.

Gracie also addresses the fact that most fighters – even his own fighters – temporarily train with different camps in order to switch things up.

“It doesn’t make us bad people, but we’ve got to terminate people like that. We want people that we can rely on. And honestly, I’ll be honest with you, this particular situation, it’s not something that I’m that upset about. If we wanted Condit to lose a fight, we would send him Caio Terra. I’ll tell you why, that’s not even a dig. Caio Terra doesn’t understand anything about MMA. He’s never done any training for it or anything. You can not win a fight with the IBJJ jiu-jitsu rules.

Condit would have done much better, he did great by the way, but he would’ve done much better had he just listened to his other coaches, (Mike) Winkeljohn and those guys, and not sat there and tried to set up some complex submission attempt from the bottom while he was getting punched in the face. That’s what lost him the fight, really.”

And just for good measure:

“I heard [Terra say], ‘The Diaz brothers didn’t call me.’ It’s like, dude, what? Who are you? You’re promoting the Diaz’s and Jake Shields? No, they promoted you. They went on YouTube and helped you out with your videos. They did all this stuff for you to make a name for yourself. They taught you the leglock game because you were getting tapped out all the time when you got down here, and now you’re winning these tournaments and everything because of training with guys like the Diaz’s. And the first opportunity [you get], you give him a little bit of money, you put a camera in his face, the guy’s got like a Napoleon complex, and bam, all of a sudden it’s like, ‘Oh, I’m in the news. I’m with Ariel Helwani talking about it. Cesar’s pissed.’ I’ve turned the page, man. I’ve already replaced the guy. I’ve got better people in already. It’s nothing, so if we can get past [it], get over it, whatever, that’s it.”

To recap everything: Terra is a force to be reckoned with at a teenage girls’ pajama party, but he’s an easily replaceable coach who showed no loyalty to the gym that taught him the leglock game by training Condit – even though Condit lost because he was listening to Terra’s advice. Oh, and he also has a Napoleon complex.

Never change, Cesar Gracie. Never change.

Jake Shields Doesn’t Think Nick Diaz is Done Fighting [VIDEO]

(“Tell me you aren’t going to miss this shit, bro.”)

Our friends at Kimura.se caught up with Jake Shields ahead of his UFC 144 fight with Yoshihiro Akiyama Saturday in Japan and they asked the Team Cesar Gracie fighter whether or not he thinks his teammate Nick Diaz will follow through on his plan to retire.

(“Tell me you aren’t going to miss this shit, bro.”)

(Video courtesy of YouTube/Kimura.se)

According to the former Strikeforce middleweight champ, he doesn’t believe Diaz’s fighting days are behind him and he feels that the Stockton native let his emotions get the best of him after his razor-close decision loss to Carlos Condit at UFC 143. Shields says that some time away from the sport will likely rejuvenate the former Strikeforce welterweight champ and stoke the fire in Diaz to compete again.

“He’s calmed down; I think he’s gonna fight again. I think it’s just, you know, he’s been a little burned out. They’ve been fighting him like crazy, keeping him busy. I think he just needs a little break,” Shields explained. “Unfortunately, he’ll probably be suspended for a little while, but the time off will make him love the sport again and make him wanna get back in there.”

During a Nevada State Athletic Commission hearing today Diaz’s license was suspended and his fight purse and bonuses ordered held until a future disciplinary hearing is held at a yet-to-be-determined date. We’ll have more info as it becomes available.

Diaz’s Camp Fires Back at Penn For Yesterday’s Random Twitter Salvo

(“See, where I come from bitching like that will get you backhanded.”)

Well, it didn’t take long for Team Cesar Gracie to return fire on BJ Penn after “The Prodigy” launched a random Twitter attack on Nick Diaz yesterday.

Here’s what they had to say about Penn’s latest bitchfest via a posting made today on Cesar’s official blog, GracieFighter.com.

Say It Ain’t So BJ…

JANUARY 6, 2012

BJ Penn has apparently not come to terms with the beating he received at the hands of Nick Diaz. Below is his latest posting on his Twitter account:

@nickdiaz209 Look how much bigger you are in this pic..I thought you were gonna scrap from the beginning homie? What was that coward fence holding strategy to tire out the smaller man? Street fighter my ass! I made you fight like glass jaw @jonfitchdotnet poser!
I’ll be ready for that weak bs next time we fight!

At some point it is up to those around you to protect you from yourself. To take you aside and let you know you are wrong and help save you from your folly. Unfortunately for Penn he is surrounded by “Yes Men” that are unwilling to do that. The outcome will be predictable, resulting in a fighter that will never push himself to the fullest and will always have excuses for his losses.