I failed my drug test I think for Xanax. I had a doctor’s prescription, I was just, I didn’t do it before the fight, I did it the night before, I was nervous and I couldn’t sleep.
Why this failed test was not made public by the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission is anyone’s guess, but we’re going to assume that Griffin was simply given a pass because he was essentially fed to the wolves over an open flame. That, and it seems that the idea of fighting Silva is enough to make any of his opponents at LHW become suddenly dependent on an outside prescription for one thing or another. Just ask James Irvin.
(In retrospect, this news should not come as a huge surprise.)
I failed my drug test I think for Xanax. I had a doctor’s prescription, I was just, I didn’t do it before the fight, I did it the night before, I was nervous and I couldn’t sleep.
Why this failed test was not made public by the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission is anyone’s guess, but we’re going to assume that Griffin was simply given a pass because he was essentially fed to the wolves over an open flame. That, and it seems that the idea of fighting Silva is enough to make any of his opponents at LHW become suddenly dependent on an outside prescription for one thing or another. Just ask James Irvin. Unfortunately, judging by Griffin’s performance that night, we’re guessing he was accidentally prescribed the extended release form of Xanax, hence his inability to throw a punch that Silva couldn’t see coming from a mile away. As Paulo Filho will tell you, Xanax and MMA does not a winning performance make.
But according to the always self-deprecating Griffin, the Silva fight was simply a harsh, harsh learning experience that he could only improve from. Now THAT’s optimism, Nation.
Look what happened when I fought Anderson Silva. It can’t possibly get worse than that. I’ve already seen the bottom and it wasn’t that bad. I made it through. I survived. It’s fighting. It’s not the end of the world.
(Well, at least she has looking hot in front of a camera as a fallback career.)
Although the main card of Strikeforce: Rousey vs. Kaufman card provided most of the evening’s highlights, you would be hard pressed to find an MMA site that didn’t declare Miesha Tate’s come-from-behind win (insert puns now) over Julie Kedzie to be the most exciting fight of the evening. Despite being rocked on various occasions and almost ending up as the first entry in the head-kick-nip-slip Hall of Fame, Tate was able to brave the storm and score an armbar victory of her own late in the third round.
But up until that point, it was plain to see that there was clearly something a little off about the former title holder. Her combinations came few and far between, and her takedown attempts seemed to be lacking a certain gusto that they had previously held. While part of this could be attributed to the toughness of Kedzie, who has been training at Greg Jackson’s gym for some time now (and is in fact his personal assistant), an equal amount could just as easily be blamed on Tate’s somewhat lackadaisical attitude in the cage on Saturday night.
The fact that she still managed to pull off an amazing, gritty win over a tough opponent despite this only shows what caliber of fighter Tate truly is, but according to the source herself, we might not be seeing “Cupcake” in action for a while. In a recent interview with Ariel Helwani during TheMMA Hour, Tate explained that she simply “didn’t feel the passion and fire that [she] had felt in her previous fights” when facing Kedzie:
I felt out of my element, I didn’t feel normal in there whatsoever. It was very strange, it was not a feeling I enjoyed and not something I want to experience again, I don’t really know what my next step is here. Even when I was when lined up with Julie, across the cage, I was like, ‘Is this really happening right now? Am I really here? Am I really in this fight?’ I felt like I was kind of just in this twilight zone. I did not like that. It’s not how I normally feel, not how emotions really run. Normally I’m excited to be there, I’m amped and pumped, and I felt little to nothing, and I mean, she literally elbowed me and got my lip really good and I was like ‘ehh, whatever.’ She kicked me in the face, ‘ehh, whatever,’ It was not, it wasn’t a normal circumstance for me I don’t know why that is but I’m asking myself a lot of questions. I think I need to take a step back, relax a minute, and evaluate it.
More from this interview is after the jump.
(Well, at least she has looking hot in front of a camera as a fallback career.)
Although the main card of Strikeforce: Rousey vs. Kaufman card provided most of the evening’s highlights, you would be hard pressed to find an MMA site that didn’t declare Miesha Tate’s come-from-behind win (insert puns now) over Julie Kedzie to be the most exciting fight of the evening. Despite being rocked on various occasions and almost ending up as the first entry in the head-kick-nip-slip Hall of Fame, Tate was able to brave the storm and score an armbar victory of her own late in the third round.
But up until that point, it was plain to see that there was clearly something a little off about the former title holder. Her combinations came few and far between, and her takedown attempts seemed to be lacking a certain gusto that they had previously held. While part of this could be attributed to the toughness of Kedzie, who has been training at Greg Jackson’s gym for some time now (and is in fact his personal assistant), an equal amount could just as easily be blamed on Tate’s somewhat lackadaisical attitude in the cage on Saturday night.
The fact that she still managed to pull off an amazing, gritty win over a tough opponent despite this only shows what caliber of fighter Tate truly is, but according to the source herself, we might not be seeing “Cupcake” in action for a while. In a recent interview with Ariel Helwani during TheMMA Hour, Tate explained that she simply “didn’t feel the passion and fire that [she] had felt in her previous fights” when facing Kedzie:
I felt out of my element, I didn’t feel normal in there whatsoever. It was very strange, it was not a feeling I enjoyed and not something I want to experience again, I don’t really know what my next step is here. Even when I was when lined up with Julie, across the cage, I was like, ‘Is this really happening right now? Am I really here? Am I really in this fight?’ I felt like I was kind of just in this twilight zone. I did not like that. It’s not how I normally feel, not how emotions really run. Normally I’m excited to be there, I’m amped and pumped, and I felt little to nothing, and I mean, she literally elbowed me and got my lip really good and I was like ‘ehh, whatever.’ She kicked me in the face, ‘ehh, whatever,’ It was not, it wasn’t a normal circumstance for me I don’t know why that is but I’m asking myself a lot of questions. I think I need to take a step back, relax a minute, and evaluate it.
Tate’s fleeting desire to compete, at least in my opinion, could easily be attributed to the lack of depth that currently exists in WMMA. It’s bad enough that these ladies are barely making enough to cover their medical expenses, but the fact that Tate can only knock off so many “contenders” before being thrown into an inevitable rematch with Ronda Rousey must be kind of depressing considering how their first fight ended.
Tate mirrored these concerns:
I need to find a way to fire myself up again and get that passion, because I know there’s so much I still want to accomplish in MMA. I absolutely want to fight Ronda Rousey twice, but at this point, you know, mentally and emotionally, I’m not right. I shouldn’t be getting into the cage if I’m not going into it wholeheartedly for this fight. It’s hard for me to admit that, but that’s the honest truth. I didn’t feel like it for this fight like I did for other fights. I don’t know how to explain that, I guess it’s something I just have to figure out at this point.
And why would Tate have issues getting excited for her fight with Kedzie, you ask? Well, considering that she was coming off arguably the biggest fight in WMMA history, only to be placed on the undercard for her very next fight could be a factor. It could also be that Tate and Rousey were lobbing incredible amounts of shit back and forth at one another, only to have Rousey do exactly what she said she would come fight night, that has Tate discouraged. Or it could be the simple fact that Kedzie appears to be one of the nicest, kindest figures in the sport, to the point that it would be hard for even a Diaz to hate her.
It’s pure speculation at this point, but at least Tate is willing to admit that her heart is really not in the game, instead of trying to convince herself otherwise and fight on. The latter normally ends in more violent fashion.
We’ve added a brief highlight of the Tate/Kedzie fight below. Let us know what you thought of Tate’s performance in the comments section.
(Seen here: Bob Sapp’s most legit fight in the past five years.)
If you’ve followed this thing we call MMA for even a couple years now, then you’ve undoubtedly heard of the travesty to the sport that is Bob Sapp. If he were a band, the boys over at MetalSucks would refer to him as “A Shitstain on the Ass of the Universe,” which is perhaps the most appropriate label to place on someone who seems to be doing his damnedest to soil the metaphorical trousers of the sport we hold dear.
Possibly sent on a mission of mercy by the fellas over at Mitch and Murray, Ariel Helwani decided to bring Sapp onto his show, “The MMA Hour,” to dispel or confirm the general consensus that he has thrown most, if not all of his fights over the past four or five years. What started off as at least a coherent defense on Sapp’s part quickly spiraled into a smorgasbord of nonsensical rants and accusations punctuated by creepy, baritone laughter, before concluding with several futile attempts by “The Beast” to justify his pathetic existence through Youtube hits, or something like that. In other words, it was typical Bob Sapp.
Just take this gem, for instance, which actually came before Sapp decided to go full retard:
I will receive no damage to my body that will be long lasting for a small insignificant amount of cash. I think we’ve seen that now with examples with the NFL and the fact that some of these guys are coming back and saying, “Hey we want some money, we have brain damage.” I’m getting paid well underneath what a professional boxer would, or Manny Pacquiao. So I will, in no means ever, will I sustain long-lasting damage for a small paycheck. Never will that happen, never will “The Beast” ever have that happen.
Join us after the jump for the whole interview.
(Seen here: Bob Sapp‘s most legit fight in the past five years.)
If you’ve followed this thing we call MMA for even a couple years now, then you’ve undoubtedly heard of the travesty to the sport that is Bob Sapp. If he were a band, the boys over at MetalSucks would refer to him as “A Shitstain on the Ass of the Universe,” which is perhaps the most appropriate label to place on someone who seems to be doing his damnedest to soil the metaphorical trousers of the sport we hold dear.
Possibly sent on a mission of mercy by the fellas over at Mitch and Murray, Ariel Helwani decided to bring Sapp onto his show, “The MMA Hour,” to dispel or confirm the general consensus that he has thrown most, if not all of his fights over the past four or five years. What started off as at least a coherent defense on Sapp’s part quickly spiraled into a smorgasbord of nonsensical rants and accusations punctuated by creepy, baritone laughter, before concluding with several futile attempts by “The Beast” to justify his pathetic existence through Youtube hits, or something like that. In other words, it was typical Bob Sapp.
Just take this gem, for instance, which actually came before Sapp decided to go full retard:
I will receive no damage to my body that will be long lasting for a small insignificant amount of cash. I think we’ve seen that now with examples with the NFL and the fact that some of these guys are coming back and saying, “Hey we want some money, we have brain damage.” I’m getting paid well underneath what a professional boxer would, or Manny Pacquiao. So I will, in no means ever, will I sustain long-lasting damage for a small paycheck. Never will that happen, never will “The Beast” ever have that happen.
(The interview starts around the 2:13:00 mark.)
Some notable quotes from Sapp include:
On his appearance fee: On average, it’s roughly around that $30,000 to $40,000 a fight range. And that can be a bit misleading because in between time, I am doing the television shows and commercials and things of this nature and so when you say on average, that’s what it is. Obviously it calculates to be significant more between three to five times that, yes that is correct. However, when you talk about just the fights, with me, you have to worry about the schedule commercials and stuff like that, but just the fights right now, you are looking at basically $30,000 to $40,000.
On whether or not he is throwing fights: Am I throwing these fights? No. Will I go into that ring and receive large amounts of damage for small paychecks? No. When it came to K-1, at the time, when everyone at K-1 was doing well they get paid significantly enough to have you go into that ring, and hey, any kind of injury you get, they are going to pay. Let me give you an example: Mirko Cro Cop, he cracked my eye socket. Mirko Cro Cop, he received his paycheck, I received my paycheck and they also paid for my entire hospital bill. These small organizations that you see that look so wonderful, they pay none of your bills if you get hurt, period. If you want to get hurt for a small amount of money in a fight, we call that the military. If you would like to get hurt in an arena where it is supposed to be sanctioned and it is supposed to be safe and their supposed to pay for at least your medical bills if you get hurt, then we call that entertainment. If you want to see two strangers fight for free, you can do that. We will give you seven dollars and go in a night club and you can see two drunks getting it on in the corner, fighting. You have no idea who they are and you can do that for free. My fans and my family they will stand by me and behind me, win or lose. So, Bob Sapp, I guess it is easy to love a winner.
On how he justifies his increasingly terrible performances: One thing that I say, is let’s take a look and rewind back. You saw some historical and difficult fights that I fought with Ernesto Hoost and with Antonio Noguiera, this is correct. If you were to take a look at what recently has happened with K-1 and the fact that you had wonderful, great, strong fighters such as Ray Sefo fight for K-1 and then K-1 leaves and they were left without collecting a paycheck. So, when “The Beast” enters the ring, is he in there to collect a paycheck? The answer is hell yes! You’re asking, “Bob you are receiving less damage, there is no amount of damage that you are receiving and sometimes these fights are being lost.” Well, if you would want to put numbers on my record, whether they be a zero or number one, you will be doing so on my paycheck. That is what it is, plain and simple. The Beast is number one in the media for every 12 fights, that is correct. We see this and we know this. I’m number one in every media category. Number one in the entertainment, number one for the views, I am number one and I have a losing record. So, if I was to come in on a winning record, these small organizations, the last thing they would be able to do is afford my services and on top of it, what am I going to do? Be number one and number one? If I am, they are no longer going to be able to afford me. So I just won myself out of a job.
Other interesting things of note:
-After Helwani begs Sapp to stop with his “shtick” and just answer his questions honestly, Sapp more or less agrees to have sex with Ariel on pay-per-view if the price is right. We’ve never seen a moose impregnate a chickadee before, but we imagine that it would at the minimum last longer than twelve seconds.
-Sapp also tries to justify his loss to Minowaman as legit because Minowaman won the Super Hulk Tournament for Christ’s sake, and is therefore a champion. Technically, we must agree with him.
-Ariel makes a challenge to Sapp, not unlike our own, to see if he can last until exactly the one minute mark of his next fight, which is scheduled to take place in Kazakhstan. Clearly Ariel is not aware that Sapp can not count past eleventeen.
-Around the 2:50:00 mark, Sapp’s mind apparently short-circuits, and he launches into a series of bizarre accents and incoherent dialogue that no human on this planet including Sapp himself could even begin to understand. Helwani proceeds to hand him a verbal beatdown worse than any actual beatdown he has received in the past few years.
If there is some sort of Purple Heart handed out for MMA journalism, Helwani just earned it for suffering through that mind-numbing interview.
Filed under: UFC, MMA Fighting Exclusive, VideosThe MMA Hour is back in your life on Monday, and we’ll be joined by a full slate of guests from around the world of mixed martial arts.
* UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones will discuss UFC on FOX …
The MMA Hour is back in your life on Monday, and we’ll be joined by a full slate of guests from around the world of mixed martial arts.
* UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones will discuss UFC on FOX 2 and his upcoming title fight against Rashad Evans.
* Nick Diaz’s manager and trainer Cesar Gracie will preview Diaz’s fight against Carlos Condit at UFC 143.
* Mike Pierce will talk about his showdown against Josh Koscheck at UFC 143.
* Dustin Poirier will look ahead to his fight against newcomer Max Holloway this weekend.
* UFC Primetime producer Jason Hehir will discuss the making of the Diaz vs. Condit series.
* MMAFighting.com’s own Mike Chiappetta will look back at UFC on FOX 2 and look ahead to UFC 143.
Got a question or comment? Give us a call at 1-888-418-4074.
Watch the show live below beginning at 1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT. Subscribe to The MMA Hour on iTunes: audio feed here; video feed here. Download previous episodes here. Listen to the show via Stitcher here.
Filed under: UFC, Strikeforce, MMA Fighting Exclusive, News, VideosThe MMA Hour returns on Monday with a loaded lineup. Here’s who will be stopping by:
* Jim Miller will discuss his big submission win over Melvin Guillard on Friday night.
* “King” Muhammed Lawal will look to clear the air on last week’s announcement that he tested positive for the steroid Drostanalone.
* And MMAFighting.com’s Mike Chiappetta will look back at UFC on FX Fight Night and ahead to UFC on FOX 2.
Got a question or comment? Give us a call at 1-888-418-4074.
Watch the show live below beginning at 1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT. Subscribe to The MMA Hour on iTunes: audio feed here; video feed here. Download previous episodes here. Listen to the show via Stitcher here.
* KJ Noons will discuss his win over Billy Evangelista and what’s next for him.
* New Showtime Sports boss Stephen Espinoza will discuss the new Strikeforce deal and what to expect in the future.
* MMA Fighting’s Mike Chiappetta will look back at Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Mavidal and ahead to UFC 141.
Plus, we’ll be giving away some holiday gifts, courtesy of our friends at Round 5 (for U.S. residents 18 and over), so give us a call at: 212-254-0193, 212-254-0237 or 212-254-0714.
Watch the show live below beginning at 1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT. Subscribe to The MMA Hour on iTunes: audio feed here; video feed here. Download previous episodes here. Listen to the show via Stitcher here.
*** You can also stream the show live on your iPhone or iPad by clicking here.
* KJ Noons will discuss his win over Billy Evangelista and what’s next for him.
* New Showtime Sports boss Stephen Espinoza will discuss the new Strikeforce deal and what to expect in the future.
* MMA Fighting’s Mike Chiappetta will look back at Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Mavidal and ahead to UFC 141.
Plus, we’ll be giving away some holiday gifts, courtesy of our friends at Round 5 (for U.S. residents 18 and over), so give us a call at: 212-254-0193, 212-254-0237 or 212-254-0714.
Watch the show live below beginning at 1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT. Subscribe to The MMA Hour on iTunes: audio feed here; video feed here. Download previous episodes here. Listen to the show via Stitcher here.
*** You can also stream the show live on your iPhone or iPad by clicking here.
The MMA Hour