Ladies and gents, we got ourselves a curse goin’. After losing three notable American fighters due to injury — Anthony Pettis, Josh Koscheck, and Robert Drysdale — we have even more UFC 163: Aldo vs. Zombie withdrawals to report today. Also falling off the August 3rd card in Rio are…
Is it a coincidence that four Americans and one Brit have all pulled out of scheduled matchups against Brazilian fighters on this card? Yes. Do Brazilian UFC fighters have a notoriously high win-percentage while fighting at home? Sure. Should we file this under #boringconspiracies? Why the hell not.
The current UFC 163 lineup is after the jump. You know it’s a bad-sign when a barnraiser like Machida vs. Davis is by far the second-most-interesting match on this card…
Ladies and gents, we got ourselves a curse goin’. After losing three notable American fighters due to injury — Anthony Pettis, Josh Koscheck, and Robert Drysdale — we have even more UFC 163: Aldo vs. Zombie withdrawals to report today. Also falling off the August 3rd card in Rio are…
Is it a coincidence that four Americans and one Brit have all pulled out of scheduled matchups against Brazilian fighters on this card? Yes. Do Brazilian UFC fighters have a notoriously high win-percentage while fighting at home? Sure. Should we file this under #boringconspiracies? Why the hell not.
The current UFC 163 lineup is after the jump. You know it’s a bad-sign when a barnraiser like Machida vs. Davis is by far the second-most-interesting match on this card…
MAIN CARD (Pay-per-view, 10 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. PT)
Jose Aldo vs. Chan Sung Jung
Phil Davis vs. Lyoto Machida
Cezar Ferreira vs. Thiago Santos
Thales Leites vs. Tom Watson
John Lineker vs. Jose Maria Tome
PRELIMINARY CARD (FX, 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT)
Vinny Magalhaes vs. Anthony Perosh
Sheila Gaff vs. Amanda Nunes
Neil Magny vs. Sergio Moraes
Ian McCall vs. Iliarde Santos
PRELIMINARY CARD (Facebook, 6:30 p.m. ET / 3:30 p.m. PT)
Josh Clopton vs. Rani Yahya
Francimar Barroso vs. Ednaldo Oliveira
Viscardi Andrade vs. Bristol Marunde
The main event of last night’s Bellator 79 produced one of the oddest instances of an athlete giving up mid-contest since Bob Hamelin retired during a minor league baseball game. Santos dominates the fight from the beginning, rocking him with early combinations and controlling him on the ground. Yet as the fighters are separated, Santos takes out his mouth guard and appears disinterested in continuing. A few half-assed punches later, Hale counters Santos, who drops to the canvas and turtles up until the fight is waived off.
Was this just a case of Thiago Santos having conditioning issues? Probably, although gassing out halfway through the first round is pathetic even at the amateur levels. Is Richard Hale’s striking just that underrated? Maybe – Santos lost a tooth during the fight, which explains why his mouth was bleeding, although don’t ask me to point out the punch that caused it. Regardless of the reason, Hale earned a victory last night because Santos essentially gave up during the fight, and will now face the winner of Vinicius Queiroz vs. Alexander Volkov for the promotion’s heavyweight championship.
After the jump – Shahbulat Shamhalaev knocks out Mike Richman at Bellator 79 in a far more traditional fashion.
The main event of last night’s Bellator 79 produced one of the oddest instances of an athlete giving up mid-contest since Bob Hamelin retired during a minor league baseball game. Santos dominates the fight from the beginning, rocking him with early combinations and controlling him on the ground. Yet as the fighters are separated, Santos takes out his mouth guard and appears disinterested in continuing. A few half-assed punches later, Hale counters Santos, who drops to the canvas and turtles up until the fight is waived off.
Was this just a case of Thiago Santos having conditioning issues? Probably, although gassing out halfway through the first round is pathetic even at the amateur levels. Is Richard Hale’s striking just that underrated? Maybe – Santos lost a tooth during the fight, which explains why his mouth was bleeding, although don’t ask me to point out the punch that caused it. Regardless of the reason, Hale earned a victory last night because Santos essentially gave up during the fight, and will now face the winner of Vinicius Queiroz vs. Alexander Volkov for the promotion’s heavyweight championship.
After the jump – Shahbulat Shamhalaev knocks out Mike Richman at Bellator 79 in a far more traditional fashion.
When heavyweight Ryan Martinez (8-2) hit Manny Lara (4-2) twice in the groin over the course of their three round Bellator 75 prelim bout Friday night in Hammond, IN one could only assume that he secured the low blow highlights for the night. Then Eric Prindle came along in the night’s main event and stole Martinez’ nut shot thunder.
If there was a low blow of the night bonus award…what am I saying? If there was a low blow of the decade award, Eric Prindle’s axe kick to the family jewels of a downed Thiago Santos would be the clear front runner.
After a failed jumping guillotine choke left Santos on his back with seconds left in the first round of their Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal bout, Prindle (7-3) began kicking him with round houses to the legs. Then the massive Prindle thought to get all GSP with it and loaded up with a stomping axe kick, likely aimed for Santos’ mid section.
Instead, the full force of a 265 pounder’s stomp came down onto the groin of a prone Santos. The Brazilian was given five minutes to recover.
He could have been given thirty. It would likely not have made a difference. Santos laid flat on his face without moving, not even able to writhe in agony, before being lifted onto a stretcher and taken out of the cage.
When heavyweight Ryan Martinez (8-2) hit Manny Lara (4-2) twice in the groin over the course of their three round Bellator 75 prelim bout Friday night in Hammond, IN one could only assume that he secured the low blow highlights for the night. Then Eric Prindle came along in the night’s main event and stole Martinez’ nut shot thunder.
If there was a low blow of the night bonus award…what am I saying? If there was a low blow of the decade award, Eric Prindle’s axe kick to the family jewels of a downed Thiago Santos would be the clear front runner.
After a failed jumping guillotine choke left Santos on his back with seconds left in the first round of their Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal bout, Prindle (7-3) began kicking him with round houses to the legs. Then the massive Prindle thought to get all GSP with it and loaded up with a stomping axe kick, likely aimed for Santos’ mid section.
Instead, the full force of a 265 pounder’s stomp came down onto the groin of a prone Santos. The Brazilian was given five minutes to recover.
He could have been given thirty. It would likely not have made a difference. Santos laid flat on his face without moving, not even able to writhe in agony, before being lifted onto a stretcher and taken out of the cage.
Santos (11-1) won by DQ and advanced to the semi finals of the tournament in a month, if he’s even able to fight at that point. At the post event press conference Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney was not sure if he would be able to and said that if Santos is unable to continue, Martinez would replace him in the tournament.
The ending was disappointing for everyone and was also ironic because Prindle and Santos had fought before, a year ago, and that fight also ended with a low blow. That time Santos hit Prindle low and when Prindle was unable to continue the fight was ruled a no contest.
For some reason Prindle’s coach Erik Paulson was given a chance to ask a question of his fighter at the post presser as if he represented a media outlet. No doubt genuine, the still necessarily partisan Paulson gave his charge a softball and leading question about the supposed unfairness of him getting disqualified for the low blow when the last time he was hit low, the fight was just ruled a no contest.
For his part, Prindle was apologetic and said that it wasn’t his call to make. This writer, for one, thinks that the next Prindle/Santos fight needs to either take place with them both wearing medieval chastity belts or be fought under Junkyard Rules.
Young Bucks
During his post fight interview and while speaking at the post presser twenty three year-old Alexander Volkov (17-3) looked shy and overwhelmed by the stage and moment. In his fight with Brett Rogers (12-5), however, the young Russian looked masterful in winning a unanimous decision and advancing to the Heavyweight Tournament semis.
Volkov bullied Rogers around the ring with punches, kicks and knees from the start and by the second round had the convicted wife beater shirking from the fight and merely backing up or running away. Rogers had held his own for a round with Fedor Emelianenko and knocked out former world champion Andrei Arlovski but was completely out classed by Volkov’s sharp striking.
Volkov had already beaten a former UFC world champ himself when he beat Ricco Rodriguez earlier this year. The win over Rogers was the Russian’s first fight in the states and it was a successful coming out party.
If he wants to continue impressing on U.S. soil, he’ll have to take out Vinicius Kappke de Queiroz (6-2), who also impressed Friday night. Queiroz was dropped fast and hard early by Mark Holata (12-4).
Somehow the Brazilian was able to recover on the ground and submitted Holata with an arm bar from the full guard, advancing to the semis. The drama of Queiroz’ come back win highlights one of the dangers of Bellator’s tournament format.
Queiroz is a warrior and should be celebrated for having the conditioning and heart to continue and pull out a win, but there is no way he should be physically cleared to fight in less than a month as he’ll have to be in order to continue in the Bellator tournament. The ‘Spartan’ didn’t just get knocked down, he went totally rigid after getting hit and slowly fell like a chopped redwood.
His head hitting the ground woke Quieroz up and, though he was able to win, he later said that he couldn’t remember how he had ended up on the ground. The man is clearly concussed and shouldn’t be jumping right into another training camp and fighting again in less than four weeks.
I love the spirit of Bellator’s tournament structure but one has to wonder if its schedule is too demanding and dangerous for fighters at times.
Richard Hale (20-4) didn’t look like he’ll have problems maintaining his strength up in the heavyweight division as he quickly took out UFC vet Mike Wessel (12-5). Former WEC bantamweight champion Chase Beebe (21-8-1) and Bo Harris (7-3) had a hard-fought and intense bout. Beebe came away with the unanimous decision on the strength of his wrestling and pressure on the feet.
(Believe it or not, Columbia Pictures saw this coming some 8 months ago, and chose Kevin James to star in a movie about Konrad’s life.)
Maybe it’s just me, Potato Nation, but recent events have led me to believe that I have stepped into some sort of alternate reality where up is green, foot is west, and Joe Silva apparently never existed. So maybe I should just take the confounding news that current Bellator heavyweight champion and undefeated powerhouse Cole Konrad is retiring from MMA to obtain a position as a financial trader specializing in milk products as sign that my suspicions are correct. Seriously, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.
The Twincities.com report said Konrad, 28, is leaving fighting to become a financial trader at a Minnesota-based firm that supplies ingredients to the feed, pet food, food processing and chemical industries. Konrad will specialize in trading milk products.
Plans to find a new champion are unclear at the moment. The news first was reported byTwincities.com and subsequently confirmed to MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) by a source close to the promotion.
Of all the reasons for retirement we have heard MMA fighters give…this is a new one.
(Believe it or not, Columbia Pictures saw this coming some 8 months ago, and chose Kevin James to star in a movie about Konrad’s life.)
Maybe it’s just me, Potato Nation, but recent events have led me to believe that I have stepped into some sort of alternate reality where up is green, foot is west, and Joe Silva apparently never existed. So maybe I should just take the confounding news that current Bellator heavyweight champion and undefeated powerhouse Cole Konrad is retiring from MMA to obtain a position as a financial trader specializing in milk products as sign that my suspicions are correct. Seriously, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.
The Twincities.com report said Konrad, 28, is leaving fighting to become a financial trader at a Minnesota-based firm that supplies ingredients to the feed, pet food, food processing and chemical industries. Konrad will specialize in trading milk products.
Plans to find a new champion are unclear at the moment. The news first was reported byTwincities.com and subsequently confirmed to MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) by a source close to the promotion.
Of all the reasons for retirement we have heard MMA fighters give…this is a new one.
Granted, it’s not exactly like Cole has been fighting enough lately to reel in a ton of money — he’s fought just twice since the start of 2011 — but considering how far he has managed to come in the sport despite being a professional for less than two years, you can’t help but feel that he is blowing a huge opportunity here.
Apparently there is a lot of money to be made in milk these days, especially in the line of work Konrad has chosen, but I just get creeped out by the kind of crowd it draws. Best of luck to Konrad, though.
Konrad now joins Jorgen Kruth as the second flabbergasting retirement in as many weeks to happen in the world of MMA, and will end his career (for now, at least) with a perfect record of 9-0.
Although Bellator officials have declined to comment on Konrad’s decision, you have to imagine that the finals of this season’s heavyweight tournament — which is set to kick off on October 5th at Bellator LXXV and features a rematch between Eric Prindle and Thiago Santos that will totally happen this time, for reals — will now determine the new champion of the division.
Then again, we’ll probably hear word that three of the four quarterfinalists have been forced to withdraw from the event due to injury any minute now…
(Who knew that this moment would become a metaphor for Eric Prindle’s Bellator career?)
At this rate, Bellator’s season five heavyweight tournament is going to take longer to come to a close than Strikeforce’s heavyweight tournament, a notion this writer didn’t think was possible until earlier today. Because believe it or not, season five winner Eric Prindle has been forced to withdraw from a scheduled match on less than a week’s notice yet again, this time from his title fight with heavyweight champion Cole Konrad.
The fight, which was supposed to go down at this weekend’s Bellator 65 card, has now been pushed back to May 25th as a result of a hand injury Prindle suffered in training, an injury that he described as “all my own fault.”
(Who knew that this moment would become a metaphor for Eric Prindle’s Bellator career?)
At this rate, Bellator’s season five heavyweight tournament is going to take longer to come to a close than Strikeforce’s heavyweight tournament, a notion this writer didn’t think was possible until earlier today. Because believe it or not, season five winner Eric Prindle has been forced to withdraw from a scheduled match on less than a week’s notice yet again, this time from his title fight with heavyweight champion Cole Konrad.
The fight, which was supposed to go down at this weekend’s Bellator 65 card, has now been pushed back to May 25th as a result of a hand injury Prindle suffered in training, an injury that he described as “all my own fault.”
For those of you who have not followed the story of Eric Prindle’s Bellator run, it is not unlike that of the television show Lost. Every time closure seemed within sight, the rug was abruptly pulled out from beneath the viewing audience at the last moment, leaving them feeling cheated and pissed off, yet somehow more pretentious as well. This first happened in the original finals of the heavyweight tournament, which took place back in November of 2011. Prindle’s opponent at the time, fellow tourney finalist Thiago Santos, nearly punted Prindle’s testicles halfway across this building, leaving the fight to be declared a no-contest when Prindle could not continue.
The rematch was scheduled for Bellator 61, but the former U.S soldier was forced to withdraw from the fight just one day beforehand due to an alleged case of the flu. The rematch was then rescheduled for Bellator 62, and wouldn’t you know it, both fighters actually managed to make it to the weigh-ins. This was where things would go awry once again, as Santos would weigh in at a scale shattering 12.8 pounds over the heavyweight limit. Prindle was awarded a title shot against Conrad, and the fight was scheduled for Bellator 65.
Conrad has not fought since out gunning UFC veteran Paul Buentello in one of Bellator’s infamous non-title bouts at Bellator 48 in 2011 and has yet to defend the belt since submitting Neil Grove at Bellator 32 in October of 2010 to earn it.
Like we said, Prindle’s match against Konrad is scheduled for May 25th, but we wouldn’t recommend buying those tickets just yet.
Bellator 65, on the other hand, goes down this weekend from the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey and features a headlining bantamweight title fight between champion Zach “Fun Size” Makovsky and challenger Eduardo Dantas.
Instead of postponing Santos’s HW finals match against Eric Prindle again — remember, this fight has already been re-scheduled twice due to savage groin kick and flu-like symptoms — Bellator decided they’d had enough of Big Monster’s antics and booted him from the tournament. By default, Prindle scores the $100k check and will face undefeated champion Cole Konrad for the Bellator heavyweight title later this year.
All of Bellator 62’s season six lightweight tournament fighters were on weight for their opening-round bouts, although welterweight Joseph Daily came in three pounds heavy for his preliminary card match against Sean Spencer. Full weigh-in results and broadcast info for tonight’s event are below…
(“Menstrual period, bro. I’ve done nothing this week except retain water and eat Girl Scout cookies.”)
Instead of postponing Santos’s HW finals match against Eric Prindle again — remember, this fight has already been re-scheduled twice due to savage groin kick and flu-like symptoms — Bellator decided they’d had enough of Big Monster’s antics and booted him from the tournament. By default, Prindle scores the $100k check and will face undefeated champion Cole Konrad for the Bellator heavyweight title later this year.
All of Bellator 62′s season six lightweight tournament fighters were on weight for their opening-round bouts, although welterweight Joseph Daily came in three pounds heavy for his preliminary card match against Sean Spencer. Full weigh-in results and broadcast info for tonight’s event are below…
MAIN CARD (MTV2, Epix2 HD, and Spike.com; 8 p.m./7c)
– Eric Prindle (265.2) vs. Thiago Santos (277.8) – season-five heavyweight-tourney final rematch, fight canceled
– Patricky “Pitbull” Freire (155.6) vs. Lloyd Woodard (154.8) – lightweight-tournament opening round
– Rick Hawn (155.6) vs. Ricardo Tirloni (155.2) – lightweight-tournament opening round
– Thiago Michel (154.8) vs. Rene Nazare (155.8) – lightweight-tournament opening round
– J.J. Ambrose (155) vs. Brent Weedman (155.8) – lightweight-tournament opening round
