Jake Shields and Tim Sylvia will be in the main and co-main event for the December 3 edition of Submission Underground 6. The event takes place from Portland and airs live on FloGrapling. Shields will headline the card, as the former Strikeforce champi…
Jake Shields and Tim Sylvia will be in the main and co-main event for the December 3 edition of Submission Underground 6. The event takes place from Portland and airs live on FloGrapling. Shields will headline the card, as the former Strikeforce champion and UFC title contender takes on Gilbert Burns. Shields picked up a […]
In an effort to clean up the sport, today’s new and enhanced MMA landscape where the UFC has partnered with USADA to implement a world-class anti-doping regimen, drug test failures for performance-enhancing drugs have become much more commonplace and public in fighting than ever before. Perhaps it was to be expected as the sport continues […]
In an effort to clean up the sport, today’s new and enhanced MMA landscape where the UFC has partnered with USADA to implement a world-class anti-doping regimen, drug test failures for performance-enhancing drugs have become much more commonplace and public in fighting than ever before.
Perhaps it was to be expected as the sport continues to struggle with the program more than two years since its inception, but some high-profile failures have wrecked what would have otherwise been huge events, and some would even argue that the UFC’s partnership with USADA is actually doing more harm than good for the promotion.
That’s ridiculous, of course, as preventing a highly trained athlete from beating another athlete while under the benefit of PEDs is obviously a very good thing – yet there are signs that USADA’s timing and overall implementation could use some smoothing out of their own. Those details are another discussion for another time, however. With big UFC PPVs being ruined by drug test failures seemingly a regular occurrence these days, it brings to light how drug testing has affected events and even fighters’ careers both in the past and present.
We took a look back at the 10 most devastating drug test failures in MMA history, and the results found show just how impactful they have been on the still-young sport. Check them out:
Cris Cyborg – Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Masvidal:
The drug test that UFC women’s featherweight champ Cristiane ‘Cyborg’ Justino failed for stanozolol after her thunderous 16-second TKO of Hiroko Yamanaka in December 2011 is arguably the most impactful on this list as it’s caused Cyborg to be followed by a reputation as a steroid user, and probably always will.
She was suspended for one year, stripped of her Strikeforce women’s featherweight belt, and her win over Yamanaka was changed to a no-contest. The failure was one of the main reasons (along with weight) why former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey wouldn’t fight Cyborg, and that topic was again brought up when original UFC 145-pound champion Germaine de Randamie refused to defend the belt against Cyborg, even if it could certainly be argued there were several other factors in play there.
It appeared Cyborg was headed into a disappointing squandering of her talent when she was popped for a USADA violation last year, but she was able to clear her name of that violation by claiming a prescribed substance she used during her foolish cuts down to 140 pounds for the UFC in 2016. For what it’s worth, she’s apparently complied with all of the rigorous requirements of the UFC’s anti-doping program with USADA (despite rumors otherwise), but her career will always be shrouded by her singular failure in Strikeforce.
Conor McGregor is a master on the mic, Chael Sonnen can cut a promo like no other and Dominick Cruz is as smart and insightful as anyone in the sport, but let’s face it, there’s plenty of fighters out there who don’t share their gift for the gab. You can’t blame them. After all, you […]
Conor McGregor is a master on the mic, Chael Sonnen can cut a promo like no other and Dominick Cruz is as smart and insightful as anyone in the sport, but let’s face it, there’s plenty of fighters out there who don’t share their gift for the gab.
You can’t blame them. After all, you try busting out your snappiest one-liners and lucid streams of consciousness live on air after 15 minutes of getting punched and kicked in the head, as thousands of fans yell in the background and millions around the world judge you on your every word.
Nonetheless, it would be remise of us not to notice that moments like these often provide the perfect breeding ground for some of the most unintentionally hilarious quotes you’re ever likely to hear, and so in this article we’ll pay tribute to 10 of the very best of them!
Tito Ortiz
Tito Ortiz has truly proven himself to be a black belt in World Salad over the years.
For instance, who can forget the time he served as Affliction’s in-cage interviewer for their ‘Banned’ show in 2008.
”I want to tell me what you see. Let’s go ahead and see by the fight, what you saw, in the ring,” he incoherently babbled to Renato ‘Babalu’ Sobral.
That night Ortiz would take to calling Sobral, “Seraldo”, Russian heavyweight legend Fedor Emelianenko, “Theodore,” and of course not forgetting, “Matt ‘The Lindland’ Law.”
Then there’s the time Ortiz mused that strategizing as a coach on ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ show was, “like a game of chest.”
However, if there’s one quote that stands out like a shining beacon from the rest, it has to be when he humbly declared:
”God put me on this earth to be a tool.”
Later in that same Bellator 120 presser, Ortiz would answer a question about retirement by stating that, “When I start sounding retarded, perhaps its time to stop.”
No one had the heart to tell him and he’d go on to fight for three more years.
The old saying that, ‘what goes up must come down’ has been proven time and time again in the Octagon over the years, though some fighters have experienced the second half of that equation far more vividly – and indeed violently – than others. It’s a strange phenomenon to bear witness to, as a fighter
The old saying that, ‘what goes up must come down’ has been proven time and time again in the Octagon over the years, though some fighters have experienced the second half of that equation far more vividly – and indeed violently – than others.
It’s a strange phenomenon to bear witness to, as a fighter who could do no wrong suddenly find themselves in a position where they can’t seem to do anything right.
Whether it’s the effects of age, an accumulation of injuries, a weakened chin, or a loss of focus, in this article we’ll look at 10 classic examples of fighters whose career entered into that dreaded downward spiral while competing in the UFC and were never able to recover from it.
Roger Huerta
It’s hard to believe now, but back in 2007 Roger Huerta was being tipped as the next big thing in the UFC.
Huerta enjoyed a rapid ascent up the UFC pecking order, entering the promotion after a long unbeaten run and then racking up six wins in a row inside the Octagon while also landing on the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine at a time when mainstream exposure was hard to come by.
Huerta seemed to have the world at his feet, but he took his eye off the prize when he began dating ‘That 70’s Show’ actress Laura Prepon and started talking about leaving the UFC to pursue an acting career.
His downward descent proved to be as swift as his rise had been, with back-to-back losses coming to Kenny Florian and Gray Maynard before his UFC departure in 2009.
Huerta’s relationship with Prepon and acting career didn’t take off, and his MMA career never recovered, posting a tepid 3-6 record over the past seven years away from the bright lights of the UFC.
There have been numerous examples of ‘David vs. Goliath’ fights over the years, as we’ve discussed in previous articles, but the only way to really know for sure what these larger-than-life fighters are capable of is to match them up with someone their own size. That’s no easy task as there’s not exactly a whole
There have been numerous examples of ‘David vs. Goliath’ fights over the years, as we’ve discussed in previous articles, but the only way to really know for sure what these larger-than-life fighters are capable of is to match them up with someone their own size.
That’s no easy task as there’s not exactly a whole lot of fighters out there that measure up to the kind of jaw-dropping physical dimensions that would result in a worthy, ‘Clash Of The Titans’.
Nevertheless, in this article we’ll delve deep into the sports history to revisit 10 real-life examples of living giants going head-to-head in the cage or ring, from 7′ 2″ wrestlers to 520-pound sumo stars, super-heavyweight boxers to former world’s strongest man champions, all competing under MMA rules.
The notion that a smaller man could take down a giant has always been an appealing one, tapping into our inherent desire to see the apparent underdog come out on top against the odds. It’s a concept that everyone is familiar with, thanks to the classic bible tale of David and Goliath, and that symbolism
The notion that a smaller man could take down a giant has always been an appealing one, tapping into our inherent desire to see the apparent underdog come out on top against the odds.
It’s a concept that everyone is familiar with, thanks to the classic bible tale of David and Goliath, and that symbolism has been revisited many times over the years.
In the early 1970’s, the legendary Bruce Lee explored the idea in a martial arts concept via his movie ‘Game Of Death’, writing a script that would require him to battle a 7ft 2” giant, portrayed by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
It’s not just a spectacle that’s consigned to books and movies though, as there have been many real-life instances of courageous martial artists testing themselves against gigantic opponents dating back to the earliest days of mixed martial arts competition.
Better yet, on many occasions it’s the smaller man who has emerged victorious thanks to superior technique, stamina and fighting spirit, and in this article we’ll pick out 12 of the most memorable examples of David defeating Goliath in MMA history.
