Chael Sonnen might be the greatest pro-wrestler in MMA history. After his thrilling arm-triangle submission of Brian Stann at UFC 136 last night, Sonnen got on the mic, channeled his inner Ric Flair, and cut a promo directed at a single person — his arch-rival, Anderson Silva:
“Anderson Silva, you absolutely suck. Super Bowl weekend, the biggest rematch in the history of the business, I’m calling you out Silva, but we’re upping the stakes. I beat you, you leave the division. You beat me, I will leave the UFC forever.”
Gotta love the Charles Barkley cameo at the end. So will the Spider take the bait? And how did you feel about Sonnen’s WWE-style hype-routine?
Chael Sonnen might be the greatest pro-wrestler in MMA history. After his thrilling arm-triangle submission of Brian Stann at UFC 136 last night, Sonnen got on the mic, channeled his inner Ric Flair, and cut a promo directed at a single person — his arch-rival, Anderson Silva:
“Anderson Silva, you absolutely suck. Super Bowl weekend, the biggest rematch in the history of the business, I’m calling you out Silva, but we’re upping the stakes. I beat you, you leave the division. You beat me, I will leave the UFC forever.”
Gotta love the Charles Barkley cameo at the end. So will the Spider take the bait? And how did you feel about Sonnen’s WWE-style hype-routine?
Jose Aldo grew up playing soccer, but transitioned to MMA when his love of brawling with rival teams began to overcome his love of scoring goals. His UFC 136 opponent Kenny Florian took his passion for soccer all the way to a position on the Boston College varsity team. Tomorrow night, they’ll be trying to kick each other, in a real sport. As this is a championship fight, their soccer-juggling showdown should have really gone five rounds. But I have a feeling it would have been an even bigger blowout if Aldo didn’t grab the fence in the third. A sign of things to come? [Ed. note: No.]
Jose Aldo grew up playing soccer, but transitioned to MMA when his love of brawling with rival teams began to overcome his love of scoring goals. His UFC 136 opponent Kenny Florian took his passion for soccer all the way to a position on the Boston College varsity team. Tomorrow night, they’ll be trying to kick each other, in a real sport. As this is a championship fight, their soccer-juggling showdown should have really gone five rounds. But I have a feeling it would have been an even bigger blowout if Aldo didn’t grab the fence in the third. A sign of things to come? [Ed. note: No.]
Add this to the list of explanations as to why Jose Aldo nearly fell apart in the last round of his title defense against Mark Hominick. As the above video illustrates, the UFC featherweight champ suffered through the worst weight cut of his career before UFC 129 in April. Aldo’s coach Andre “Dede” Pederneiras explains that Junior had packed on more muscle than he had in the past, and was forced to cut 6.6 more pounds on the day of weigh-ins. Aldo’s training partner Marlon Sandro guides us through the weight cut process, which involves a lot of weight loss cream and a hot bath (“it feels like your skin is melting”).
With 1.1 pounds to go, Aldo mentally breaks down, refusing to cut any more, damn the consequences. The video leaves us hanging for part 2 for some reason, but look, we all know what happened; Aldo made the weight, and showed obvious signs of fatigue in his fight the next day. No matter what happens in his title defense against Kenny Florian at UFC 136 on October 8th, Aldo’s days in the 145-pound division may be numbered.
Add this to the list of explanations as to why Jose Aldo nearly fell apart in the last round of his title defense against Mark Hominick. As the above video illustrates, the UFC featherweight champ suffered through the worst weight cut of his career before UFC 129 in April. Aldo’s coach Andre “Dede” Pederneiras explains that Junior had packed on more muscle than he had in the past, and was forced to cut 6.6 more pounds on the day of weigh-ins. Aldo’s training partner Marlon Sandro guides us through the weight cut process, which involves a lot of weight loss cream and a hot bath (“it feels like your skin is melting”).
With 1.1 pounds to go, Aldo mentally breaks down, refusing to cut any more, damn the consequences. The video leaves us hanging for part 2 for some reason, but look, we all know what happened; Aldo made the weight, and showed obvious signs of fatigue in his fight the next day. No matter what happens in his title defense against Kenny Florian at UFC 136 on October 8th, Aldo’s days in the 145-pound division may be numbered.
UFC 139 goes down November 19th at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, and the major players are convening at the San Pedro Square Market right now for a little press-conference action. Click “play” on the live YouTube player above to see Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Dan Henderson, Wanderlei Silva, Cung Le, and UFC president Dana White field questions from the media in attendance beginning at 1 p.m. local time.
UFC 139 goes down November 19th at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, and the major players are convening at the San Pedro Square Market right now for a little press-conference action. Click “play” on the live YouTube player above to see Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Dan Henderson, Wanderlei Silva, Cung Le, and UFC president Dana White field questions from the media in attendance beginning at 1 p.m. local time.
(Eder Jones wins fight, loses pie-eating contest.)
This Friday marks the official start of Autumn, and like clockwork, I’m catching a goddamned cold. There’s something about the change of seasons that seems to wreck my immune system, which has grown frail due to a life of solitary blogging and poor hygeine. So as I chug my Airborne/orange juice cocktail, let’s all take inspiration in these six men, who were way worse-off than I am now, and still managed to kick ass.
Method of victory: TKO (cut), 4:45 of round 2 In his own words: “I took the fight and I was really sick. I was so sick, after the first round I thought I was going to fall unconscious. And I told my cornerman, I’m like, listen, when the second round will start I will try a high kick in the beginning and if I don’t knock out my opponent, I want you to throw the towel. My cornerman look up at me like this, he said ‘Georges, I don’t have a towel, you’re gonna die in the ring.’
And I got so angry, I was like, I can’t believe this guy, he’s supposed to be my friend, he wants me to die in the ring. So I stood up, I hear the [bell], I fought through it, and by some kind of miracle I was able to cut the guy and to TKO him and the referee stopped the fight. I was completely exhausted. That was my toughest fight.”
(Eder Jones wins fight, loses pie-eating contest.)
This Friday marks the official start of Autumn, and like clockwork, I’m catching a goddamned cold. There’s something about the change of seasons that seems to wreck my immune system, which has grown frail due to a life of solitary blogging and poor hygeine. So as I chug my Airborne/orange juice cocktail, let’s all take inspiration in these six men, who were way worse-off than I am now, and still managed to kick ass.
Method of victory: TKO (cut), 4:45 of round 2 In his own words: ”I took the fight and I was really sick. I was so sick, after the first round I thought I was going to fall unconscious. And I told my cornerman, I’m like, listen, when the second round will start I will try a high kick in the beginning and if I don’t knock out my opponent, I want you to throw the towel. My cornerman look up at me like this, he said ‘Georges, I don’t have a towel, you’re gonna die in the ring.’
And I got so angry, I was like, I can’t believe this guy, he’s supposed to be my friend, he wants me to die in the ring. So I stood up, I hear the [bell], I fought through it, and by some kind of miracle I was able to cut the guy and to TKO him and the referee stopped the fight. I was completely exhausted. That was my toughest fight.”
RICH FRANKLIN vs. Aaron Brink @ IFC: Warriors Challenge 11, 1/13/01
Method of victory: TKO (foot injury), 2:42 of round 1; later changed to a no contest In his own words: “That’s the first time that somebody had flown me out to an event. At the time, the IFC was a California-based organization, and Aaron Brink was a California guy, so I was pretty much brought in to lose. But the interesting thing about that fight is I had gotten very sick beforehand. I was sitting in my hotel room about an hour-and-a-half before the event started, and I had over a 104-degree fever. I skipped the rules meeting, skipped all this stuff and basically just showed up to fight. And you can tell by looking at me on the tape that I was definitely not feeling good.
That was a long night of my life. And that’s actually when Monte Cox started managing me, after that fight. He and I had been at several shows together — I knew who he was, he knew who I was — and he liked me, and he said, ‘I pretty much saw you make about the stupidest decision you’ve ever made in your life tonight. If you’re interested, I’d be willing to manage you and make sure that things like that don’t continue to happen.’”
JOSE ALDO vs. Mark Hominick @ UFC 129, 4/30/11
Method of victory: Unanimous decision F*ck antibiotics: Following the fight, Aldo complained to his corner that he should have taken antibiotics, to which his cornerman replied, “Antibiotics would not have helped at all, you’re the champion kid, fuck antibiotics, everything is okay. You fought well, smooth and composed.” In his coach’s words: ”(Aldo) suffered a cut in one of his toes a week before the fight and got it infected with a bacteria. He was taking a dose of antibiotics and anti-inflammatory for three days, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday before the fight so he’d not need to take anything else close to Saturday. I can’t say with 100% certainty that it affected his performance because I’m not a doctor. I give Hominick a lot more credit for enduring the fight than the fact that Aldo took these medications.”
Method of victory: KO, 2:58 of round 1 In his own words: [two weeks before Kim fight] ”My stomach was all fucked up, bro. The first couple days I was throwing up, my stomach hurt bad. I couldn’t sleep at night…This is my first day back training since probably last Friday, so it’s been seven days. I went to a friend’s wedding in Vegas last weekend, and I’m not exactly sure whether I ate something or whether I picked something up or what, but I got really sick. I was throwing up for a few days and was just, I was pretty messed up. I wasn’t able to eat or train for quite a while.” Greg Jackson adds: “It was so bad we were contemplating canceling the fight, just because he was really, really sick, he lost some weight, he’s not being able to train, and we’re really close to the fight, so it’s very dangerous. So we’ll see how it goes, and if he starts improving we’ll keep him in.”
Method of victory: TKO, 0:21 of round 1 In his own words: “I actually had a really bad fever the night before the fight. I did a steam room that I’m not used to doing to cut weight because I came in at about 224.5 (pounds) at the beginning of the week on Tuesday, and I like to be about 220.
So they have the nice salon down there at Mandalay Bay, and I hit that up. I was hitting the steam room, and I got a little moisture in my lungs. I was thinking nothing of it, but a couple days went by, and it got worse…Later that night I sweat the bed so bad. I had a fever. I’m still recovering from it…I haven’t really been able to celebrate my win. I haven’t felt that victory yet just because I’ve been so under the weather.”
TIM SYLVIA vs. Assuerio Silva @ Ultimate Fight Night 3, 1/16/06
Method of victory: Unanimous decision In his own words: “Not taking anything away from Assuerio, he’s a tough dude, obviously. I hit him a couple of times and couldn’t finish him. I was really sick for the fight. I got really sick Saturday and had problems holding my innards. When I was warming up, I had a few problems, and I actually had a few problems in the ring when I was fighting.
I don’t know what it was. It got really cold when we were outside working out and stuff, going back and forth from the room. I caught something, and I just couldn’t hold in my number twos…If you look at the fight you’ll see that when my shorts came down, you’ll see the wet mark in my underwear.”
