DREAM 1 Full Fight Card Set for March 15th

This Saturday, DREAM makes it MMA debut show, here are the details.

HEIWA DREAM.1 Light Weight Grand Prix 2008 1st Round
March 15, 2008
Saitama Super Arena, Saitama, Japan

LWGP Matches
Shinya Aoki vs. Gesias "JZ" Calvancante
Tatsuya Kawajiri vs. Kultar "Black Mamba" Gill
Kazuyuki Miyata vs. Luiz "Buscape" Firmino
Joachim Hansen vs. Koutetsu Boku
Eddie Alvarez vs. Andre "Dida" Amade
Mitsuhiro Ishida vs. Bu-Kyung Jung
Katsuhiko Nagata vs. Artur Oumakhanov

Non-Tourney matches
Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic vs. Tatsuya Mizuno
Hayato "Mach" Sakurai vs. Hidetaka Monma

EliteXC Expected to Announce Deal with CBS

This is courtesy of MMAjunkie.com, this could be a hit to the UFC, but the UFC will always have PPV.

The announcement will come just weeks after EliteXC’s successful “Street Certified” event in Miami, Fla. In addition to drawing a sold-out crowd and setting a live gate record at the BankUnited Center, the event reportedly drew more than half a million Showtime viewers.

The fact that EliteXC — and not the UFC, the worldwide MMA leader — landed the first network-television deal is a bit of a surprise.

Beginning in October, UFC president Dana White stated that he was confident the organization would reach a deal with a major TV network, most notably CBS or NBC. In November MediaPost Publications reported that the UFC and CBS were in “advanced negotiations” and that the announcement of an official partnership was expected to happen at any time. UFC 81, which took place earlier this month, was expected to be the first UFC event to air on CBS.

However, the deal eventually fell apart — reportedly over issues with the creative control of the events. Those same issues kept a deal between the UFC and HBO from coming together last year, as well.

ProElite has been on a shopping spree during the past year, purchasing organizations such as ICON Sport, Cage Rage, King of the Cage, and Spirit MC. Additionally, the organization has recently signed long-term deals with notables such as Nick Diaz, Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson, Robbie Lawler, Jake Shields, Murilo “Ninja” Rua and Gina Carano.

Read the Rest Here

Top 10 Greatest Upsets in MMA History

10. Kazuyuki Fujita vs Mark Kerr-Pride 2000 Grand Prix
Mark Kerr was probably the favorite in this whole tournament and thats saying something because at the time this was the deepest pool of talent ever brought together in MMA. Kerr truly was a beast in the ring with amazing strength, wrestling and the best striking of any wrestler at the time. This was only Fujita's 4th pro MMA bout so not much was known about him. As the fight began Kerr looked like he was gonna walk right through the Japanese wrestler and landed a huge knee to the chin of Fujita. But "Iron Head" just ate the knee that would have knocked out any normal human being(of course now we know about his legendary chin) and ended up outworking Kerr for a decision win.


9. Randy Couture vs Vitor Belfort-UFC 15
If you know anything about MMA you knew before even reading this article that Randy "The Natural" Couture was gonna be on this list and probably more than once. Vitor "The Phenom" Belfort was truly gonna be the young Mike Tyson of MMA. I mean this guy ended fights quick, the longest fight he had before he met Couture was a minute and 17 seconds. This is the fight that started the legend of Randy Couture as he just completely dominated the Phenom with wrestling, dirty boxing and ground and pound, eventually stopping Vitor at 8:16 of the first round.


8. Fedor Emelianenko vs Antonio Rodrigo Noguiera-Pride 23 Body Blow
Back in good ole 2003(bad if your a Cubs fan like myself!)Minotauro Nogueira was an unquestioned dominate fighter, he had won 13 consecutive fights and most recently avenging a loss to Dan Henderson. Not much was known about Fedor except that he dominated the RINGS organization for a awhile and won his first 2 fights in Pride (Semmy Schilt and Heath Herring) with relative ease, but Nogueira was the man. What followed was a beautiful display of punching someone's face over and over and over again, but seriously Fedor put on an MMA clinic against Nogueira. Fedor just completely dominated the best fighter in the world at the time and he even went to the ground on purpose to show that Sambo was better than jiu-jitsu.


7. Randy Couture vs Chuck Liddell 1-UFC 43
Chuck Liddell was running through people before he faced Randy Couture. It was clear from the sound of the bell that Couture had a good gameplan and he was gonna stick to it. Using his incredible Greco-Roman wrestling and an unorthodox striking style Couture just stayed on Liddell like a shadow, he did't let him breathe for a second. He eventually got the stoppage in the third round to seal the upset.


6. Forrest Griffin vs Mauricio Shogun Rua-UFC 76
This is a fight that quite frankly astounded me when I watched it. Shogun was just coming over from Pride and he was a machine. Shogun would just come at his opponents with tremendous cardio, muay-thai, aggressiveness and heart. Which is why when he gassed against Forrest I was pretty damn shocked. Taking nothing away from Griffin but most in the MMA world were expecting Shogun to not let Griffin out of the first round.


5. Takanori Gomi vs Nick Diaz-Pride 33
This fight is one of the best fights you'll ever see in the history of MMA and produced one of the best submissions in MMA also. The outcome was a pretty big suprise, Gomi was considered the best lightweight in the world. We knew Diaz was good but against Gomi most thought he couldn't handle the Fireball Kid. Diaz got rocked in the first round but quickly regained his composure and kept a torrid pace on Gomi. Long story short Gomi gassed, and fell into a beautiful gogoplata by Nick.


4. BJ Penn vs Matt Hughes 1-UFC 46
Matt Hughes literally tore through his opponents in the welterweight division before running into the Prodigy. Everyone knew Penn was talented, but he had failed to win the lightweight title and was trying a move to welterweight. The only way to describe this fight is complete and total domination by Penn, this is a fight that started the MMA fan's love affair with the Prodigy. Penn sunk in a rear naked choke to seal the deal in the closing seconds of the first round.


3. Kevin Randleman vs Mirko Crocop-Pride Total Elimination 2004
In 2004 Crocop was considered the man that would finally take down the Russian Experiment Fedor Emelianenko. He was running through everyone and in brutal fashion. Randleman was a solid fighter, but he was a wrestler and Crocop basically owned any pure wrestler that stood in his way. The Monster Randleman caught Crocop with a beautifully placed left hook and dropped the Croatian Sensation and finished him with some brutal ground punches that ended the fight in under 2 minutes.


2. Gabriel Gonzaga vs Mirko Crocop-UFC 70
Crocop was at the height of his career at the time of this fight he had just won the Open Weight Grand Prix tournament, beating Wanderlei Silva and Josh Barnett. Also dominating in his first UFC fight against Eddie Sanchez. To the suprise of most watching the fight, Gonzaga landed a Crocop-like high kick that completely knocked the croatian unconscious. Crocop also went on to lose his next UFC fight against Cheik Kongo, another fight he was heavily favored to win.


1. Matt Serra vs Georges St. Pierre-UFC 69
Matt Serra was just coming off winning the Ultimate Fighter 4, the show where fighters with experience had a shot to resurrect their careers. Georges St. Pierre looked like an unstoppable force at the time with his amazing athletic skills and coming off beating some impressive opponents. In succession he beat Jason Miller, Frank Trigg, Sean Sherk, BJ Penn and then Matt Hughes for the title. Well, easy pick right, wrong Serra came out confident and showed some heavy hands stunning GSP on numorous occasions. Finishing with a flurry of uncontested shots to GSP's face on the ground. This was the greatest upset in MMA history in my opinion.

There have been so many big upsets and especially the last year that its hard to boil it down to just 10, but this is my list of fights that really shocked me.

Tito Ortiz Says "Dana White is Exactly Like Don King" on Howard Stern

Tito and Jenna were on the stern show this morning here is some of what Tito said, thanks to phillyburbs.com

Tito will be fighting Lyoto Machida on May 24 in Las Vegas, NV for UFC. Tito confirmed this once again this morning, taking some steam away from UFC’s impending announcement. I believe that Tito is being booked by UFC to lose, which isn’t a bad thing if he is on the way out. Machida is undefeated in his last four matches, yet he has never beaten anyone the caliber of Tito Ortiz.

Tito compared Dana White to Don King during the interview, saying they were exactly alike. Tito said that the only difference between the two is that King is black. Tito went on a diatribe about the pay scale in UFC. Ortiz said that UFC makes $43 billion a year, yet he makes $200,000 for a fight (leaving out his bonuses). Tito’s biggest outrage isn’t all about him, but for the younger fighters who are only making $5-10,000 a fight. I wrote about this when I first came to phillyBurbs.com and $10,000 after training costs is nothing compared to the revenue that UFC generates for an entire show.

Read the whole article here.

Bas Rutten on Best Damn Sports Show Video- Talks About Almost Fighting Chicago Bears Linebacker Brian Urlacher

This is an oldie but a goodie. Apparently Bas was at a charity event playing the drums on a stage. He jumped off the stage and accidently stomped right on Brian Urlacher's toes. Urlacher's my favorite NFL star as I am a huge Bears fan. Urlacher apperently challenged Rytten to a fight, bad idea, but let Bas tell you the story himself about halfway through this interview.

Urlacher Story starts at 3:39

Bas Rutten on Best Damn Sports Show
Uploaded by mma-tv

7 Things You Don't Want to See in MMA in 2008

I got this idea from a sherdog forum post. Of course there are many things we need to see, but there are many things that we don't need to have any part of.

7. Horrible Judges Decisions- Seriously do we need another Hamill/Bisping, judges need to be people who are obsessed with watching fights. They need to be fans of the sport and not just people who are doing a job.

6. More Fighters being Suspended for Steroids, HGH, etc.- I've said it before and I'll say it again steroids is the ultimate form of cheating in any physical sport. If you take PED(Performence Enhancing Drugs) your already doubting your ability to win a fight.

5. Smaller Organizations Go Under- I love the UFC, but I also love Cage Rage, M1 Global, WEC, Elite XC, HDNet Fights, K1 etc.. Some of the best MMA fights you will ever see will come out of the smaller orgs. Maybe the best fight I saw of 2007 was Marius Zaromskis vs Ross Mason at Cage Rage 22, track it down and watch it you will not be dissapointed.

4. Great Pride Fighters not Fighting- Where is Takanori Gomi? One of the best most exciting fighters in history isn't fighting anywhere. How about Mark Hunt, one of my personal favorite heavyweights, he should be fighting the best in the world. Get these guys in the ring, cage, my backyard or wherever and let them scrap.

3. Wanderlei Silva, Crocop and Mauricio Shogun Rua Losing- Three of the most exciting fighters in history, I hope they can turn it around for every MMA fans sake. Whether its the rule changes, the cage or whatever these extremely entertaining fighters need to figure it out because if they keep losing we might not see the dream matches we all hope for.

2. Chuck Liddell Fighting Rampage Again for the Title- I'm sorry but when you beat a guy so decisively 2 times in a row, that guy should'nt get a third crack at it. Same goes for Rich Franklin vs Anderson Silva, there's no point in it. So if Liddell and Franklin land a haymaker in the third fight, does that mean that they're better fighters? Don't think so, we already know who the better fighter is.

1. Fedor Fighting Cans- How in the world does Aleksander get to fight Josh Barnett before Fedor does? This is the best fighter I've ever seen, he should be fighting fighters who actually have a chance at beating him. We don't need to see him fight Semmy Schilt or Bob Sapp, which are some of the new rumors going around, because we all know what the outcome will be. Hopefully the Randy Couture fight will take place this year.

Aleksander Emelianenko Expects to Fight Sought After Free Agent Josh Barnett

This news first came down on Aleksander's official M-1 Global website at alex.mixfight.ru. The alleged fight would take place in Chicago at an unnanounced M-1 Global event. MMAJunkie.com has all the details, here is a snippet from their story.

Aleksander Emelianenko (12-3), a highly ranked heavyweight (and the younger brother of famed fighter Fedor Emelianenko), will next fight April 11 for the upstart M-1 Global organization, and the Russian expects his opponent to be Josh Barnett (20-5).

Read All the Juicy Details here.

My Take- This makes absolutely no sense to me what so ever. Why would you bring in one of the most sought after and talented Heavyweight fighters in the world and not have an immediate match with Fedor? I mean a fight with Aleks is intriguing and I will be watching but why the fight that everyone wants to see is not first on the M1 Global agenda is an absolute mystery to me.

Official UFC 80 Bonuses Revealed

UFC 80 was a good show I thought, picking the Fight of the Night and Submission of the Night must of been extremely easy. Paul Kelly vs Paul Taylor easily wins the fight of the night($35,000 to both fighters) being the only televised bout to go the distance and the undercard fight that went the distance was Sam Stout vs Per Eklund which was largely uneventful. Paul Kelly vs Paul Taylor could've won fight of the night honors on alot of cards though, there was some wicked exchanges standing and the ground action was good also.

Submission of the Night($35,000) or should I say "Only Submission of the Night" went to BJ Penn for his rear naked choke of Joe Stevenson in the card's main event. Penn completely dominated his opponent and submitted the bloody mess that was Stevenson at 4:02 of the second round.

Picking knockout of the night($35,000) had to be a tough decision as 6 fights were ended via TKO/KO. UFC chose Wilson Gouveia's comeback knockout of Jason Lambert. Gouveia was getting dominated dominated by Lambert in the first round and then at 37 seconds of the secnd round Gouveia landed a beautiful left hook that sent Lambert to the canvas.

Top 10 Things I Learned From UFC 79

UFC 79 was a great event, here's what I learned.

10. Lyoto Machida is no joke, whether or not you like his fighting style, the guy wins. Soko is a talented guy, but I think we all underestimated Machida's skills.

9. Melvin Guillard and Rich Clementi should not be allowed back in the UFC. Talking shit to each other is fine, hating each other is fine, but the way these 2 guys acted is just idiotic.

8. Okay UFC we get it, you hated the Pride Fighting Championships. The whole "we're not in Japan" thing is getting old.

7. I still don't understand why the UFC doesn't show ALL undercard fights, for 40-50 bucks most people want all the action they can handle and many times the undercard fights are great.

6. Georges St. Pierre will be the welterweight champion in 2008.

5. Take it from GSP, if you wanna beat a world class wrestler(Hughes, Koscheck) put them on their back.

4. Wanderlei Silva remains on the top of my list as the most entertaining fighter ever.

3. When Chuck Liddell wins, Dana White is the happiest man on earth.

2. Biased commentary is getting a little out of control. I watched the Liddell/Silva fight 3 times and you would think Chuck was fighting a nobody. All the replays were Chuck highlights and the knock down for Silva was discredited as a simple slip.

1. I don't care what anyone says Wanderlei Silva vs Chuck Liddell is in the top 3 greatest fights I've ever witnessed and for me it lived up to the hype.

Sean Sherk Will Not Be Stripped of His Title

****UPDATE, Apparently Sherk is now being stripped! Here's a LINK to the story****
UFC Lighweight Champion Sean Sherk will remain the champion, despite testing positive for steroids. Here's the meat of the article from mmafightline.

UFC president Dana White has gone back and forth on whether he would strip Sherk of his title were he to lose his appeal to the NSAC. First, White told Yahoo!Sports' Kevin Iole that Sherk would keep the title regardless of the outcome of his appeal, then a few days later, White backpedelled on those comments stating during a conference call that Sherk would probably be stripped of his title if he were to lose his appeal.

Read the rest HERE

Sherk has denied the positive test from the beginning and some in the MMA community would question the way CSAC has handled the whole situation. In any case Sherk and B.J. Penn need to get in the cage and fight. Until that happens many fans will still consider the lightweight belt in limbo.

New Video Interview with Frank Mir About His Upcoming Bout with Brock Lesner

Frank Mir weighs in on his fight with former pro wrestler turned MMA fighter Brock Lesner. Also an interview with Frank Trigg about his clothing line Triggonomics.

Modern MMA's First Death Occurs

MMA fighter Sam Vasquez has passed away after complications from an MMA bout on October 20th he was 35. Heres a snippet from sherdog.

The Harris County Medical Examiner, which confirmed Vasquez passed at 8:15 p.m. CT, has not yet released the cause of death, the report said.

After enduring separate surgeries to remove blood clots from his brain as well as a massive stroke, Vasquez was discharged from downtown Houston's Saint Joseph Medical Center Critical Care Unit and transferred to an area hospice on Nov. 26.

On Wednesday Sandra Vasquez, the fighter's wife, told Sherdog.com, "He's about to go." Two days later, Vasquez, the father of a 7-year-old boy, lost his battle with the apparent affects of a regulated mixed martial arts fight.

Read the rest HERE

New Interview With Dan Henderson

Hey guys here is an interview with Hendo from mmahawaii.com, pretty good interview except for the first couple minutes all they talk about is supplements?

New Video Interview with Wanderlei Silva

Hey guys, check out this wanderlei interview, he weighs in on a number of issues.

Part 1


Part 2

Why MMA Will Overtake Boxing

Hey guys here's an article I wrote awile back about why I think Mixed Martial Arts will overtake boxing. Below is the article in its entirety.

Boxing has long been the king of the pay-per-view airways, and that still holds true, just barely. Although the recent superfight between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr. grossed a record breaking $120 million, this was not the fight to save boxing. This was not even a great fight. The fight sold well on massive hype and the fighters names, but a fight you tell your grandkids about it was absolutely not.

"This puts to bed this theory of boxing being in trouble, or being dead or dying," said Ross Greenburg, head of HBO Sports. "This fight would have never materialized if boxing was dying." Sorry Ross, but he knows whats going on and he knows exactly why his sport is struggling so much. It has become tradition for HBO boxing announcer Jim Lampley to say something derogatory about Mixed Martial Arts, saying after the De La Hoya vs Mayweather fight that "Mixed Martial Arts is entertaining. The kind of skill level you saw in the ring tonight - there's nothing in mixed martial arts which is within light years of what Mayweather and De La Hoya are able to do with their hands."

Cheap shots aside, Lampley knows MMA is winning some battles in the war. Colorful UFC president Dana White knows it too, saying in his 60 minutes interview "When you start watching the UFC, boxing sucks, boxing is boring". He may be right on the money with that statement. Why watch 2 guys use one form of fighting discipline on each other, when you can watch 2 guys not only use boxing, but Jiu-Jitsu, Judo, Sambo, Kickboxing, Muay Thai, submissions and many forms of wrestling. If Lampley wants to talk about skill level why don't you ask a boxer to take 4 or 5 leg kicks without crying, protect against a shoot and takedown or avoid getting arm-barred, choked out or leg-locked. Boxer's only have to worry about getting punched and throwing a punch. So don't bring skill level into the discussion.

Lets take a look at the main reason boxing was popular in its hey days. The most often overlooked aspect of boxing's popularity is the presence of one true champion, usually heavyweight. These days we have no clue has to who that is in part because nobody's good enough to completley dominate. Its the allure of being labeled "unbeatable" that draws people to that kind of champion. Where would golf be without Tiger Woods and what happened to basketball when Michael Jordan retired the first time. In MMA there is this "unbeatable" champion, Russian heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko. Fedor is a mild-mannered stone cold fighter who is versed in every aspect of the MMA game. He is considered unbeatable by most, which makes it all the more appealing to watch his fights. If he ever loses it will be a major shock to anybody watching, which is why people tune-in. This affects all the fights because you watch an up and comer and think "could he be the one to take down Fedor"

UFC owners Zuffa {owned by Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta} recently bought their biggest competitor, Japanese promotion Pride Fighting Championship. From the perspective of die-hard fans Pride was considered to have the best fighters in the world. It was extremely popular in Japan, until Fuji TV terminated their contract. Pride couldn't handle the loss and had to sell. With Pride on board many superfights that was thought never to be possible are. Popular fighters such as Fedor, Wanderlai Silva, Mauricio "Shogun" Rua and before the purchase Mirko "CroCop" Filipovic and Quinton "Rampage" Jackson are now able to go up against the UFC's elite such as Randy Couture, Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell, Rich Franklin, B.J. Penn and Matt Serra. Being able to promote these kind of superfights will further cement MMA as a true young contender to an old champion, boxing.

One more aspect overlooked by skeptics is the fact that MMA has less serious injuries than boxing. Its not like in boxing where you may take over 100 punches to your head and midsection. Furthermore if you get knocked out in boxing you can get back up and take more punishment, in MMA if the ref thinks your knocked out for a second the fights over. So Lampley and other skeptics can moan all they want, but the facts are the facts and pay-per-view has a new shining prince waiting to be crowned king.

quotes provided by foxsports.com

Original Source

The Rise of Mixed Martial Arts

Hey everyone, this is an article I wrote a while back for a website, obviously alot of things have changed since then(like some people thinking Fedor isn't number 1 anymore), but its an educational article for someone who may be new to MMA.



In the early days of mixed martial arts the concept was simple. Fighters used their specific fighting discipline against an opponent with a different fighting discipline. To prove their style was better they simply got in the ring and used the only style they had trained in for years. This mix of styles often resulted in boring matches. In November of 1993 the first event was held by entrepreneur Art Davie and son of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu creator Helio Gracie's son Rorion Gracie. They named their event Ultimate Fighting Championship now known as the UFC.

The only rules in these fights were no eye-gouging and no biting, but other than that anything else was allowed including groin shots and head butts. The event became popular as people were drawn to the violence and technique. Then came politics as many politicians denounced the sport for its brutal nature. Senator John McCain was so adamant about banning the UFC he was successful in making it illegal in all but 3 states. McCain, who is known for having connections in boxing, also had it removed from 90% of pay-per-view providers. While the UFC was struggling mightily, a promotion in Japan called Pride Fighting Championship was flourishing.

Pride fights were fought in a traditional ring and had slightly different rules than UFC. The UFC was bought by the Zuffa organization in 2001 a company with money and connections. Zuffa is owned by Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta with Dana White being the president. Zuffa was able to get the sport sanctioned in most states that McCain got it banned from. They also inserted boxing like rules with a point system, weight classes, outlawing techniques such as kicking a downed opponent along with rules that were already in place such as glove wearing, no groin shots and no head butts. With these rules in place viewers were able to see the amazing techniques used by the fighters realizing it wasn't just an all-out street brawl with no abilities. Fighters now combined many different fighting styles in fights including jiu-jitsu, boxing, kickboxing, muay thai, judo, sambo, greco-roman wrestling, submissions and other forms. Fighters in Pride and UFC became celebrities.

UFC owners Zuffa bought Pride recently and is now able to have Super-Fights that many people thought would never happen. Some examples would be Chuck Liddell vs. Wanderlai Silva(Now on for December 29th at UFC 79), Fedor Emelianenko vs. Randy Couture and Couture vs. Silva. One of the things that makes MMA so popular now is the fact that there is a consensus greatest fighter in the world in Fedor Emelianenko. Boxing was at its finest when there was one man on top and Fedor is considered unbeatable by most, so if he does lose it would be a major shock. The allure of one guy dominating a sport like Tiger Woods or Roger Federer always makes the sport more popular because everybody is after him but no one can beat him. This sport will continue to grow as the reality TV show "The Ultimate Fighter" on Spike TV lets people in on the world of MMA. MMA is NOT a fad that will go away, its here to stay.

UFC Announces Dan Henderson vs Anderson Silva

The UFC announced at the post fight press conference that Middleweight Champion Anderson Silva will face Dan Henderson in March next year.

Heres the FULL ARTICLE from MMAweekly.

My Take- Man I'm counting the days for this fight to happen, what a war this should be. Both have ridiculous chins so a knockout is not likely, but both have serious power so you never know. The big question I think would be is if the wrestler Hendo will want to take Anderson down and hold him there or will Anderson's muay thai be too much. In any case there is plenty of time to dissect every angle of this fight, so for now I'm just really excited because this will one of the best main events in UFC history.

Top 5 MMA Submissions of the Last Year

There is nothing I love more than a good submission to end a fight. Its one of the most exciting moments in MMA, you see a fighter caught in a submission and you wonder can he escape it, is he gonna tap, will he go unconscious or will his arm/leg be broken. These are my top 5 submissions of the last year in MMA.

5. Frank Shamrock Rear Naked Chokes Phil Baroni Unconscious with Baroni's eyes still open- First time I've ever seen someone choked out with their eyes open. These 2 guys hated each other and after the fight Shamrock even admitted to holding the choke a little longer to punish Baroni for talking so much trash. If you watch the video it looks like Baroni is a corpse, its great! WATCH HERE

4. BJ Penn Rear Naked Chockes Jens Pulver at the TUF 5 Finale- The transitions that set up this choke were amazing. Pulver puts his arm up while BJ has his back for a split second, then in an instant secures that arm with his leg while grabbing his neck. Penn admitted later on to holding the choke longer to punish Pulver. WATCH HERE

3. Renato Babalu Sobral Anaconda Chokes David Heath Unconscious at UFC 74, Then Gets Fired from the UFC- Before this fight David Heath was wearing a shirt with Babalu's mugshot on it all weekend in Vegas. Apparently Babalu was pretty pissed off at the guy. Before the infamous choke Babalu had bloodied Heath to the point where it looked like both men were standing next to Stephan King's Carrie at the prom. Then he slaps the anaconda on tight, Heath starts tapping but Babalu keeps it in deep until Heath goes to sleep. Babalu would say that he couldn't feel Heath tapping, but was still fired from the UFC. WATCH HERE

2. Forrest Griffin Rear Naked Chokes Mauricio Shogun Rua at UFC 76- Probably the most shocking outcome to a fight in a long time. Coming into the fight Shogun was considered the second best fighter in any weight class in the world. To the suprise of many Forrest shows better ground skills and even better standup than Rua. Middle of the second round Shogun gasses, by the third he is totally gassed, Forrest gets his back and sinks the choke in to make sure the fight didn't go to a decision(which he would of won anyway) and shock many MMA fans. WATCH HERE

1. Nick Diaz Submits Takanori Gomi with a Gogoplata at Pride 33- This is one my favorite fights ever and a fight that everyone should see. These are 2 of the most entertaining fighters you will ever see and when they got in the ring together chaos ensued. Diaz is known for never letting you breath, he will keep on throwing lighter punches while his opponents throw powerful punches every now and then. Gomi landed a haymaker that dropped Diaz early on but Diaz has the ability to relax in the ring and weathered that one shot with ease. Late in the first round Gomi started to gas and Diaz took advantage with pitter patter punches, landing a ridiculous amount on Gomi's chin. In the second round Gomi gets a takedown, but in the process gets caught in the Gogoplata, amazing ending to an amazing fight. WATCH HERE

There were alot of great submissions the past year, but these are the ones I enjoyed the most.

Fedor Wins Combat Sambo World Championship, Again

We all know that the main reason Fedor Emelianenko didn't sign with the UFC is that Zuffa, and Dana White wouldn't let him compete in Russian Sambo. Now this is something that he has done for years and has a deep passion for. Anyways I'll save my opinion of that for another time, here's a snippet of the story.

Fedor Emelianenko (Pictures) won the open-weight division of the 31st Combat Sambo World Championship on Nov. 10 in Prague. With the win, the 31-year-old Russian, widely regarded as the No. 1 heavyweight fighter in the world, defended the title he won two years ago in the Czech Republic capital.
Read the whole article HERE

Fedor is so far above the competition of Russian Sambo, probably even more so than mixed martial arts. Make sure you check my VIDEOS SITE in the coming weeks, I'll see if I can get a video of this.

MMA Internet Slang for Noobs- Part 1

I've been blogging about MMA for a while and I get alot of emails from people just getting into MMA wondering what some of the things I say mean. Well for those people I'm gonna make a list, a reference for newbs, so when they sign up for forums and discussion boards they know what more experienced users are saying. For the MMA die-hards, feel free to let me know what Im missing. This is part 1 of a 3-part series. If you know someone who is just starting out in MMA, make them read these articles before posting in forums. By the way MMA means Mixed Martial Arts!

*UFC- Refers to the American promotion, Ultimate Fighting Championships, considered the top promotion in the world.

*Pride- Refers to the now defunct Japanese promotion Pride Fighting Championships, which was bought by UFC owners Zuffa LLC.

*Wandy or Wand- Refers to Wanderlei Silva, one of the most popular fighters ever, known for his legendary staredowns and aggressive style, his nickname is "The Axe Murderer". Fought in Pride, now fights for UFC.

*Rampage or Page- Refers to Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, the current UFC Light Heavyweight champion. Rampage is known for his signature slams, hilarious commentary and a tense rivalry with Wanderlei Silva that produced 2 unforgettable fights.

*Fedor- Refers to Fedor Emelianenko, A Russian Heavyweight fighter and longtime Pride champion who is widely considered to be the best fighter in the world. Fedor recently signed with the promotion M1 Global, breaking many fans hearts who wanted to see him in the UFC.

*Crocop- Refers to Mirko "Crocop" Filipovic, A Croatian Heavyweight fighter who is known for his left high kick, kickboxing career and an unforgettable superfight with Fedor. Crocop signed with the UFC, but has lost 2 of 3 fights he was heavily favored to win.

*GSP or Rush- Refers to UFC Welterweight Georges St. Pierre, a Canadien fighter who is known for his athletic style and is considered one of the best fighters in the world. He was the UFC Welterweight Champion, until being derailed by heavy underdog Matt Serra.

*TUF- Refers to the Spike TV reality show about upcoming fighters vieing for a contract from the UFC called "The Ultimate Fighter".

*TTT- Means "To The Top", this is used in forums to bump up threads that have little or no responses.

*TUF Noob- Refers to a person who only started watching MMA because of the reality show The Ultimate Fighter. This is often a means of insulting somebody who makes a stupid forum post.

Those are the first 10, check in tommorow for part 2.