Before UFC 80 I really thought that Joe and BJ would be a closer fight. Once BJ put the rear naked choke on Joe Stevenson the first thing that came to my mind was, “I thought he would win”. I really wasn’t sure until that point though even if BJ had better stand up. After a year of upsets in 2007 the MMA community have come to almost expect an upset in every card of the night. All the legends that had permanent places had all been knocked down by the end of 2007. This made all those guys start thinking about retirement, the road back to the belt or what they needed to do to get back on top. Since we do not have any more long reigning champs to date or have any one guy that dominates his weight class it isn’t as likely we will have any upsets left for 2008.

I am not saying that there won’t by any more good fights, but fights that have clear underdogs won’t happen as often in 2008. I look at the next four main UFC events and all the main cards have guys that have legitimate shots to beat each other. What this translates into is when you have two guys that are so closely matched you have great fights and that alone. You have all the fans not knowing who is gonna win which creates even more excitement leading up to the fight. I am not saying I don’t enjoy a good upset, but having equally matched opponents usually makes for great fights.

Can somebody give Mike Zambidis some 4oz gloves, please? Take a look at the damage he can do. Granted it is only kickboxing, but you gotta believe Zimbidis could dominate in MMA. Tons of fighters have come from K-1. In kickboxing he has KO wins over MMA notables such as Norifumi “Kid” Yamamoto and Pete Spratt. He has had 83 Knockouts in 150 fights. All his losses have come from decisions and one unlucky cut.

I heard this when I was watching this show and when I heard what this guy said I thought, Hmm, that’s weird. They kept going on in the interview like it was no big deal and I thought it was odd that Lorenzo would do something that was so blatantly a conflict of interest. I am not a conspiracy person by any means, but I smell a story here.

Zuffa, the parent company of the UFC, has formally requested that CNBC air a retraction concerning “misstatements and inaccuracies” regarding the Zuffa Owners’ purchase of the UFC brand and Lorenzo Fertitta’s conduct as an NSAC commissioner.

 

CNBC recently aired a documentary entitled “Ultimate Fighting: From Blood Sport to Big Time” featuring an interview with Robert Meyrowitz regarding his role as President of Semaphore Entertainment Group (SEG), predecessor-in-interest to the Ultimate Fighting Championship brand.

 

When discussing SEG’s need to obtain Nevada State Athletic Commission approval for mixed martial arts prior to selling the brand to Zuffa, LLC in January 2001, Meyrowitz stated: “We went out there [to Nevada], it looked like we had the votes, we were told we did, and about midnight I got a phone call that one of the commissioners had changed his mind… and it turns out that commissioner was Lorenzo Fertitta, that he had changed his mind and that we wouldn’t be able to get approval.”

According to UFC President Dana White, Zuffa immediately challenged the false claims made by Meyrowitz and proof of the misstatements prompted CNBC to correct the content of the program in subsequent re-airings.

 

Mr. Meyrowitz also gave an inaccurate portrayal to CNBC of how the Zuffa owners first contacted SEG regarding the possible purchase of the UFC brand by claiming that he first received a phone call from Dana White in which Mr. White stated “I have somebody who wants to buy this, you’ll never guess who… I said give me one guess… Lorenzo Fertitta… he said ‘how’d you guess?’ I said ‘call me lucky.’”

Source:
http://www.mmafighting.com/news/2008/zuffa_seeks_retraction_of_statements_by_meyrowitz.html

Is it just me or does BJ look like hes got some crazy Cauliflower ear in the UFC Rapid Fire Picture. I know its Gonzaga’s glove, but at first glance I had to take a second look. Look at the weigh in picture. BJ looks pretty good.

Wear your Ear Guards people!

OFFICIAL WEIGHTS – UFC 80MAIN EVENT – VACANT UFC LIGHTWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP

BJ Penn (154) vs Joe Stevenson (154)
Fabricio Werdum (247) vs Gabriel Gonzaga (255)
Jess Liaudin (170) vs Marcus Davis (169)
Wilson Gouveia (205) vs Jason Lambert (204)
Jorge Rivera (185) vs Kendall Grove (186)
Antoni Hardonk (244) vs Colin Robinson (238)
Paul Kelly (170) vs Paul Taylor (170)
James Lee (206) vs Alessio Sakara (206)
Per Eklund (155) vs Sam Stout (155)

Source:
http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=news.detail&gid=9634

Attention Tappers! Check out this fight in Arkansas last weekend. This girl goes to sleep instead of tapping. Not a lot of fighters out there much less guy fighters that are willing to do that. Congrats to Hillary on the well rounded win.

Source:
http://www.subzerofighting.com/photogallery.htm

For all you Ultimate Fighting purists and original Kimbo Slice fans out there here is something for you. If you haven’t heard about Dog Brothers Martial arts you soon will. National Geographics will be a doing a documentary on it and is interviewing people that do it now for their upcoming show. If you want to learn about it or join them here is the information below. Their next “Gathering” is scheduled for August. Click on the link I provided below to see what the UFC thinks about the Dog Brothers Art in a letter to them.

Greetings from the National Geographic Channel! We want to hear from you about your experiences with Dog Brothers Inc.What we are looking for is to hear about your experiences in this group and why you decided to join. It doesn’t have to be anything long, a short paragraph will do. We’ll pick the best ones and publish them on our channel’s blog in a post leading up to the show and possibly as the show
re-runs later through the year. What we will need from you: - The short
paragraph that was mentioned above - Your first name (We want to respect
your privacy) - Your professional occupationWe can’t promise much, except
an additional story that you will be able to brag to your friends about. We
bet you all have some!We look forward to hearing from you.

Peter BouchardNATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC Email :peter.bouchard@natgeochannel.comt: 202.912.6528 f: 202-912-6603

Click here to let National Geograhpic hear from you:National Geographic Blog The adventure
continues!Marc “Crafty Dog” DennyDog Brothers Inc. Martial Arts

Source:
http://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?topic=1491.0

Previous Post:
http://billygamble.blogspot.com/2007/08/dog-brothers-martial-arts.html

Letter from UFC:
http://dogbrothers.com/images/ufc.jpg

I am guessing that the UFC is waiting until all their own UFC rules are accepted before they hold an event. Instead of changing there rules per the state they are in they would rather wait until the state changes its rules.

White, who told the Star Bulletin six months ago that he was close to
finalizing a deal to hold a show at Aloha Stadium this year, said he will wait
until a recently passed bill to regulate mixed martial arts goes into effect.

House Bill 1866, which establishes many new rules to help legitimize
the sport, was enacted into law last July, but isn’t effective until July 1,
2009.

“Thirteen new states regulated (mixed martial arts) last year and
Hawaii is one of them, so we want to go over there, but the regs aren’t done,”
White said. “We’re not like all these other cheese dog shows that go over there
before the regs are done.”

Source:
http://starbulletin.com/2008/01/18/sports/story05.html

Setanta Sports has acquired the exclusive broadcast rights to UFC programming in
the UK and Ireland.The multi-year deal covers all UFC UK fights in 2008 and
2009, and from July all other UFC fights will be exclusively live on Setanta.The
broadcaster added that supercards would not be made available on an additional
pay-per-view basis and will simply air on Setanta Sports 1.

Source:
http://www.setanta.com/en/UK/

Source:
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/programming/a86058/setanta-grabs-ufc-rights.html

Sorry, a little late on this one. Maybe they will have a rerun. Supernanny brings a kid with a lot of energy to the gym to try and show the parents that he can burn it up in a positive way.

The episode of Super Nanny featuring Mike Pyle and Gray Maynard airs tonight on
ABC at 9 Eastern & Pacific and 8 Central.
Check out the episode preview here.

Source:
http://xtremecouture.wordpress.com/2008/01/09/mike-pyle-gray-maynard-on-supernanny-tonight/

In a sport where there is a new MMA event and referee popping up every day, most people would say that the UFC referees have been around the longest. Big John McCarthy was one of the oldest starting at UFC 2 and the next would be Mario Yamasaki starting at UFC 20. These two, along with Herd Dean and Steve Mazzagatti, share a love for the sport that runs deeper than a measly paycheck from an Athletic Commission. True, they are some of the longest running refs in MMA, but they also have something else in common. They all currently practice or have competed in some form of martial arts.

Big John McCarthy was training under Rorian Gracie at the time of UFC 1 and even tried to enter the tournament, but Rorian Gracie advised against it. John then went on to ref UFC 2 and is now a MMA icon. McCarthy is a black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and currently runs a school called Big John McCarthy’s Ultimate Training Academy.

Herb Dean was actually training with Zane Frazier when UFC 1 was being put together and has a professional MMA record of 2-3. Dean has practiced Judo, but one of the actual martial arts credits Dean has is his 2nd Dan Black Belt in American Jiu Jitsu. When asked why he referees he said, “I think of being a referee is similar to being a bass player in a band. The bass player provides a consistent rhythm and sets the groove so that the other instruments can shine.”

Steve Mazzagatti was practicing Muay Thai early on and opened the first school for it Las Vegas. Steve has also practiced Hung Gar and Wing Chun Gung Fu.

I got to speak with Mario Yamasaki about his passion for martial arts. He said he was going to train this year and get back in shape so he could compete in the coming year for the Pan-Ams. Mario Yamasaki is currently a 3rd degree black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and also has a black belt in Judo. Mario started competing in Judo when he was five years old until he was about twenty years old. He started competing in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu when he was about seventeen and had some success at it. He is a Sao Paulo Open Champion, a three time Capital Open Champion and an Eastern Open silver medalist. Mario also has many schools in the US, Holland, Sweden, Germany, Dominican Republic and Brazil. One of his students he mentioned was Murilo Santana, a recent CBJJE World Champion. His school is called, Yamasaki Academy.

These guys love the sport so much that they will find a way to stay as close as they can to as many fights as possible. Like all sports, people get older and become more of a spectator than a participant. Randy Couture has recently made it harder to use that as an excuse, but some people, including referees, have one of the better jobs. “We get the best seat in the house,” said Mario. “When you get old and can’t fight no more, you ref.”