Quick Hits: TUF 11 Tryouts in October, Cyborg Unlikey to Fight on November 7, DREAM Debuts “White Cage,” and More
Posted by Kris Karkoski on Sep 30, 2009 at 1:03 pm ET45 Comments
Middleweights and light heavyweights are invited to tryout for The Ultimate Fighter 11 on Monday, October 26 at the Renaissance Airport Hotel in Los Angeles. Veteran David Loiseau is among the fighters who plan on trying out for the show. [Fanhouse]- Urijah Faber says he’s close to a new deal with Zuffa and plans to fight in January [Raw Vegas]
- Undefeated light heavyweight Stanislav Nedkov has been added to the rumored lineup for Sengoku 11. [MMAjunkie]
- Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos is unlikely to defend her Strikeforce title on November 7 against Marloes Coenen as rumored, with an undisclosed injury likely preventing her from participating on the CBS-televised card headlined by Fedor Emelianenko vs. Brett Rogers. [MMAjunkie]
- Dan Henderson would reportedly fight fellow middleweight contender Nate Marquardt contrary to previous reports, but still needs to finalize a new contract with the UFC. [Fighters Only]
- Chuck Liddell has advanced to round three of ‘Dancing with the Stars’.
- Jesse Taylor, the Ultimate Fighter 7 finalist who dropped a unanimous decision to Jay Hieron in his Strikeforce debut in August, recently posted on Facebook that he’ll be fighting on the main card of a November 6 “Strikeforce Challengers” event on Showtime.
- Former UFC middleweight contender Thales Leites has signed with Maximum Fighting Championship in Canada.
- Butterbean vs. Tank Abbot will headline “Alabama Pride” on December 12 in Birmingham, Alabama, with rapper DMX co-headlining the card in a celebrity boxing matchup.
- At a Tuesday press conference, DREAM revealed the six-sided “white cage” it will use for its October 25 DREAM 12 event, which will also mark the promotion’s first use of the standard three, five-minute round fights, a format that will only be used once each year. The promotion also added Eddie Alvarez vs. Katsunori Kikuno and Won Sik Park vs. Kuniyoshi Hironaka the event’s official lineup.
- Starting in October, the WEC plans to hold a show each month through next summer. [MMA Weekly]
- Undefeated Bellator featherweight champion Joe Soto will face off against California prospect Mike Christensen at the Tachi Palace Fights debut at an outdoor event at the Tachi Palace Hotel & Casino in Leemore, California on October 8. [MMAJunkie]
- The infamous Kalib Starnes will face Bellator middleweight champion Hector Lombard at Cage Fighting Championship 11 on Oct. 9 in Queensland, Australia. [MMAWeekly]
- The three American Kickboxing Academy welterweights (who by the way refuse to fight one another) plan to continue calling out Matt Hughes as a game because they, “know he’s not going to agree to it.” Apparently Paul Daley likes their plan, and has decided to call out Hughes as well, in the hopes of elevating his UFC status. [CagePotato and FightersOnly]
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Wow, I really like the look of DREAM’s cage. “The Corw” on TUF 11, wow. On that note I would love to see another “comeback” season of TUF.
-I’m glad that Chuck has advanced in Dancing With The Stars, good job Chuck
-Can’t wait to see Uriah Faber back in action, i wish the dude would consider fighting at 155 in the UFC, he’s already done his thing at 145……maybe he needs to beat Brown first then make the move to the UFC. The fact that Brown had trouble with a Faber who’s hand was broken speaks volumes IMO, i think a 100% Faber would beat him, but we’ll see.
-I think Dan Henderson knows he’s been put in position where he has no choice but to fight Marquardt at 185 and realizes that the UFC has no intention of giving him the next title shot at 185. Hope the dude and Marquardt get some kind of gift for “broken promises” made by Dana White.
-I have no respect for Jesse Taylor and the dude is not a real MMA Fighter IMO and i’ll just leave it at that.
-Man, i feel sorry for Thales Leites, the dude didn’t deserve to get cut if you ask me, yeah he didn’t exactly give Anderson a challenge but who has? AND come on, the dude is a decent fighter……but this is business i guess.
-Butterbean vs. Tank Abbot??? talk about sad, and Rapper DMX, in “Alabama Pride” wow some funny stuff there.
-Super excited that the WEC will have more events, this should help them score more fans and should just have an all around positive effect on the company.
You know MK4, it really leaves a sour taste in my mouth that Hendo is getting his title shot after Dana said at a press conference that he will. Just irks me.
Why is Tank/Butterbean sad?
Neither guy is allowed to make a living IYO?
Trust me you don’t have to watch.
Why is it sad?
1) It’s making a spectacal of our sport. A sport that me, MK4 and the rest of the Frenzies have been defending/ supporting/ actively involved in for years. These types of Japanese shoot fighting freakshows bring a lot of negative attention to the sport and is probably why some people still do not view it as a sport. Also there is almost zero real MMA skill between the both of these guys.
2) These guys are done and over the hill. How would you feel if a past-thier-prime athlete who is in no shape to be participating in such a physically demanding sport still get out on the field/ court? I would be heavily concerned for thier safety. Yes there are refs in the ring/ cage to protect the fighters but it still boils down to the fact that it is a fight and someone (esp. these two) can get seriously hurt.
Seriously get off of your soapbox and just how actively have you been involved in the sport of MMA?
As involved as say oh I don’t know…TANK ABBOTT.
I prefer reading etherbunny’s posts from his “soapbox”, rather than reading some post defending a Tank Abbott-Butterbean fight…
I really don’t want to see Jesse Taylor (CoCo the Peeing Monkey) fight again especially in my hometown AGAIN,he just hasn’t been impressive.. Perhaps he has changed since the last August…
Good for Urijah
DREAM.12 is going to be fun, hey next week is DREAM.11
DMX v his manager (seriously? and ya Seriously)
Butterbean vs Tank…LOL the poster for that fight is hillarious. Butterbean looks like he weighs 500+ The DMX mugshot is rediculous & wouldn’t everyone love to beat up on their manager…
I like the “they refuse to fight each other” part about AKA, what a twist..
Kalib should get destroyed by Lombard
Just so no one gets mad at Kris about the AKA thing, I wrote that part.
How come we can’t see “The Ultimate Fighter: The Comeback 2″? There are enough guys to make it happen..
-Houston Alexander
-David Loiseau
-Andre Arlovski
-Thales Leites
-Tim Sylvia
-Josh Burkman
-Chris Leben
-Rich Clementi
-Tim Boesch
-Rocky Balboa
-Clubber Lang
-frank Deux9Bloodsport)
-Bolo9Bloddsport)
-Ivan Drago
-Rambo 10th Blood…..
Some not-so-quick responses:
- I wonder just how much I could embarrass myself by bringing the jcohl project to the Renaissance Airport Hotel in Los Angeles on Monday 26 October.
- Urijah fighting at 155 is probably a foregone conclusion.
The guy ran the table at 145, and gave Mike Brown 9 kinds of He11 with broken bones in both hands. IMO it’s time to move on and move up, unless Dana can pull together some sort of superfight with Miguel Torres at 140.
- I’ll let someone else post a sh!ts and giggles bit on why Guyborg can’t defend on 7 November.
- I’m guessing Hendo is taking his time with the UFC, and making sure he gets some sort of compensation for getting fu<ked over by Dana White on the title shot deal.
Maybe a title shot at 205, maybe one of those much-loved "undisclosed" payouts, or maybe both depending on how p!ssed Hendo is, and how sorry Dana is.
I'm also thinking that a p!ssed off Hendo is no fun at all to fight, just ask Michael Bisping. Even though he's probably been the coolest cat during this whole "next title shot" thing, I can almost see Hendo taking all of his aggrvation with this sitch out on Marquardt, although Marqaurdt is light-years ahead of the Count.
- Is there a DWTS Championship belt for Chuck if and when he wins this ballroom thing? It would be cool for him to be the only champion ballroom dancer in the UFC HoF.
- As a person I hope things in his personal life get squared away, as an MMA fighter I hope he just GOES away.
- Oh great, now Thales Leites can simultaneously put people to sleep and fu<k over other grappling contenders in ANOTHER MMA promotion.
- Butterbean…Tank Abbott…DMX…who's doing the national anthem, the fu<king Gin Blossoms?
- Wow.
Just wow.
It's official.
The Octagon is now the second coolest platform for MMA on the planet.
Good job, DREAM.
- WEC holding more events?
Don't they really mean more UFC events, headlining with UFC 125, 135 and 145 title matches, and the hoped-for Faber-Torres superfight?
- Cool to see Bellator keep on keeping on, but sorry about Kalib Starnes. Maybe he'll shock the world?
- Calling out Matt Hughes?
Not only is it disrespectful and fairly unintelligent, but the creepy 3-sided AKA bromance between Kos, Fitch, and Swick is probably what Bob Arum was talking about in his senile rant a couple of weeks ago when he referenced certain homoerotic tendencies within MMA.
For Paul Daley it makes a lot of sense, but as good as Semtex is, he's not ready for Hughes, even a diminished version of Hughes, who would simply put Daley on the mat at will, and GnP him until the round was over or the ref waved him off.
As for the Three AKAmigos, they should be glad they don't have to face Hughes in his prime, because honestly, 4 years ago he would have pounded the a$$es off of all three of them.
Hughes has as much admitted in interviews and in his biography that MMA isn't the priority in his life that it once was, and therefore he lacks both the fore and the will to maintain his former championship level of performance.
Calling him out now, when he's more concerned about his kids and his farm, would be like Todd Duffee and Cain Velasquez calling out Dan Severn.
Its honestly become almost impossible for me to not become an instant supporter of whoever Swick, Kos, or Fitch is fighting, because of their rampant and repeated douchbaggery…
It is interesting to me that you hold such a grudge against AKA this week, when almost every big name from that camp has an upcoming fight against someone not named Matt Huges and well KOS just won against Trigg…
I highly doubt that Arum knows or helll has even heard of KOS, Fitch or Swick, and for you to state (essentially) that they are douche’s or homo’s because they say hey Hughes lets fight (Swick told KOS to do it and Swick called him out, lets see if Fitch does it), is well not a big deal,, honestly… Hey your talking about the WW division in some other context than GSP = The Greatness (which is obivious)…. And I’m not sure that 4years ago Hughes would destroy Fitch…
I’m not a supporter of KOS, Swick or Hughes, I do however like Fitch but honestly you have undoubtably set out to shoot down AKA at every moment, my hats off to you.
Scolded by the Boss!
Maybe its just me, but I think that men with the skill of Kos, Swick, and especially Fitch should carry themselves like sportsmen, and not “call out” opponents like some Monday Night Raw interview.
GSP aside, these men represent the finest 170ers on the planet, and IMO should ACT like it.
Also, I think AKA is one of the best MMA training camps in the world, and when their top guys act like a$$-clowns, they sort of disrespect their camp.
One of the first things you learn when you sign up for BJJ, kajukenbo, or most martial arts, is to not bring disgrace or otherwise discredit your school/studio/dojo/gym etc.
Honestly, how does Kos asking for a fight with Hughes bring glory to AKA, or himself?
As for Hughes v.2004/5, he might have had a tougher time with Fitch, but Kos and Swick probably wouldn’t have made it all 25 minutes with him.
You go back and look at some of Hughes’ fights, and you tell me if you think Swick would have come out better or worse having stepped in with Hughes, my friend.
I’d also be more impressed if Swick, Kos, or Fitch called out GSP, or Kampman, or Daley, or Alves, or Karo Parisyan or pretty much any 170er still hungry for the gold.
And if a guy like Kos or Swick is looking for a tough fight, and they’re so bad-a$$, can’t they ask Joe Silva to set something up with Rumble Johnson?
Calling out a man who has repeatedly said that MMA is no longer priority one in his life makes them all look bad, and disrespects a future HoFer in Hughes.
“Aging legends shouldn’t have to prove themselves against younger men they could have beaten in their prime.”
-quote attributed to Joe Louis in one of his last radio interviews discussing his fight with Rocky Marciano
I’m not so much trying to put AKA on blast, as much as I’m trying to keep in perspective what it looks like when you try to short-cut your way to the top…
Hughes’ response to Kos calling him out was, “What’s the point? He should be calling out GSP, not me. I’m not the champ anymore.”
O goodness no, I don’t think that Swick could last 4 minutes with Hughes, hell I don’t give him 9 minutes with him now, and KOS well that might be a decent fight but honestly I have no intrest in seeing that fight, actually I’m not sure who I would like to see against Hughes rightnow….
Fighters have called out fighters before and I’ve enjoyed some of them, Rampage calling out Wanderlei in PRIDE, the staredown between Chuck and Wanderlei in the UFC (long time ago), I liked Shad and Quinton, it happens but hey, I can see your point about WWF stuff..
I believe that AKA’s top guys (in the UFC) are Cain and Fitch, not KOS or Swick (I assume thats who u meant bout clowns)
KOS, isn’t training in Martial Arts he is training to be a top MMA WW, I believe that there is a difference, but I do get what you mean about honor, I do..
Rumble has been training off and on at AKA (not sure if he is still there, rightnow or soley with Cung Le’s camp)
I guess I’m just a little disappointed in Kos, Swick, and especially Fitch.
I also wonder where it will end.
Lets just say that Hughes faces Fitch, and age and lack of desire, plus the fact that right now Fitch is the number 2 170er in the world, wins.
What then?
Does Kos go gunning for Pat Miletich?
Will Swick as for a fight with Royce Gracie?
I’m probably making more of this thing than is necessary, I just want our sport to avoid the pitfalls of boxing and blurring the lines with ventures like pro wrestling is all.
Apologies for some of my more over-the-top stuff…
As far as Hughes fighting, I don’t think I would mind seeing him fight Daley, I think he could get him down and submit him. If not Daley, maybe Condit or Ellenberger or even Kampmann since he just got KOed.
jcohl
Finally someone agrees that Swick and Kos are douches for calling out an uninterested matt hughes. Its pretty obvious that hughes doesn’t care about the belt anymore and just wants to compete for love of the game, and he has already cemented his status as one of the best champs ever so i wouldn’t really care either about fighting a number four or five guys. he should just beat up twinkletoes again and retire on a good note. I cant say this for KOS but swick still really hasn’t done anything for the WW division and i was hoping for kampman to hitman Swick
“The infamous Kalib Starnes will face Bellator middleweight champion Hector Lombard at Cage Fighting Championship 11 on Oct. 9 in Queensland, Australia”
Bellator to my knowledge hasn’t signed a contract for “Season II”
I think they are working on a contract, but considering they haven’t yet made public who will carry the fights the next time around, I don’t think it’s done yet.
Lombard’s fight with Starnes is in another organization.
The article says the fight is under Cage Fighting Championship auspices.
I missed that, too.
I personally think that the “homoerotic” line about AKA was a little over the line, BTW.
I do, too Justin.
I also think its a little over the line to have 3 guys from the same camp calling out a man like Matt Hughes, who has pretty much admitted that he’s fighting for the love of the sport, and has no title aspirations, and by extension no real need or desire to fight contenders.
Shouldn’t men like Swick, Kos, and Fitch be gunning for GSP, or other competitors, rather than someone who is coming to the end of his road?
Is the task of taking on GSP THAT horrific that the AKA trio would rather call out a disinterested Hughes than face the prospect that until GSP’s mothership returns and beams him back aboard, they haven’t a chance in He11 of wearing UFC WW gold?
I personally think that the reason all these guys are calling out hughes is because they all think they can KO him and stuff his takedowns. Beating Hughes got alves on the right track and they are likely thinking the same thing. Besides that whats the point, they should be calling out each other. those are the fight everyone wants to see.
I, sir, will not stand idly by and let you insinuate anything about my “girl” Cyborg. She is a hottie and I will not stand idly by. I challenge you to a duel.
That went too far. -Justin
I couldn’t help but laugh when I read the line about Liddell and DwtS tucked in there nicely with a bunch of mma news. Good on ya, though Chuck.
Also, the AKAmigo’s thing was good too.
ALL THIS TALK ABOUT AKA CALLING OUT MATT HUGHES AND NOW PAUL DALEY??
-I actually hope that Hughes ends up fighting one of them and takes them to school. Hughes may be getting older but he hasn’t reached Liddell or Couture old, he’s still got enought to put a hurtin on them, so i do hope he gets to fight Koscheck and does him like he did Penn in their 2nd fight. I won’t fighter bash but i’ll just say that AKA and Paul Daley’s so called “strategy” just goes to show how these guys truly DO NOT want to fight TOP COMPETITION nor do they wish to challenge themselves as MEN or TRUE MMA FIGHTERS WHICH THEY ARE PROVEN TO BE NOT.
It’s funny to me how badly these guys want to fight Matt Hughes to get an easy road to the title BUT either way even if they do make it to a title shot they’ll have to face Georges St. Pierre who already has busted 200+ Combos on Koscheck and Fitch and is eye a FATALITY FINISH on s UNDESERVING HASN’T BEATEN A TOP GUY MIKE SWICK. Mike Swick was in the audience when Paul Daley proved me right and beat Kampmann, Swick after the fact looke visibly scared and worried obviously because he doesn’t want to fight Daley who can for sure “Kampmann” Swick.
I honestly hope that Dana White mans-up and keeps his word of matching these “firends” up because they are not acting like fighters who want to be real MMA fighter they are acting like ……………., i just can’t see how either of them can look themselces in the mirro and call themselves a man let alone a true fighter let alone a Martial Asrtists which they SURE AS HE11 ARE NOT.
MARK MY WORDS, NEITHER AKA FIGHTER WILL EVER BE A CHAMPION, NEVER PERIOD.
Daley doesn’t train with AKA as far as I know, and there is actually some possibly legit reasoning for him to fight Hughes. Namely trying to clear up that whole “I don’t have a ground game” thing.
Justin,
dude i know that Daley doesn’t fight for AKA, i was just going by the article above that says Daley wants to call out Hughes also.
Ok, just making sure that when I wrote that I didn’t make it seem like he did train with them.
This is how i see Swick,Fitch or Koscheck in their “future” title fight with Georges St. Pierre.
-First off the lack of top competition for these guys will not help them when they step into the octagon with St. Pierre plus they will problably realize that they should have fought a top 5 WW at least to give them a better sense of how difficult it wil be to even challenge GSP..anyway……
The fight will start and either Koscheck,Swick or Fitch will be fighting GSP…..After realizing that GSP is “GS-fu*king P” they will desperately try to take the fight to the ground which then GSP will do this circular gesture and hold his hands close to his stomach in which time a blue fire-ball will surface from his hands and then he will say “HADUKEN” and then hit either Swick,Koscheck or Fitch with this fireball and then Herb Dean will metamorph into Shang Sung and Say “FINISH HIM”, GSP will then bust a 300+ Hit Como and then finish the fight with a Mortal Kombat Style “Animality” and then Bruce Buffer will say “for the winner by FATALITY, Georges “Rush” St. Pierre”….
i like the way you fraised paul daley calling out matt hughes kris, good work
i think out of the 3 AKA guys that have a chance to be a ww champ it would be fitch. he seems to be the best out of the three. kos cant be consistent enough, i do respect the fact he wants to fight every two months or so, but i have yet to see him be consistent. swick has yet to beat any of the top contenders yet he is getting a possible title shot against another guy that has yet to beat anyone worth mentioning in hardy. its mind boggling.
the only way fitch will be a champ is if gsp and alves move up in weight.
Im thinking the coaches for TUF 11 could be Forrest/Franklin.
Other possibilities could be tito/Franklin or Tito/Forrest
Lombard should be able to crush starnes. The guys at ATT right now and is likely progressing at a great pace. Starnes I heard is training with Usain Bolt.
Anybody heard anything about Lyman Good. That guy is a beast and should be scooped up by the UFC or strikeforce sometime next year.
I heard Santos had to pull out cause she had a freak accident in training and injured her adams apple.
I hope Faber does something new. I think he could make 135 he doesnt look much bigger than bowles. Plus him versus Torres or Bowles would be outstanding fights.
Good to see that DMX is making the hits inside the ring while hes not at rapping.
I rather doubt Franklin would be involved as a coach, he’s said before that he is wholly uninterested in being a coach on TUF again.
If memory serves, Franklin has said something to the effect on more than one occasion “that it would take a lot more than a custom H2 to get him to coach TUF again”.
That being said, I think a Griffin-Franklin coached TUF leading up to a fight between them would not only be a big draw, but probably pretty funny to watch, as both men are masters of self-depracation…
what bothers me about the dmx issue is that it in no way helps legitimalize[sp] mma in the eyes of the public. no celebrity/actor/whoever doing mma benefits mma regardless if its at a high level, or a local level. sure they are allowed to go out for it, but it hurts the public’s idea of mma. i was watching PTI yesterday, and they laughed at dmx for doing mma, they said who isnt doing mma this day? its a joke to them and the other media who dont report on the true stars of the sport, just the guys that arent true mixed martial artists. like when canseco was ko’d by HMC a while back, that made the rounds on the shows and did nothing but cause negative views on the sport.
mma is still trying to make it mainstream, and imo guys like dmx and others like RJJ, and floyd talking bad or saying they will do mma and be great about it are doing no good for the sport. id love to see mma become nationally respected and get a network tv deal, but it needs to get rid of the negative image being cast on it by people attempting to do it because its the “cool and in thing” to do.
Athletic commissions exist for a reason. If the Tank/Bean fight is happening in a regulated state and is sanctioned then I am all for it. It will be hilarious. Elitist opinions aside, I am interested why anybody thinks something like this makes the sport less legitimate considering that nobody will see it.
That’s like saying crazy floor hockey tournaments for some reason devalue hockey as a sport when you only a very small percentage of people are exposed to it and then it is mostly hard cores, or those freak show boat races in Australia for some reason diminish the legitimacy of power boat racing.
Let the Athletic Commissions do their job and stop trying to push opinions that don’t really make too much sense. IF they are healthy to fight, then they can fight, period. It does not effect the standing of MMA in mass media. UFC, TUF, Strikeforce, EliteXC, ESPN and Sports Illustrated make up/have made up the general populations opinion of MMA. I would doubt your going to see these fights make it anywhere near exposure to mainstream. Trust me I have a lot of friends who are not MMA hardcores and it is interesting to see what they do pick up from the GENERAL media.
Also having a well known former boxer competing somehow is damaging to MMAs standing as a sport, when boxing is an olympic sport is not the best logic either.
DMX may get some exposure but hey.. celebrities are always trying their hand or getting involved in various sports. Also it’s boxing, celebrities box all the time.
Alabama is not a regulated state for MMA, and therefore no commission is overseeing this.
Man it is tempting to go there just to see the spectacle. Especially when tickets would only run $20…
I’m fine with celebrities and other publicity wh0res boxing, after all, the professional sect of that sport is a joke anyway, so whats a few more chuckles between chuckleheads?
But MMA?
One of these attention-seekers is going to get seriously hurt, and THATS going to put our sport in a very poor light, and that is something that cannot and should not be allowed, even in a state like Alabama, where laws are more like polite suggestions for the local populace to consider, sort of like Hawaii…
The celebrity match is boxing.