• Former EliteXC lightweight champ KJ Noons will return to MMA in 2009, likely with Strikeforce.
• Dana White is featured on the cover of the first-ever UFC magazine.
• Former UFC fighter Lee Murray, who was accused of a record $92 million robbery in 2006 in the UK, was released from a Moroccan prison on Wednesday only to be re-arrested on Thursday to be tried under Moroccan law at the request of British authorities.
• According to rumors, Quinton Jackson and Rashad Evans are likely to headline UFC 107 on December 19 in Las Vegas. Main events aren’t yet rumored for Fight Night 19 (September 16 – Oklahoma City),  UFC 105 (November 14 – Manchester, England), UFC 106 (November 21 – Las Vegas), or The Ultimate Fighter 10 Finale (December 5 – Las Vegas).
• A possible headliner for one of the upcoming events is Chuck Liddell, with rumors swirling in recent days that the former UFC light heavyweight champ won’t retire and will instead return for at least one more bout, with Rich Franklin mentioned as a possible opponent.
• WEC and PFC lightweight veteran Poppies Martinez has signed  with Strikeforce and will make his debut at the promotion’s August 15 event featuring Gina Carano vs. Cris Cyborg.
• Perhaps in an attempt to dismiss rumors fueled by Diego Sanchez’s recent interview that he could pull out of his August 8 lightweight bout with Kenny Florian, BJ Penn’s latest video blog is brief, simply showing the UFC lightweight champ stepping on a scale and weight in at slim 166.8 pounds ahead of the 155-pound bout.
• In a recent interview with Knuckled Up, WEC lightweight contender Donald Cerrone, who has just one fight remaining on his current contract, says that a move to the UFC is possible and that he wants to fight Cole Miller.
• With his broken hand now healed, Houston Alexander is working on his ground game with veteran Jeremy Horn in preparation for a fall UFC return.
• Following the recent demise of Setanta, the UFC’s new television partner in the UK could be ESPN.
• Early UFC fighters Mikey Burnett and Pat Miletich could rematch at a to-be-announced Strikeforce event in Oklahoma.
• Weigh-ins for UFC 100 will take place at 7pm ET on Friday July 10 and will air live on MMAFrenzy.com.
• Yoshihiro Nakao vs. Choi Mu Bae and Clay French vs. Eiji Mitsuoka have been added to the card for Sengoku Ninth Battle, which takes place on August 2 in Saitama, Japan.
• Hopes to have MMA regulated in New York before year-end have been dashed after the 2009 legislative session ended earlier this week before a decision was made on the bill.
• Aleksander Emelianenko will take on Blagoi Invanov, the 2008 Combat Sambo champion who defeated his brother Fedor en-route to the title, at a September 29 event in South Korea.
• In an appearance on HDNet’s “Inside MMA,” Cyrille Diabate, who appeared as the Team US striking coach on the ninth season of The Ultimate Fighter, says he expects to make his UFC debut this year.
• Lyoto Machida, Randy Couture, and Fedor Emelianenko are some of the fighters who could be featured in EA’s mixed martial arts video game.
• The UFC will return to Germany in early-2010, with an event scheduled for April in Oberhausen.
• PRIDE veteran Ricardo Arona will resume his career on September 12 in Brazil.
• The UFC awarded TUF 9 coaches Dan Hendersona and Michael Bisping new Land Rovers.
• Wanderlei Silva, who lost a close decision to Rich Franklin earlier this month at UFC 99, wants to fight twice more before the end of 2009.

[Pictured: Chuck Liddell]

Arloski competed exclusively for the UFC from 2000 through 2008, including a reign as the promotion’s heavyweight champion, but was allowed to become a free agent in early-2008 despite a three-fight win streak and promptly signed with Affliction. After victories over Ben Rothwell and Roy Nelson pushed his win streak to five-straight, Arlovski suffered first-round knockouts to top-ranked heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko and undefeated prospect Brett Rogers.

Affliction vice president Tom Atencio confirmed the news on Tuesday with Fighters Only, and also that the company will keep Tim Sylvia under contract for now despite back-to-back losses of his own and that Affliction has no plans for Fedor’s  brother Aleksander Emelianenko to fight for them in the future.

[Pictured: Andrei Arlovski]

Emelianenko was rocked by a right early in the opening round, but opened up a cut on Magomedov during a later exchange that forced the referee to step in and halt the contest early in the first round.

A video of the fight is embedded below:

Fedor Emelianenko

Fedor Emelianenko is considered to be the best heavyweight fighter in the history of MMA, ranking in the top 2 or 3 in every pound for pound ranking you will find. In Russia he is their Michael Jordan, but his sport of calling is Sambo. Fedor and his brother Aleksander will enter the 2009 Russian Combat Sambo Championship, which takes place on February 21st at Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. The two brothers will both enter the competition in the same weight class of 100-Kg, making an all-Emelianenko finals a likely possibility.

Fedor will be looking to do something he hasn’t ever done as he tries to rebound from a third place finish in his last Sambo Tourney. Fedor is in a league of his own when it comes to wins and losses in both sports. He has only suffered 1 MMA loss and that was due to an illegal elbow with many feel that he has never been beaten in the sport of MMA. His recent Sambo loss last November was not as controversial. He suffered a 8-5 loss to Bulgarian Blagoi Ivanov, but was able to finish third in the tournament. The loss was his first in 8 years in the sport.

Everyone outside of Fedor’s camp made this a much larger deal than truth be told. Everyone has a bad day. Although the king of Sambo had seemed to be unbeatable, the loss was simply one loss. One reason the loss was taken out of proportion was the fact that Sambo is more of a past time for him. It isn’t what pays the bills, and outside of Russia it is not what defines the fighter.

Fedor successfully defended his WAMMA world title against Andrei Arlovski via first-round knockout in January and at this time his next opponent for an MMA fight has not been put on paper, though he’s expected to meet Josh Barnett this summer.

• Affliction heavyweight Aleksander Emelianenko (14-3), the younger brother of WAMMA heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko, posted a first-round knockout of South Korean Sang Soo Lee (10-5) on Saturday in the main event of M-1 Challenger 9 in St. Petersburg, Russia. Emelianenko earned the victory with a right hook midway through the opening round that dropped Lee to the canvas. In other notable action from the event, PRIDE veteran Gilbert Yvel stopped Alexander Timanov with strikes in the first round and Kiril “Baby Fedor” Sidelnikov defeated Jang Yong Kim via first-round TKO.
• Former WEC light heavyweight champion Doug Marshall successfully made his middleweight debut on Thursday in the main event of Palace Fighting Championship 11 at the Tachi Palace Hotel and Casino in Lemoore, California. Marshall stopped opponent Rafael Real with strikes just 69-second into the headlining bout. Also on the card, Jorge Olivera retained the PFC light heavyweight title in the co-main event, defeating challenger Isaiah Larson via third-round submission, and Erin Toughill improved her record to 8-2-1 with a unanimous decision win over Jan Finney.
• Heavyweight prospect Dave Herman returned to action on Saturday, earning a TKO of Chris Guillen early in the first-round of their bout at King of Kombat in Texas.
• UFC veteran Dan Christison was also victorious on Saturday, submitting Steve Banks with a kimura late in the first-round of their matchup at Intimidation Cage Fighting “Redemption”.
• The Ultimate Fighter 7 cast member Paul Bradley, who was forced out of the middleweight tournament due to a skin infection, defeated fellow TUF 7 fighter Dante Rivera via TKO just 34-seconds into their bout at a Ring of Combat event at the Tropicana Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, NJ on Saturday.

Belfort (17-8) defeated Terry Martin at Affliction’s first-ever event in July, but is currently serving a 180-day medical suspension and will need to be cleared early to take on Lindland (21-5), who topped Fabio Negao via unanimous decision at the July event.

Antonio Rogerio Nogueira vs. Vladimir Matyushenko was also officially added to the main card.

On the three-bout preliminary card, which will be broadcast on HDNet, IFL heavyweight champion Roy Nelson will meet Paul Buentello and Mike Pyle will take on Jason High.

The promotion also announced on Wednesday the signing of IFL lightweight standout Chris Horodecki. Horodecki will make his Affliction debut at “Day of Reckoning”, but his opponent has not yet been determined. IFL welterweight champion Jay Hieron is also expected to be in action at the October event.

Noticeably absent from the press conference was former UFC light hevayweight champion Tito Ortiz. Ortiz, who had reportedly signed a deal with the promotion on Tuesday that was to be announced at the Wednesday press conference, remains a free agent according to reports but is still expected to sign with Affliction in the coming days. He is expected to face UFC veteran Renato “Babalu” Sobral on the Affliction “Day of Reckoning” main card.

Rumored Affliction “Day of Reckoning” participants Aleksander Emelianenko, Tim Sylvia, and Ben Rothwell were not added to the fight card on Wednesday and are unlikely to fight at Affliction’s second-ever event.

Tickets for the event go on sale on Saturday, August 9th, at UNLVTickets.com and range in price from $75 to $500.

For more on Affliction “Day of Reckoning” check out the MMAFrenzy.com MMA rumors section.

“I passed the medical board and my license to fight was obtained without any problems. But the fact is that in California the commission is very rigid for admittance. One of the main conditions to let you fight is the ability to pass all of your tests on time. I had to be in America by July 13, the Visa was only good until the fourteenth and my tickets were purchased in advance for the fifteenth.

On the whole, I was late. They thought the organizers could agree and settle the problem but they quickly found out they would not be able to get me on the card. Instead they were able to find a suitable replacement for Paul Buentello. The laws in California are so rigid.”

So Emelianenko was fine medically, but just couldn’t get all that paperwork into Armando Garcia and friends fast enough. You stay classy, CSAC.

“A source close to the situation…explained that the blood tests came back right before Aleks and Buentello were scheduled to weigh in and that is why there was so much confusion around the stage and why the fighters did not weigh in. Gary Goodridge ended up stepping up on extremely short notice and filling in for the Russian heavyweight.

The tests were positive for Hepatitis B which resulted in the CSAC cancelling the fight.”

Common symptoms of Hepatitis B include liver inflammation and vomiting and, while the virus could potentially be career-ending, approximately 95-percent of those infected with the virus fully recover within months.

A second test is likely to be conducted to confirm the presence of the virus.

According to Sherdog.com Goodridge was “already in California, licensed and expecting to fight in San Diego this weekend on a card that was cancelled”.

MMAJunkie.com is reporting that weigh-ins for the bout, which is slated to air on Fox Sports Net between 8pm ET and 9pm tomorrow evening prior to the pay-per-view card, will take place at 11am tomorrow.

Goodridge has lost three of his last five bouts.

For complete weigh-in results for Affliction “Banned” click here.