It was a slow weekend in MMA with no major cards headlining July 4th. Most of the build up is for this weekend’s UFC 100 which has garnered a significant amount of attention. After the weekend, here are my thoughts.

1. UFC 100 is getting the hype it deserves

UFC 100 is less than a week away and we are seeing great countdown previews, all the media outlets counting down their top moments and Spike TV is running the top 100 UFC fights of all time. This is the type of coverage that the UFC deserves and it’s fitting that it took them 100 Pay Pay View events to achieve it. I can’t wait to see what this week has in store for pre fight hype. Read More

With victories in The Ultimate Fighter Season 9 finale, Ross Pearson and James Wilks are most assuredly bound for title fights and UFC greatness, right? Well, if you look at the recent history of TUF winners you would likely conclude otherwise. In fact, there’s a nasty trend that has developed and these two fighters from the UK will be focused on bringing it to an end.

Consider this. The first four seasons of TUF produced eight winners. Of them, three have won championship belts since their win on TUF (Forrest Griffin, Rashad Evans and Matt Serra), one has fought for a championship (Joe Stevenson) and one has blown a weigh in that would have been for a championship fight (the bonehead award goes to Travis Lutter, who might still be in the sauna). Read More

Team USA Coach Dan Henderson has been a man of very few words throughout this season of The Ultimate Fighter. However, immediately following Frank Lester’s loss to Team UK’s James Wilks, Henderson summed up the situation perfectly for Lester; “You were worn out before you got there”.
 
Lester has been the most interesting story on this year’s show both inside and outside the ring. He overcame the loss of four of his front teeth and a broken nose in his first fight against Wilks to defeat David Faulkner while fighting as an injury replacement for Jason Pierce. Prior to his fight with Faulkner, no one would have given Lester a chance to win if both he and Pierce were allowed in the cage at the same time, but somehow he found the will to beat Faulkner when the Brit refused to fight in the sudden victory round. Lester gave new meaning to the word “emotional” (and perhaps also to “scary”) and provided more entertainment value than any other fighter by far. Read More

Another weekend and another successful UFC in the books. UFC 99 from Cologne, Germany appeared to be a big hit for the 12,000 plus in attendance as the UFC went to Germany for the first time ever. Some items were learned from this weekend.

1. Dan “The Outlaw” Hardy is a smart man and a better fighter than most gave him credit for.

 After weeks of trash talking back and forth between him and Marcus Davis, Hardy admitted days prior to UFC 99 that he was just trying to suck Davis into signing the contract and that “Marcus shouldn’t have signed to fight me. He should be fighting guys in the top 10. I thought if I called him out enough, he would sign.” Davis did and it worked. Hardy is also alot better than most were giving him credit for. He was strong on his feet and his ground game was impressive Saturday night. The Read More

Once again, this week Mark Dennison brings us his unique and light look at The Ultimate Fighter show in a segment we call “Dennisons TUF Corner”.

These fights are really starting to count. The Ultimate Fighter is now down to the semi-final matches to determine who fights for the title and that lucrative UFC contract. This week’s episode featured the four remaining Lightweight fighters and we were treated to one great fight and one…well, I’ll just say that the guy who sucks his thumb won that one.
 
That’s right, it was revealed that Team UK’s Andre Winner is a thumb sucker. While his teammates chided him for this unusual habit, Read More

Everyone is going to be talking about it.
 
No, this week’s bout between Demarques Johnson and Nick Osipczak on The Ultimate Fighter was not a classic fight. In the end, it wasn’t even a close fight. But, for 20 seconds, viewers saw one of the most exciting exchanges they will ever see, which left UFC President Dana White open mouthed and shocked. 
 
With last week’s departure of Team UK’s Dave Faulkner, some would suggest that Johnson is now the best fighter remaining on the show. Prior to his fight, Johnson stated as much himself and added that he intended to “hurt Osipczak’s feelings”. Read More

Last week the idea floating around was that the next 205 lbs title shot wouldn’t go to the man who claimed he desperately wanted his belt back, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. Instead Rampage will coach TUF 10 against Rashad Evans and face the former champion at season’s end. The next title shot will go to former Pride superstar Shogun Rua. Many wondered if Rampage was ducking Machida after watching his dismantling of Rashad Evans from cageside at UFC 98. Regardless how you interpret Rampage’s new found lost desire for the belt, having Shogun fight for the belt makes the most money for the UFC and all the fighters involved. Read More

For weeks, on The Ultimate Fighter, we’ve heard that Dave Faulkner is the best fighter on Team UK. We’ve watched as Jason Pierce drummed up excuse after excuse to avoid fighting the dangerous Brit, eventually getting his wish at the end of last week’s episode. No one on Team USA would stand a chance against Faulkner and perhaps no one would be foolish enough to take on the challenge. Read More

I’d like to report that this week’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter featured two exciting bouts between willing combatants. I’d like to say that the action outside the ring was entertaining, but in no way compared to the drama inside the octagon. Unfortunately, I can’t say any of this, but can however write that there was much more Mexican wrestling than I expected when I tuned in.

What? Read More

Here’s a newsflash - The Ultimate Fighter isn’t about the fighting, it’s about the fighters. Wednesday night’s episode didn’t even come through with the second fight which has been promised for each show and yet it was one of the more entertaining episodes of the season. Read More