Month: August 2022

I’m not gonna ‘give you the PC answers’ – Adesanya bored by Whittaker vs. Vettori booking

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, UFC News, UFC Paris: Gane vs. Tuivasa

It always behooves the champ to keep an eye on the division around him. Pay attention to the matchups, watch the fights; after all they never know when someone might make themselves a contender for the crown. When the upper echelon of a weight class is populated by fighters who’ve already had their chance at glory and failed, however, it’s no surprise if things feel a little less interesting.

Given a chance to talk about this week’s upcoming UFC Paris Fight Night event, middleweight king Israel Adesanya gave his thoughts—not just on the heavyweight main event between Tai Tuivasa and Ciryl Gane, but also on a battle of familiar foes Robert Whittaker and Marvin Vettori. On a recent episode of the Blakamoto & Oscar Show, Adesanya made it clear that ‘The Italian Dream’ vs. ‘The Reaper’ isn’t exactly a bout to get his blood flowing. Mostly because he’s already fairly sure who will walk away with the win.

“I’m excited for the main event. The co-main event, I’m excited for as well—actually, I’m not,” Adesanya said when asked about the fights (transcript via MMA Mania). “I’m not gonna lie. I’m not gonna bullshit you guys and give you the P.C. answers. I’m not actually excited for the co-main event.

“I’ll watch it. Meh. I know who’s gonna win. Rob’s gonna win so that’s why it’s not exciting for me. But, the main event, I don’t know who’s gonna win and I like Gane but I love Tai. That’s my dog.”

Having faced both men twice, ‘The Last Stylebender’ is in a unique position to judge the potential dynamics of the fight. He’s also pretty much right in line with the betting lines, which see former middleweight champion Whittaker as a solid, if not quite commanding favorite, sitting in the -225 range to Vettori’s +185 underdog.

A bit ironically, Gane is a much larger favorite in the main event over Tuivasa. The Frenchman is sitting at a healthy -560 line to Tuivasa’s +400.

Adesanya is currently preparing for a November 12th showdown against former kickboxing foe Alex Pereira at UFC 281. Pereira bested Adesanya twice in the ring, the second time via a crushing third round knockout. Despite their shared history—and thanks largely to Adesanya’s remarkable success in his run to UFC gold—the City Kickboxing talent is still a narrow favorite to retain his belt this fall. Oddsmakers have the New Zealander sitting at about -170 to the Brazilian’s +140 underdog line.

UFC Paris goes down this Saturday, September 3rd, at the Accor Arena. Alongside the main and co-main event, the card is expected to feature middleweight bouts between Alessio Di Chirico & Roman Kopylov, Abusupiyan Magomedov & Dustin Stoltzfus, and Nassourdine Imavov & Joaquin Buckley.

‘That’s what happens when you give a monkey a gun’ – BJ Penn turns on Hawaii Republican Party

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, MMA News

BJ Penn’s dreams of becoming Hawaii’s next governor appear to be dead in the water. The former UFC champion recently ran in the Republican primary for a chance to secure the GOP nomination for his home state’s upcoming gubernatorial race, securing 26.1% of the vote in the process.

Considering Penn’s seeming complete lack of past political ambitions, it’s a pretty surprisingly solid result for ‘The Prodigy’. But the 43-year-old hasn’t seemed to be taking the loss nearly so well. In the initial wake of the primary election results, Penn announced that he was refusing to concede the race. In the weeks following he has moved to officially contest the election, claiming signs of ballot tampering.

“There is an appearance of inaccurate reporting, ballot mishandling, ballot design components, breaches at counting centers and ballot deposit sites, discrimination, voter suppression, and media violations are the main catalysts for this inquiry,” Penn stated, as part of a 123-page complaint filed on August 26th.

Perhaps it’s not terribly surprising then, that alongside the André Pederneiras black belt’s contestation, Penn recently released a statement to his Instagram account suggesting that he will not be supporting GOP nominee James ‘Duke’ Aiona in the general election. Penn event went so far as to accuse the Hawaii branch of the Republican party of bringing Aiona into the race specifically to stop candidates like Penn from getting the nomination.

Aiona is expected to face off against Democratic Party nominee, and current Lieutenant Governor Josh Green in the general election. If primary voting numbers are anything to go by, it looks like Aiona will have a lot of ground to make up if he hopes to become governor.

Video: Bellator interim champ scuffles with top contender during face-to-face interview

Posted on by Zane Simon in Bellator, Front Page, Wrestling

Bellator’s Bantamweight Grand Prix was meant to include at least one title defense for current divisional champion Sergio Pettis. However, following Pettis’ removal from the opening round due to injury, the eight man tournament has prompted the creation of a new interim belt.

When ‘The Phenom’ dropped out of his bout against Raufeon Stots, Bellator subbed in the man who lost the title to Pettis, Juan Archuleta. The outcome became an interim belt for Stots, following his 3rd round KO victory over the ‘Spaniard’. Stots is now set to carry his piece of the championship forward into the sem-final tournament round, against Danny Sabatello at Bellator 289 on December 9th.

Already gaining a reputation as a flamboyantly outspoken fighter, the 29-year-old Sabatello entered the Bantamweight Grand Prix as a ‘wild card’—defeating Jornel Lugo to secure a quarter-final contest against former title contender Leandro Higo. Sabatello defeated Higo via 5 round decision, lining him up for this latest showdown.

Stots and Sabatello sat down for a recent episode of the MMA Hour to do a live and in-person, face-to-face interview promoting their upcoming bout. When host Ariel Helwani got to the topic of wrestling and who—between the two men—was better at it, things got a little heated.

A former two-time NCAA DII champion, Stots was quick to trumpet his own talents.

“I’m the better wrestler,” Stots told Helwani. “We can go wrestle right now, I’ll beat the shit out of him.”

That, it turns out, was all Sabatello needed to hear. A former two-time Illinois state champion high school wrestler, the ‘Italian Gangster’ went on to compete with solid success in Purdue University’s NCAA DI program. Both men have their fair share of bonafides when it comes to their abilities on the mats.

Helwani was able to get the two athletes calmed and separated enough to continue the interview, but the altercation will no doubt provide some extra motivation when the cage door closes this December.

Alongside the bantamweight interim title fight, Bellator 289 is expected to feature the second Grand Prix semi-final bout between former title contender Patchy Mix and former ACB bantamweight champion Magomed Magomedov.

Vadim Nemkov vs. Corey Anderson 2 set for Bellator 288

Posted on by Zane Simon in Bellator, Front Page, MMA News

Back in April, Bellator was all set to culminate the last act of a year long Grand Prix tournament. Eight of the promotion’s top light heavyweight talents faced off in a series of 5-round fights, with Vadim Nemkov’s world championship belt on the line all the way through.

Nemkov took out Phil Davis in the opening round, then scored a sub over Julius Anglickas (replacing Anthony Johnson) in the semis, to make it all the way to the finale. On the other side of the brackets, Corey Anderson took out Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov, and then Ryan Bader to secure a fight with the champ in the co-main event of Bellator 277.

After all that work and time, however, fans were left unsatisfied. The title fight was officially declared a ‘no contest’ due to an illegal clash of heads, the result of a botched attempt to by Anderson to land GnP strikes from halfguard.

“It’s very upsetting,” Anderson said told the assembled press after the bout. “Especially because I broke him, you know? You can’t say I wasn’t winning the fight and the clash happened. It is what it is. I went out there and did exactly what I was supposed to do, like I said I was going to do. I said I was going to go out there and dominate. He can’t handle my wrestling, my ground-and-pound. I was pacing myself. And I knew, the fourth round, it was going to be over.”

Whether or not Anderson was on the verge of taking Nemkov out, he’ll get his chance to once again prove his wrestling dominance this coming November. In a post to their social media accounts, Bellator announced that Nemkov vs. Anderson 2 has been booked for their November 18th fight card.

Going into their first fight the 32-year-old Anderson (16-5 (1 NC)) was on a three fight unbeaten streak, having not lost since a 2020 KO at the hands of future UFC champion Jan Blachowicz. Now 15-2 (1 NC), Nemkov is unbeaten in his last ten bouts, stretching all the way to a pair of back-to-back losses under the RIZIN FF banner, to Karl Albrektsson and current UFC champ Jiri Prochazka.

Alongside the light heavyweight main event, Bellator 288 is set to showcase a lightweight title fight between champion Patricky Pitbull and fast rising contender Usman Nurmagomedov. The event will take place at the Wintrust Arena in Chicago, IL. Stay tuned to Bloody Elbow for more news and updates.

‘I wish you all the best’ – Bisping sends warm regards to Luke Rockhold in retirement

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, UFC News

When it came to their time together atop the UFC’s middleweight division, there was little love lost between Michael Bisping and Luke Rockhold. The two men first faced off in 2014, at UFC Sydney—a bout Rockhold won by second round submission. But, even in the lead up to that fight, there was some animosity brewing.

“I think Bisping’s just a douche,” Rockhold told fans during a 2014 Q&A, when asked to compare and contrast the ‘Count’ with fellow outspoken middleweight Chael Sonnen. “Chael is putting on an act. He talks trash, but he’s the most respectful guy every time I’ve met him. Chael plays a role. Bisping plays himself.”

Obviously, their title fight rematch two years after that first bout only heightened the rivalry. Bisping’s first round KO of the longtime AKA talent at UFC 199 spelled the end of Rockhold’s brief tenure as champion, and became a crowning glory in the ‘Count’’s MMA career. Time, however, has a way of healing all wounds, and by 2021 the two former foes were even spending some time in the gym training together.

So it’s perhaps not too terribly surprising that, in a recent video uploaded to his YouTube channel, Bisping had a lot of kind words to say about his longtime rival as Rockhold heads off to MMA retirement.

“I wish you all the best in retirement, Luke. I really, really do mean that,” Bisping said (transcript via MMA Fighting). “I know we had some back and forths over the years, but it was just competitive. Just rivals, sporting rivals. I’m sure if we met under different circumstances — in fact, I always said this — I’m sure we’d get along. We’ve got some mutual friends and Jason Parillo thinks the world of you as well. So congratulations in what you do.”

Bisping event went so far as to say that he believe Rockhold has been “underappreciated” by a lot of MMA fans. Fans who maybe aren’t familiar with the career Rockhold had in Strikeforce before he came to the UFC, or the amount of guts it took to come back from a long layoff into a bout with an opponent like Paulo Costa.

“Luke, I do believe is underappreciated by a lot of people,” Bisping explained. “The run that he had, the career that he had, Strikeforce champion, UFC champion, always a top contender, always in big fights, always took on the best challenges. I mean look at that, he just came back after three years of being away and took on Paulo Costa, one of the toughest guys in the division, one of the top guys, one of the hardest hitting and one of the hardest hitting with the best chins. There’s not a lot of people queuing up to take on that guy when they’ve been out of the octagon for three years…

“So Luke, whatever you’re going to do in retirement, mate, enjoy. You had a fantastic career. I think people still don’t give him the credit that he was due, but I do.”

Rockhold announced the end of his MMA career after dropping a unanimous decision to Costa at UFC 278 back in August. That fight marked his first return to action since suffering a second round KO to future light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz in 2019.

Bisping stepped into the cage for the last time way back in 2017, suffering a first round KO loss to Kelvin Gastelum. That bout came just three weeks after losing the middleweight title he took off Rockhold to welterweight legend Georges St-Pierre. In the time since, Bisping has become a fixture in the UFC commentary booth.

Vitor Belfort returns to boxing against Hasim Rahman Jr. on October 15th

Posted on by Zane Simon in Boxing, Front Page, MMA News

It appears that the next leg of Vitor Belfort’s foray into boxing has been found. The former UFC 12 tournament champion, UFC light heavyweight champion, and multiple time title contender left the Octagon back in 2018 having made known his intentions to retire from MMA.

A contract deal with ONE Championship followed shortly afterward, but failed to produce a return to competition before Belfort parted ways with the promotion. Instead, the years since have seen the ‘Phenom’ turn his attention to a budding boxing career.

The Brazilian first tried his hand in the ring way back in 2006, picking up a quick KO win in the process. In 2021 he made his return, with an exhibition bout against boxing legend and former undisputed two-division champion Evander Holyfield. A shell of his former talent, Holyfield was dispatched by the then 44-year-old Belfort in just 1:49 seconds into the first round of their contest.

During the recent Misfits & DAZN X Series boxing event featuring celebrity pugilist KSI—fighting two opponents in the same night—heavyweight boxer Hasim Rahman Jr. announced on the broadcast that he would be meeting Belfort in the ring for a professional bout on October 15th.

The son of former heavyweight boxing champion Hasim Rahman, Rahman Jr. recently made headlines when a planned PPV bout against Jake Paul fell apart back in early August. Concerns over Rahman’s inability to make the contracted weight led to the match being scrapped just one week out from fight night. Rahman went on to hold an unofficial weigh-in for the event to try and prove he could have met the contracted limit, but came in 1.6 lbs over.

Speaking recently to The Mirror, Rahman Jr. said that while a fight with Belfort may not have the same cache as the Paul bout, he believes that Belfort is a much more difficult opponent.

“It’s not quite Jake Paul but I believe that my opponent is 20 times better than Jake Paul and 50 times better than anybody Jake Paul has fought,” Rahman Jr. enthused. “KSI said earlier during his press conference that his goal was to expose Jake as the phoney and fraud that he is and I’m on that same page.

“I’m sill chasing him down, but I’m not going to wait for him I want to put the car in drive, put my foot down and keep my finger on the pulse of all this YouTube boxing extravaganza that’s going on. I’m in the mix now, and it’s going to be very hard to get me out.”

The 31-year-old last stepped into the ring in April of this year, taking on Kenzie Morrison—himself the son of former WBO heavyweight champion Tommy Morrison. Morrison handed Rahman Jr. the first loss of his pro boxing career, via fifth round knockout.

Misfits & DAZN X Series 002 is set to go down at the Utilita Arena in Sheffield, England on October 15th. Alongside the heavyweight fight, a celebrity boxing match between YouTube pranksters Jay Swingler and Chad Lebaron (aka Cherdleys) has also been announced for the card.

‘The fans turned on me’ – Israel Adesanya says Yoel Romero fight was career low point

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, UFC 281, UFC Interview, UFC News

Israel Adesanya enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame in the UFC. After making his debut with the promotion in 2018, the former world class kickboxer rattled off six straight victories, picking up an interim middleweight title in the process—before defeating Robert Whittaker to unify the the belts in 2019.

A little more than a year later, and Adesanya tried his hand at securing his second UFC belt, with a light heavyweight title fight against then-champion Jan Blachowicz. The ‘Last Stylebender’ walked out of that fight with the first loss of his pro MMA career. However, in a recent video posted to his YouTube channel, the 33-year-old admitted that losing didn’t sit half so poorly with him as a fight he had in 2020. The real low point of Adesanya’s MMA career came in his first title defense, a notably lackluster victory over Yoel Romero.

“It’s not the Jan fight, surprisingly,” Adesanya admitted in the brief interview clip, “Because people expected, like, ‘Oh, it’s gonna be—’ No, I’m fine. Like I said, dare to be great.”

“Lowest point in MMA, holdup—if I’m being honest, the Romero fight. Because that was the first time people were just like, ‘Ah, boring.’ He had another fight after me and he did the same thing. The smart people were like, ‘Ah, Israel was right. He’s doing the exact same thing.’ Because he knew if he made a move against me the wrong way, I was gonna catch him.”

“Bits of it still reared its ugly head, but I squash it now because I’m an adult and I know how to handle it. But after that fight, I was like, ‘I was fighting, I was trying to—he was just standing there, why are you blaming me?’ That’s why this now, I’m just like, ‘Eh, whatever.’ And I talked to George about it, and I’m like, ‘Eh, whatever, I know what I’m gonna do.’

“But that was my first time where I kind of felt, like, ‘Bluh.’ I hate to say it, but the fans ‘turned on me’ in a way. Where I was like, ‘Wait, what? Now they’re saying I’m shit?” I’m like, ‘Did you not watch the one before this? Did you not watch the one before-before that? The one before, before that!?’

“That’s why in that Costa fight I had that chip on my shoulder, and I was just like, ‘Watch this.’”

Adesanya went on to talk about his feelings in the wake of his KO loss to Alex Pereira as well, but eventually came back around to the Romero fight again.

“Like I said, the Romero thing as well, that was the worst for me,” Adesanya added. “It wasn’t that ‘worst.’ But, it was just, like, the narrative, and it was the voices that were the loud—they were probably the minority, but they were the loudest voices. The fucking eat-ass cunts. So that’s why I went in to the Costa fight just free, like, ‘Alright, I’m gonna show you what’s up.”

Adesanya is currently scheduled to take on his aforementioned former kickboxing foe, Alex Pereira, in defense of the UFC middleweight title on November 12th, at UFC 281, in Madison Square Garden, New York, NY. Alongside that main event bout the UFC has booked a women’s strawweight title fight between recently re-crowned champion Carla Esparza and former champion/current top contender Zhang Weili.

The MMA Depressed-us: 2022’s best of bad big boy battles

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, MMA Podcasts

The UFC is taking another rare off-week, which means the MMA Depressed-us has a lot of catching up to do. We’ve had a whole bevvy of wild and weird fights since the last time we went seven days without a fight card. So for this week’s show, we’ve chosen a few select recent fights to revisit, especially those in the division’s ripe for fistic comedy: middleweight, light heavyweight, and heavyweight.

June M. Williams

Kicking off today’s show is a bout from UFC 277 between newcomer Hamdy Abdelwahab and Don’Tale Mayes. From there, we’re jumping to the middleweight division and Dricus Du Plessis’ UFC 276 wild and bloody victory over Brad Tavares. And to wrap the whole thing up, we’ve got the recent tragi-comic light heavyweight bout between Volkan Oezdemir and Paul Craig at UFC London.

We’re watching all three fights over on the ESPN+ app, and starting each video from the very beginning. If you want to watch along with us, just press ‘play’ when Zane says “Go.” If you’re watching the fights on a different platform, Connor will try and announce the start of round 1, so you can sync your video to that.

If you enjoy our shows, give us a shout out in the comments here on Bloody Elbow, and give us a “like”, share & subscribe on your BE Presents Podcast platform of choice: SoundCloud, YouTube, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Stitcher, Spotify, TuneIn, OverCast, Player FM, & Amazon Music – For previous episodes, check out our playlists on any of our BE Presents channels.

‘I don’t know if it’s true’ – Gilbert Burns heard Colby Covington battling ‘very bad’ neck & jaw injuries

Posted on by Zane Simon in Front Page, MMA Health and Science, UFC News

With Kamaru Usman losing his title to Leon Edwards, there’s the potential for a couple of former contenders to force their way back into the hunt. Calling back to his infamous ‘3-piece & a soda’ incident, Jorge Masvidal is already trying to drum up interest in a fight with Rocky. But ‘Gamebred’ isn’t the only man to lose to Usman who might find a path back to gold.

Gilbert Burns dropped his chance at the belt to the ‘Nigerian Nightmare’ back in 2021. Although he’s currently fresh off a loss to rising star Khamzat Chimaev, he’s hunting for bookings with some of the division’s most notable names. That includes Masvidal, but also a potential “dream” fight with Colby Covington.

Unfortunately, at least from what Burns appears to have heard, it looks like ‘Chaos’ may not be back in the Octagon any time soon. In a recent interview with The AllStar, ‘Durinho’ revealed that the MMA Masters talent has apparently been struggling to recover from neck and jaw injuries.

“That would be a dream,” Burns said when asked about a fight with Covington. “The rumors [were] that he was very bad. He had a neck injury, the nerves were very bad — he lost a little bit of movement in his neck. He kinda broke his jaw again, he had surgery and the surgery didn’t go well. He’s still doing the PT (physical therapy), he’s not training. If everything goes okay, he’s only back in March — that’s what I heard. I don’t know if it’s true, but I [heard] from guys that know him. I think it’s true because he’s been quiet — he hasn’t said anything. I think he’s out until March next year.”

“Colby is always an option, you know. If you’re asking me what’s the best option for me, I’d say Masvisdal in December or January, and Colby next after that.”

While Burns may not have provided an explanation of Covington’s injuries, fans have to wonder if they’re related to an alleged assault the welterweight suffered outside a Miami restaurant back on March 22nd.

The attack was said to have been committed by former friend and training partner Jorge Masvidal, stemming from an ongoing feud between the two men. Masvidal was later arrested and charged with aggravated battery over the incident. He plead not guilty to charges against him, and was set to appear in court on August 29th pending a docket hearing on August 17th. No word yet if the case is still going to trial as planned.

Covington hasn’t competed in MMA since defeating Masvidal by unanimous decision back at UFC 272 on March 5th. That bout was the former NCAA DI All American’s first since losing a title fight rematch to Kamaru Usman in November of 2021. Burns was recently linked to a potential bout against Masvidal, targeted for either UFC 281 or UFC 282. Masvidal, however, brushed off the announcement, telling fans “don’t believe anything anyone says about me unless you hear it from me.”

Askar Mozharov’s sole UFC bout marked by drug test failure

Posted on by Zane Simon in Drugs and PEDs, Front Page, UFC News

It seems the saga of Askar Mozharov’s disastrous UFC debut hasn’t quite ended. The Ukranian fighter was first signed to the world’s largest MMA promotion back in the spring of 2021, but visa and injury issues meant that he didn’t see the Octagon for the first (and only) time until June of this year.

Unfortunately for ‘No Mercy’ the extra months gave MMA record keepers a chance to take a little bit more of a hard look at Mozharov’s seemingly rock solid 24-7 career. By the time the Sherdog Fight Finder team got done combing through it, Mozarov walked into his UFC Vegas 56 fight against Alonzo Menifield with a record of 17-12. A little less than five minutes later and he was 17-13.

From there, it seems things really fell apart in a hurry. The UFC immediately dropped Mozharov from their roster and, not long after, the fighter announced that he was officially retiring from mixed martial arts. Now, however, MMA Junkie reports that even if Mozharov wanted to get back in the cage, he’d be facing a probable suspension. That’s after the Nevada State Athletic Commission announced that the fighter had failed an in-competition drug test surrounding his bout against Menifield.

Junkie reports that Mozharov tested positive for a “metabolic modulator,” the kind of substance often used in the sporting world to suppress the negative effects of steroid use. It’s a similar class of drugs to those that led to Brock Lesnar’s UFC drug test failure, and one of Jon Jones’ drug test failures.

At their August meeting, the NSAC announced that Mozharov and his team have been in communication with the commission over the matter, and that a decision on a potential suspension or fine has not yet been made. For the moment, Mozharov remains “temporarily suspended” until a final verdict has been reached.