The MMA Prospectus: Paige VanZant & A.J. McKee Jr.

It’s a bit of a strange week for MMA talent. The UFC’s most notable young prospect on display this Saturday will be PaigeVanzant, and while Alessio DiChirico and Kyle Bochniak have a chance to stand out and make a name for themselves, there’s not many other young athletes to get hyped about. Over in Bellator, Bubba Jenkins and A.J. McKee Jr. have the most cache, but fans have already seen Jenkins Struggle. This Friday’s Spike TV card may be McKee’s time to shine. We’re talking all that and a lot more on the latest episode of the MMA Prospectus.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give it a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, consider subscribing to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to get the latest BE shows, interviews, and analysis.

You can find our audio on Soundcloud and iTunes.

Here’s this week’s quick & dirty non-prospect list:

Jenkins, Bubba
Mckee Jr., AJ
Joey Davis

Naurdiev, Ismael
Stamann, Cody
Lamson, Troy
Gooden, Jared
Benicio, Luciano vs. Malta, Matheus
Cleverson Silva
Marcos Rodrigues
Marcus Vinicius
Naoki Inoue
Igor Svirid
Marcin Prachnio vs. Jake Butler
Zelimkhan Umiev
Idris Gezalov
Alexandre Ribeiro
Manny Bermudez*
Bobby Nash
Sam Toomer
Joby Sanchez
Edward Thommes vs. Tyler Diamond

The MMA Prospectus: UFC 202 and Russia is back!

With Ramadan now firmly in the rear view mirror, Russian MMA is back in season. So this week we’re looking at ACB 43 and Plotforma 70 alongside, of course, UFC 202. The UFC’s still got a hold of the two best young talents in MMA this weekend, as Cody Garbrandt and Colby Covington prepare to make their returns to the cage. Covington, especially has a chance to shine with a very very favorable matchup this weekend, while Garbrandt is working with the much more high profile opponent in top 10 bantamweight Takeya Mizugaki. Out on the regionals 2015 Scouting Report notables Abdul-Rahman Temirov and Mike Grundy are both fighting again, alongside an interesting list of other talents.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there subscribe to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be among the first to get the latest BE shows, interviews, and analysis.

You can find the show audio here on SoundCloud and iTunes.

And here’s a quick and dirty non-UFC prospect list this week:

Temirov, Abdul-Rahman*
Albaskhanov, Rasul
Mike Grundy*
Wilfred Edmund
Mikhail Ragozin vs. Wallyson Carvalho
Ivo, Leonardo
Ramos, Davi
Karginov, Maharbek
Nikaev, Shamil
Gadzhiev, Kurban

The MMA Prospectus: UFC Salt Lake – Yair, Ishihara, Gigliotti and more

Regional MMA has been at a near stand still for the past couple months. Some of the big hitters have still been out putting on shows, but what was (over the first few months of the year) somewhere between 60-75 events a week has been trending more toward 30-45 in June and July. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t some top prospects to talk about, just a few less than normal. This week, we’re looking at Teruto Ishihara, Yair Rodriguez, and Joe Gigiliotti all fighting on UFC Salt Lake. We’re also looking at a great run of top shelf unknowns who could make a big impact. Most notably, Leonardo Silva and Casey Kenney, alongside Prospectus favorite Ricardo Lucas Ramos.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, subscribe to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to get the latest BE shows, interviews, and analysis.

If you’re just looking for something to listen to on your commute, you can find our audio on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Here’s our quick and dirty non-UFC prospect list this week:

Kashiwazaki, Go
Arce, Julio
Nascimento, Allan
Silva, Leonardo
Pereira, Viviane
Siwy, Grzegorz
Khashakyan, Alfred vs. Ramos, Ricardo Lucas
Torres, Jose
Kenney, Casey
Day, Martin
Jonavin Webb vs. Isaac Steele

The MMA Prospectus: Namajunas, Grasso, Hawes & UFC 201

We’re back with another episode of Bloody Elbow’s scouting show, the MMA Prospectus. And this week we’re looking at a number of top flight prospects spread out over a number of promotions. In the UFC we’ve got Rose Namajunas (and Justin Scoggins who isn’t fighting). Over in Invicta Alexa Grasso, Jodie Esquibel, and Aspen Ladd are all looking to put on a show (among a host of other up and coming talents). And in the World Series of Fighting, Phil Hawes, Hakeem Dawodu, Marat Magomedov, and Lance Palmer all seem headed for big things. Throw in a Jungle Fight Card and a Shooto Brazil card and you’ve got a lot of potential top talent on offer.

As always if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, why not subscribe to MMANATIONDOTCOM? That way you’ll always be the first to get the latest BE shows, interviews, and analysis.

If you’re just in it for the audio, we’ve got you covered over on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Here’s our quick and dirty non-UFC prospect list this week:

Invicta
Grasso, Alexa vs. Esquibel, Jodie
Niedźwiedź, Agnieszka vs. Christine Stanley
Mizuki Inoue
Anderson, Megan
Simpson, Tessa
Ladd, Aspen

WSOF 32
Hawes, Phil
Dawodu, Hakeem vs. Magomedov, Marat
Lance Palmer

RFA
Clark, Josh vs. Giles, Trevin
Hernandez, Alexander

Gonzales, Brenda

Jungle Fight
Sousa, Herbeth
Duarte, Simone vs. Daimoni, Bianca
Quemuel Ottoni vs. Sidnei Souza
*Anderson Buzkia
Denis Silva vs. Rodrigo Praia
Leandro Soares
Diego Barbosa
Natalicio Filho

Shooto
Luciano Benicio
Daniel Virginio
Klinger Pinheiro vs. Eric dos Santos

The MMA Prospectus: UFC on Fox 20 Ngannou, Usman & Caldwell too

We’re alive… Really and truly. After a couple of off weeks to deal with family stuff the MMA Prospctus has returned. Since we’ve missed a bit, this week we’re looking back over the last four UFC events for the highlight prospect performances. Fighters like Doo Ho Choi, Gilbert Burns, and Lando Vannata all got a chance to really shine under the spotlight. We’re also talking about some of the not as flashy fights, Will Brooks debut UFC win and Sage Northcutt’s continuing career being notable among them.

Then we’re bridging over to this week’s fights and most notably the blue chip trio of Francis Ngannou, Kamaru Usman, and Darrion Caldwell. Ngannou and Usman are fighting on the UFC on Fox 20 card, Caldwell is over headlining Bellator 159 and all three men should be looking to put on highlight performances.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube, or “like” us while listening to our audio version on SoundCloud. While you’re there, why not subscribe to MMANATIONDOTCOM? That way you’ll get all the latest BE shows, interviews and analysis.

Here’s the quick and dirty list of non-UFC prospects we checked out this week:

Ellen, Bruna – Bellator
Harris, Chris – Bellator,
Ogden, Trey – Bellator
Vargas, Bruna – Bellator
Ducote, Emily – Bellator
Frevola, Matt vs. McDade, Trent -RFA
Spann, Ryan – LEgacy
Dern, Mackenzie – Legacy
Mota, Killys vs. Carvalho, Joao
Bontorin, Rogerio
Turman, Wellington
Tucker, Gavin

The MMA Prospectus: UFC 200 event week – Brooks, Choi, & Northcutt

There’s almost no MMA going on this week. Not just in the US, but worldwide. It is the definition of a dead fight week. So, what else is there for us over at the MMA Prospectus to do than focus on next week and the triple-header of UFC events featuring some of the best up and coming fighters in the sport of MMA. The big three we’re focusing on are Sage Northcutt, Will Brooks, and Dooho Choi.

Brooks is making his UFC debut after vacating the Bellator lightweight title. Northcutt is looking to bounce back from the first loss of his pro career, against Brian Barberena, and DooHo is just looking to keep the ball rolling as he moves up the featherweight division.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, consider subscribing to MMANATIONDOTCOM, that way you’ll always be the first to know about he latest BE shows, interviews, and analysis.

And if you’re just looking for some sweet-ass sounds, you can find our audio over on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Quick and dirty prospect list:

Shooto
Ryuhei Nakamoto vs. Yusuke Tamashiro

REC Combat
Samara Santos

Superstar Fight
Musu Nuertiebieke
Sai Wang
Bo Meng

One
Xiaoliang Zheng
Alexey Butorin

Road FC
Soo Chul Kim
Kai Asakura

Legacy
Kevin Aguilar vs. Tony Kelley

The MMA Prospectus: MacDonald, Jotko, UFC Ottawa fallout and more

The MMA Prospectus is here for some non-event week coverage of regional MMA. And, since it is a lighter week for potential talent, we’re focusing a lot on the fallout of UFC Ottawa, most notably the sense of potential doom and gloom surrounding Rory MacDonald’s next loss. Is he forever going to fall short of championship status? Is he the next big case study in fighters that start too young and flame out early? Or are we just diving in over our heads by reacting to a bad fight? All this plus the rise of Krzysztof Jotko and a look at Bellator Dynamite.

As always, if you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, consider subscribing to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to get all the latest Bloody Elbow shows, interviews and analysis.

If you’re just here for those sweet, sweet sounds, you can find our audio over on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Quick and dirty prospect list:

Shooto Brazil
Felipe Jesus

Kunlun
Sung Bin Jo

Deep
Rio Date
Taito Kubota

California Xtreme
Curtis Millender

Jackson’s MMA series
Stephen Cervantes

Jungle Fight
Rander Junior
Amanda Lemos
Handesson Ferreira

Big Guns
Luka Strezoski

Strike Off
Ahmet Kayretli *

ECC
Gavin Tucker

Thunder Fight
Markus Perez
Willian Cilli vs. Henerson Duarte

Valor Fights
Jonathan Pearce

WOCS
Bruno Korea
Carlston Harris
Oton Jasse
Wagner Maia *

MT4C
Xavier Alaoui

SHC
Uriel Albamonte
Luc Ngeleka *
Ange Loosa

Battle Royal Ascension
Ke Nan Song

Legacy FC
Manny Vasquez *
Levi Mowles

Bellator Dynamite
Satoshi Ishii *
Kevin Engel vs. Chel Erwin-Davis
Joaquin Buckley
Rashard Lovelace *
Justin Lawrence vs. Isao Kobayashi

Victory FC
Mike Rhodes

HEX Fight Series
Myles Simpson
Raphael Scott

The MMA Prospectus: UFC Ottawa, EFN, Bellator, WSOF and more

It just so happened that we decided to put on our show immediately after Fedor Emelianenko almost got beat (and maybe did get beat) by Fabio Maldonado. Maldonado nearly KO’d the GOAT, and while he pretty clearly lost at least one round of the fight, generally made himself very competitive in a bout that most thought he had no business being in. It all capped off a crazy night of EFN action which has become known for its ostentatious production values, ridiculous English broadcast feed and surprisingly decent roster of rising prospects. So we aren’t just here for Fedor, we’ve got a lot more to talk about to.

We’re also looking at UFC Ottawa and Stephen Thompson, Bellator 156 with Brandon Halsey and Carrington Banks, WSOF with Phil Hawes and Sheymon Moraes and whole bunch of other action going down this week.

If you enjoyed the show, give us a “Like” on YouTube. And while you’re there, consider subscribing to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to know about the latest BE shows, interviews and analysis.

If you just want our audio, you can find that on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Here’s the prospects we’re watching out for this week:

VTJ
Takumi Tamaru
Daichi Takenaka

Cage Titans
Manny Bermudez

V3
Bryce Mitchell

NATO
John White

Aspera
Julio Cesar Neves
Luis Rafael

Tech Krep
Yaroslav Amosov *

ICE FC
Lewis Monarch *

Australian FC
Tai Tuivasa – kickboxer

RFA 39
Raoni Barcelos vs. Bobby Moffett *
Ode Osbourne *

Bellator
Brandon Halsey *
Blake Watkins
Carrington Banks *

WSOF
Sheymon Moraes *
Phil Hawes *
Josh Copeland

Hard Knocks
Leo Xavier vs. Thomas Richardson
TJ Laramie * vs. Brad Katona

EFN
Jack McGann (KO win)
Valentin Moldavsky (win)
Vadim Nemkov *
Sergey Pavlovich *
Anatoly Tokov *
Vitaly Minakov *

m-1 global
Valey Myasnikov (draw)
Sergey Romanov (KO win)
Abukar Yandiev (sub win)

The MMA Prospectus: UFC 199 fallout & Regional fights

It’s a dead week for MMA. Honest to god, there’s just not much going on beyond a solid Titan FC card featuring top featherweight prospect Andre Harrison. So, we’re spending a lot of our time looking back at UFC 199 and Max Holloway and Jessica Andrade, who both put on standout performances. We’re also scanning the regional scene for the best up-and-coming young talent, this week most notably focusing on Kaik Brito & and the aforementioned Harrison.

As always, if you enjoy our show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. And while you’re there, why not subscribe to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to know about the latest Bloody Elbow shows, interviews, and analysis.

If you’re looking for a less visual and more auditory experience, check out our SoundCloud and iTunes pages.

Here’s a longer list of the guys we’re watching out for this week:

Inoue, Naoki
Daimoni, Bianca
Bazzi, Jesse
Cross, Kenneth *
Brito, Kaik *
Harrison, Andre *
Raush Manfio
Stosic, Darko
Vila, Ahmed
Sopi, Dale
Leite, Leo*
Goncalves, Anderson
Dazaev, Goity
Rivera, Emmanuel
Nunes, Istela
Sinis, Leonardo
Kallionidou, Elina
Ottow, Zak
Eckelberg, Craig
Levan Makashvili *

The MMA Prospectus: UFC Vegas fallout, 199, & losing

UFC 199 may not be the most prospect heavy card in UFC history, but it’s got some interesting names and fighters to examine. The most important matchup of the night being a welterweight battle between Tom Breese and Sean Strickland. Both men are big, powerful, young rising fighters at 170 lbs. It should make for a great battle between them.

Of course, that’s not all we’re looking at. We’ll also look back on Aljamain Sterling, Cody Garbrandt, and Thomas Almeida as we examine the fallout from UFC Vegas. And we’re taking our normal sweep around the MMA landscape to see what top talent is rising on the regional scene.

As always, if you enjoyed this show, give us a “Like” over on YouTube. While you’re there, consider subscribing to MMANATIONDOTCOM. That way you’ll always be the first to get the latest BE videos, interviews, and analysis.

If you want the sweet sounds and none of the horrible pictures, you can find our audio on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Quick and dirty prospect list this week:

ACB
Muslim Khizriev
Abdul-Rakhman Dzanaev *
Yusup Raisov * vs. Carlos Alexandre
Adlan Bataev
Alexander Peduson *

Scandanavia Fight Nights
Mohammad Babadivand
Sadibou Sy
Daniel Teymur
Amir Albazi

RFA
Thiago Moises vs. Jamall Emmers *
Jose Diaz vs. Nick Barnes
Chris Padilla
Mario Israel vs. Albert Morales *
Matt Sayles

KOTC
Ryan Walker

GOTC
Mike Pope
Adam Hunter
Adrian Vilaca

Brabos Combat
Gustavo Gabriel *

NCE
Thaty Bergamaschi *
Matheus Silva vs. Arthur Soares
Matheus Malta

CWFC
Sam Creasey
Josh Reed
Nad Narimani

Contenders
Iain Martell *

M-1
Shavkat Rakhmonov
Zalimbeg Omarov

ROC
Gregor Gillespie *
Jose Mariscal

SCC
Victor Reyna

FFC
Laszlo Senyei

USFFC
Jared Scoggins