(Photo courtesy of ajc.com. Tie courtesy of Elton John.)

Heisman Trophy winner, two-time NFL Pro Bowl selection, Olympic bobsledder, Dissociative Identity Disorder sufferer, Celebrity Apprentice contestant, Tae Kwon Do black belt, and American Kickboxing Academy student Herschel Walker will make his MMA debut on January 30th at a Strikeforce event to be held at the BankAtlantic Center in Sunrise, Florida. The news was announced yesterday via press release, though Walker's opponent has yet to be named. The only other match tied to the card at this point is Cristiane "Cris Cyborg" Santos's 145-pound title defense against Marloes Coenen.

As Dana White pondered when Walker's Strikeforce signing was first announced: "Which athletic commission is going to let this guy fight? Who the fuck are they going to find to fight Herschel Walker? A guy in a wheelchair?” We now know the answer to the first question is "Florida," the state that previously signed off on Kimbo Slice vs. Ken Shamrock at the same venue last October. As for Dana's other hypotheticals, we hope that Herschel Walker's opponent has some kind of disability, considering that Walker has only been training in MMA since last month, and it wouldn't really be fair to make him fight a guy who has both fighting experience and the use of all of his limbs. I mean, if Strikeforce really wants to put Walker against Fedor Emelianenko in the spring, they'd better give him a beatable first opponent.

(Props: Heavy.com)

We're just one day away from the return of UFC legend/unbearable heel Tito Ortiz at UFC 106, and the former light-heavyweight champ promises to go out guns blazin' against Forrest Griffin: "I gotta put on a show, I gotta win, I gotta stop him, I gotta do what I need to do in my game to make Forrest quit." Though Ortiz claims to have improved his striking for this fight, he also won't be giving up his bread and butter. "Every time he kicks he's gonna be taken down. A lot of fighters don't take advantage of that when they see Forrest kick, they try to check all the kicks. The hell with that. I'm putting him on his back. Back to the old Tito Ortiz, man, my ground and pound where it's lethal...they'll be carrying him out on a stretcher."

Later, Ortiz says that he doesn't have a problem with the way that the UFC has used his name to build the careers of Griffin and Lyoto Machida, and regarding the rash of injuries and illnesses in the UFC as of late, he'd fight Forrest with a broken leg (which he clarifies he doesn't have, but still). The only thing that matters to him right now is becoming a world champion again, one match at a time. And if that gets in the way of roles in Mark Wahlberg flicks, so be it.

And yes, he's wearing the shades again. There's a reason for that...

According to Brock Lesnar's jiu-jitsu coach, Rodrigo "Comprido" Medeiros, the big man is healing up after his surgery and will "be fighting again within six months."  That means Lesnar-Carwin could take place this spring, and there will be no need for an interim title or any other such nonsense.  Great, right?  Only maybe we should consider the possibility, however minor, that "Comprido" is substituting blind optimism for medical knowledge.

If we can believe what Dana White says, Lesnar had a hole in his intestine that was leaking stuff into his stomach.  I'm no more a doctor than I am a jiu-jitsu world champion, but that sounds like the kind of thing that could sideline a man for a little while.  Even if the surgery was completely successful in repairing the problems, Lesnar will probably need to rest for a little while before returning to the kind of intense training that might prepare him for a title defense. 

In other words, let's take this six month promise with a grain of salt.  While it's believable that Lesnar may heal much faster than your average mortal, it's also possible that he might need more time to put this behind him and get in shape to defend a heavyweight championship.  Especially after what those Canadian doctors did to him. 

(Photo by Esther Lin, for Strikeforce.)

Kerry Vera and Kim Couture are set to go at it tonight in the Strikeforce Challengers event in Kansas City.  Since they both share the names of famous UFC fighters who just faced one another, it probably seemed like a genius idea to Strikeforce.  But "Sugar Free" is a Couture in the same way that Ivana is a Trump.  When a name helps that much you hang on to it, even if you didn't hang on to the husband. 

So what do you think, is your interest in this bout harmed by the somewhat disappointing display put on by their male counterparts at UFC 105?  Or does Kim's shiny weigh-in bikini erase all those memories from your mind?  Not trying to juge or anything, but when these girls show up wearing more than you...

(Melanson and Parisyan, before it all fell apart. Props: elitefts.com)

In a new interview with Five Ounces of Pain, Karo Parisyan's longtime friend and training partner Neil Melanson confirmed that Parisyan's latest last-minute fight-cancellation was directly related to the painkiller addiction that has haunted him for years. After Melanson got permission from Karo to go public with the story, he laid it all out: