Cast Announced For “Ultimate Fighter” Season 8

(Admit it, the camera loves him.)
It’s almost time again for everyone’s favorite MMA-themed reality show, Spike TV’s “The Ultimate Fighter.” A lot of you were disappointed to hear that Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and Frank Mir would be coaching this edition, but does that mean you’ll follow through on your empty threats not to watch when the show premieres on September 17?
Season eight is all about the lightweights and light heavyweights, and the official cast was announced today by Sports Illustrated. Yours truly even has an article about what to expect and what to watch for this time around, which you can read and then send me a hateful email about here. As for the cast list, feast your eyes:
LIGHTWEIGHT
Jose Aguilar
Age: 25
MMA Record: 17-3-0
Trains With: Grapplers Edge
Location: Las Cruces, N.M.Fernando Bernstein
Age: 25
MMA Record: 2-0-0
Trains With: Progressive Martial Arts
Location: San Clemente, Calif.Junie Allen Browning
Age: 22
MMA Record: 2-0-0
Trains With: Four Seasons Martial Arts
Location: Lexington, Ky.
Rolando Delgado
Age: 26
MMA Record: 7-3-1
Trains With: We$t$ide Fight Team
Location: North Little Rock, Ark.Joseph Duarte
Age: 24
MMA Record: 3-0-0
Trains With: Unleashed Training Facility/Alliance MMA
Location: San DiegoCharles Diaz
Age: 30
MMA Record: 14-4-0
Trains With: Team EFX
Location: El Cajon, Calif.Efrain Escudero
Age: 22
MMA Record: 10-0-0
Trains With: Southwest Martial Arts
Location: Tempe, Ariz.Brandon Garner
Age: 26
MMA Record: 4-1-0
Trains With: Team ROC
Location: Raleigh, N.C.David Kaplan
Age: 28
MMA Record: 3-1-0
Trains With: Lloyd Irvin Team
Location: Las Cruces, N.M.Brian McLaughlin
Age: 23
MMA Record: 5-0-0
Trains With: Team Gracie Tampa
Location: Tampa, Fla.Wesley Murch
Age: 25
MMA Record: 4-2-0
Trains With: Trojan Gym
Location: Bristol, U.K.Shane Nelson
Age: 24
MMA Record: 11-3-0
Trains With: B.J. Penn’s MMA Academy
Location: Hilo, HawaiiPhillipe Nover
Age: 24
MMA Record: 5-0-1
Trains With: Team Renzo Gracie
Location: Brooklyn, N.Y.Ido Pariente
Age: 30
MMA Record: 13-4-0
Location: Tel Aviv, IsraelJohn Polakowski
Age: 26
MMA Record: 3-1-0
Trains With: The Pit
Location: San Luis Obispo, Calif.George Roop
Age: 26
MMA Record: 7-3-0
Trains With: Ultima MMA
Location: Tucson, Ariz.LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT
Ryan Bader
Age: 24
MMA Record: 7-0-0
Trains With: Arizona Combat Sports
Location: Chandler, Ariz.Antwain Britt
Age: 29
MMA Record: 4-0-0
Trains With: Bombsquad MMA
Location: Virginia Beach, Va.Jules Bruchez
Age: 30
MMA Record: 3-2-0
Trains With: Ronin Dojo
Location: Lafayette, La.Lance Evans
Age: 30
MMA Record: 4-2-0
Trains With: TKO MMA
Location: Niagara Falls, N.Y.Karen Grigoryan
Age: 26
MMA Record: 5-0-0
Trains With: RusFighters Sport Club
Location: RussiaJason Guida
Age: 30
MMA Record: 26-13-0
Trains With: Hellhouse Gym
Location: ChicagoRyan Jimmo
Age: 26
MMA Record: 6-1-0
Trains With: Titans MMA
Location: Halifax, Nova ScotiaKyle Kingsbury
Age: 26
MMA Record: 7-1-1
Trains With: American Kickboxing Academy
Location: Sunnyvale, Calif.Tom Lawlor
Age: 24
MMA Record: 6-2-0
Trains With: American Top Team
Location: Oviedo, Fla.Ryan Lopez
Age: 25
MMA Record: 5-3-0
Location: Oklahoma CityVinicius Magalhaes
Age: 23
MMA Record: 2-2-0
Trains With: Team Quest
Location: Temecula, Calif.Eric Magee
Age: 23
MMA Record: 3-1
Trains With: South Shore Sports Fighting
Location: Rockland, Mass.Eliot Marshall
Age: 27
MMA Record: 5-1-0
Trains With: Eastern Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
Location: Boulder, Colo.Sean O’Connell
Age: 24
MMA Record: 1-0-0
Location: Salt Lake CityShane Primm
Age: 23
MMA Record: 1-0-0
Trains With: Team Gracie Tampa
Location: Tampa, Fla.Krzysztof Soszynski
Age: 30
MMA Record: 16-8-1
Trains With: Team Quest
Location: Temecula, Calif.
P.S. For those of you who do a little research, you may notice a discrepancy between some of the fighter records provided by the UFC and those put forth by Sherdog’s Fight Finder. If this comes as a surprise to you, we can only assume you’re new to the sport of mixed martial arts. In that case, welcome. Have you heard about Fedor yet?














August 18th, 2008 at 10:15 am
Hey, lets add fighters to the two most stacked divisions!
August 18th, 2008 at 10:24 am
Okay wise-ass, I thought those comments would be in the comments section not actually in the article. Most know the deal with the UFC… they can’t even get the correct fighter heights in most cases let alone the records. On a more serious note, I cannot f’in believe that they are really using LHWs and LWs. I saw the preview a few weeks or months back and I wanted someone to wake me up. Like they don’t have enough fighters in those weight classes already. Well at least these groups can be sure that they will not have a great future in the UFC which may be a good thing if Affliction really is doing well. Here I am thinking that 3-deep HW roster that the UFC has would spark an idea to have HWs in the next season, but stupidity reigns supreme.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:30 am
ya no shit…. how bout some heavy weights?
August 18th, 2008 at 10:35 am
This is why i hate the UFC.
Reality TV MMA is no different than any other reality TV bullshit.
This is for the homos who want WWE/General Hospital storylines about who is mean to the others… fudge packing wankers.
Familiarity breeds fan identification and the sheeple will accept Patrick Cote as a legitimate contender to a belt… because they know him. They watched him ‘interact’ and feel a connection, so its not much of a leap of belief thereafter.
Melvin Manhoef will never fight in the UFC but Im supposed to follow these newbs from Bumfuck, Idaho because they wrestled in some hick college town?
What the fuck is a Kenny Florian?
That shitstain has spent more time in front of cameras than in the ring.
Fuck Dana White and fuck reality TV and the inbreds it spawns.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:51 am
I think the LHW is Karn Grigoryan of Team Link, not the guy from Russia
August 18th, 2008 at 10:55 am
Krzysztof Soszynski is on the next season of TUF, and Horowich is fighting on a PPV. Horodecki is on an Affliction PPV, and Schultz is out in Japan. I guess this is a reflection of what happens to mediocre IFL fighters compared to the better guys on the roster.
August 18th, 2008 at 10:56 am
dana white is such a shit back cock sucking fuck head. he’s cheapening the sport. he is the don king of MMA. i hope joe rogan fucks him to death when he forgets the safe word.
August 18th, 2008 at 11:02 am
So, it sounds like you’re all pretty excited…
August 18th, 2008 at 11:06 am
Go ISRAEL !!
August 18th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Best of luck to Junie Browning. Four Seasons represent!
August 18th, 2008 at 11:14 am
cool
ill go talk about this in the forums ……..shit i forgot there broke
August 18th, 2008 at 11:22 am
Hey fight fans (and all-around bitching-complaining-pms’ing-insufferable-not happy with anything- pricks!),
I personally can’t wait for the show! Even in past seasons when I didn’t think the coaches and or fighters were up to snuff’, it usually proved me wrong and provided some great fights and great entertainment … Look out for Ryan Jimmo in the light-heavy division this season! He fights out of my hometown of Halifax, Nova Scotia and is a really good prospect…
And to the 2 Ben’s, keep up the GREAT work!!!
August 18th, 2008 at 11:24 am
As far as LHWs go, has anyone noticed that the last time they did MWs they all dropped to WW after the show? And that many of the guys in general drop a weighclass after the show.
I think they are hoping that some of the talent from this show ends up dropping to MW afterward. Maybe even the winner.
August 18th, 2008 at 11:31 am
Ewww. An Israeli. Here’s to him getting KOd in the first few seconds of his first fight and getting bumped off the show.
August 18th, 2008 at 11:37 am
Nova Scotia eh? If you’re commin’ on…COME ON!!!
I wonder what ever happened to Harold Clarence Howard. It’s like he fought a few times, lost once, and quit. Kind of a shame.
August 18th, 2008 at 11:50 am
DDT, good point. The quick-tournament setup of TUF — fighting several times in a six-week period — doesn’t lend itself to a large weight cut at all. It’s likely a lot of those guys will end up in middleweight. Maybe the lightweights end up challenging Uriah Faber in the WEC in a year?
Also, does anyone know who the lightweight Dana White keeps talking up is? The one he said is a lightweight version of Anderson Silva?
August 18th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Yes the guy he is talking up as the next Anderson Silva is Joe Duarte
August 18th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Joe Duarte SuckS!!!!
August 18th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
@ john c. dvorak
TUF is first and foremost a way for MMA (UFC mostly, obviously) to make money and draw attention to the sport. Without Dana White and TUF (and this is a fact) you would not have even a fraction of the new talent that is coming and will continue to come into the sport, and none of the dynamite packed cards that you see regularly these days and will continue to see. Moral of the story: Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, you complete and utterly dipshitted fool.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
I hope Joe Duarte gets his feral ass kicked!
August 18th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
who’s da guy dat dana said was da next anderson silva?
August 18th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
@question-We already answered that you lop….
August 18th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
that dude is Joe Duarte, nigga
August 18th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Joe Duarte sucks!
August 18th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
I hope that upstanding, civilized ass muthafucka gets his ass kicked!
August 18th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Pardon me, gentlemen, but might you articulate to me who the man is that mr. Dana White had insinuated may very well have Mixed Martial Arts skills comparable to those of Anderson Silva?
August 18th, 2008 at 12:54 pm
Why that was no other than mysterious, jungle denizen Joe Duarte.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
I pray that savage is given what for!
August 18th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
‘Ey mon. You be ‘earin who da mon is what Dana White be sayin’ is de next Anderson Silva?
August 18th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Dat mon be Joe Duarte mon, but le’s not be givin’ ‘im too much credit aye? Because really he looks like a fucking dumbass.
August 18th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
im guessing everybody on here bashing the UFC/Ultimate Fighter, is somebody that didn’t get choosen for season 8.
August 18th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
i’m cool with some minor discrepencies but sherdog has jason guida listed at 17-17 whereas ufc has him at 26-13. Thats huge. he’s going from a minorly accomplished fighter to a baroni 500…whats the deal with dat stuff
August 18th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Hey!!! You aren’t Me!!! I am Me! Imposter!
Anyways, if you guys remember the Joe Duarte interview he said that he is not the next A. Silva that Dana was talking about, but he knows who is.
August 18th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
@Me(The real one)-Yes i remember that interveiw….I think they said he was reffering to The Browining fella with blonde hair….and after comparing the two different fighting styles it was obvious that it was not Joe Duarte.
August 18th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Word up to BIG CHRIS who can recanotice the real Me inside us all! (umm…eewww?)
and for remebering that interview…
August 18th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Efrain Escudero is going to SMASH everyone in LW…watch, homie is sick with it
August 19th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
I look forward to the show. So… who is this Fedor anyway?
August 19th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Your killing me smalls!
August 20th, 2008 at 3:15 am
LOL, I can assure you its not Joe Duarte. Joe Duarte doesn’t even make it into the house. Saw that mofo on a bus two days after his tryout…his face was busted up.
August 22nd, 2008 at 2:43 pm
I’m excited about seeing my friend Ido Pariente fight. A few years ago Ido came to the USA to train in our dojo (Sho-Rei-Shobu-Kan). He spent two years here training and fighting. When he started mma our teacher, John Roseberry and I were Ido’s corner men.
He is a fiece competitor and one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met.
Best Of Luck Ido!
September 15th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
efrain escudero is a great wrestler and an outstanding jiu jitsu fighter…..he will win the lw
September 24th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
lol, go israel. more like go back to israel
September 25th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
WE JUST WONT YALL TO NO THAT WE BE ROOTIN FOR THAT KENTUCKY BOY… MANAISE A BUNCH A BIGGINS FIGHTING BUT WE THINK HE CAN WOOP ALL YENS UP ERE…HOLLA BACK…GO CATS!
October 11th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
mose of these guys r reely sissy gays an only want attention coz they not happy with themselves i meet planty of them an so queer reely
October 25th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
whats up with the anti-semetic comments on here?? didnt know kkk and terrorists types could even type
October 25th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
o wait they r cowards so they live behind their computer