(Brett was dumbfounded when Fedor slipped him a ten dollar bill and asked to be seated at a quiet table somewhere in the back of the restaurant. Photo courtesy of Combat Lifestyle.)

At today’s Fedor Emelianenko meet-n-greet in New York City, Strikeforce announced that the top heavyweight’s next opponent will be everybody’s favorite work-doer, Brett "The Grim" Rogers.  There’s no solid date just yet, but Strikeforce is shooting for late October or early November, though we all know that if you announce the date of your big show too far in advance it just gives the UFC more time to work up a solid counter-programming effort. 

The decision to match Emelianenko up with Rogers means that Strikeforce is entering the build-up phase of their Fedor marketing approach.  According to our rankings, it’s the #1 heavyweight in the world taking on the #10 heavyweight in the world.  Not exactly a clash of titans, at least on paper, but as long as Rogers doesn’t test positive for steroids and Fedor doesn’t have any trouble with his Work Visa, I suppose we can’t complain.  Now who wants to guess what the odds will be on this one?  If Fedor is anything less than a 5-1 favorite, I’ll be stunned.

While aimlessly cruising Wikipedia last night, I learned that Keith Jardine‘s first loss came in his third pro fight back in February 2002, against MMA ironman Travis Wiuff in the quarterfinals of an Extreme Challenge eight-man heavyweight tournament in Iowa. Coincidentally, it was Wiuff’s third fight as well, and it took Diesel just six seconds to claim a victory via straight-right directly on Jardine’s off-button. The video is above, and the action starts at the 2:18 mark. Wiuff would go on to lose to Mike Radnov in the semis, while Radnov lost to tournament-winner Ben Rothwell in the finals.

Following the Wiuff fight, Jardine went on a 6-0-1 run, joined the second season of The Ultimate Fighter, and quickly found himself in marquee fights against Forrest Griffin, Chuck Liddell, Wanderlei Silva, and Quinton Jackson. This Saturday, he’ll take on Thiago Silva at UFC 102. If you believe in streaks, then the Dean of Mean has this one wrapped up. And of course, if he ever decides to walk out to the cage as Techno Viking, he’ll be unstoppable.

(The much-hyped mixed semi-doubles division of XARM seemed like a great idea at first. Only when Art Davie had to tell that nice blond girl’s parents how she ended up in a persistent vegetative state did he realize his folly.)   

UFC 102 may not have a title fight to draw Portland residents out of their coffee shops and dive bars, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t still plenty at stake this weekend.  Here are four lingering questions we can plan on getting some resolution to once this event is in the books.

1. If Randy Couture Will Ever Get One More Title Shot

Couture keeps talking about wanting another chance at UFC gold as if he isn’t in his mid-forties with only one fight left on his contract after UFC 102.  While we respect a guy with long term goals, how he performs in this fight will determine whether those goals ever come to fruition.  It probably won’t be enough just to beat Nogueira.  He needs to dominate him like he’s just another Gabriel Gonzaga with more scar tissue.  If he can’t do that the UFC will be taking a hard look at his price tag and future prospects when it comes time to talk about a new contract. 

(Natasha Wicks, pre-UFC makeover. Photo courtesy of Calvin Dakari, via Model Mayhem.)

If you’re anything like us, you’ve probably spent more time than you’re comfortable with imagining the glamorous life of a UFC Octagon girl.  In our minds it involves a lot of sitting around at Vegas hotel pools, fending off awkward advances from Mike Goldberg, and taking pictures of yourself with your cell phone.  A charmed life, indeed.  But judging by Ariel Helwani’s interview with Natasha Wicks, the newest addition to the UFC’s stable of professional hot chicks, it’s more like a part-time job among other part-time jobs.  In addition to filling Edith Labelle’s empty seat at UFC events, Wicks says she also works as a go-go dancer at the Wynn and as a caddy for local golf courses:

You actually caddy for golfers?
Yeah. I’m not just sitting in the cart like, ‘Hee hee.’ I actually do my job.

Do you suggest what kind of clubs they should use?
Yeah, sometimes. I’m not the best. I’m actually really bad at golf. It’s like the one thing I can’t pick up. I can pretty much pick up anything. Usually if I try something, I’m usually extremely competitive, and I like to try new things. But golf for some reason, for me, it’s just like I have goofy arm or something. I feel awkward-looking. I’m just impressed when people hit it. I’m like, ‘Wow, good job!’ So I’m probably even a better caddy, just because every time they even just hit the ball, I’m so impressed.

(Props: xkingkongx)

The UFC has confirmed ten fights for UFC 104 (October 24th, Los Angeles), making the Machida vs. Rua headliner official, as well as adding a main card bout between Sean Sherk and Gleison Tibau. Sherk is coming off a disappointing unanimous decision loss against Frank Edgar at UFC 98, while Tibau most recently lost a controversial split-decision against Melvin Guillard at the TUF 9 finale in June.

Unfortunately, Sherk vs. Tibau comes at the expense of two other fights that are probably more worthy of main card status. Currently slated for the undercard are TUF 8 light-heavyweight winner Ryan Bader vs. Eric Schafer (who are both riding two-fight win streaks in the Octagon) and Yushin Okami vs. Chael Sonnen. Yes, Okami is on the undercard once again, despite his current three-fight streak against Jason MacDonald, Evan Tanner, and Dean Lister. My God this disrespect. You know, UFC, if you’re not careful, you’re gonna lose him.

The updated UFC 104 lineup is as follows…

(Mr. T pities your broke-ass chain.)

According to The Sun, Quinton "Rampage" Jackson has been confirmed for the role of perpetually angry B.A. Baracus in Joe Carnahan‘s movie remake of The A-Team. Jackson beat out rappers The Game and 50 Cent, who were also being considered for the role that Mr. T made famous. The casting is no surprise considering Jackson’s extensive acting reel, which includes being wrecked by Vinnie Jones in Midnight Meat Train, playing an MMA fighter in Never Surrender, and sexually assaulting our reporter. The flick is scheduled for release next summer, and will reportedly feature Liam Neeson as John "Hannibal" Smith and The Hangover star Bradley Cooper as Templeton "Face" Peck. The role of "Howling Mad" Murdock is still up for grabs at this time.

For some time now, Justin "The Insane 1" McCully has had one of the worst nicknames in the UFC.  By implying that the owner of such a nickname is not only crazy, but possibly the only crazy person alive, it’s a nickname that manages to be both cliche and nonsensical all at the same time.  But that apparently wasn’t enough for McCully.  He had to go and get tricky with the spelling.

You read all about it yesterday, now watch the video of best-selling author Matt Polly’s first/last MMA bout.  It isn’t the most technically pretty fight you’ll ever see, though the Tuff-N-Uff announcers compare Polly to Fedor Emelianenko and Neo from the Matrix before finally concluding that he’s "one of the fastest fighters" they’ve ever seen in that promotion.  Whitest, maybe.  But fastest?  Still, Polly used his range and killer jab to pick his young opponent apart over two rounds until he quit on his stool, and damned if it doesn’t make us proud to see a fellow nerd kicking a little ass. 

Now go write that book, Polly.  Cage Potato readers want to hear more about the IFL incident.  Don’t let them down.

Okay, we already know the answer to that question: getting KO’d by Chuck Liddell was no fun any more and any division that Tim Sylvia is at the head of has ‘easy pickings’ written all over it, which Randy Couture himself basically admitted.  That said, Couture weighs 221.8 pounds at the time of this filming and he’ll probably be around that size when he steps into the cage at UFC 102 on Saturday night.  Maybe it won’t be a deciding factor against Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, but if he really does get that rematch with Brock Lesnar that he wants, it’s hard to see how showing up at least 45-50 pounds lighter than your opponent isn’t a disadvantage.

Couture has obviously done well as a heavyweight, despite being closer to 205 than 265.  But now that the Lesnars and the Carwins are moving in to MMA, is the 220-pound heavyweight a relic from a bygone era? 

(Props: community.livejournal.com/mma_rus via Fightlinker)

A punch-drunk fighter with a heart of gold learns to love himself again through the graceful (life) lessons of an auburn-haired dance instructor. No, it’s not the plot of a new Mickey Rourke/Isla Fisher romantic comedy. It’s Chuck Liddell‘s real fuckin’ life, so get used to it. (It’ll help if you put on this song, and try to pretend that this is all just part of some badass training montage.) Season nine of Dancing With the Stars premieres on September 21st. Will the Iceman’s moves be up to snuff, or will the judges starch him harder than Sugar and Shogun combined? And what are the odds that Kimbo Slice will join DWtS for season 10?

Previously: Chuck Liddell’s Dance Partner: This Russian Chick

(Tuchscherer puts Alexey Oleinik right where he wants him during the semi-finals of YAMMA Pit Fighting last April. Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

With a record of 17-1 and wins over UFC vets like Krzysztof Soszynski, Travis Fulton, and Branden Lee Hinkle, Chris Tuchscherer has been paying his dues for over five years. And yet, the 33-year-old North Dakota native and former two-time NCAA Division II All-American wrestler was told "no dice" when he tried out for TUF 10 earlier this year. Luckily, the UFC came to their senses and decided to give the Crowbar a shot against Gabriel Gonzaga at UFC 102 this Saturday, in a match that could be pivotal for both of their careers. After months of training with long-lost-twin Brock Lesnar, Tuchscherer is ready to test his might in the Octagon. And his first opponent had better watch the hell out…

***

CAGEPOTATO: You tried out for the tenth season of The Ultimate Fighter, and ended up with a contract to fight Gabriel Gonzaga. How exactly did that come about?
CHRIS TUCHSCHERER: I thought I was going to get on the show — I tried out, everything was looking good, I got a second interview — then I got home and I got a call saying I wasn’t going to make the show. Later on that week, I got an e-mail from Joe Silva with a contract offer, so it worked out for the best. But I honestly couldn’t tell you why it went down like that. I was never told, like, “your record is this good, so we just want you to have a contract.”

If you did end up as a castmember on this season of TUF, how do you think you’d do?
I think I would have done very well. I would have seen myself as one of the guys to make it to the finals.

At UFC 102 you’ll be facing Gabriel Gonzaga, who’s very dangerous but has been somewhat inconsistent during his time in the UFC. Do you view this fight as a big step up in competition?
Well, I’ve faced some pretty good guys in the past. Gonzaga’s made his resume as a dangerous opponent in every aspect of the game, so I guess it’ll be a step up in competition considering where he’s been so far, but I don’t look at him as being any better of a man than me, or intimidating to me, because we’re all the same. He got his shot in the UFC in a different way, he made a name for himself right when he got in there, and he is who is now.

I’ve seen a few of your fights online, and your general strategy seems to be to take your opponent down and finish the fight with strikes from the top. Is that pretty much how it’s going to go down against Gonzaga?

After losing a decision in his last outing, Ryan Couture returned to the ring last weekend to face Jimmy Spicuzza on the same Tuff-N-Uff card that saw Matt Polly stumble awkwardly towards victory.  Spicuzza started fast and had Couture rocked early on, but again we see Couture’s considerable prowess in the ground game come to his rescue.  Something tells me it won’t be so easy for his dad to pull off an armbar against Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira this weekend, though.

After the jump, Seth "The Kimbo-Slayer" Petruzelli is back in action, plus a vicious body shot KO, and Bas Rutten actin’ the fool.

(The illegal knee that never was.)

Remember the Strikeforce Challengers event back in May where the main event bout between Billy Evangelista and Mike Aina ended in a controversial disqualification?  Sure you do, it was the one where Evangelista landed what appeared to be an illegal knee to the head of a downed Aina, though replays later proved it to be a totally legal knee to the shoulder.  Aina played up the injury until he was ruled unable to continue and the bout ended with Evangelista’s disqualification, thus making the case for the exact type of instant replay use that the NSAC just approved.  But even without the use of replay, the California State Athletic Commission actually did the right thing in yesterday’s appeal hearing, voting unanimously to change the outcome of the bout to a ‘no decision’ and removing the only loss from Evangelista’s record.

(Props: CageWriter)

In the above interview with Steve Cofield, Brandon Vera says he sees little difference between his UFC 102 opponent Krzysztof Soszynski and his original opponent, Matt Hamill, aside from their records, their stance, and the fact that K-Sos’s name is much harder to pronounce. Vera respects Soszynski’s clinch game and strength, but hopes the fight will stay standing: "If somebody decides that they want to stand in front of me and bang, it’s gonna be a show. You’ll be able to see some stuff that I haven’t pulled out of the closet yet, because I haven’t had the chance. So if you got somebody that’s willing just to stand there and trade with me, it’s gonna be some good times." Unfortunately for Vera, Soszynski is no Mike Patt.

After the jump: K-Sos talks about his experience on The Ultimate Fighter, his gameplan for Vera, and the UFC’s stacked 205-pound division.

("Forget about these worthless idiots," the lion told Karo. "Soon we’ll bathe in their blood, and their children’s blood." And in the room was an echoing silence. Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle.)

With his nine-month suspension for painkiller use winding down, Karo Parisyan is ready to get his career back on track. The welterweight veteran will be returning to the Octagon at UFC 106 (November 21st, Las Vegas) against 23-year-old submission artist Dustin "McLovin" Hazelett. Parisyan’s last appearance was in January at UFC 94, where he scratched out a split-decision win against Dong Hyun Kim; the result was changed to a no contest following Parisyan’s positive test for Hydrocodone, Hydromorphone, and Oxymorphone. Before that, the Heat suffered a TKO loss against Thiago Alves in April 2008, meaning that he hasn’t scored a legitimate win since his unanimous decision over Ryo Chonan at UFC 78. Hazelett is coming off back-to-back victories (and back-to-back Submission of the Night bonuses) thanks to his acrobatic armbars against Josh Burkman and Tamdan McCrory, but he hasn’t competed since last November due to injury. So whose grappling will be stronger? And whose ring rust will be rustier?

Besides the main events of Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin and Tito Ortiz vs. Mark Coleman, UFC 106 is also expected to feature a welterweight bout between Jon Fitch and Ricardo Almeida, which will be Almeida’s 170-pound debut. Not exactly easing him into the division, are they?

What you see here is actual security camera footage of a break-in at the new Tapout Training Center in Las Vegas on Sunday morning.  Seems this criminal mastermind decided to smash the front door of an MMA gym and then take his time carrying out a bunch of merchandise that seems like it would be difficult/not that profitable to resell on the street, and all without really bothering to cover his face or conceal his identity.  The footage makes it hard to get a good look at him, but according to our friend The Fight Nerd, the owner of the Tapout facility is looking to dispense a little MMA street justice if he can get his hands on this dude:

“It’s the principle of the whole thing, it’s not even how much or what the value of what he took is. He broke into the gym and that’s not a good thing to do… you don’t break into this facility and get away scot free. We will find this person and he will get dealt with. I don’t know if that person realizes exactly who we are and what we do and when we find this guy, he will know exactly what industry we are in.”

(The weird thing is, those are actually prescription.  Leave it to Mayhem to find the world’s zaniest opthamologist.)

MMA’s hardest-working lunatic may be fighting for a title soon, and in America no less, or at least that’s what a recent forum post from Jason “Mayhem” Miller would have us believe.  In addition to updating fans on the status of “Bully Beatdown’s” second season on MTV (Eddie Alvarez kicks some ass in week one), Miller casually mentioned that he’ll be fighting Jake Shields “for the middleweight championship of the world in Strikeforce.” 

At this point you might be thinking to yourself: 1) Isn’t Cung Le still technically the Strikeforce middleweight champ? and 2) Isn’t the phrase ‘championship of the world in Strikeforce’ kind of like ‘one of the greatest light heavyweights of the night?’

(Sherman’s the guy on the left. Get used to that face, you’ll be seeing it again next month. Photo courtesy of osirisshoes.)

MMA Mania passes along the full lineup for Adrenaline MMA IV (September 18th; Council Bluffs, Iowa) and while we’ve already covered the Tim Sylvia/Jason Riley main event, we now know that UFC light-heavyweight Houston Alexander will be taking on Sherman "The Tank" Pendergarst (11-14) in the co-main event. Alexander’s three-fight losing streak may be a major bummer — and the reason he has to take a tune-up fight outside of the UFC — but Pendergarst has lost his last five matches, and has only won two of his last twelve. Competing mostly as a heavyweight, the Tank has suffered KO/TKO losses against such notables as Shane Carwin, Antoni Hardonk (at UFC 65, Pendergarst’s only Octagon appearance), Justin EIlers, and Tim Hague, and was one of the unfortunate fighters to experience the YAMMA pit first-hand; he lost to Alexey Oleinik by submission.

In other words, this could be just the sacrifical lamb that heavy-handed Houston needs to get his confidence back. Then again, eight of Pendergarst’s 11 wins have come by submission, meaning that Alexander should still be on high alert. So, dude with no ground game (Houston) vs. a guy who gets knocked out a lot (Sherman) — who will be able to impose their gameplan?

The full lineup for Adrenaline IV is after the jump…

(Props: dragonman34)

In the latest installment of Tito Ortiz‘s comeback-trail video blog, Tito helpfully reads us the main details of his UFC 106 bout agreement. It seems that nobody has informed him of the one-pound-allowance rule for non-title fights, and yes, his usual signs of dyslexia are present. ("It’s not going three rounds, no way," Tito says of his fight against Mark Coleman. "I’m taking your ass out in at least two.") Later, he tries to list all the fighters that he’s retired (see the 2:50 mark), and the camera conveniently cuts out after Ken Shamrock. Also, he refers to his fax machine as "the X machine," which made me LOL real hard.

Currently, Ortiz appears to be caught between respecting Mark Coleman as a legendary ex-champion, and disrespecting him because that’s what Tito does. But there is one specific memory of the Hammer that Ortiz is using as motivation: "If you guys pay close attention, when I beat Evan Tanner, and after I slammed Evan Tanner on his head and I jumped up on the Octagon, and I flexed to the audience, Mark Coleman jumped up on the side of the cage, and you can see the disgust on his face. So I think Mark Coleman’s had a little hatred for me for a while. So now he gets the chance. Too bad your chance ain’t gonna be good."

Chilling. Ortiz also predicts a head-kick knockout and vows to get back his title. ("The roads are comin’," whatever that means.) November 21st can’t come soon enough…

(Guess which of these men doesn’t make his living with his body. Go ‘head. Guess.)

Best-selling author and friend of the Potato, Matthew Polly, won his MMA debut at Saturday night’s Tuff-N-Uff event in Las Vegas after his combination of awkward offense and pudgy middle-agedness proved to be too much for his 24 year-old opponent, who could not answer the bell for the third round. 

If you didn’t know, Polly wrote the hilarious and insightful American Shaolin about his time living and training with the Shaolin monks in China.  He’s been at work on a new book about MMA for what seems like years now, and he spent the last several months living in a flophouse in Vegas and getting beaten up at Xtreme Couture in preparation for his first foray into MMA competition.  Said Polly: 

“I was really nervous. I actually went and hid in one of the bathroom stalls to try and calm down,” Polly said of his routine before the fight. “My first thought when I got out there is, I got Joey Varner (Xtreme Couture trainer), Robert Drysdale (world-class Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu expert) and Randy Couture walking in with me, I was like, I can’t shame them. I can’t go out there and get knocked out in five seconds with them in my corner.  Then it was weird. There was a calm right as the music started. I can do this. I can do this.”

(The photo that helped set a new record for Jenna Jameson midget porn jokes on CP.)

The good news is, our UFC 102 caption contest has come to a merciful end.  The bad news is, so few of the funnier ones among you seem to be in or around the Pacific Northwest.  Don’t worry, though.  We found ourselves a big winner anyway, and we’ve got some Fight Magazine subscriptions to give away to a couple others that made us chuckle.  Too bad it won’t be in time to get the September issue, featuring a cover story written by a certain dashing young scribe who shall remain nameless.  Better head out and pick that one up this week, available wherever kick-ass MMA publications are sold.

Here are our subscription winners, in no particular order:

Jet Li, a midget, and Tito Ortiz all indicating how many times they’ve brought Jenna Jameson to orgasm. – IrishLobo

For weeks to come, Extreme Couture smelled of Icy Hot, Herpecin, Crab Rangoon, Mediocrity, Nyquill and a little bit of stolen Mojo. – BigCountrysCholesterol

No matter how the hard The Thundercats attempted to blend into human society, Snarf always gave them away. – BrandedtoKill

And the winner of two free tickets to UFC 102 is…

(Cyborg, reppin’ her set. Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle.)

Not only did Cristiane "Cris Cyborg" Santos‘s drubbing of Gina Carano at the last Strikeforce event bring heaps of attention to women’s MMA, but it also made Chute Boxe relevant again. Though the Brazilian fight camp used to be a fearsome presence in the PRIDE era, it fell out of favor as its biggest stars all left to start their own teams. Now, Cris Cyborg is one of the most compelling champions in the sport, and Chute Boxe founder Rudimar Fedrigo is rewarding her with her own school. As he told Portal das Lutas:

Could we see a rebirth of Chute Boxe’s axe-murdering brawl-’til-you-fall style in the U.S.? And with Cris Cyborg as the face of the camp in America, will other female fighters be lured to Chute Boxe? No American MMA team is specifically known for producing great women fighters. It’ll be interesting to see if the Cyborgs recognize this opportunity and seize it.

(Photo courtesy of mmafightspace)

After years of estrangement, legendary MMA fighter/trainer Pat Miletich and the UFC are seeing eye-to-eye again. As Miletich told MMA Madness following a meeting with Dana White at UFC 101, "We touched on me potentially fighting in the UFC again, but nothing was concrete. The door was left open, so that was good.” Now, as Bloody Elbow points out, the Croatian Sensation’s fighter profile has returned to UFC.com.

Miletich has only competed twice since leaving the UFC in 2002, losing to Renzo Gracie by submission at an IFL event in 2006, and knocking out Thomas Denny last December at Adrenaline 2. We’ve previously argued for his induction into the UFC Hall of Fame, and hopefully this is a sign that Miletich will be honored at a future event. But my God, could the 41-year-old really be returning to the Octagon? Sure, the UFC let Mark Coleman fight after inducting him into the Hall of Fame, but that’s because they needed somebody to throw at Lesnar. The justification for bringing back Miletich is much hazier — unless, of course, he’ll be fighting alongside Dennis Hallman and Phil Baroni on TUF 11. (No, I’m not letting this idea go. Get used to it.)

(Fight starts at the 0:58 mark. Props to NelsaoCB)

As the above video proves, Chris Clements and Steve Ramirez do not hold the record for fastest knockout in MMA history. At a Japanese event called "The Outsider 2" held last July, Ryohei Masuda caught Takahiro Kuroishi rushing in and knocked him into the land of wind and ghosts in two seconds flat. (Doesn’t that idiot know that the running start only works when Kid Yamamoto does it? Well, he does now.) Don’t ask us to explain the in-ring brawl that comes directly afterwards, though if there are any Japanese speakers in the house who can translate the narrator, please enlighten us.

After the jump: If you have 17 minutes free, check out this amazing timeline of the UFC’s lightweight title by our friend Koeikan. "Short People" FTW.

(Bud Light enthusiast/big scary dude Shane Carwin.)

Dana White was quick to latch on to the personal angle when playing up the Brock Lesnar/Shane Carwin title fight planned for UFC 106 on November 21, telling Dave Meltzer that Carwin “hates” Lesnar.  When I got in touch with The Engineer of Pain for this SI.com feature, he told me that, “hate is a strong word, but yeah, I hate what he did after UFC 100.  I hate that he disrespected the greatest sporting fans in the world and I can’t wait to fight him.”

Carwin was also critical of Lesnar’s tirade against Bud Light – not just as a fellow UFC employee, but also as beer-drinker:

“[T]alking trash about your boss’s business partners is just ridiculous.  I live in Colorado, the home of Coors, and me and my friends drink Bud Light.  Can he really even like Coors?  Or is he saying if you pay him enough money he will drink anything?”

An argument over domestic beer.  Great fights have been built on less, I suppose.  And if you’re wondering whether fighting for the UFC heavyweight title is enough to make Carwin quit his full-time job as an engineer, he’s got news for you:

(Matt Hughes hawks something that looks like cocaine for deers, promises to help you knock out a buck. Props: The Garv)

- Frank Fertitta II, father to Lorenzo and Frank III, dead at 71. (Yahoo)

- Seth Petruzelli discusses possible Kimbo Slice rematch. (Fanhouse)

- Check out the ludicrous character names for "The Expendables." (Fightlinker)

- UFC 106 has big time pay-per-view potential. (MMA Payout)

- Penn vs. Sanchez to headline UFC 105? (Inside Fights)

- Arianny Celeste keeps her clothes on at the Playboy Mansion. (Twitter)

- Ryan Couture fights in Vegas on Saturday night. (MMA Madness)

- Denis Kang offered fight with Bisping at UFC 105. (Fighters Only)

- Shaq boxes Oscar De La Hoya. (MMA TKO)

- Top 10 MMA fighters under 25. (Bleacher Report)

- Top 49 most influential men of 2009. (Ask Men)

- 12 weirdest hotel rooms from around the world. (Asylum)

- Real TV commercials of the "Mad Men" age. (Screen Junkies)

- Pressure point kill guide. (Made Man)

- 25 hot vintage babes. (Holy Taco)

- Wreck of the Week: girls mud-wrestling. (All Left Turns)

- Great one-punch KO in boxing match. (Nothing Toxic)

You might remember that a while back we pointed you to Fight Magazine’s “Full-Time Fighter” contest, in which they were giving one lucky MMA hopeful a free trip to Las Vegas to train with Shawn Tompkins and Xtreme Couture for a week.  We voted for Drew Dober, who is 6-0 in his young career.  Somebody must have agreed with us because he was voted the winner,  though after voicing our mostly uninformed opinion we pretty much forgot about the whole thing and went back to LOL-ing at all the ‘tarded things Tito Ortiz says.  You know, business as usual.

But now Drew is actually in Vegas training with Xtreme Couture and chronicling his experiences.  There’s something weirdly fascinating about it.  I would say it’s because it makes you realize what it would be like for a regular guy to live and train with pro fighters, only this kid is undefeated as a pro and once knocked a dude out in sixteen seconds at a Strikeforce event, so he’s not exactly just some punk they yanked out of a dorm room recliner somewhere.

Mainly it’s interesting because there’s a disconnect between the experience this guy seems to be having, and his interpretation of it.  When he describes getting his ass kicked by serious pros twice a day, every day, he seems to think it’s loads of fun.  For example:

(Nine months later, Cris gave birth to a litter of wolverines. Photo courtesy of YorkBlog.com.)

Wow, TGIF you guys, amirite? We might as well give away some obsolete t-shirts. (Don’t worry, a new design is in the works. These things take time.) This week’s big winners are…

Sneaky Pete on "Scott Coker Viciously Punk’d by Cris Cyborg": Of all the parties involved with the prank, I think the hypothetical baby was the most relieved.

agentsmith on "Mitsuhiro Ishida Claims Gilbert Melendez Was Greasy": I’m reserving judgement on this matter until I hear what Ishida’s mother has to say.

And finally, a "Classic MMA Moments Recreated in MS Paint" submission that hits very close to home…

(Just like armbarring a bike: Filho emerges from an eight-month hiatus to take out Melvin Manhoef at DREAM.10 last month.)

In all our hand-wringing about the lack of challenges for Gegard Mousasi, we may have overlooked one formerly fearsome recovering addict — and Paulo Filho wants you to know that he will not be ignored. From Tatame.com via WatchKalibRun:

(To this day Jet Li still isn’t convinced that this photo wasn’t somehow taken during an interesting, though slightly terrifying dream he had after passing out drunk with Spike TV blaring in the background.)

Good news for the Pacific Northwest portion of the Potato Nation.  We have two free tickets to give away to UFC 102 in Portland, Oregon next weekend – thanks to our good buddies at Fight Magazine – and we’re going to give them to whoever can most successfully amuse us with a caption for the above image.  Just ask the winner of our UFC 101 tickets, Lebowski1976, and he’ll tell you that it’s totally worth the struggle if it means you get to pour beer on some loudmouth jerk from your free seats at a UFC event.

As usual, if your entry does not tell us that you are geographically capable of actually attending the event, we’re going to assume that you aren’t and therefore no matter how LOL-worthy your entry is, you’ll still be watching UFC 102 from home.  However, this time around we do have a special, non-regionally exclusive consolation prize for a few select runners-up: a year’s subscription to Fight Magazine.

So go ahead, give us your best shot in the comments section.  We’ll comb through the entries and announce our winners early next week.  And no, we won’t give a damn if you thought yours was funnier.  We read it, and it wasn’t.  We’re absolutely positive.