(The upside is, now Vera’s sure to get that role as Sloth in the "Goonies" remake. Photo courtesy of UFC.com)

That sickening, dead meat smacking sound you heard when Jon Jones landed his fight-ending elbow strike on Brandon Vera last night? That was the sound of Vera’s face being rearranged. The word is that Vera suffered three broken bones in his face last night, and the injuries are severe enough that he was reportedly prevented from boarding a plane to go home.

That might not have been a big deal if the fight had been in Las Vegas. He could always pass the time by buying himself a cold one and walking down to see the pirate battle outside of Treasure Island, or else wander around the M&M’s store with all the senile old ladies from Wisconsin. Not a bad way to waste time while you wait for your face to regain its structural integrity, really.

But damn, you’re telling me Vera is stuck in Broomfield, Colorado? Not only did he lose the fight and get his face smashed, but he also has to sit around his hotel room watching an endless stream of shows about Nazis on the History Channel, while sending his cornermen down the hall for ice every ten minutes? That, my friends, is a special little slice of hell.

(Don’t fear Cheick Kongo’s patented elbow-to-hip attack. Fear the career consequences of tapping out to it. Photo courtesy of UFC.com)

After a bizarre night of injuries, illegal blows, and confusing stoppages, we sort through the raw data to arrive at a number we made up out of nowhere in order to assess who’s up, who’s down, and by how much after the UFC’s first event on Versus.

Jon Jones +86
We were expecting more of a stand-up battle, but as long as you can take the guy down so easily, why risk it? The win was impressive, and yet expected. For his next act, he’s got to face a top contender.

Brandon Vera -82
When the most significant blow you land in a fight is an illegal one, you know it was a bad night. Going home with a lump the size of a golf ball on your eye probably doesn’t cheer you up any, especially when you just lost your third fight in the last five outings. At this stage in his career, “The Truth” is no longer a friend to Vera.

(Josh Barnett vs. Mighty Mo. Skip to the 6:28 mark to see Barnett accept a knee to the groin as repayment for the one that happened during the fight. Video courtesy of 19054771 via Bloody Elbow.)

Full results from today’s seven-bout card in Yokohama are below; more videos after the jump.

– Bibiano Fernandes (champion) def. Joachim Hansen via split decision
– Josh Barnett def. Siala-Mou "Mighty Mo" Siligia via submission (kimura), 4:41 of round 1
– K.J. Noons def. Andre "Dida" Amade via unanimous decision
– Ryo Chonan def. Andrews Nakahara via unanimous decision
– Cole Escovedo def. Yoshiro Maeda via KO (head kick), 2:29 of round 1
– Katsunori Kikuno def. Kuniyoshi Hironaka via KO (strikes), 1:26 of round 1
– Ikuhisa Minowa def. Jimmy Ambriz via submission (toe hold), 2:42 of round 2

(Photo courtesy of MMA Fighting.)
 
So, weird night, huh? The main card of UFC on Versus: Vera vs. Jones gave us two fights where guys were docked points for illegal blows, two fights that ended with the losers grabbing their eyes in pain, Cheick Kongo transforming into a boring wrestler, and referees being applauded for their brilliant decisions. I’m still waiting for the hail of frogs. And here’s another bit of strangeness: The UFC decided to hand out three Knockout of the Night bonuses after the show, but no Fight of the Night bonuses. The $50,000 bumps went to the following scrappers…

Knockout of the Night #1: Jon Jones, for caving in Brandon Vera‘s head with an elbow that came from an acceptable clock-position.

Knockout of the Night #2: Junior Dos Santos, for wasting Gabriel Gonzaga and picking up his fifth-straight KO/TKO in the UFC.

Knockout of the Night #3: John Howard, for starching Daniel Roberts in the only prelim fight that was shown on the broadcast.

Submission of the Night: Clay Guida, for his arm-triangle tap of Shannon Gugerty. (Who else are they gonna give it to, Kongo for submitting Paul Buentello via leg-elbows?)

Some important notes from the press conference:

("Room for the Holy Ghost, kids. Your mothers raised you better than that." Photo courtesy of the UFC on Versus Weigh In Pics gallery on CombatLifestyle.)

Because pay-per-view and Spike TV are not enough to contain all the UFC’s awesomeness, Versus is presenting four fights tonight that could all end in thrilling knockouts, and will momentarily make us forget that we’re missing the season premiere of Breaking Bad. In this extra-special Lord’s Day Liveblog™, Jon Jones tries to live up to his hype against a man who once fell prey to his own, Junior Dos Santos continues his warpath in the heavyweight division against fellow meat-skewer aficionado Gabriel Gonzaga, Cheick Kongo and Paul Buentello throw bombs for the hell of it, and lightning will strike James Irvin on his way to the cage. Yes, indoor lightning. Live results from UFC on Versus: Vera vs. Jones await you after the jump; refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest…

(Sure, he lives in an RV and has creepy facial hair, but trust us, Clay’s a fantastic babysitter. Photo courtesy of MMA Junkie.)

Spoilers after the jump…

(Props: Cagewriter)

Two notable moments came out of yesterday’s UFC on Versus: Vera vs. Jones weigh-ins at the 1stBank Center in Broomfield, Colorado. First off, James Irvin made his public debut at middleweight, and my God, I would kill for those cheekbones. Seriously, the phrase "cancer survivor" comes to mind. Also, Jon Jones got way up in Brandon Vera‘s face after they hit the scale. Dana White stepped in to separate the two so their forehead-jostling wouldn’t turn into something more serious. Jones explained his high emotions following the weigh-ins, telling Steve Cofield: "I just really don’t like Brandon as a person. I just think he’s disrespectful. I think he’s arrogant. I think he’s full of himself…I guess I let his arrogance get under my skin a little bit. It’s just a learning experience. In the future I’ll deal with talkers better."

The weigh-in numbers are after the jump, courtesy of UFC.com. Remember to come back tonight at 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT for live round-by-round results…

(Jon Jones warms up backstage by doing battle with a mummy. Photo courtesy of Combat Lifestyle.)

Your old friend the Enabler faced himself a quandary this week. Should he blow some money on college basketball, which he knows/cares almost nothing about, just for the warm feeling he gets from wagering irresponsibly large sums? Or should he save that cash and put it toward something useful, like a crazy parlay bet featuring all three of the Octagon newcomers in this Sunday’s ‘UFC Live’ event?

In the end he decided to try for the best of the both worlds, which means that if Julio Paulino and Cornell both win this weekend, somebody might finally be making a child support payment. Or purchasing a riding lawn mower. Definitely one of those two.

Betting lines today come to us courtesy of BestFightOdds.com:

Jon Jones (-220) vs. Brandon Vera (+215)
Junior dos Santos (-260) vs. Gabriel Gonzaga (+250)
Cheick Kongo (-365) vs. Paul Buentello (+335)
Alessio Sakara (+105) vs. James Irvin (-110)
Clay Guida (-380) vs. Shannon Gugerty (+335)
Eliot Marshall (+155) vs. Vladimir Matyushenko (-150)
Duane Ludwig (-155) vs. Darren Elkins (+153)
John Howard (-190) vs. Daniel Roberts (+190)
Brendan Schaub (-238) vs. Chase Gormley (+214)
Mike Pierce (-439) vs. Julio Paulino (+425)
Eric Schafer (+135) vs. Jason Brilz (-135)

Break it down…

(Deep thoughts with Jorge Rivera.)

- Brock Lesnar makes the case that he’s better than ever now. (The Rumble)

- Overeem/Rogers and Arlovski/Silva official for May 15 event. (Strikeforce)

- Sakara and Irvin know why they’re on TV. (MMA Fighting)

- Gabriel Gonzaga fighting for relevance this weekend. (Heavy)

- UFC 111 fighters program your iPod. (UFC.com)

- Fight world lookalikes. (Cagewriter)

- GSP gets a workout in before UFC 111. (Ask Men)

- Gina Carano looking sultry while filming a movie. (WKR)

- Shannon Gugerty promises a breakout performance. (Bleacher Report)

- South Park’s awesome take on Tiger Woods. (Total Pro Sports)

- Why your band hasn’t made it yet. (Asylum)

- March Madness on demand screenshots. (Scores Report)

- Suplex knocks wrestler out cold. (Break)

- 2010 Douchebag Tournament: round 2, day 2. (Holy Taco)

- A special NSFW clip from "Hot Tub Time Machine." (Screen Junkies)

- When NASCAR feuds turn ugly. (All Left Turns)

- The truth about cohabitation. (Made Man)

- Soccer player freaks out and attacks fans. (Nothing Toxic)

(Don’t do it, Paul! Think of all the impressionable German children! Photo courtesy of Fight Magazine.)

Those wacky Germans are at it again, Potato Nation. It wasn’t enough that the UFC had to put up with all manor of ill-informed, reactionary nonsense when they held their first event in Germany last summer. Oh, no. Now they’ve been banned from German TV for the “unacceptable” level of violence in their broadcasts. Since the UFC has been broadcasting on German sports television channel DSF for roughly a year, it seems odd that they’d be banned only now, especially when their programming is completely unchanged. That’s pretty much the exact position of UFC UK president Marshall Zelaznik, who told Sherdog.com:

“The Bavarian state office for new media has approved UFC programming on DSF twice on separate occasions in the past,” said Zelaznik. “That is why we deem the sudden ban unusual as the content of our programming has not changed. We have also had a commission for youth protection in the media review the situation and they deemed the broadcast legal if televised after 11 p.m.”

So what’s Germany’s problem with MMA, you ask? Well, aside from a vague belief that it will somehow damage the minds of their youth, they also seem really hung up on the whole ‘hitting a man when he’s down’ thing. In its statement explaining the UFC ban, the BLM (which, in German, apparently stands for Bavarian state office for new media) cited certain “breach of taboos” such as “punching a downed opponent.” Also, remember that article from Der Spiegel describing the Brock Lesnar-Randy Couture bout:

(You should see the other guy. Seriously, not a mark on him.)

First off, an announcement for MMA FightPicker prize-pool participants: Due to a technical screw-up on our end, we had to clear your tie-breaker answers so we could put up answer-fields that actually made sense. All of you should have been contacted via e-mail by now, but in case this is news to you, please revisit your prize pool(s) and make sure you have the tie-breaker question entered. We’d like to give a hearty "Nice, Player!" to everybody who entered those prize pools to win the gear from MMAWarehouse.com. As of now, there are two spots remaining in the 1,200-chip 10-person pool, and an infinite number of spots remaining in the Unlimited pool.

This week, BF and BG snuck into Contender Pool 10 #787, where they’ll be competing with perennial contender Ryan Johnson and someone named RaWrBoOm. As for the questions, there seem to be a lot of heavy favorites this time around. Who of you will be ballsy enough to pick the upsets? Certainly not us — BF and BG had a difference of opinion on just one question. We should really change the name of "Ben vs. Ben" to "Ben and Ben are Best Friends and Never Argue." Anyway, here’s how we’re picking ‘em for UFC Live: Vera vs. Jones this Sunday on Versus (9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT)…

Brandon Vera vs. Jon Jones: Who will win?
BF: Unless Jones gets himself DQ’d or suffers a stroke on his way to the cage, he’s got this. Vera can’t strike with him and can’t get him down. Cue the spinning back elbow.
BG: Jon Jones via spinning Superman punches and Greco rag-dolling. He’s just more special then Vera, y’know?

Will Vera vs. Jones end in a KO/TKO?
BF: I hate hemming myself in with an answer that has one way to be right and at least two ways to be wrong, but I gotta say yes. I see Vera getting dropped and finished with a flurry on the mat.
BG: Yep. The fight ends with Jones on top and Vera eating leather and elbow-bone.

Erin Toughill announced via Facebook Thursday afternoon that she isn’t going to be fighting for Strikeforce any longer, and she actually sounds pretty serious about the whole thing.  Now, I realize we’ve all written things we didn’t mean on Facebook from time to time.  For example, I do not actually believe that the MTV show "Teen Mom" is one long advertisement for abortion, contrary to what I may have written on my profile in the past.  But Toughill insists that this wasn’t a hasty decision on her part, and she even seems to be considering giving up the sport for good. 

You’ll recall that she was supposed to be next in line for a shot at "Cyborg" Santos in Strikeforce, but it doesn’t look like that’s happening now.  Her gripe is a familiar one among female fighters.  Even now that they have a major promotion to compete in, there just aren’t enough chances to fight.  Sure, Strikeforce has gotten into a good rhythm with women’s bouts, putting one on almost every event of late, but never more than one.  You factor in the various weight classes and the numerous female fighters under contract, and suddenly there aren’t that many chances to go out there and get paid.

Maybe that’s the source of Toughill’s beef, or maybe they’re jerking her around over the Santos fight.  Hopefully all this gets explained in future Facebook posts, which are accompanied by pictures of her and all her friends drinking margaritas at their local Chili’s.

Brody plays Royce, a mercenary who reluctantly leads a group of elite warriors who come to realize they’ve been brought together on an alien planet… as prey. With the exception of a disgraced physician, they are all cold-blooded killers – mercenaries, Yakuza, convicts, death squad members – human "predators" that are now being systemically hunted and eliminated by a new breed of alien Predators.

Okay, so it’s a bit of a stretch. The part where we’re supposed to believe that Brody is a stone cold mercenary, that is. The part where aliens abduct elite warriors to hunt them for sport is pretty believable by comparison. But hey, at least there’s Oleg to utter some sweet one-liners before he inevitably gets aced by a Predator. Get a preview of what that might look like after the jump.
 

(We weren’t sure what to put up at the top of this post, so we figured, hey, Miesha Tate’s ass, right guys? Photo courtesy of Fight! Magazine.)

Praise Crom it’s Friday! Time to shout out our favorite members of the peanut gallery… 

chamby on "War Machine Returning to MMA in April, Still Out His Damn Mind": I wish that grenade on his neck would blow up already

Aptninja on "Photo Gallery: 17 Amazing MMA Event Posters": (@skeletor) Sperm sometimes move toward an egg rather than the space bar.

ReX13 on "Heads-Up: Win a $200 MMA Warehouse Gear Package in This Week’s FightPicker Prize Pools": (@JoseMonkey) Don’t think i won’t put on this entire outfit and run errands, including stopping at the bank, where i will refuse to take out my mouthpiece while i converse with the tellers. Despite the fact that i have hands so dimunitive that i refuse to go to Burger King, i will not remove my gloves. I will grasp the pen-on-a-chain with an overhand stabby grip and scrawl an approximation of my name, and mumble about "fucking staph" while they count out stacks of ones, per my request. When i am bid a good day, i will grunt the words "protein", "gym", "train", "appreciate your help and have a lovely afternoon", or some combination of preceding, and i will stalk out. I hope the rash guard won’t cover the awesome tribal armband i have planned. If you want to quit being a pencilneck, feel free to come by my gym, Keyboard Warrior, and ask for a free month’s membership (promotional code: Tap, Nap, or Snap).

Goog on "Tito Ortiz Rumorwatch: Now It’s a Neck Injury": "I tattooed my fathe, beat the pith out of Robin Giventh, and thquandered over 300 million dollarth and I’m thtill not the biggest douchebag in thith photo."

If your name has been called, please send your real name, address, and shirt size to feedback@cagepotato.com, and we’ll send you a CagePotato.com Devil Horns tee to you at some point in the near-to-distant future. 

CagePotato.coms MMA Minute: UFC on Versus Edition – Watch more Funny Videos

Because you never get tired of seeing our creepy faces, here’s another video installment of Ben vs. Ben, in which we cover some hot-button issues related to Sunday’s Vera vs. Jones show on Versus (How badly will Jon Jones beat Brandon Vera? Is the main card in greater need of a Carpenter or a Janitor?) and debut a brand-new segment called "Nice, Player!/Nah, Player!", which is inspired by the groundbreaking Ed Lover series "C’mon Son." Of course, you can’t really see our home-made cardboard signs because we’re Internet Geniuses and we didn’t realize that they wouldn’t fit inside the video windows. Trust us, they were awesome. Any suggestions for things you’d like to see in future installments of MMA Minute? You know, besides smaller cardboard signs? Let us hear it in the comments section…

(A little hard on the ref, aren’t we? We’ll let it go because we love the "G is for gangster" line so much.)

We have three words to say about this video of Miguel Torres getting his head repaired: Ho. Lee. Shit.  The boys at MMA Mania shot this video of a New Jersey cosmetic surgeon trying to make Torres look like a regular human being again following the nasty cut he suffered in his loss to Joseph Benavidez at WEC 47. 

Now that we’ve seen the footage, we sort of wished they’d just stayed out of the operating room and let us continue believing that these things are healed by the delicate licks of newborn kittens.  Something about seeing a living person’s skull, as well as watching their skin get tugged around like a pair of unloved pleather pants feels…wrong.  I’m going to go throw up now, and then immediately cancel my trip to audition for the next season of "The Ultimate Fighter." 

(Well done, Nick the Face. If in fact that is your real name.)

The UFC sent out an email this afternoon pumping up the match-up between “bitter rivals” (sound familiar?) Rashad Evans and “Rampage” Jackson for UFC 114 on May 29. All we can say is, it’s about damn time. Their coaching stints on “The Ultimate Fighter” initially got us hyped for this bout, but then almost immediately we had to get unhyped as ‘Page ran off to make movies/announce his retirement instead of delivering on the “black-on-black crime” he promised us.

Now that it’s on again, we must begin the slow, arduous process of rehyping ourselves. This highlight video helps a little, but how about throwing down with some incendiary quotes to push us over the edge, UFC press release?

(Daniel Roberts grappling highlight reel. Props: YouTube.com/ninjaroberts)

Three hungry up-and-comers will be making their Octagon debuts this Sunday, filling some gaps on the "Vera vs. Jones" preliminary card. But who will explode on the scene, and who will blow the biggest opportunity of their careers like total losers? Read on and get acquainted with…

DANIEL "Ninja" ROBERTS (WW)
Experience: 9-0 record (7 wins by submission), mostly in Oklahoma-based promotions. Most recently scored a submission-via-punches over MMA old-schooler Anthony Macias in January.
Will be fighting: John Howard (13-4, 3-0 UFC)
Lowdown: Roberts is filling in for Anthony Johnson, who dropped off the card last month with an injury. He comes from an amateur wrestling background, and as you can see in the video above, his grappling is ferocious. Roberts currently trains at the Cesar Gracie camp with Strikeforce champions Nick Diaz, Jake Shields, and Gilbert Melendez. He’s thrilled to be fighting John Howard: “I have to say that if I were to pick my opponent for the UFC, it probably would be him. Not to say that he’s a bad guy or an easy win — the fact that he’s 3-0 in the UFC is actually a good thing. I checked him out, I saw what he has, and I definitely feel like my grappling is way ahead of his…if he can last through the first and second round, then he’s pretty tough, because I plan on giving it everything I’ve got…I know a lot of people like to stand up and bang, but I think I’m gonna win a lot of fans over with my grappling. I move really well on the ground and there are not a lot of people that can move like me."

(Honestly, which would you rather watch: Chuck Liddell vs. Rich Franklin, or the stunning conclusion to this red-hot war of words? Video courtesy of MiddleEasy.)

Our condolences to anybody who was looking forward to a hastily thrown-together UFC card featuring a couple of old-timers and whoever else was available at the time. A Spike TV source has told MMAFighting.com that the UFC’s rumored Strikeforce counter-programming show on April 17th is no longer happening. This shouldn’t come as a huge surprise, considering that no fights had been made official a month away from the date. (The UFC doesn’t seem to share the same "whatever happens happens" attitude as the Japanese when it comes to fight-booking.) And so, Strikeforce wins this particular standoff, and will instead be going heads-up against one of the UFC’s recent pay-per-views. Considering how those PPVs have been doing lately, that’s good news for Scott Coker.

Speaking of Strikeforce: Nashville, MMA Junkie reports that Bobby Lashley (5-0) is slated to appear on the card against an opponent to be named later; if there’s any justice in the world, Wes Sims will get the rematch that we all know he deserves. Lashley’s fight is expected to be part of the event’s preliminary card, but will be shown on the CBS broadcast unless all three title fights go long.

(This is why B.J Penn still wakes up some nights in a terror, convinced that he’s covered in Vaseline and his own blood.)

Whether we want to admit it or not, excuses are as much a part of mixed martial arts as Tapout tees and fist-pose photographs. They have to be. In a world where you must talk yourself into believing that you’re either the baddest man in your weight class or else on your way to becoming it, a loss is something you have to find some way to reconcile, or else have your identity destroyed. That other dude couldn’t have won just because he was the better fighter. No, surely there’s a reason for this temporary setback, and chances are it’s very detailed and probably a little bit ridiculous.

In honor of the post-defeat excuse in MMA, we give you ten of the worst and weirdest attempts to explain away an ass-kicking. They aren’t necessarily untrue (though some are demonstrably untrue), but neither can they turn that L into a W. The best you can hope for is that they make sleeping at night just a little easier for the people who uttered them.

10. Mark Coleman couldn’t afford a proper training camp

(Don’t forget those elbows to the back of the head, either.)

(Props: KingHillerx)

In case you missed it, here’s last night’s installment of Spike’s UFC Primetime hype-series, which opens in a Long Island Hooters, where Dan Hardy can somehow smell Georges St. Pierre‘s fear over the pungent aroma of hot wings and urinal cakes. Hardy has come out to New York early to get acclimated with the time zone and funny accents of the American East Coast. Acting as his spirit guide is former UFC welterweight champ Matt Serra, who is helping Hardy work on the positions that he’ll surely be placed in against GSP, and lending him some of his lovable underdog magic. Back in Montreal, we learn a little more about Tristar Gym trainer Firas Zahabi, his obsessive work ethic, and his cute wife. Nate Marquardt and Kenny Florian stop by to add some star power to St. Pierre’s camp. (Ferrum Ferro Acuitur, bro.) Our buddies Ariel Helwani and Randy Gordon interview Hardy about training with monks; turns out Hardy really is a martial artist, even if he doesn’t walk out to the Octagon in his pajamas. Part 2 is after the jump. Give it a look before it’s pulled…

When we last interviewed her two years ago, Joanne Spracklen of MMAGirls.net was an up-and-coming video-blogger known for her UFC predictions and jiu-jitsu tutorials, and CagePotato.com was just a struggling MMA blog with a very small audience. Now, Joanne rubs elbows with UFC stars, sponsors female fighters, and acts in movies, while CagePotato…well, not much has changed for us, actually. But after we featured her as one of the 12 Hottest Women in MMA last month, Joanne offered to answer a new set of questions, for old time’s sake.

In this brand-new video interview, Joanne tries to seduce her way into a higher placement on our Hottest Women list, discusses her "lurker" role in Never Back Down, explains why she’s never dated an MMA fighter, and does a pretty solid impression of a vapid L.A. resident. For more of Joanne, follow her on MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter!

Now this is more like it.  Dan Hardy and Georges St. Pierre alone might lend themselves too easily to pre-packaged storylines, but Matt Serra is a born freakin’ entertainer over here.  This clip is forty seconds long and still he manages to do/say more interesting things than either Hardy or GSP managed in the entirety of the first episode.  You gotta love the guy for that.  It’s almost enough to make me want to watch this one live instead of on my DVR tomorrow morning while eating leftover Chinese food and nursing a severe hangover.  Almost.

Just in case this short clip isn’t enough entertainment to make the afternoon pass more swiftly, follow me after the jump for some totally gratuitous old school Wanderlei Silva ass-kicking action.  There’s no real reason for it.  Except that it’s awesome.

(Did anyone else just get a great idea for a buddy cop movie?)

Do you know what today is? Well, yeah, it’s St. Patrick’s Day, which means that for at least one evening you can puke on the sidewalk outside of your favorite bar without people judging you, but aside from that. Today is a brand new day from yesterday. That means it only makes sense that we get a new Tito Ortiz rumor to force us back to that inevitable question: why do we have to keep talking about this guy?

The newest report comes from Five Ounces of Pain, and it claims that “multiple herniations in the neck” forced Ortiz off “The Ultimate Fighter” and out of his fight with opposing TUF 11 coach Chuck Liddell. Sound familiar?

In case you missed it on Monday, we have something very special going on this week over at the ol’ FightPicker. MMAWarehouse.com has given us $200 fight-gear packages to give away to the winners of the two prize pools that are currently running. (They’re at the top of the Open Pools page — you can’t miss ‘em.) So far, 33 players have entered the 250-chip Unlimited pool for a shot at the Hayabusa fight gloves, TapouT mouthguards, Sprawl Fusion-S fight shorts, and Manto rash guard. But only three high-rollers have entered the 10-person pool for Big Boys; we need three more players to join by Friday or the thing will be canceled, so please, do whatever you can to get enough chips together and join the action. As for the rest of you, predicting the number of knockdowns in the first round of Kongo vs. Buentello will have to be its own reward.

Extra note, for everybody who joined one of the prize pools on Monday: We were late in getting the tie-breaker question up, so please revisit your pools and make sure you’ve answered it. Good luck everybody, and thanks again to MMA Warehouse!

(Step one in preparing for a fight with Jon Jones? Spinning elbow defense. Step two? Hiring a gypsy to put a hex on him before fight night.)

For the past six weeks Jon Jones has been at Greg Jackson’s gym in New Mexico, getting ready for a main event showdown with Brandon Vera on the UFC’s first Versus event this weekend. Despite Vera’s edge in Octagon experience, Jones is better than a 2-1 favorite in this fight, but he says he knows that the fans are a fickle lot, and he needs to show what he can do against the elder opponent who swears he’s on the verge of getting back to his old destructive self again. We sat down with Jones recently to get his thoughts on Vera’s renewed sense of purpose, the lingering effects of his disqualification loss to Matt Hamill, and more.

Clay Guida told us in a recent interview that he’s not using his plane ticket to get to Denver for the fight on Sunday and is going to drive his RV instead, and stay in it instead of his free hotel room. You guys are both at Greg Jackson’s in Albuquerque right now. Are you going to ride up in that beast with him?

Yeah, I’m going to go with him. I haven’t been inside [the RV] yet, but I hear it’s like the ultimate bachelor pad, like there’s video games and everything. It’s supposed to be pretty sweet. I’m going to use my hotel when I get there, don’t get me wrong, but I’m looking forward to driving up with Clay. We’ve been doing everything together. We’ve been eating together, training together – not directly with each other, since we’re in different weight classes – but we do our conditioning together. It’s been great.

(Don’t worry, buddy. We’ll pick you up a pair of oversized sunglasses at the gas station on our way to the after-party, and no one will even notice that thing.)

In the past few years James Irvin has had about as difficult a time as you can experience while still being employed and above ground. His string of untimely injuries and unfortunate mishaps earned him the title of ‘Most Cursed Fighter in MMA History,’ and the last time he was actually healthy enough to limp into the cage he took a beatdown from Anderson Silva and then got suspended for using prescription painkillers. He’s the kind of guy you don’t want to walk down the street with because chances are good that a piano might fall on his head and you’ll end up getting hit with the resulting splinter shrapnel.

But in an interview with Heavy.com on the verge of his return to action at ‘UFC on Versus’ this weekend, Irvin offers a sober assessment of his career and abilities that is so honest and forthright that we don’t know whether to be impressed or really bummed out.

(Images courtesy of twitter.com/Randy_Couture and twitter.com/JayHieron.)

Judging from the typos in his Twitter update, he might have been drunk when it happened. But at least Randy didn’t get the name of some chick branded on his arm, which would have to be covered up by a half-assed tribal design in about six months. For the uneducated, "Ferrum Ferro Acuitur" is a Latin phrase meaning "iron sharpens iron." It’s a reference to Proverbs 27 ("…so one man sharpens another"), and when included in an MMA fighter’s tattoo, it basically means that if you surround yourself with strong people, you will become stronger yourself. As for the Fleur-de-Lis, it’s either a symbol of Couture’s French lineage, or a tribute to GSP’s calf.

("When I find out who did this to my window, I am going to Randleplex the shit out of them." Photo courtesy of flickr.com/photos/shosports.)

Strikeforce’s May 15th event in St. Louis — which is slated to feature the heavyweight clashes between Alistair Overeem vs. Brett Rogers and Andrei Arlovski vs. Antonio Silva — picked up two more notable matchups this week. First off, BJJ prodigy Roger Gracie (2-0) is set to face off against explosive UFC/PRIDE veteran Kevin Randleman (17-14). Gracie’s grappling credentials include eight titles at the Mundials and sweeps of the 98kg and Absolute divisions at the 2005 ADCCs; his last MMA fight was two years ago, when he choked out Yuki Kondo at Sengoku 2. Randleman has suffered decision losses in his last two bouts against Mike Whitehead and Stanislav Nedkov, and has dropped nine of his last 12.

Meanwhile in the lightweight division, fast-rising prospect Lyle "Fancy Pants" Beerbohm (13-0, 12 wins by stoppage) will get his next test against former top 10 lightweight Vitor "Shaolin" Ribeiro. After a long period of injury-related inactivity, Ribeiro returned to MMA competition last year in DREAM, defeating Katsuhiko Nagata by TKO, but then losing a decision to Shinya Aoki. Beerbohm’s last two Strikeforce appearances saw him choke out Duane "Bang" Ludwig and score a doctor’s-stoppage TKO over Rafaello Oliveira.

Speaking of Strikeforce, their middleweight champ Jake Shields may not be sticking around after his next fight. As he told Graciemag:

(You may have been listening to us, Brandon. But you certainly weren’t *hearing* us.)

I swear you guys, sometimes it almost seems like these fighters are not constantly checking our site for updates and then living according to what we say like it’s the freaking gospel. Just a little over two weeks ago we enacted one of our irrevocable Cage Potato Bans on the practice of promising to bring back your old self. We’d had more than we could stand of guys vowing that this next fight, this was when we’d once again see that bright-eyed young ass-kicker we’d once known. It struck us as a cloying and empty gesture, and so we banished it from the land forever.

But wouldn’t you know it? Here comes Brandon Vera, wantonly flouting our edict like it meant absolutely nothing to him. As he told MMA Weekly:

"I stopped believing in the hype, I stopped worrying about what people think. I’m going back in there just trying to hurt people again like I used to," Vera said. "When I first came out, I would just bang on people and roll with people just to see them break. I got away from that somehow. I don’t know what happened. I got sucked into the MMA world of trying not to disappoint people. I’m over it, I want to go back in there and start doing things like I used to."