Rememer the "UFC Primetime" series that premieres tonight?  Well, in a continued effort to generate buzz before the first episode, the UFC has put out a couple clips of what they’re calling "unseen moments" from the show.  Of course, they’re not at all unseen now that the UFC has put them on their official YouTube page, but you get the point.  It’s footage they weren’t going to use anyway, and it’s supposed to make you want to watch the show, which is in turn supposed to make you want to buy the  UFC 111 pay-per-view or pay $25 to see it at a movie theater. 

Trouble is, this stuff is painfully boring.  We’re talking Jim Jarmusch levels of boring here.  As in, a two-minute clip of Georges St. Pierre talking about a bet he made with a friend for really uninteresting stakes, followed by him calling that friend and discussing those uninteresting stakes all over again.  We realize it’s throwaway footage, but damn.  I’m supposed to bump "16 and Pregnant" off my DVR queue for this?

After the jump, GSP does some push-ups and drills and stuff.  It’s exactly as interesting as that sentence makes it sound.

("See? I am friend. Now get in van, please." Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

Four months after he put Mike Swick to sleep at UFC 109 — thereby going up 2-1 in his one-man assault on the American Kickboxing Academy — welterweight rising star Paulo Thiago will step into the cage at UFC 115 (June 12th, tentatively in Vancouver) against highly regarded contender Martin Kampmann. "The Hitman" is coming off a first-round submission victory over Jacob Volkmann in January, and was slated to take on Ben Saunders at UFC 111, but lost a large piece of his face during training. Coincidentally, Thiago also holds a win over Volkmann, who has been absolutely thrown to the wolves during his brief time with the UFC. (FYI, "Christmas" Volkmann will have his win-or-GTFO match against Ronnys Torres at UFC Fight Night: Florian vs. Gomi on March 31st.)

UFC 115 will be headlined by Chuck Liddell vs. Tito Ortiz, and is expected to feature Mirko Cro Cop vs. Pat Barry, Ben Rothwell vs. Gilbert Yvel, Tyson Griffin vs. Evan Dunham, and Mac Danzig continuing his slow road back to contendership against Matt Wiman.

(We were originally going to run a photo of Colt Toombs at the top of this post, but then we found this photo of his father, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, chilling with the guys from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. We hope you respect our decision.)

Attention MMA FightPicker players: We’ve had to make two changes to this week’s pools. First off, Adam Gabel has dropped out of his King of the Cage Canadian lightweight title fight against Charlie Zak due to concerns about making the 155-pound weight limit. Replacing him will be 6-1 MFC vet Gavin Neil. Sadly, Colt Toombs has also been pulled from his Sportfight 27 match against Roy Bradshaw for unspecified reasons. Bradshaw has a replacement opponent now, but screw it, we’ll just get rid of that question entirely. Please revisit your FightPicker pools and make any appropriate changes. Special props to CP reader "kellyman" for giving us the heads-up about this stuff…

(Sometimes the difference between making the cut and staying home is all in how you wear your silly hat.)

The time has come once again for the UFC and Spike TV to scour the land in search of MMA fighters who want to be on a reality show and/or need a place to stay for a few weeks. I refer now, of course, to the open tryouts for season twelve of “The Ultimate Fighter” which, Spike announced today, will be held on April 1 at the Omni Charlotte Hotel in Charlotte, North Carolina.

This time around the UFC is looking for lightweights and light heavyweights, and since our vast readership encompasses everyone from angry pre-pubescent boys to confused retirees who are still trying to figure out where the internet keeps its porn, we figured that somewhere in there we’ve got to have some readers who are aspiring UFC fighters. To help these special members of the Potato Nation achieve their dreams, we’d like to offer some tips for a successful TUF audition. You can thank us after you win that six-figure contract and weird cut glass trophy.

1. Have an Interesting Personal Story
If you haven’t noticed by now, reality TV producers are lazy. They don’t want to have to work too hard to figure out the angle on anything, so make it easy for them. Tell them all about your life of hardship and tragedy. Explain that you want to become a UFC fighter because you promised your dying mother you would. Mention the interesting/quirky job you have. Unless you work as a bouncer or bartender. Trust us, they’ve heard that one already. If all else fails, tell them that you think you might be gay. Or an alcoholic. Or a gay alcoholic. They won’t be able to resist putting you in that house.

(And just like that Bonnar’s dreams of being a forehead model went up in smoke.)

We’re not exactly sure what the Combat Sports Authority of New South Wales actually did between the time Stephan Bonnar submitted his appeal and the time they ruled to deny it. One would assume that at some point their decision-making process would have led them to actually view a tape of the fight at UFC 110, which is when they would have seen the accidental headbutt from Krzysztof Soszynski that led to the fight-ending cut. Only somehow it didn’t happen that way. Somehow, even after “a review was held,” the officials reported that they “did not seek to interfere with the referee’s decision.” Which means that loss is as permanent on Bonnar’s record as the k-shaped scar probably is on his forehead.

As anyone who’s seen the tape knows, this is the wrong decision. The cut was clearly caused by a headbutt and not a punch, as the referee initially ruled. The ref can be forgiven for making that mistake. The action’s moving pretty fast in the Octagon, as perhaps you’ve noticed, and he didn’t have days to sit around looking at the video and thinking it over. The Combat Sports Authority did, and they still decided to do nothing. Why? Probably because doing nothing is usually easier than doing anything at all, and it’s a hard habit to break for a regulatory body.

(Props: Inside MMA via TtoMyJ14)

At Shark Fights 2 in December 2008, Shannon Ritch ended John Wood’s night in 15 seconds with a technique that pro-wrestling fans will immediately recognize as a "superkick." Apparently it works in real life, too. This was the last in a four-fight win streak that Shannon had going in 2008, and if you know anything about The Cannon’s career, you know what a big deal that is. Fun fact: Ritch’s last 26 fights have ended in the first round; he won 10 of those fights.

After the jump: An early highlight from Jens Pulver’s vast body of work that you probably haven’t seen before.

(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)

The welterweight title fight between Georges St. Pierre and Dan Hardy headlines this month’s UFC 111 card (March 27th, Newark), and both fighters will be featured in a new three-part weekly UFC Primetime special which kicks off tonight at 10 p.m. ET/PT on Spike. The UFC hasn’t put together a Primetime show since January 2009, when BJ Penn vowed to go "to the death." Hardy probably won’t get that dramatic with his trash-talk, but he will be landing his shots:

Primetime gives viewers a behind-the-scenes look at the fighters’ training camps — from Hardy’s Rough House team in Nottingham to St. Pierre’s home base in Montreal — as well as their personal lives. To promote it, the UFC’s YouTube account has posted a very short clip of GSP jumping over a bar. Hmm. Well, I wasn’t planning on spending $45 to watch Georges beat the crap out of a +500 underdog, but now? Now you’ve got my attention.

(Can you believe he had no professional training before this fight? Amazing.)

The more the subject gets discussed, the more it seems that the only people who really want to see Jose Canseco fight Herschel Walker in Strikeforce are Jose Canseco and the boys down at Cesar Gracie’s gym. These are the jokers who encouraged Canseco in the first place by inviting him down to train, and now one of them has gone and created a website designed specifically to push the fight (thanks to Cagewriter for the link). The site features a petition that’s aiming for 50,000 signatures (as of the time of this writing, they have a total of 49), and a home page that insists Canseco-Walker will not a be a “joke” of a fight. And what’s their reasoning behind this statement, you ask? There really isn’t any, aside from a list of prominent fighters who "Team Gracie Fighter" has trained thus far, implying that they can turn almost anybody into a legit fighter.

But where this website really goes wrong is by including a poll in the sidebar. By giving visitors the option to vote against the proposed bout that is the raison d’être for the entire website, they’ve opened the door for disaster. Currently, 55% of voters have answered “NO WAY!!” to the question “Do you want to see Jose Canseco fight Herschel Walker?”

You know what that’s called? That’s called democracy in action. The people have spoken.

Few people love the old ‘bad blood’ storyline in MMA more than we do. Truth be told, if it wasn’t for intense hatred, we’d hardly ever feel any emotions at all. But there’s a point when the blood just gets too bad, and the fight at last weekend’s Action Fight League “Rock n Rumble 2” event between Ariel Gandulla and Mike Bernhard is a prime example of why we need to maintain some semblance of civility in organized combat. As the announcers let us know at the start of the video, these two have a history together. They used to train at the same school, but a dispute over money has since driven a wedge between them, and now they’re trying to hurt each other for real.

You know the fight’s going to be a mess, because it doesn’t even make it through the first thirty seconds before someone takes a shot to the pills. In all fairness, the knee from Bernhard in the clinch seems like it was probably unintentional, or at least it does if you aren’t Gandulla. A few minutes later Gandulla finds himself stuck in side control, and his response is to just go ahead and put his fingers in Bernhard’s eyes. Not a good idea, because Troy Waugh is all over that stuff. He pauses the action, takes a point from Gandulla, and now we’re even. Now we can have ourselves a nice, orderly brawl, right?

If only we could be so lucky. Gandulla hits Bernhard with a shot to groin of his own after the restart, and then things really get ugly. See what we mean after the jump.  Trust us, you’re going to want to see this.

(Alessio Sakara turns Thales Leites’s face all doofy at UFC 101.)

After a few weeks of thumb-twiddling, the UFC has finally decided that the previously announced fight between Alessio Sakara and James "Most Cursed Fighter in MMA History" Irvin will kick off the UFC Live: Vera vs. Jones broadcast next Sunday (3/21) on Versus. The middleweight contest was originally slated for the prelims, but the card’s lineup shifted a bit after Sean Sherk and Anthony Johnson pulled out due to injuries. Sakara is riding back-to-back victories over Joe Vedepo and Thales Leites, but hasn’t competed since last August, while Irvin hasn’t been inside the Octagon since his KO loss to Anderson Silva in July 2008. The current lineup of "UFC on Versus" looks like this…

MAIN CARD
Brandon Vera vs. Jon Jones (LHW)
Junior dos Santos vs. Gabriel Gonzaga (HW)
Cheick Kongo vs. Paul Buentello (HW)
Alessio Sakara vs. James Irvin (MW)

PRELIMINARY CARD
Clay Guida vs. Shannon Gugerty (LW)
Eliot Marshall vs. Vladimir Matyushenko (LHW)
John Howard vs. Daniel Roberts (WW)
Brendan Schaub vs. Chase Gormley (HW)
Mike Pierce vs. Julio Paulino (WW)
Eric Schafer vs. Jason Brilz (LHW)

After the jump: Kongo vs. Buentello video hype, plus a list of international TV stations showing the event courtesy of MMA Junkie.

By Cage Potato contributor Matt Kaplan

Like fellow New Jersey native Frank Sinatra, UFC lightweight Jim Miller has been doing things his way. A former Cage Fury Fighting Championship and Reality Fighting title holder, Miller has used his ferocious style to catapult himself to the bright lights of the UFC Octagon, but the fire in Miller’s belly is not lit by the prospect of championship gold or the adulation of the masses. Instead, he maintains a deep commitment to his own personal standard of excellence and is poised to fulfill his own destiny, win or lose.

With a dominating win over the heavy-handed Duane “Bang” Ludwig at UFC 108 just two months ago, the New Jersey native is set to take on submission maven Mark Bocek at UFC 111 on March 27. I caught up and talked with Miller about his upcoming match, personifying a Creedence Clearwater Revival song, and a few of New Jersey’s finest exports.

So have you let the excitement of fighting Mark Bocek at UFC 111 in front of your hometown New Jersey crowd get to you, or have you been keeping it business as usual?

For me it really is business as usual. You know, it really doesn’t matter where I’m fighting. It’s cool that I’m going to have a lot more fans there, and that I don’t have to fly, but other than that, I’m stepping into the Octagon against a tough opponent, and that’s really what I’m focused on. Fortunately, the UFC fans have been great wherever I’ve been.

(Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

The WEC paid out $276,500 in disclosed salaries and bonuses for their WEC 47 card on Saturday, with bantamweight contender Joseph Benavidez taking home the biggest cut. Benavidez’s $39,000 haul — including his win bonus and submission bonus — made him one of just three fighters to earn over $20,000 from the event. The numbers are below; keep in mind that they don’t include income from sponsorships or undisclosed "locker-room bonuses," or deductions for taxes, insurance, and licensing fees.

Dominick Cruz: $18,000 (includes $9,000 win bonus)
Brian Bowles: $12,000

Joseph Benavidez: $39,000 (includes $14,500 win bonus, $10,000 Submission of the Night bonus)
Miguel Torres: $26,000

Javier Vazquez: $12,000 (includes $6,000 win bonus)
Jens Pulver: $14,000*

L.C. Davis: $18,000 (includes $9,000 win bonus)
Deividas Taurosevicius: $9,000

Putting recent speculation to rest, the UFC officially announced yesterday that Kimbo Slice will indeed face off with his TUF 10 castmate Matt Mitrione at UFC 113 (May 8th, Montreal). Slice is coming off a lackluster unanimous decision win against Houston Alexander at the TUF 10 finale, while Mitrione made his professional MMA debut at the same event, knocking out Marcus "Big Baby" Jones in the second round of their fight.

The fact that the Slice/Mitrione match was briefly removed from the UFC’s website, as well as the UFC’s previous vagueness with Mitrione, makes it seem like the UFC was actually considering Kimbo as an opponent for James Toney, but that freak-show will have to wait for another day. At the moment, Toney’s first opponent in the Octagon and the date of his debut are still question marks.

UFC 113 will be headlined by the light-heavyweight championship rematch between Lyoto Machida and Mauricio Rua; the current lineup is after the jump.

UFC fighter and former Cage Potato guest blogger Gerald Harris is the kind of guy who can appreciate a good joke. He’s also the kind of guy who can appreciate a joke even more when it is perpetrated against colleagues. That’s why while Pat Barry and “King Mo” Lawal were guests on MMA Scraps Radio recently, Harris pulled out his best ignorant redneck voice to play a little prank on the K-1 kickboxer turned MMA fighter by insisting that all this leg kicking nonsense is just not what real fighting is about.

The best moment is when Barry gets frustrated enough to float the idea of kicking this caller in the leg hard enough to make him think he got punched in the face. That’s when Harris, with perfect comedic timing, responds: “You must not be very educated because my leg and my face are very far apart.”

Gerald Harris, we don’t hand these out frivolously, but you, my friend, have earned yourself an official Cage Potato Attaboy.

(Looks like somebody took a wrong turn on the way to the Cirque du Soleil show. Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle.)

Don’t ask us to explain it, but whenever fighters and fans get together for a group photo, at least one person has to raise their fist like a tough guy. But instead of dropping the ban-hammer on this bizarre phenomenon, we decided to compile the most ridiculous, hilarious, and straight-up awesome MMA fighter fist-pose photos that we could find. If we left out any of your favorites, please shoot us some links in the comments section…

("Hey, hey, one at a time, I’m not that kind of boy.")

(Seriously, Guy-on-the-Right. What the hell have you been eating?)

(Left: WEC 47′s ugliest bloodbath. Right: WEC 47′s second-ugliest bloodbath.)

To the general public, March 6th seemed like any other Saturday. But for those of us who watched WEC 47, it was Opposite Day. Miguel Torres fought without his usual aggression and paid the ultimate price. Brian Bowles got absolutely clowned by Dominick Cruz and became the first fighter to be stopped by Cruz in the WEC. Stoppages outscored decisions, 8-3. The Fight of the Night went to a split freakin’ draw.

As you can imagine, few of us did well in our MMA FightPicker pools. Even our great leader Aaron Rampey didn’t win first place in any of his, though he did manage to tack on 112 chips to his grand total, and still sits comfortably in first place. This seems like a good time to mention that I, BG, tied with Rampey in our Contender Pool, while BF failed about as hard as we all figured he would. Surf_Finland won our pool (congrats!), which helped him move to the #2 spot in FightPicker’s current Top 5:

Aaron Rampey: 1,758
surf_finland: 829
Me: 800
Peetee: 800
ToothGuy: 796

Now that that’s behind us, what do we have to look forward to this week?

(Photo courtesy of Fight Magazine.)

After more than ten years in the game and 36 professional fights, it’s looking like the sun may have finally set on Jens Pulver’s career. “Lil Evil” wasn’t necessarily the guy who ever dominated his division completely. In fact, in many of his fights with big name opponents – guys like Takanori Gomi, Urijah Faber, and B.J. Penn (at least the second time) – he came out on the losing end. But fans have revered Pulver not because he won every time out, but because he always fought with fury and passion, and because there was always a chance that he might come close to decapitating someone with one well-placed left hand.

With a string of recent losses his fighting days are (hopefully) behind him for good now, but that doesn’t mean we should forget what a terror he once was. As we have with other MMA warriors, sometimes prematurely, we now pay tribute to some of Pulver’s greatest moments in the cage.

(Striking fear in the hearts of buffet owners everywhere.)

Now that James Toney has signed with the UFC and hired a trainer known primarily for his boxing expertise, you might think he’d be hard at work trying to get a feel for this MMA stuff. If this were a movie, this is the point where some inspiring, upbeat music would accompany a training montage that shows Toney’s rapid improvement in the span of just a few minutes. But this isn’t a movie; this is real life. And in real life, “Lights Out” isn’t really that worried about anyone taking him down and laying on top of him.

As Toney told MMAFighting.com, he still has yet to do any actual MMA sparring, but has been shown some “basics” by Juanito Ibarra. He’s also “tried a little kickboxing and wrestling,” but isn’t too concerned since it’s “all hand-to-hand combat.” In other words, don’t even trip. Toney has got this under control, playa.

(Maximo Blanco vs. Chang Hyun Kim; brutal finish @ 1:33. Props to WatchKalibRun)

From yesterday’s Sengoku Raiden Championships show in Tokyo…

– Jorge Santiago def. Mamed Khalidov via unanimous decision
– Akihiro Gono def. Diego Gonzalez via unanimous decision
– Maximo Blanco def. Chang Hyun Kim via KO, 1:10 of round 1
– Marlon Sandro def. Tomonari Kanomata via KO, 0:09 of round 1
– Yoshihiro "Kiss" Nakao def. Henry "Sentoryu" Miller via TKO, 3:27 of round 2
– Yuji Hoshino def. Nick Denis via submission (guillotine choke), 0:47 of round 2
– Leonardo Santos def. Kiuma Kunioku via submission (rear-naked choke), 3:06 of round 1
– Shigeki Osawa def. Kyung Ho Kang via unanimous decision

Two more fight videos after the jump…

(Props: FightersOnlyMagazine)

At WEC 47‘s post-event press conference, MMA legend Jens Pulver discussed the pride he feels in watching the lighter weight-divisions develop into popular, exciting products — even if the level of competition in those divisions has officially passed him by. "I’m just a proud old man," Pulver said. "I’m a proud poppa, I guess, I’m the godfather of this stuff, and it’s a good place and a good way to go." The younger fighters in attendance took some time to talk about what Jens meant to them as featherweights and bantamweights following the trail that Lil’ Evil blazed…

Scott Jorgensen: "Jens is one of the guys that kind of got me interested in MMA as an actual sport that I could compete in…The guy’s the greatest guy ever. He’s sincere, he’s from the heart, what he says he means. I don’t have a bad word to say about him, he’s the best, man. I wouldn’t be where I’m at today without people like Jens."

(Image courtesy of twitter.com/MiguelTorresMMA)

Yeah, that’s a bad one. In the co-main event of WEC 47 on Saturday, Joseph Benavidez struck a gusher on Miguel Torres‘s forehead before finishing him with a guillotine choke in the second round. Now, the former bantamweight champ will have a very prominent scar to remind him of the ugly loss. So what happened? Is Torres slipping, or was he undefeated for so long just because he never faced opponents as dangerous as Benavidez and Brian Bowles? Your thoughts, please.

A photo of the stitched up aftermath is after the jump…

(Looks like someone deserves a lollipop for being such a brave boy. Photo courtesy of Brian Bowles‘s Twitter.)

Fans were treated to a night of upsets at WEC 47, as favorites Brian Bowles and Miguel Torres both went down to unceremonious defeats in Columbus, Ohio. As you see in the above photo, Bowles wasn’t kidding about that injured hand. He claims to have broken it on the very first punch he landed, which then threw his whole game off and eventually prompted him to relinquish his title when he couldn’t continue past round two. That makes Dominick Cruz your new 135-pound champ, and the way the title’s been bouncing around lately he better get all the enjoyment he can out of it while it lasts.

In another minor shock, 5’4” Joseph Benavidez swarmed all over former champ Miguel Torres before securing a guillotine choke in the second round that forced Torres to tap out. With the victory, Benavidez claimed the $10,000 bonus check for Submission of the Night. The other bonus awards went to Anthony Pettis for his Knockout of the Night-winning finish of Danny Castillo, and to George Roop and Leonard Garcia, who earned Fight of the Night in a three-round draw during the prelims.

(Wait a minute, Brian Bowles was hanging out with Don Frye last night? I hope it’s not too late to change my FightPicker bet, because there’s no way Bowles wasn’t hung over and short one kidney this morning. Photo courtesy of the WEC 47: After the Weigh Ins gallery on CombatLifestyle.com.)

WEC 47 kicks off on Versus at 10 p.m. ET, featuring the bantamweight title fight between Brian Bowles and Dominick Cruz, plus Miguel Torres vs. Joseph Benavidez and Jens Pulver vs. Javier Vazquez. Follow us on Twitter tonight for updates, and let us know how you’re feelin’ in the comment thread below. Okay? Let’s have some fun tonight…

(Props: backcaster421)

To be fair, I think it’s really cool that your dad is Internet-savvy enough to record video blogs and post them to YouTube. I was a little worried after your mom divorced him, but it seems like he has a good outlet for expressing his opinions now, and he’s probably not as depressed as he would have been otherwise. 

That being said, I have to disagree with your dad’s take on Nick Diaz. Nobody said that every professional athlete has to be a role model for our youth that are growing up, particularly the ones that depend on a "bad boy" persona to be marketable. Diaz may be a loud-mouth punk, but he’s also one of the best welterweights in the world, and some of us actually find his antics entertaining. He’s not for everybody, I know. There might be a generation gap that’s keeping your dad from appreciating Nick’s unique brand of don’t-give-a-fuck-ness. And the middle fingers are a bit much, no argument there. But does that mean he should be banned from the sport, like your dad is suggesting?

As for the part about Robbie Lawler beating Diaz down to his knees and forcing him to his apologize for his mouth, please tell your dad that they fought once back in 2004, and Lawler got wrecked, so he’ll have to find another hero for his Nick Diaz humbling-fantasy. Nothing personal, it just seems like your dad has a lot of anger he’s still working through, and it might be a good idea to look for some new hobbies for him. Anyway, send him my best, and we’ll see you guys at Brian’s wedding, okay? 

Previously: Well-Informed Fight Expert Explains How He Would Beat the Inbred ‘Feedor Emelenkio’

(Go ahead, tell Bas Rutten that he doesn’t know how to use nutmeg properly. See what happens.)

- Dissecting James Toney’s actual MMA prospects. (The Rumble)

- Houston Alexander and Seth Petruzelli looking to scrap in April. (MMA Fighting)

- Did Nick Diaz call Takanori Gomi a very bad, very racist name? (Middle Easy)

- Torres and Benavidez discuss their impending bout. (Cagewriter)

- Stephan Bonnar has a new gig. (Fightlinker)

- Miguel Torres video blogs before his WEC 47 fight. (Heavy)

- Back in the day video: Wanderlei Silva vs. Mark Hunt. (MMA Share)

- More dubious remarks about Overeem’s supposed title defense. (Fighters Only)

- Juanito Ibarra vows "we’re gonna shock the world, dude." (Bleacher Report)

- There’s no consensus on what ‘having sex’ really means. (Asylum)

- Tim Burton’s latest looks cool, but falls flat. (Ask Men)

- Ben Roethlisberger accused of sexual assault…again. (Scores Report)

- Boise State player travels to the NFL combine in style. (Total Pro Sports)

- Your probably NSFW spicy gallery of the week. (Break)

- Unbelievable news stories that are actually real. (Holy Taco)

- A really creepy 3D bust of Mr. Burns. (Screen Junkies)

- 2011 Shelby Mustang GT350 pace car. (All Left Turns)

- The 5 books every man must read. (Made Man)

- Leaked footage of Sea World whale attacking trainer. (Nothing Toxic)

(Brian Bowles: kicking ass, letting his personal assistant take the names.)

All fighters made weight for the WEC 47 in lovely Columbus, Ohio this afternoon. While the spray tan crowd at the Arnold Classic won’t have UFC action to look forward to this weekend, as they have in previous years, at least there’s guys like Brian Bowles and Miguel Torres there to hurt people for their entertainment. Check out the official weigh-in results below.

By the way, you made your FightPicker picks yet? You know, this isn’t like buying a Mother’s Day gift. You can’t keep waiting until the last minute and trusting that the kindness of the gesture will pull you though.

Brian Bowles (134.5) vs. Dominick Cruz (134)
Miguel Torres (134.5) vs. Joseph Benavidez (135)
Jens Pulver (145.5) vs. Javier Vazquez (145)
Deividas Taurosevicius (145) vs. L.C. Davis (144.5)
Bart Palaszewski (155) vs. Karen Darabedyan (156)

You remember Paulo Filho, right? Brazilian dude, at one point considered the second-best middleweight in the world? Had a mental breakdown during a fight against Chael Sonnen, liked drugs, emerged from rehab with some of the strangest tattoos in MMA history? Well unfortunately, the former WEC champ isn’t 100% sane yet. After Filho no-showed a fight last month for Bitetti Combat (which he blamed on a financial dispute), his U.S. manager Ed Soares revealed that Filho was still battling his personal demons. Paulo recently checked in with GracieMag to tell everybody that he’s broke, and to show off his new face-tattoo, which is a homage to one of his heroes:

(I hope you’re working hard, James, because Kimbo is working double-hard.)

It’s not enough for the UFC to simply hold an event the same day their rivals are holding one. No, gentle readers, what Dana White may have in mind is far more savage. In an update on the Strikeforce: Nashville counter-programming situation, Sherdog passes along the following amazing detail:

Tennessee Athletic Commission Executive Director Jeff Mullen says that the UFC has not yet applied for a permit, but if this actually happens, holy shit. This is basically something Keyser Soze would do if he was running an MMA promotion. Again, overall TV ratings would still lean in favor of Strikeforce, but the UFC could steal a lot of the local heat in Nashville depending on who’s on the card. Although the proposed Mike Swick vs. Matt Serra match isn’t happening due to Swick’s impending arm-surgery, Carmichael Dave drops the rumor that James Toney vs. Kimbo Slice is being prepared as the main event for the UFC’s April 17th show.

Kind of short-notice for Lights Out, but it’s not like he was planning on getting his blue belt in BJJ before stepping into the Octagon. He’s working with a fucking boxing coach to prepare for his MMA debut, okay? He doesn’t plan on anybody laying on top of him like a lil’ fag, you feel me? All of this is still unconfirmed, but we hope it goes down, just so we can hear Dana White explain why Dan Henderson vs. Jake Shields is a freak show, while Kimbo vs. Dark Gable is legitimate MMA…

(‘Sorry everyone, but could we take another one? I forgot to sneer.’)

Really, there are two disturbing aspects to this rumor. One is that someone intentionally had sex with C.B. Dollaway. The other is that the same person was also, perhaps during the same general time period, having sex with Tiger Woods. Sports by Brooks says Tiger mistress and former reality TV show participant Jaimee Grubbs (not the girl pictured above, btw. we’re talking about the chick who was on "Tool Academy" until her boyfriend’s other girlfriend showed up, so yeah, classy broad) was also banging “The Doberman.” So you see? It’s not that this girl was intentionally trying to wreck Woods’ marriage. She just has really, really poor judgment.

(Man, I do not want to be the one to point out to Nate that the letter from Publishers Clearing House says he *might* have won ten million dollars.)

Nate Quarry takes on Jorge Rivera at the end of the month at Fight Night 21 in Charlotte, North Carolina, but there was a time not too long ago when a chronic back problem almost sidelined him for good. Recently “The Rock” sat down for an interview with Cage Potato to discuss the surgical procedure that likely saved his career, as well as his well-publicized beef with a former sponsor, and a special surprise he has in store for fans who still remember him as the only redeeming aspect of the infamous fight that saw Kalib Starnes run his way out of the UFC for good.

Your last fight against Tim Credeur was a great battle, you guys won Fight of the Night, but by the end you guys both looked like you had been to hell and back. As great as those fights are for the fans, do you ever think to yourself, Man, I don’t know how many of those I can do.

[Laughs] You know, I don’t think you can really go into this sport thinking too much about the end game. Part of the rush of the fight is living in the moment. You get so lost in what you’re doing. Fighting is one of those few times in your life where your goal is 100% clear. There’s nobody coming to stab you in the back. You don’t have to worry about your boss or your wife or your kids. You know that for the next fifteen minutes you have this guy who’s standing in front of you and he’s going to try and put you away. It’s such an incredible part of life to go through, to be so clear and single-minded.