(Keith Jardine: The love child of Michael Berryman and this thing. Photo courtesy of ESPN)

You know what time it is, Potato Nation — it’s time to steal some money from your girlfriend’s purse and wire it to a shady off-shore gambling site in the faint hope that A) You’ll win your bets, and B) They’ll eventually send you your profits. Lots of luck, suckers! As tradition dictates, here are the betting lines for Saturday’s TUF 11 Finale, courtesy of BestFightOdds.com 

Court McGee (-180) vs. Kris McCray (+175)
Matt Hamill (-138) vs. Keith Jardine (+125)
Aaron Simpson (-334) vs. Chris Leben (+292)
Spencer Fisher (-175) vs. Dennis Siver (+163)
Jamie Yager (-105) vs. Rich Attonito (+105)

John Gunderson (-245) vs. Mark Holst (+285)
Brad Tavares (-205) vs. Seth Baczynski (+200)
Kyle Noke (-185) vs. Josh Bryant (+170)
Chris Camozzi (-125) vs. James Hammortree (even)
Travis Browne (-185) vs. James McSweeney (+155)

So how can we beat the bookmakers on Saturday? Pull up a chair and I’ll lay it all out for you…

(Video courtesy of YouTube/ProMMNow)

Heavyweight standout Dave "Pee Wee" Herman spoke to ProMMANow recently and discussed his contract dispute with Bellator and legal arbitration he has been involved in with the organization.

"Well. I don’t really know what to say; I just have court. They were pretty much in breach of contract and I followed the contract and let ‘em know and they were just like ‘no’. It reminds me of the time I tried to break up with my girlfriend. We’re dating and I’m like, ‘Pfft…This relationship just isn’t working; we’re done.’ She was like, ‘We’re not done. We’re still going out.’ I was like, ‘Man, what to I say to that? I don’t know.’"

("Yep. Definitely sharted." Photo courtesy of MMA Junkie)

Strikeforce’s six-bout just-for-the-hell-of-it middle-of-the-damn-week event goes down tonight at the Nokia Theater in L.A., and will be broadcast on Showtime beginning at 11 p.m. ET/PT. If you’re still awake, come back to CagePotato.com at 11 p.m. ET for round-by-round updates from the main card. Will Renato Sobral earn a title shot against the light-heavyweight champ who won’t fight him? Will Robbie Lawler earn a title shot against the middleweight champ who won’t even be around after next month? There’s just so much at stake! Yesterday’s weigh-in results were…

Main Card
195 lbs. Catchweight: Robbie Lawler (195) vs. Renato Sobral (193.5)
Welterweight: Evangelista Santos (171) vs. Marius Zaromskis (169.5)
Middleweight: Tim Kennedy (185.5) vs. Trevor Prangley (185.6)
160 lbs.: Conor Heun (159.5) vs. K.J. Noons (159.5)

Preliminary Card
160 lbs.: R.J. Clifford (159.6) vs. Jeremy Umphries (159.5)
Bantamweight: Marcus Kowal (134.8) vs. Hugo Sandoval (135.6)

($10,000 for pouring an energy drink over my head? What would you fine Machida?)

We spoke with  Muhammed "King Mo’" Lawal at last weekend’s MMA Expo in Toronto and we asked him about the prospect of fighting friend and training partner Renato Sobral, should Babalu get past Robbie Lawler in the pair’s 195-pound catchweight bout tonight, and according to the Strikeforce light heavyweight champ, the fight will likely never happen.

"The thing is, Babalu is like my brother. I knew him before I started fighting and he was actually my favorite fighter when I first started to really follow the sport," explained Lawal. "I’ll fight anybody but him."

(Props: James Blair-BDog7)

You can call him a loudmouth liar with no heart — damned reality-show editing! — but to me, Jamie Yager was by far the most interesting character on the eleventh season of The Ultimate Fighter. In the Octagon, he kept his opponents guessing with wild high-kicks and a relentless pace. (Not that we don’t love a long, drawn-out, wrestling-based grind.) In the house, he had a way of pushing his fellow fighters’ buttons.

Since he’s still so new to the game, the only non-TUF fight featured in the above highlight reel comes from another reality show, The Iron Ring, which he also appeared on. Unsurprisingly, the video doesn’t include the anti-climactic ending of his fight against Josh Bryant. Can Fro Cop redeem himself at this Saturday’s TUF 11 Finale against Rich Attonito?

After the jump: To get that oily Yager taste out of your mouth, here’s another highlight reel that James Blair did for a more deserving fighter…

("For years, Forrest Griffin has been waiting anxiously to find himself in a post-apocalyptic future. Why’s he so excited about the near-extinction of mankind? Think about it: with grooming and personal hygiene no longer a prerequisite to social acceptance, you can let your mutton chops grow and live out your secret fantasy of becoming Wolverine. You could kill squirrels with your bare hands, practice throwing knives all day, and never have to say ‘excuse me’ after farting." Props: Amazon.com)

Some must-see highlights from our friends around the Internet. Show your support. Tip your waitress.

– Chael Sonnen Pulls Out of Oregon State Senate Race (FightMagazine)

– Punch Drunk Preview: Strikeforce Los Angeles (Heavy.com/MMA)

- New EA Sports MMA Trailer from E3 (MMA Scraps)

– Scott Coker Thinks Nick Diaz vs. Mayhem Miller Will Happen Within Year (MMAFighting)

– This UFC Board Game Will Have You Addicted (MiddleEasy)

– Battlefield Medicine: Rich Franklin’s Broken Arm (WatchKalibRun)

– The Fight After the Fight: BAMMA Stiffs Petruzelli, War Machine, Horwich (Five Ounces of Pain)

(With 9mm down and out, WEC is looking for someone to face "The Polish Hammer.")

TopMMANews is the first outlet to report that Ed Ratcliff has been forced to withdraw from his scheduled Sunday night WEC 49 showdown with Chris Horodecki in Edmonton, Alberta, for undisclosed reasons, although he is rumored to be injured, leaving the promotion scrambling to find a last-minute replacement for the former IFL standout.

Ratcliff confirmed the news on his Facebook page:

“I wanna say sorry to all the fans, family, and friends for having to pull out on such late notice. Even more importantly I wanna appologise to Chris Horodecki for going thru all of that hard work and not getting the final release u deserve. I wish u the best. Sorry everyone.!!!!!!”

(I’m not sure if I can pull off a playing a brash, cocky hoodlum, but I’ll give it a shot.)

Now when people talk about the "Michael Bisping soap opera," there’s a good chance they’ll be talking about a television show, not the drama the perpetual smack-talker usually creates leading up to his UFC bouts. 

The 31-year-old Cyprus-born Liverpudlian revealed during The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani today that he will play a gangster on an unnamed British daytime drama.

"I’m expecting to get a lot of grief from the Internet," Bisping told Helwani. "It’s not a novel soap opera, it’s a daytime soap opera. I play a bit of a bad guy."

(Travis Browne’s knockout of Brian Campbell)

(Travis Browne’s knockout of Abe Wagner)

Along with the six TUF 11 castmembers getting a shot on the preliminary card of this Saturday’s Finale show, two Octagon first-timers will also be trying to make a big impression. Get to know them below, and tell us how you think they’ll fare in the comments section…

TRAVIS BROWNE (HW)
Experience: 9-0 record with appearances in Bellator, King of the Cage, and Gladiator Challenge. Five of his wins came within the first minute of the fight. Most recently scored a 35-second knockout of Aaron Brink at a GC event in February, which followed an eight-second knockout of Abe Wagner two weeks earlier and a nine-second knockout of Brian Campbell last November.
Will be facing: James McSweeney (4-4, 1-0 UFC)
Lowdown: At 6’6", 250 pounds, and with a Carwin-like habit of ending fights early, Travis Browne could make a very nice addition to the UFC’s heavyweight roster. Based out of the Alliance Training Center in San Diego, "Hapa" works as a professional dog trainer when he’s not knocking people unconscious. Browne was exposed to drug and gang culture in his native Hawaii at an early age, but escaped his rough upbringing and found a positive outlet for his aggression in jiu-jitsu. He was not selected to appear on Bully Beatdown, which really bothered him.

(Fedor, didn’t I lay out the black tie for you?)

Ray Hui from MMAFighting spoke with M-1 Global director of operations, Evgeni Kogan and asked him why the heavily anticipated Fedor Emelianenko-Alistair Overeem Strikeforce bout has yet to materialize.

According to Kogan, contrary to popular belief, his company has very little to do with picking opponents for their client and he says that they would take a fight with Overeem if it were offered to them.

"The matchmaking for this is more coming out of Strikeforce than from our side. We are open to fighting basically whoever is put in front of us," Kogan explained. "There has never been a point where [a fight with Overeemt] was offered and turned down. M-1 management is not ducking Overeem, and once again, if that fight is presented to us, then that’s what that fight will be."

When Impact FC announced its July fight cards, most of us looked at the fact that Pedro Rizzo and his chronically unreliable fellow Brazilian, Paulo Filho were fighting two weekends in a row and said "Good luck with that."

Well, now it seems that a yet-to-be-named promotion is rolling the dice one more time by adding Rizzo, Filho and fellow Impact FC signee Murilo Bustamante to a planned August 14 card, according to TATAME.

MMA fans have their work cut out for them this week, with three notable events featured on cable TV. Tomorrow night, Strikeforce: Los Angeles airs on Showtime (11 p.m. ET/PT), headlined by Robbie Lawler vs. Renato Sobral. On Saturday, the TUF 11 Finale goes down in Las Vegas (Spike TV, 9 p.m. ET/PT), with Court McGee and Kris McCray battling for the weird glass trophy, and Matt Hamill and Keith Jardine meeting in a light-heavyweight scrap. And on Sunday, Jamie Varner and Kamal Shalorus face off in a potential #1 lightweight contender’s match at WEC 49 in Edmonton (Versus, 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT). 

This week’s MMA FightPicker pools focus on the TUF 11 Finale, but we’ve also thrown in three matchups from the WEC card just to keep you on your toes. Feeling lucky? Then join some pools and show everybody how smart you really are. The current questions are after the jump…

"Some people are sending [us] emails going, ‘You guys are crazy going [to Salt Lake City] on a Sunday; it’s a holy day’…We’re going there on a Sunday. We’re going to Salt Lake City, Utah, and we’re going to put on an event…Talk to God and let him give you the day off to come watch." — Dana White, 4/22/10

Well, God has spoken, and he says "no dice." Due to sluggish ticket sales, the UFC on Versus 2 event scheduled for August 1st at the EnergySolutions Arena in Salt Lake City has been canceled, and will instead be held at the San Diego Sports Arena. Said Dana: "Our television ratings in Salt Lake City have always been strong. When we finally found the opportunity to bring a UFC event there with a great card, I was very surprised and disappointed in ticket sales."

Fans who purchased tickets to the Salt Lake City event will receive a full refund, and tickets to the show at the San Diego venue go on sale this Saturday at 10 a.m. According to DW, it’s the first time in the company’s history that a venue has been changed after tickets already went on sale; UFC 12 comes to mind as an exception, but still, this is basically unprecedented. So what does it mean?

Our own senior editor, Mike Russell was on hand at last weekend’s MMA Expo in Toronto, where he caught up with a number of MMA fighters, including former UFC welterweight Karo Parisyan.

As always, “The Heat” had a lot to say about a variety of subjects including how he’s turned the corner from his highly publicized depression and anxiety issues that he revealed to us included thoughts of suicide, his upcoming fight in Australia, what really happened during his meeting with Strikeforce president Scott Coker, his hope that fans will forgive his past mistakes and aspiration to one day compete again in the Octagon.

Parisyan admits he screwed up and that digging himself out of the hole he dug for himself will be an arduous task, but points out that he is prepared to do whatever it takes to earn back the respect of the MMA community and to one day make it back to the UFC.
 

Buncha savages in this town. Props to MMA TKO and MiddleEasy.

(Props: SNETCF)

It’s one thing to deny responsibility for your own Twitter page when your creative insults start to draw attention on mainstream news outlets — particularly when you’re trying to lead a double-life as a shit-stirring heel and a respectable business owner and candidate for the Oregon State Legislature. Sure, it’s a lie that’s easily disproven, but at least we understand the motivation. What we can’t understand is the way Chael Sonnen constantly lies about everything. His record, his opponents, general details about things that happen to him in his daily life, you name it. Obvious, shameless lies. My God, they just keep coming.

So far, I’ve been a fan of Sonnen’s verbal abuse of Anderson Silva, because Silva kind of deserves it, and nobody else has had the stones to disrespect the Spider the way Sonnen has. But watching the above MMA Connected clip this morning, I couldn’t help but feel that Sonnen’s schtick has officially jumped the shark — and that he might not even be in control of himself anymore. Let’s run down this interview appearance, point-by-point…

(Sir, take your shirt off and come with us.)

According to a report from Fighters Only, Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic was interrogated  questioned at length by Canadian immigration officials about his Croation military career and possible knowledge of war crimes committed during the Yugoslavian civil war that took place in the 90′s and was close to being deported for not cooperating with the group.

Cro Cop, a former soldier, who is now a member of Croation parliament says Canadian officials threatened to put him back on a plane and send him home for not answering a number of questions they asked him. Apparently they wanted him to give them the names of individuals he had served with and whether or not he was involved in or witnessed the torture or interrogation of civilians during the war, but when he refused to discuss what he knew, they tried to play hardball.

(Picture the pad as Koscheck’s face, Georges.)

We spoke with the longtime coach and trainer of UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre, Firas Zahabi this weekend about the recent claims made by his charge’s opposing The Ultimate Fighter 12 coach, Josh Koscheck that GSP likely uses steroids. Part of Kos’ argument focused on the fact that St-Pierre was in shape all year round, insinuating that most fighters get fat when they don’t have fights coming up. Maybe that’s why GSP’s a champion and Koscheck isn’t?

According to the head of Zahabi MMA, there is absolutely no truth to Koscheck’s baseless claims, that were backed by BJ Penn, who retracted his retraction regarding similar claims he made last year in a video he posted on his website last week.

(Bring him the gabagool and nobody gets hurt. Photo courtesy of Rich’s Facebook page.)

Our beloved TUF 11 guest blogger wraps up last week’s jam-packed episode, and explains why things got so heated between house heel Jamie Yager and the rest of the fighters. Rich and Jamie will throw down this Saturday at the TUF 11 Finale. Tune in and show your support!

Last week everyone was treated to the final episode of The Ultimate Fighter with certainly no shortage of drama. But first we got a visit from some guys who know how to handle drama the right way, the Marine Corps. My grandfather was in the Marines. Several of my uncles also served in the Armed Forces as well. So it was great when Dana surprised us with a visit from these guys.

We got a chance to see and learn some very cool tactical techniques they use for disarming people with weapons. They were so efficient at it, they made it look easy. After we got to train together they came over for a BBQ. We got a chance to interact with them on a more personal level and it was definitely fun to meet these guys and hear their stories. I have the utmost respect for the men and women of our country who sacrifice so much for our personal freedoms. I made sure I took the chance to express my gratitude to them.

(Photo courtesy of MMAFighting.com’s UFC 115 Fight Night Photos gallery.)

Chuck Liddell may have lost his ability to take a punch, but he still had enough offensive firepower at UFC 115 to break Rich Franklin’s arm with the first body kick he threw. Following their meeting on Saturday night, Ace confirmed that he broke his left ulna during the fight, and would be in a cast for at least eight weeks. As the former UFC middleweight champ told reporters at the post-fight press conference:

"I definitely wasn’t going to quit — I’ve broken bones before and continued fighting — but there was part of me that was wondering what kind of strategy I was going to use to win the fight with a broken left arm in the second and third rounds." 

…proving once again that knocking your opponent out early is always the best gameplan. (Are you listening, Pat?) Liddell woke up from his knockout with a horribly split lip and a gash over his left eye, but that didn’t stop him from making an appearance at his afterparty. A photographic timeline of Chuck’s night continues after the jump.

(This moment brought to you by FreeHugsCampaign.org. This pic brought to you by UFC.com.)

In MMA, we’re constantly being reminded that one of the many things that makes our sport great is the mutual respect and admiration between the athletes. As fans, there’s something inspiring about seeing two guys pound each other for 15 minutes and then smile and shake hands afterward. It’s also fun to see guys fight when it seems like they’re really enjoying themselves. The sportsmanship, the camaraderie, the brotherhood; that stuff is great. But last night at UFC 115, all the smoking-and-joking and gripping-and-grinning might well have cost Pat Barry a win.

(VidProps: MMA Fighting)

Regardless of how you think of Chuck Liddell on a personal level, it was hard not to feel bad for the guy last night. Liddell seemed just seconds away from heading back to his corner up 1-0 during his UFC 115 main event fight against Rich Franklin, after showing off a surprisingly diverse striking attack and even a takedown during the opening stanza. Then Franklin clipped him with a short right square on the jaw and as soon as Liddell’s rigid body hit the canvas, you could almost hear the entire MMA world sigh and say: Well, that’s the end of that.

And it was. Hopefully for good this time. In the above video with Ariel Helwani, UFC President Dana White guaran-damn-tees that we’ve really, absolutely seen the end of “The Iceman” in the Octagon. Liddell was taken to the hospital immediately following the fight, so he and White had not yet spoken at the time of filming, but there’s no arguing with the decision. At this point in his career – after three consecutive ugly KO losses – it’s starting to look like a solid gust of wind has to potential to knock Liddell stiff. It’s time to pull the plug on this thing while he still has most of his faculties.

Some decent fights tonight. I’m guessing we’ve seen the last of "The Crow" and "The Iceman" and we’ll be seeing a lot more of Rich Franklin (once his arm heals) Rory MacDonald, Martin Kampmann, Carlos Condit and Claude Patrick.

I’m thinking Cro Cop UFC career may be close to its expiry date considering he is on the last fight of his contract and he carries an exorbitant price tag, but you never know.

Check out the post-fight presser after the jump. It should start around 1:30am ET.

(Maybe now I can get some RE$PECT!)

I just got back from the MMA Expo in Toronto and will have a bunch of interesting video, audio and text versions of interviews I did with Forrest Griffin, Karo Parisyan, King Mo’, Bibiano Fernandes, Firas Zahabi, Shonie Carter, Ryan Ford and Dan Miller up on the site this week.

Unfortunately, I was unable to land one with Jake Shields, as, immediately following his teaching session at the Paradise Warrior Retreat, he was whisked away in a car to catch a plane to Vancouver to attend tonight’s UFC show.

I had a small window of time for a brief exchange as he walked to the parking lot, so I handed him the Photoshop I did of him outside the pawn shop after selling the Strikeforce belt and questioned why it was so important that he be at the show tonight. I asked him if we can expect an announcement at the show that he was Octagon-bound, to which he replied, "Not yet," but what else could he say if an announcement is forthcoming?

I’d say there’s a pretty good chance we’ll hear something tonight.

*FYI, he had already seen the picture as a someone had sent him a copy.

"Yeah, I’ve seen that one. It’s funny, but it isn’t real," he said. "Somebody Photoshopped it."

(“Go ahead and strap that black belt on right here, Deano.”)

Amid concerns this week that James Toney may not yet have signed his formal bout agreement to face Randy Couture at UFC 118, reports surfaced that the former boxing champion had tabbed one-time Xtreme Couture affiliate Dean Lister and Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Muhammed Lawal to help shore up his ground game. To this, I say: Bullshit. Toney might be rolling with Lister and Lawal a bit just to keep up appearances, but there’s no way he’s making an honest effort to learn to grapple.

Look, in his day James Toney was nothing short of an unmitigated badass. He was a guy who took on all-comers in numerous weight classes and more often than not came out on top. Even at his advanced age he can still hit very, very hard. But Toney has never, especially in recent years, been overly committed to training. The idea that he would suddenly attempt to augment his skill-set three months before his MMA debut is far-fetched. The notion that – even if he did – he could close the grappling gap on Couture in that short amount of time is, well, ludicrous.

(See, this only looks like a picture of Chael Sonnen getting arm-barred by Jeremy Horn at UFC 60. It’s actually just a clever Chael Sonnen impersonator. PicProps: Susumu)

So in a nutshell, here’s what Chael Sonnen would currently have us believe about his “fake” Twitter feed: Back in February, some enterprising imposter started an account in Sonnen’s name for the purpose of … well, we’re not sure exactly why … but over the next four months only used the account to post a grand total of 10 tweets (two of which link to Sonnen’s website) and did such a good job parroting the middleweight’s distinctively crazy voice that not only did no one notice the charade, but the UFC’s official twitter feed and Sonnen’s own “official campaign” Twitter account both became followers of the "fake" Chael Sonnen.

At least that’s the story Sonnen seemed to be sticking to as recently as Friday, when he appeared on stage for a Q&A session with luminaries from the UFC Fight Club in Vancouver and again reportedly claimed that he does not have a Twitter account. This despite the small matter of a video from a couple months back where he not only admits it to Ariel Helwani (at about the 45:40 mark) but spells out the “fake” account’s address so we can all find it.

Apparently, if someone is impersonating Chael Sonnen on Twitter, they’re doing such a great job that even he thought it was his real account for a while there.

(Ken Shamrock on steroids? Stop the presses!)

The revelation of a UFC Hall of Famer’s past steroid use promised by HDNet’s “Inside MMA” became pretty anticlimactic on Friday when the fighter in question turned out to be Ken Shamrock. While Shamrock’s taped interview during a segment of the show called “Fighting Words with Mike Straka” marked his first public admission of cheating, the MMA pioneer has long been rumored to dabble in the juice and tested positive for banned substances following his most recent victory –  a submission win over the now-deceased Ross Clifton in Feb. of 2009  — so the news came as a surprise to exactly no one.

More interesting than the actual confession were Shamrock’s contentions that steroids are so easy to get it’s “like going to the grocery store,” and that fans should shoulder at least some of the responsibility for athletes turning to performance enhancers.

(Video courtesy of YouTube/GoodMorningTexas)

Gone are the days of seeing Chuck all hopped up on "NyQuil" rambling on about fighting Tommy Morrison and Vernon "Tiger" White on morning television. "The Iceman" has reinvented himself physically for his fight with Rich Franklin tomorrow night in Vancouver at UFC 115, which means night clubs and pharmacies have taken a hit beyond what the recession dealt them.

Feel free to rewatch the video, reminisce about this bizarre moment in MMA history and talk amongst yourselves until the stream of the weigh-ins goes live tonight at 7pm ET.

As always, the link to the UFC media player is after the jump

(Everyone’s a suspect, but only one man will admit it on Inside MMA tonight)


(Video courtesy InsideMMA/HDNet)

Tune into tonight’s episode of HDNet’s Inside MMA for an interesting episode that focuses on the use of performance enhancing drugs in MMA.  Dennis Hallman shocks the panel with his revelation that at least 50% of fighters are on the juice and a UFC Hall of Famer will admit his past steroid use on the show.

Place your bets on whether it’s Ken Shamrock, Mark Coleman, Royce Gracie or more likely Dan Severn, who just happened to retire in April and is likely shopping around for a publisher for his biography.

How crazy would it be if it’s Randy or Chuck?

- James Toney has tapped out "King" Mo Lawal in training. (Middle Easy)

-Video Renato"Babalu" Sobral is mean, crazy, and hungry. (Fight Magazine)

- Carlo Prater set to take on Ryan Ford at TFC 11. (TopMMANews)

- July 23 Kaufmann-Modafferi title fight official. (MMAFighting)

- Dean Lister training James Toney in BJJ. (MMAFighting)

- King Mo’ wants Shogun. (Tatame)

- The pros weight in on Liddell-Franklin. (Sherdog)

- Girlfriend deletes boyfriend’s Warcraft characters. Tantrum ensues. (Break)

- Dating red flag of the week: Daddy’s girl. (Asylum)

- A-Team review. (ScreenJunkies)

- How to put together a burglary kit (MadeMan)

- 25 pictures of the USC song girls (HolyTaco)

- LOL race pics (AllLeftTurns)

- Should the Lakers trade Bynum for Bosh? (ScoresReport)

- Little kids light up with no adults in sight (NothingToxic)

– Parenting fail. (FailBlog)