(Eat up Mr. Feathers. I chewed up these worms and grubs special for you.)

From the time he first began knocking out anyone who was foolish enough to stare across a boxing ring at him, Mike Tyson has been one of the most polarizing fighters in professional sports.

From his highly publicized problematic personal life that included a stint in prison for a rape he still contends never took place to his falling out with promoter Don King and his business managers who he says all robbed him blind, Tyson walked a thin, yet precarious line of contradiction between the seemingly invincible, cold, calculated killer in the ring and the frail, emotional and mental midget outside of it.

If you were a fan of boxing in the 90s, you were more than likely a fan of Tyson. Pound for pound, many feel he was the best fighter who ever competed. He was the "Anderson Silva" or the "Fedor Emelianenko" of boxing long before either fighter ever competed in a cage or ring.

In recent years, the former champ who was purportedly once worth more than $300 million has suffered a lifetime’s worth of tragedy and tribulation, claiming bankruptcy in 2003 and tragically losing his four-year-old daughter in 2009.

(Props: Mifojei via CRE)

An Alistair Overeem highlight video edited to follow the dialogue and plot of Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange? Why the hell not. After all, the Demolition Man has a way with the ol’ ultraviolence. If you’re unfamiliar with ACO, check out the beginning of the flick after the jump to see where this strange little vid gets its inspiration…

(Don’t look in his eyes, Reem. That’s how he steals your soul.)

Well, Alistair Overeem, Scott Coker and M-1 Global’s collective prayers may have been answered.

According to a report from Super Lutas, Werdum may be out of action for the rest of the year due to an injury that will likely require surgery and rehab to remedy, likely clearing the way for an Alistair Overeem-Fedor Emelianenko Strikeforce heavyweight title fight later this year.

(Sylvester Stallone reads Modern Man every day — right after his HGH injections. Seriously though, are you kidding me with those arm-veins? Thor was drawn more realistically.)

Attention! A new guy-centric website called ModernMan.com has joined the Break Media family, and we highly recommend you check it out. Described as "the online destination for guys who want to keep evolving," MM provides helpful advice on how to look and feel your best, how to talk to women so that they’ll agree to have sex with you, what to do after those women have agreed to have sex with you, what shiny new bullshit to squander your money on, and so much more. Check out a couple of their articles below, and follow Modern Man on Twitter and Facebook. Much appreciated.

– How To Get Laid on Facebook

– Sports Cars That Will Make You Look Richer Than You Really Are

– 7 Gadgets That Make You Smarter

- Prevent Hair Loss Before It’s Too Late

(Ladies and gentlemen, I present you with Paulo Filho’s next tattoo)?

When the upstart Impact Fighting Championships organization announced it would be putting on a series of events in Australia anchored by a cast of controversial WEC, PRIDE and UFC castaways like Karo Parisyan, Ricco Rodriguez, Paulo Filho, Ken Shamrock, Paul Daley and Jesse Taylor, Ben and I figuratively high-fived each other in anticipation of the sheer amount of material for the site the event would undoubtedly produce.??

The fact that the first show basically went off without a hitch would have lost us both money if we trusted our predictions enough to bet that there would be problems with the show.??

As the saying goes, "Men make MMA predictions and God laughs." With that in mind, let’s revisit some of the most classic blunders in CP history, in chronological order. Good thing we’re completely unaccountable for the things we say here!

From: "Gambling Addiction Enabler: UFC 84 Edition" (The very first installment of the G.A.E.)
BG said: "Look, we know the Axe Murderer was a killer in PRIDE — but he needs to win a couple in the Octagon to convince me that he’s just as fearsome over here. Take away the use of soccer kicks and knees to the head on the ground, biased refs and judges, matchmaking that had him go up against opponents that were tailor-made for his style, (*cough*steroids*cough*), and the confidence that comes from never losing, and we’re not even talking about the same guy anymore. Silva won’t be doing any axe-murdering at UFC 84 — he’s going to be fighting not to lose, and will come out a much more cautious, tentative version of himself. Meanwhile, Jardine is surely working on another great game-plan with Greg Jackson, knowing that if he pulls off another big win his title shot will be waiting."
What happened: Wanderlei Silva via KO (rape choke), 0:36 of round 1. LOL @ Jardine’s "title shot."

From: "UFC 85: Bedlam — Ipecac Rematch Picks" (this article seems to have disappeared from the Internet; you can check out a screen-shot from my Google Reader here, and a little bit of backstory here.)
BG said: "Matt Hughes may be on the decline, and Thiago Alves is definitely on the come-up, but they haven’t passed each other yet, so to speak. Though Alves caught Karo Parisyan at UFC Fight Night 13, he’s failed in previous big tests against Spencer Fisher and Jon Fitch. Hughes may have trouble with Alves’s striking and youthful energy, and a submission victory is unlikely, but I can see the future Hall of Famer dominating the young challenger with his wrestling and grinding out a decision."
What happened: Matt Hughes got utterly ruined by the Pitbull’s striking and youthful energy; Alves via TKO, 1:02 of round 2. I lost bragging rights to Fightlinker, as well as the entire contents of my stomach.

(You got *lucky*, Soa!)

With such a volatile lineup, it was only a matter of time before names started dropping off Impact FC’s event in Sydney this weekend (which takes place Sunday afternoon local time, Saturday evening if you’re in North America). The first casualty is Bob Sapp, whose fight against Aussie UFC vet Soa Palelei has been canceled. So what the hell happened? Well…

Bob’s side of the story (via MMA Junkie): Sapp, who is currently in Bulgaria shooting that Conan the Barbarian remake, received an e-mail from Impact yesterday informing him that they wouldn’t fly him out to Sydney because the plane ticket would be too expensive. "Just like that," Sapp said. "We had all the paperwork completed." The Beast claims he had assembled a training camp in Bulgaria for the bout, and spent at least $10,000 on coaches, training partners, and living expenses. Sapp’s team plans to draft a formal letter to Impact FC asking for reimbursement of those expenses. If they don’t pay up, he’ll file a lawsuit. "I’m not going to allow anybody to screw me over," Sapp said.

(Armageddon is fitting name for the promotion, since Kalib Starnes fighting for a title likely signals that the world is coming to an end.)

If you’re jonesing for some MMA to watch this weekend since July is pretty dry for events, and you don’t want to shell out the $29.95 for the Austrailian Impact FC "Island of Misfit Toys" pay-per-view, for the price of a small pizza you can watch a pretty decent card from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada on Saturday night.

Armageddon 3 will feature a middleweight title bout between Nick Hinchliffe and UFC 100-yard dash record holder Kalib Starnes (who, incidentally, gave me the excuse linked here after the day after the bout with Quarry, and later, when he was criticized for his comments, tried to excuse the excuse by wrongfully blasting me on the Sherdog forums for printing comments he says he made "off the record" even though he didn’t bother to mention that they were).

(For those of you wondering, now we know what happened to Color Me Badd)

Strikeforce held a press conference yesterday at the Toyota Center in advance of its August 21 event that will take place at the venue in Houston, Texas. Ben and I were both unable to attend since, well,  neither of us wanted to, but thankfully KBME Sports Talk 790 was on hand to catch what we may have missed.

The videos are after the jump.

(Props: V4YDEN via MMA Scraps)

October 2002, Montreal. With first-round stoppages against Ivan Menjivar and Justin Bruckmann under his belt, Georges St. Pierre (2-0) was already the welterweight champion of the Canada-based Universal Combat Challenge when he stepped into the ring against Edmonton native Travis Galbraith, who was a slightly-more-seasoned 5-1 at the time. It took St. Pierre all of four seconds to score the double-leg takedown — Rush was already a natural at age 21 — and aside from an armlock attempt, Galbraith didn’t have much to offer on the ground.

The real reason to check out this fight if you’ve never seen it before is the unique finish, which starts around 3:23. With Galbriath’s arms locked around GSP’s arm and neck, St. Pierre pulls up and drives Galbriath’s head against the mat a couple times. After throwing in a couple of conventional strikes, GSP goes back to the brutal short-slams until his opponent is dazed and the ref stops the fight. After two more wins in Canada, St. Pierre earned his ticket to the UFC. And hopefully we’ll see this finishing move again someday…

(After shaving his chest and face, Karo hit 170 with ease.)

Karo Parisyan spoke with MMAJunkie Radio yesterday and explained in depth the Strikeforce deal, codenamed by the promotion’s CEO Scott Coker as "a cup of coffee," that never materialized.

According to the beleaguered former UFC fighter who has admitted that he has struggled with anxiety and although he hasn’t confirmed the rumor, is said to have battled addiction to painkillers the past few years, the contract was all but drawn up and it was he who rejected the deal because of certain provisions.

A 46-year-old admitted steroid user. A hot-headed sucker-puncher. A veteran film actor. A crazy person. Not one, but two TUF 7 burnouts. Yep, this Sunday’s Impact FC show in Sydney is going to be all kinds of stupid. Even if you’re not buying the pay-per-view, please head over to fightpicker.cagepotato.com and see how accurately you can predict the results. Although with a card this volatile, you may as well try to predict how many fights War Machine will get into while incarcerated.

This week’s MMA FightPicker pool question list is after the jump. If you have any other ideas for FP questions related to the Impact show, please let us know in the comments section. Who knows, we may toss your question in as a bonus on Friday..

(If a regarded submission and kickboxing specialist like Butterbean thinks Pudz needs to round out his game, it must be true.)

It didn’t take long for Moosin USA promoter Eric "Butterbean" Esch to go into damage control when he saw his potential October 9 main event slip through his fingertips.

A day after Sherdog’s Loretta Hunt quashed Moosin executive Corey Fischer’s claim in a report by MMAFighting that the promotion was finalizing a marquee bout between Kimbo Slice and Mariusz Pudzianowski for the planned Chicago show, Butterbean has spun the situation in a press release sent out by the organization earlier today.

(Miguel may have lost a pint of blood, but he *gained* a pint of valuable life experience. / Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

There was a time when Miguel Torres looked absolutely untouchable in the WEC bantamweight division. But after two consecutive stoppage losses to Brian Bowles and Joseph Benavidez, the former champion finds himself in an odd position — in the middle of the 135-pound pack, fighting up the ladder like everybody else. Torres will return to competition at WEC 51 (September 30th; Broomfield, Colorado) against Charlie Valencia, who is 5-3 in the WEC and has picked up three-straight decision victories against Seth Dikun, Coty Wheeler, and Akitoshi Tamura. Not a bad resume, but Torres doesn’t plan on adding his name to it. In fact, he’s already planning to, well, return to the old Miguel. As he tells MMA Fighting:

("Filthy" Tom Lawlor gives an interview to Aaron Tru while getting a colonic. Luckily, the years spent training with Seth Petruzelli have prepared him for this moment. Props: truplya777)

Some selected highlights from our friends around the MMA blogosphere. E-mail feedback@cagepotato.com for details on how your site can join the MMA Link Club…

– Midseason MMA Awards: Best Knockout (MMA Fighting)

- Dana White: Vladimir Matyushenko Deserves Shot Against Jon Jones (Versus MMA Beat)

– GSP Says He’ll Retire Once He’s the Best Pound-for-Pound (Watch Kalib Run)

– FIGHT! Girl Galleries (Fight! Magazine)

– M-1 Global Is Launching Its Own TUF-Style Reality Show (LowKick)

- It’s Official: Dan Quinn vs. Aaron Brink Is Going Down August 20th (MiddleEasy)

– 5 Biggest Threats To Brock Lesnar’s Belt (Heavy.com/MMA)

– Rusty Business: Addressing the Problem of Ring Rust in MMA (Five Ounces of Pain)

– Jose Canseco’s Celebrity Boxing Record Drops to 1-2-1 After Losing to 60-Year-Old Athletic Trainer Gary Hogan (MMA Scraps)

(The pair will square off on the aptly named "Shark Fights: Pretty Boys" card)

Recently released UFC veteran Keith Jardine didn’t stay long testing the waters of free agency. 

According to a report from Loretta Hunt of Sherdog, "The Dean of Mean" has signed with the fledgling Texas-based Shark Fights organization and will make his debut against the promotion’s light heavyweight champion, Trevor Prangley in a non-title affair September 11 in Lubbock, Texas.

(Photo courtesy of travisthehurricane.com)

Bellator announced yesterday that they have signed 14-2 prospect Travis "The Hurricane" Reddinger for their upcoming bantamweight tournament. You can’t miss him — he’s the guy with the enormous "BELLATOR" tattoo on his stomach. So did Reddinger get the piece done in a fit of excitement after he learned of his signing? Nope. It turns out it was just a strange coincidence. As Travis explained, he got the tat four-and-a-half years ago, long before Bellator Fighting Championships even existed: 

"For me it just symbolizes perseverance and the never-say-die mentality that I strive for. I know that Bellator stands for the warrior mentality as well, so it’s a great honor for me to be a part of the organization.”

Makes sense to us, though it’s still going to to look strange when he gets picked up by the WEC. Reddinger’s Bellator-ink earns him a spot in MMA’s Weird-Stomach-Tattoo Hall of Fame. You can check out the other members after the jump…

(Eat your heart out, Yamma.)

Well it appears that contrary to popular belief, Moosin MMA may not go the way of the Yamma, just yet.

MMAFighting is reporting that the promotion, which is co-owned and promoted by Eric"Butterbean" Esch and Corey Fischer is planning a second card tentatively scheduled for October 9 in Chicago, Illinois.

According to Fischer, the promotion is in the process of securing a number of main event fights for the card that could potentially include UFC cast-off Kimbo Slice squaring off against "World’s Strongest Man" Mariusz Pudzianowski as well as a battle of awkward gangly brawlers Tim Sylvia and Hong Man Choi.

("Could you make it out to ‘the guy that ended my career’?")

According to Rich Franklin’s business manager, J.T. Stewart the former UFC middleweight champion will not require surgery for the broken ulna he sustained in his UFC 115 knockout win over Chuck Liddell last month.

Stewart told MMAJunkie that Franklin could be back in the Octagon as soon as December.

"He needed to make sure it healed correctly," Stewart said. "He was feeling good. A few days before (the doctor’s appointment), he was telling some people, ‘I don’t think I’m going to need surgery. It’s feeling pretty good.’"

("Congrats buddy, here’s your piece of jagged f*cking glass." Photo courtesy of UFC.com)

MMA Junkie reported yesterday that TUF 11 winner Court McGee will return to the Octagon at UFC 121 (October 23rd, Anaheim) against Ryan Jensen. In doing so, the well-bearded Utah native follows a proud tradition of Ultimate Fighter winners who take on middling veterans directly after winning their six-figure contracts, and beat them (most of the time) before eventually dropping in weight (some of the time). As a helpful reference, we decided to put together a timeline of those first post-TUF fights, as well as some relevant statistics. Starting at the beginning…

Season 1 light-heavyweight winner: Forrest Griffin
First post-TUF opponent: Bill Mahood (0-0 in the UFC at the time)
Result: Griffin via submission (rear-naked choke), round 1
Is Mahood still in the UFC? No, the fight against Griffin was Mahood’s only Octagon appearance.
Does Griffin still compete at light-heavyweight? Yes

Season 1 middleweight winner: Diego Sanchez
First post-TUF opponent: Brian Gassaway (0-0 in the UFC at the time)
Result: Sanchez via submission (strikes), round 2
Is Gassaway still in the UFC? No, the fight against Sanchez was Gassaway’s only Octagon appearance.
Does Sanchez still compete at middleweight? No. Sanchez immediately dropped to welterweight after the show, and has spent the majority of his UFC career there.

("Okay, fine! Team Edward! Team Edward!" Joey Villasenor gets chased down by Ronaldo Souza at Heavy Artillery. Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

It was announced on Friday that Strikeforce: Houston — which goes down August 21st at the Toyota Center, and will be headlined by the light-heavyweight championship match between Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal and Rafael "Feijao" Cavalcante — will also feature a fight between Tim Kennedy and Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza for the organization’s middleweight title, which recently became vacant when Jake Shields got fired. But wait just a goddamned minute, wasn’t the new MW champ supposed be determined by a potentially epic tournament? Well, it seems that was the plan. Unfortunately, Strikeforce didn’t do their homework before booking the event. As MMAFighting.com explains:

Strikeforce had been planning a one-night, four-man tournament in Houston to determine its next champion. The four competitors were to be Kennedy, Souza, Robbie Lawler and Matt Lindland. Those plans, however, were nixed by the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation…

TDLR administrator Greg Alvarez confirmed to MMA Fighting on Saturday that Strikeforce wanted a one-night, bracket-style tournament for the Houston show, which will air live on Showtime. But Alvarez said that request was denied. "They asked if it was possible and I told them that when Tough Man was outlawed, the state also did away with tournaments back in 2001," Alvarez said.

(Video courtesy YouTube/ESPN)

Number one UFC heavyweight contender Cain Velasquez was on Friday night’s episode of MMA Live to talk about his upcoming UFC 121 showdown with heavyweight champ Brock Lesnar in October in Anaheim, California.

In the interview, the undefeated American Kickboxing Academy product, who has been sitting out since February waiting for his shot at Lesnar, weighed in on the champ’s win over Shane Carwin at UFC 116, the biggest hurdles he will face going up against a guy of Brock’s size,  strength and wrestling pedigree and the advantages he feels he needs to utilize to pull out a win in the fall.

(I guess humiliation makes you an angry man.)

If you haven’t seen the clip of Shinya Aoki’s achilles lock win over Tatsuya Kawajiri at DREAM 15, it really was impressive, but as usual, Mr. Rainbow pants had to go and taint the victory by spouting off about wanting to seriously injure his opponent.

Check out the video after the jump and we’ll catch you up with what Aoki said following the match.

Spike TV announced earlier today that their next UFC Fight Night event will go down September 15th at the Frank Erwin Center in Austin, Texas. The broadcast is expected to serve as the lead-in to the premiere of The Ultimate Fighter: Team GSP vs. Team Koscheck. Headlining the fight card will be Demian Maia — returning from his unsuccessful (and bizarre) five-rounder against Anderson Silva in Abu Dhabi — against fellow middleweight contender Alan Belcher, who is coming off back-to-back stoppages of Wilson Gouveia and Patrick Cote. As the press release tells us, "A victory over Maia will elevate Belcher’s chances for a shot at Anderson’s coveted middleweight crown." Uh, I think you mean Sonnen’s middleweight crown, bro. The current lineup of "UFC Fight Night: Maia vs. Belcher" is below. If you have any early predictions, let’s hear ‘em…

MAIN CARD (officially confirmed)
– Demian Maia vs. Alan Belcher (MW)
– Matt Wiman vs. Mac Danzig (LW; rematch of controversial UFC 115 fight)
– Jim Miller vs. Gleison Tibau* (LW)
– Ross Pearson vs. Cole Miller (LW)

PRELIMINARY CARD (reported but not yet confirmed)
- Efrain Escudero vs. John Gunderson
– Nick Catone vs. Tomasz Drwal
– Kyle Kingsbury vs. Jared Hamman

* Fun fact: According to Wikipedia, Gleison Tibau’s birth name is Janigleison Herculano Alves. Weird.

(Leave it to the professionals, Andy…)

A couple weeks ago, I stumbled across a Bleacher Report article titled “The Top 10 Questions Every MMA Fighter Should Be Asked.” It was written by a teenage contributor named Dale De Souza who, at that point, had only done one interview with an MMA fighter, but still felt like he’d accumulated enough wisdom to put together a guide for aspiring MMA journalists. Isn’t that adorable? For the most part, De Souza’s question suggestions are pretty standard fare if you’re interviewing an up-and-comer that fans don’t know much about, and you don’t mind being unoriginal. (i.e., “How did you get into the sport?” “Which team are you training with in preparation for your next bout?” “Do you like to stand with your opponents or take them to the ground?”)

As the founding editor of CagePotato.com, I’ve been interviewing MMA fighters for nearly three years, and through trial and error, I’ve learned a lot about what not to ask during fighter interviews. Dale will learn this stuff in time, but to save him (and others like him) a lot of heartbreak, uncomfortable silences, and dull articles, I’ve put together a list of my own. Read on, and avoid these interview questions at all costs…

1. Will you choke me out?/Will you kick me in the leg?
Don’t do it. It’s been done, and you might end up in the hospital. You’ll have to find another way to make your name by humiliating yourself. (By the way, barfing on camera has also been done.)

2. What’s your gameplan for [opponent's name]?
As it turns out, very few fighters are willing to publicly reveal what they’re planning to do to their opponents, in specific detail; go figure. So don’t expect a satisfying response to this question. Most of the time, you’ll get some variation of “I’m just gonna focus on what I do best, and try to show everybody what I’m capable of.” Boooooooring.

(Video courtesy YouTube/MMABay)

I’m not sure if it’s nostalgia, his love of epic movie series like the Dr. Doolittle franchise or the fact that three is the number of words he can usually string together without screwing up, but Tito Ortiz is calling for yet another trilogy fight.

Conceding defeat without an excuse for the first time in his career when talking about the fact that he will likely never get the third bout with Chuck Liddell that was put off by his recent neck surgery, Ortiz wasted no time in calling for another three-peat fight with the guy he was beaten by in his last Octagon appearance: Forrest Griffin.

(Video courtesy YouTube/MMAH.E.A.T.)

Sometimes Strikeforce interviewer and MMA H.E.A.T. reporter Karyn Bryant sat down with current number one UFC light heavyweight contender Rashad Evans recently and got his take on some of his former and potential future opponents among other topics.

Here’s what Suga had to say about his fight with Rampage, his shot at Shogun and Lyoto’s camp’s call for an interim title bout.

(They don’t like smiling. Put that in your little notebook.)

Dana White confirmed with MMAFighting.com over the weekend that Brock Lesnar‘s expected title defense against Cain Velasquez will come at UFC 121, slated for October 23rd at the Honda Center in Anaheim, California. The meeting will come nearly four months after Lesnar’s comeback submission win over Shane Carwin at UFC 116, and eight months after Velasquez stormed through Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 110.

Though betting odds for the fight opened with Lesnar as a minor favorite (-125 to Cain’s -105), Lesnar has already moved as high as -160, due to money flooding in on the champ. At this point, the only other matchup reported for UFC 121 is a lightweight scrap between Sam Stout and Paul Taylor. In other booking news…

(Props: Corey O.)

Just a reminder for all you creative, good-humored types: You have until Thursday night to submit entries for our current Photoshop contest. The theme is "How are MMA fighters spending their summer vacations?", and all entries must be submitted to our Facebook page. I know we said that we’d be awarding CagePotato t-shirts to the five ‘shops that drew the most "Likes," but we’ve been getting so much good stuff that we’ll probably give out shirts to every image that made us laugh. A few more of our current favorites are after the jump.

And one more thing: We’d like to start collecting questions for an "Ask the Potato" segment on our new podcast, so if you have any pressing queries for Ben and Mike — MMA-related or otherwise — let us hear it. You can submit questions through the comments section on this post, at Facebook.com/CagePotato, or by sending an @cagepotatomma tweet on Twitter.

(“Of course I wore me sunglasses to the press conference. I didn’t want to look like an idiot in front of all these people, now did I?”)

As part of an on-going effort to be all things to all people, the omnipresent BJPenn.com published a report this week citing “undisclosed sources” saying British firebrand/sucker-puncher Paul Daley had inked a deal with Bellator Fighting Championships. In response to this report, please allow CagePotato.com to extend its sweaty, frail hand in friendship to BJPenn.com and say: Welcome to the wild world of journalism, pal, where the pay is terrible, the food is worse, nearly everybody hates your guts and the entire world sits poised over its keyboards, waiting for the slightest provocation to tell you you’re totally full of shit, even when you’re not.

Case in point: Bellator says it hasn’t signed Daley. At least not yet. Contract negotiations are apparently top secret over at the BFC – almost as secret as where to actually find the company’s programming on your TV dial – so an unnamed source (assumedly different from Penn’s “undisclosed” one) was only willing to issue the briefest of contradictory statements to MMAFighting.com on Saturday.