(Video courtesy YouTube/MMA DieHards)

- Roger Clemens Once Again Denies Using Steroids and HGH (ScoresReport)

- The coolest car you’ll never own (MadeMan)

- The 6 most insane Barack Obama rumors (HolyTaco)

- Adam Scott’s Pirhana 3D guarantee (ScreenJunkies)

(Video courtesy YouTube/FightHubTV) 

I don’t know if it’s just coincidence, but most of the people involved with mixed martial arts who I can’t stand are either named Gary or Shaw. There’s the obvious Gary Shaw, his son Jared "$kala" Shaw and then there’s Jerry Millen, who changed his name from his given name of Gary because he thought Jer or Jerdog sounded cooler. Seriously.

Anyway, the blobfather of EliteXC and boxing who tried to have his way with Gina Carano on national TV is back talking about how he hasn’t decided if he’s going to screw up start another MMA promotion or whether he’ll just take some fighters with him to compete on one of his boxing cards.

("Actually, Bobby is the one who’s adopted. Long story." Photo courtesy of allelbows.)

Clear your schedules, Potato Nation. CagePotato.com will be liveblogging tomorrow night’s Showtime broadcast of Strikeforce: Houston starting at 10 p.m. ET, so be sure to stop by. The fighters just stepped on the scales at the Toyota Center, and 86% of them were able to successfully hit their marks. Pretty impressive, guys! The numbers are below:

Main Card
Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal (203.75) vs. Rafael "Feijao" Cavalcante (203.5)
Tim Kennedy (185) vs. Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza (184.75)
K.J. Noons (156.25)* vs. Jorge Gurgel (154.75)
Bobby Lashley (246.5) vs. Chad Griggs (228.5)

Preliminary Card
Daniel Cormier (249) vs. Jason Riley (256.5)
Andre Galvao (170.75) vs. Jorge Patino ()**
Vinicius "Draculino" Magalhães (144.5) vs. Rocky Long (146.25)
Kier Gooch (155.5) vs. Adam Schindler (155.5)
Jose Santibanez (154.25) vs. Reynaldo Trujillo (155.25)
Humberto DeLeon (127.25) vs. Chad Robichaux (131)***
Chad Cook (205.25) vs. Arteneus Young (204)

* Gurgel allowed Noons the extra quarter-pound; Noons will not have to shed the additional weight.
** Wasn’t present at the weigh-ins; will weigh-in later this evening.
*** Was given an extra hour to lose one pound for the 130-pound catchweight bout.

Unrelated: You have the rest of the weekend to get in your final submissions for our ongoing desktop wallpaper contest with Throwdown. The entries have been awesome so far — but we want MORE! So get hustlin’ for your chance to win that $250 gear package.

(Scott "Bear" Barrett rocking the most ironic boxer-briefs in Bellator history. Photo courtesy of Bellator.com)

By DL “@ReXone3” RichardsonJr

Bellator FC rolled into Chicago this week, in the second stop of the season 3 tour. On the menu for the evening are two heavyweight tilts, one women’s featherweight bout, and a handful of showcase fights. Bellator has continued to sign talent, and they bring in a few UFC vets to fill out the card: Brad Blackburn (3-2 UFC) is matched up with Dan Hornbuckle, who came up short last season in the welterweight tournament. Brian Gassaway lost to Diego Sanchez back at UFC 54 when Diego was the next big thing, and he faces off against fellow one-and-done Zuffa employee Kevin Knabjian, who lost to Brock Larson in the WEC. And for those of you who enjoy the finer things in life — pimpin’, traveling the world, and spinning elbows, Bellator presents Mr International himself, Shonie Carter.

Bellator has done everything they can to ensure an entertaining show. Will the tournaments continue to be action-packed? Will one of these vets make a statement with their performance? Will Jimmy Smith and Sean Wheelock correctly pronounce “Megumi Fujii”? Will Cole Konrad come out in a singlet, bro-ssiere, maybe both?

Well, I have some answers for you. You may not like them, but I got them….

(Is that a huge chocolate chip cookie?) 

When Tim Sylvia beat Paul Buentello to win the Powerhouse World Promotions’ heavyweight title at last weekend’s War on the Mainland event, the first thing I thought was, "He’s never going to take that belt off."

If you don’t know the back story, according to guys Tim used to train with at Pat Miletich’s gym like Matt Hughes, after Sylvia won the UFC title, he ate, slept, showered and did just about every other day-to-day task wearing the belt.

(For some reason, Strikeforce opted to hold this week’s prefight media events at The Black Lodge. VidProps: YouTube/Helwani)

I’m going to tread lightly here, because I don’t want KJ Noons’ dad to physically attack me, but sometimes it just seems like it would be better, maybe, if Karl Jr. didn’t talk. At least not in public. Sure, Noons is a decent fighter, but watching him stumble through six minutes, 35 seconds worth of half-finished sentences, "you knows" and grammar that is probably best described as “Tito-esque” in the above video makes me wonder if a better public relations strategy for him wouldn’t be to just stand there and smile and occasionally flip his lustrous hair out of his eyes.

Noons in fact does spend the first minute of his interview with Ariel Helwani talking about his hair. He’s growing it out, see, just for the experience and just in case he goes bald later in life. You never can be too careful. “It’s pretty crazy, dude,” he says about his plans to see how long he can get it. It takes until the 5:38 mark in this vid for Noons to get to the heart of anything interesting, like the recent comments he made about the UFC being “boring as hell.” When the subject does come up, Noons falls back one of the more tried-and-true defenses for morons who say shit they later regret: It was the media’s fault.

 
(Mo’s ride makes Huggy Bear jealous.)

Muhammad Lawal was on last night’s episode of Sportsnet’s MMA Connected and talked a little bit about his baby — a tricked out cherry red 1980 Cadillac Coupe de Ville

Here’s King Mo’s description of the car he calls his everyday ride:

"[It's got] air bags, 22-inch rims, screens, ostrich interior — all that. It’s nice, dog," Lawal explained. "I can hit the switches and hop up on three front-to-back, side-to-side."

CagePotato Contest – Watch more Funny Videos

After considering all three (3!) of the submissions that came in for our UFC Fan Expo/2010 SuperFan of the World video contest, we are proud to present the winner. Thanks to his colorful accent, the subliminal shout-outs to the Potato Nation, the unexplained inclusion of a giraffe in the background, and the fact that he actually lives in Boston, we’ve decided that beloved commenter Viva Hate deserves our extra exhibitor pass for the Expo. (August 27-28 at the Hynes Convention Center! Booth #2017 bitches!) Hate’s hilarious entry is above. Congrats buddy, we’ll be in touch. 

Before we get to the runners-up, I’d just like to take the time to say that CagePotato’s appearance at the UFC Fan Expo is going to be amazing. We will have a punch machine at our booth, where you can test your might against other expo fans. We will be holding contests where visitors can win UFC 118 tickets, an MMAWarehouse gift card, Six Deuce gear, and BRAND NEW CAGEPOTATO.COM KEYCHAIN BOTTLE OPENERS!!!?!1111. You will get to meet BG and shake his hand. You will get to meet Viva Hate and kick him square in the balls. You may get to drink with us at the various pre-parties and viewing parties going on around town, assuming that you don’t give us the creeps.

Anyway, ReX13 and steampunk22 also submitted amazing videos, which you can watch after the jump. Since they don’t live anywhere near Boston, we felt that Viva Hate was the more worthy candidate — but there’s still hope for them. Read on…

(Matt Wiman’s face-off against Shane Nelson gets heated before UFC 107. Poor, sweet Natasha. She has no idea what’s going on. / Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

Just one day after his opponent Mac Danzig fell off the card, UFC Fight Night 22 co-headliner Matt Wiman has also withdrawn from the event due to a broken arm suffered in training. The Curse of Fight Night 22 has already claimed Alan Belcher (detached retina), as well as Nick Catone (shoulder and back) and Aaron Simpson (staph). Austin-area police are currently rounding up local witches and voodoo priestesses for questioning.

Still, one man’s misfortune is another’s unbelievable opportunity. Stepping in for Wiman against Efrain Escudero will be undefeated Brazilian prospect Charles "do Bronx" Oliveira, who made his UFC debut in dramatic fashion earlier this month at Jones vs. Matyushenko, when he tapped Darren Elkins via armbar in just 41 seconds; the performance scored him the event’s Submission of the Night bonus. Another big win just a month-and-a-half later could put Oliveira on the lightweight map. Will he rise to the occasion?

 
(Well, they’ve definitely felt the cutbacks in the creative lab.)

It looks like FEG is giving this MMA thing one last try before calling it quits.

The Japanese organization today released the poster for its DREAM 16 event and if it’s any indication of who will be fighting on the card, it looks like Tatsuya Mizuno, Caol Uno, Shinya Aoki, Hiroyuki Takaya, Ikuhisa Minowa, Norifumi "Kid" Yamamoto, Gegard Mousasi, Kazushi Sakuraba and Hideo Tokoro will all fight on its upcoming September 25 card.

If we’ve learned anything from the past, though, its that the Japanese are crafty marketers and they often say one thing and do another.

(Video courtesy YouTube/steviaplaya)

After spending 45 days in county jail, Dan Quinn is a free man and he’s wasting no time getting his blood saturated with  lines of Stevia and homemade weed butter while rehabbing his injured shoulder with an electronic muscle stimulator.

In this segment, the inventor of Pure H₂0 ^tm addresses President Obama (because we all know Barack subscribes to Dan’s YouTube page), talks about how the drink crystals in jail gave him receding nipples and mutters something about wanting to be like TimeCop so he can go back and fight Jack Dempsey, but for the most part he didn’t have anything interesting to say except that he’s planning on fighting stoned in his upcoming stand-up only superfight with Aaron "the fighter-turned-pornstar-turned-junkie on the" Brink.

All I’m saying is somebody better film it, because it’s going to be awesome if it happens.

("Yep, just another day in the life of Mr. International. So who’s gettin’ it first, ladies?" Photo courtesy of MiddleEasy.)

Bellator 25 goes down tonight at the Chicago Theatre, featuring two opening- round bouts from the heavyweight tournament, and a women’s tourney meeting between Jessica Pene and Zoila Frausto. MiddleEasy was on the scene at the weigh-ins, and passed along two important bits of information. First, that Shonie Carter came in six pounds overweight for his non-tournament bout against 8-7-1 journeyman Torrance Taylor, even after Carter removed his purple zoot suit. As MiddleEasy writes: "Bjorn Rebney, the founder and CEO of Bellator, seemed to work out a deal to give his opponent $100 for every pound Shonie was over out of his purse rather than the obligatory 20%. Mr. International eventually cut more weight to save himself some green." $100/pound? Torrance, you got screwed, buddy.

The second notable observation to come out of the weigh-ins is that Zoila Frausto, at 115 pounds, is the most ripped broad this side of Cris Cyborg. Photographic proof is after the jump…

(Fight starts at the 5:50 mark. Props: MMAVideosPL)

Polish Anderson Silva? Not quite yet, but Maciej Jewtuszko is well on his way to making his name in the U.S. Closing out the preliminary portion of WEC 50 against Anthony Njokuani, things started out shaky the WEC newcomer. Jewtuszko got punched out of the air and onto his ass when Njokuani caught and countered his double-kick attempt. Njokuani made Jewtuszko pay with some hard punches from the top, but eventually decided to let Maciej to his feet. It was a decision that Njokuani would immediately regret.

Watch as Jewtuszko finds the right moment to land a spinning backfist/elbow to Njokuani’s chin. The follow-up guillotine choke attempt doesn’t pan out, but the finishing uppercuts certainly do. The win netted Jewtuszko his eighth consecutive stoppage victory, and his first WEC knockout bonus. Expect to see this guy again in the near future.

Related: Njokuani’s nickname on Wikipedia is currently listed as "The Nigerian Money Offer."

(Video courtesy YouTube/TheJasonEllisShow)

When Forrest Griffin ran out of the Octagon after getting sat down by Anderson Silva at UFC 101, most of us MMA media types thought, "There’s something we won’t be able to ask him about in an interview."

Apparently time heals all wounds because Forrest has finally broken his silence on what happened in the fight and what was going through his mind as he was jabbed into a living death by "The Spider" and he has apparently taken the  advice he gave me at the MMA Expo about making fun of yourself.

Earlier this week on the The Jason Ellis Show, Forrest brought up the fight with Silva on his own when he was asked if he would be fighting Jon Jones in his next bout

("The first time I got shot at in a war … I knew I was in the right place," PicProps: CanvasChronicle)

There are both positives and negatives about this weekend’s Strikeforce middleweight title fight. On one hand, it obviously sucks that Saturday night’s scrap between BJJ whiz ‘Jacare’ Souza and all-around Awesome Dude Tim Kennedy essentially represents another epic fail by Strikeforce when it bungled plans for its totally-rad-sounding 185-pound title tournament. On the other hand, that this fight gives two seemingly very likable athletes their first chance at a major championship, well, it’s hard to hate on that.

Especially in the case of Kennedy, whose status as what the UFC might call “an elite war fighter” should be well-known to you. The active duty Green Beret not only appeared as the special guest on this week’s Bum Rush podcast (which makes him a prince among men, in our opinions) but he also cut a half-fascinating, half-bone-chilling new interview with Old Dad where he shed some more light on how his experiences “Over There” helped prepare him for a career inside the cage. Essentially, it was kind of like using a cannon ball to train for throwing the shot put.

It took a while, but we’re happy to announce that we finally got approved by Apple and now The Bum Rush Radio Show will be delivered to you through the magic of iTunes.

Go ahead and subscribe and rate us with an appropriate amount of stars *cough* five *cough*.

(Poor vegan son-of-a-bitch can’t catch a break. Photo courtesy of MMABay)

Due to a chest injury suffered in training, TUF 6 winner Mac Danzig has withdrawn from his co-headlining rematch against Matt Wiman at UFC Fight Night 22 (September 15th, Austin). Danzig and Wiman previously met at UFC 115 in June, with Danzig losing by a controversial first-round technical decision; the referee stopped the fight due to a guillotine choke despite the fact that Danzig didn’t tap and wasn’t out, leading to an unfortunate "WTFIYP?" moment in the cage. It was Danzig’s fourth loss in his last five fights, and he’ll now have to wait a little longer to redeem himself.

Stepping up against Wiman at the Austin event will be TUF 8 lightweight winner Efrain Escudero, who’s coming off his unanimous decision victory over Dan Lauzon at UFC 114, and was originally supposed to face John Gunderson on the prelims. Now, Gunderson is expected to face returning UFC vet Yves Edwards (38-16-1, 6-4 UFC), who hasn’t competed in the Octagon since his TKO loss to Joe Stevenson at UFC 61. Since then, he’s made appearances in Bodog Fight, EliteXC, Strikeforce, and Shine Fights, and most recently scored a decision over Luis Palomino at last week’s Bellator event.

(Props: YouTube.com/Heavy)

— If you thought last night’s WEC main event wasn’t as close as the judges scored it, Dominick Cruz would respectfully agree with you. As the reigning bantamweight champ said after his fight with Joseph Benavidez (skip to the 2:59 mark above): 

"In my humble opinion, I thought I won all the rounds…I think that the crowd has a big part to play in the judges’ opinion sometimes. Also, he caught me with a real slick knee up against the cage that made me bleed real bad. I would assume the blood could have swayed the judges a little as well."

Benavidez was also surprised that one of the judges saw it his way: "I figured I didn’t do enough to win, but I wasn’t watching the fight, so when the judge did say my name it was quite a surprise. I was like "wow, could this happen? Is this, like, the work of God or something?" For the record, FightMetric gave every round to Cruz for outpointing Benavidez in striking (103-46 total) and takedowns (5-0 total).

— $10,000 performance bonuses were handed out to the following fighters…
Knockout of the Night: Newcomer Maciej Jewtuszko for using a spinning back elbow and a pair of nasty uppercuts to wreck Anthony Njokuani in 96 seconds.
Submission of the Night: Anthony Pettis for finishing Shane Roller via triangle choke with just nine seconds left in the fight, after wearing Roller down with his impressively-flashy striking attacks. (How ’bout that capoeira head kick in round one?)
Fight of the Night: Scott Jorgensen and Brad Pickett for their 15-minute smash-up which went all over the cage and didn’t slow down for one second. Round two was easily one of the best MMA rounds of 2010.

(Benavidez must be standing on the stack of cash he gave Nelson Hamilton before the fight)

Well WEC 50: Cruz vs. Benavidez II is in the books and in usual WEC fashion, the card didn’t disappoint.

The fact that six out of 10 fights on the card went to the judges’ scorecards is a testament to the WEC matchmaker Sean Shelby’s adeptness, because even the bouts that went the distance were wars of attrition in which both fighters left everything in the cage.

A few up-and-comers climbed further up the title contention ladder while a few others dropped a few rungs down, but none of the fights were disappointing.
The only real question mark of the show was which fights the judges were watching as they seem to have decidedly different opinions on who won a few of the bouts.

In the main event of the evening, bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz controlled the majority of action, possibly losing two rounds of the five round title affair to challenger Joseph Benavidez. Benavidez landed a handful of power shots throughout the bout, but it was Cruz’s takedowns that were the real deciding factor in the fight.

Personally, I had the fight at 49-46 for Cruz, but it arguably could have gone 48-47 depending on how you look at round two. For Nelson "Doc" Hamilton to score the the bout 48-47 for Benavidez it makes me wonder if he was watching America’s Got Talent on his iPhone instead of watching the fight.

(I have to admit, I was skeptical when FEG announced their business plan using a map with a spaceship on it that would shuttle fighters to events around the world.)

Ever since news of DREAM stiffing a number of fighters of their contracted fight purses including Gary Goodridge, Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza and featherweight champ Bibiano Fernandes, rumors have been running rampant about how dire of financial difficulty the Japanese promotion is in.

Nightmare of Battle does a great job in summing up exactly what the issues have been for FEG that have led to the company being barely able to keep its head above water.

When James Toney meets Randy Couture at UFC 118 next Saturday, he’ll be attempting to prove the dominance of the "sweet science" over that weird stuff that gay skinheads do. Of course, he won’t be the first pugilist to try to beat an MMA fighter at their own game — boxing vs. martial arts challenge matches have been around since before "Lights Out" was born. Join us as we take a look back at the brave boxers who preceded Toney…and what became of them.

MILO SAVAGE vs. "JUDO" GENE LeBELL
December 2, 1963

Arguably the first sanctioned MMA match in American history, Savage vs. LeBell came together when legendary judoka/actor Gene LeBell answered a challenge from boxer Jim Beck, who claimed that a professional boxer could beat any martial artist. (Yep, they’ve been making the same boast for almost 50 years.) According to LeBell, he was expecting to fight Beck himself in the televised match, but his opponent was switched at the last minute to Milo Savage, a top-5-ranked light-heavyweight who was allegedly wearing brass knuckles under his fingerless speed-bag gloves, and was greased from head to toe. Despite the disadvantages, Gene sunk a lapel choke in the 4th round and put Savage to sleep. But as with most stories involving Judo Gene, the details are somewhat debatable; this Jonathan Snowden article debunks several aspects of LeBell’s version. Still, LeBell vs. Savage deserves credit as the first MMA-style fight on television, and set up a rivalry between boxing and martial arts that’s somehow still relevant today.

MUHAMMAD ALI vs. ANTONIO INOKI
June 26, 1976

It sounded like good, harmless fun — the greatest boxer of all time taking on Japanese pro-wrestling kingpin Antonio Inoki in an exhibition match in Tokyo. But in the days leading up to the show, bizarre rules were added that restricted certain attacks. Most notably, Inoki could only kick if he had one knee on the ground. So, he scooted around the ring kicking Ali’s legs for the entire 15-round duration. Ali only landed six punches the entire fight and went home with two blood clots and an infection. The bout was ruled a draw, and has garnered a reputation as one of the ugliest fiascos in the history of combat sports. Fun fact: The referee of this match? None other than mixed-fighting pioneer Gene LeBell.

(The Waterboy will look to exploit "The Immortal" Matt Brown’s mortal ground game.)

UFC matchmaker Joe Silva has been busy the past week securing fights for some of the promotion’s upcoming cards.

According to German MMA website groundandpound.de, Polish-German welterweight fighter Peter Sobotta will take on The Ultimate Fighter Season 7 winner Amir Sadollah at UFC 122 when the UFC travels to Germany in November.

0-2 in two Octagon appearances, having dropped unanimous decisions to Paul Taylor and James Wilks at UFC 99 and 115, respectively, Sobotta may find him self unemployed if he loses another bout.

Sadollah, who isn’t quite on the chopping block yet, will be looking to rebound from a lackluster performance against Dong Hyun Kim at UFC 114. Prior to that, the Brooklyn-born, Richmond, Virginia-raised fighter won two in a row against Brad Blackburn and Phil Baroni — both via unanimous decision.

(Enson Inoue, shown here during a rare outpouring of genuine emotion. PicProps: Tune-In Tokyo)

In case any of you missed the reports this morning that former Pride fighter, weed enthusiast and rumored Yakuza Enson Inoue has embarked on a 1,200-kilometer spiritual journey on the Japanese island of Shikoku, here’s the Spark Notes version: Inoue is attempting to complete the island’s celebrated “88 Temples Pilgrimage,” in which travelers don white clothes and sedge hats in order to retrace the steps of a famous Buddhist monk said to have made the journey in the latter stages of the eighth century. Given that it’s now 2010, most people do it by bus, but that’s apparently not old-school enough for Inoue. He plans to walk the nearly 750 miles, even though he’s been warned that he might die from the heat.

Also, since no 21st-Century spiritual journey would be complete without continuous, near real-time commentary from the pilgrim himself, Inoue is going to be updating his blog the whole way. Anyway, it’s now day two of the walk and so far, things don’t seem to be going so well …

(Is that Toney’s heart on his sleeve or his swollen tongue?)

I’m not a fan of 90% of MMA clothing. Somehow seeing fat accountants and skinny computer programmers wearing t-shirts covered in skulls, chains and dragons at sports bars on fight nights jaded me I guess. Tapout has become the new Vuarnet or No Fear.

I own a handful of promotions’ shirts as well as a few less gaudy brands, but most of them I was given or won in contests. 

What gets me is that there are fans who will wear just about anything if it says MMA on it, regardless of how terrible the clothing is.

(Maciej Jewtuszko vs. Erikas Petraitis, 5/14/10)

Two hot lightweight prospects with identical records will be making their WEC debuts during the prelims of tonight’s "Cruz vs. Benavidez" show on Versus, and if the MMA Gods allow it, you might get your first glance at them. Of course, making the broadcast would require them to either win or lose in spectacular fashion. So which will it be? Get to know them below and let us know what you think…

MACIEJ "Irokez" JEWTUSZKO (LW)
Experience: 7-0 record (all wins by stoppage in the first two rounds), competing in Poland and Germany. Last fought at a Beast of the East event on June 12th, where he defeated Edvardas Norkeliunas by first-round heel-hook.
Will be facing: Anthony Njokuani (12-3, 3-2 WEC) in the last bout of the prelims.
Lowdown: First things first — his name is pronounced Mah-chey Yev-Tushko. The 29-year-old firefighter is a Polish national champion in Muay Thai, but started his fight training with jiu-jitsu. Like his knockout-artist opponent Anthony Njokuani, Jewtuszko prefers to keep fights standing. He admires Mariusz Pudzianowski and Pawel Nastula for representing Poland in MMA, and says "It would be an honor to someday hear me described as the Polish Anderson Silva." Jewtuszko trains with Berzerkers Team Poland. As his manager Shu Hirata explains, "Besides being a great striker and a top grappler, one of the best qualities about Jewtuszko is that he never get intimated with anyone. He is a firefighter so he has gone through many dangerous situations so he has got the heart of a warrior." 

(Cain Velasquez‘s new Lugz commercial. Yeah, he smashed that. Props: YouTube.com/MMAFightClub)

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…

– Punch Drunk Preview: WEC 50 (Heavy.com/MMA)

- Cro Cop Says He’s Not Ready for UFC 119 but Still Guarantees a First Round Knockout (MiddleEasy)

– Backstage: Ariel Helwani vs. Ed Soares (MMA Fighting)

– Total Fighter Payroll for Strikeforce Challengers Phoenix: $53,250 (MMA Convert)

– 10 Taekwondo Knockouts That Will Blow Your Mind (MMA Scraps)

– Shane Carwin still silent on steroid connection; media as well (Watch Kalib Run)

– Pettis: ‘Roller Doesn’t Want Any Part of My Stand-up’ at WEC 50 (Versus MMA Beat)

– Chael Sonnen Syndrome: Urijah Faber trash-talking his way to the WEC Bantamweight Title shot? (LowKick)

- Rafael Cavalcante: “I have been working hard for not just this fight, but for my dream, every day for six years.” (Five Ounces of Pain)

– Strikeforce Houston: Noons & Gurgel on Standing and Banging for a Title Shot (FIGHT! Magazine)

(War Machine getting ready for the Miss Jail Rat 2010 pageant.)

We were disappointed, though not totally surprised today when we visited War Machine’s Twitter page and found that the beleaguered fighter’s prison blogs had been removed.

We figured it was only a matter of time before prison or court officials got wind of War’s documented exploits behind bars that included drinking prison moonshine and finding a fellow inmate’s fishing line used to share contraband with other cons in his cell block.

Apparently we were right on the money with our estimate that he wouldn’t get through three weeks without getting in trouble and that his big house blogs would be his undoing.

Well, it was fun while it lasted.

("Listen, Jacare, those hotel carpets are usually covered in…you know what, forget it.")

Strikeforce Houston is set to blast off this Saturday and your old pal Gambling Addiction Enabler has just one question: Could you loan us a few bucks until payday? Seriously, man, we’ve got some can’t-miss fight picks cookin’, and we swear it won’t be like last time. Thanks, bro. For real, you won’t regret this. Would it be cool if we used your shower?

The available betting lines, courtesy of bestfightodds.com:

Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal (-376) vs. Rafael Cavalcante (+375)
Ronaldo Souza (-255) vs. Tim Kennedy (+215)
KJ Noons (-205) vs. Jorge Gurgel (+205)
Bobby Lashley (-500) vs. Chad Griggs (+370)
Daniel Cormier (-1350) vs. Jason Riley (+700)*
Andre Galvao (-280) vs. Jorge Patino (+240)**

* The Cormier/Riley and Galvao/Patino prelim fights will both be streamed live on Sherdog before the Showtime broadcast.

** Jorge Patino is a late replacement for Nate Moore, who has dropped out of the event due to injury. Please make your Fightpicker changes as necessary.

Anyway…

(Video courtesy YouTube/IGN)

I’m not sure whether it was because of my ADHD or because my wife pointed out that I was playing more Xbox than my 13-year-old son, but playing UFC Undisputed quickly lost its lustre for me.

Besides having to beat 50 opponents before my created player could throw even one head-kick and the fact that you needed to basically program a string of HTML code using your controller to finish an opponent by submission, what put me off the most was the online play.

Before THQ fixed a few of the glaring issues with the game, you couldn’t buy a win against an online opponent. Even if you did manage to find an opponent who wasn’t using a rapid fire controller to methodically outbox your user controlled Anderson Silva using Demian Maia, nine times out of ten they would disconnect the second you beat them to avoid incurring a loss on their record. The reality was that a win online really didn’t mean all that much in the grand scheme of things to the average casual gamer, which probably explains why sales of Undisputed 2010 dropped off significantly from its original incarnation.

It looks like Electronic Arts is looking to change that.