Zombinladen: The Axis Of Evil Trailer – Watch more horror

- Sonnen mellows ahead of UFC 136 (MMAFighting)

- The 20 most disturbing and shocking Muppet photos of all time (DoubleViking)

- LFL trash talk (Clutch.MTV)

- Hominick talks death of Tompkins, fatherhood and UFC 140 fight with Korean Zombie (CageWriter)

- The 25 most ridiculous hotels in the world (Complex)

- The Sultry side of The Playboy Club (ScreenJunkies)

-Zoila Gurgel ready for Carina Damm (Tatame)

- Paul Daley discusses desire to return to UFC  (BleacherReport)

- The reality of cougar-cub relationships (MadeMan)

- 11-year-old benched for being good at football (WithLeather)

- Mortal Kombat is koming bak to theatres (FilmDrunk)

- Holy Taco’s plot to cash in on Holly Madison’s newly-insured breasts (HolyTaco)

- 11 TV characters who flagrantly violated ‘the bro code’  (Guyism)

- UFC Live on Versus 6 weigh-in  photos (The Fight Nerd)

- Siyar Bahadurzada signs with UFC (Twitter)

(Ron Sparks: All about the peace and love. / Photo via TheFightNerd.)

Bellator 52 goes down tomorrow night at the L’Auberge du Lac Casino Resort in Lake Charles, Louisiana, featuring the quarterfinals of the promotion’s second heavyweight tournament. We’ll be honest — the eight-man bracket isn’t exactly overflowing with star-power, and watching 265-pounders slug it out is always a mixed bag. But if Cruz vs. Johnson isn’t enough to satisfy your hunger for combat this weekend, you might as well DVR the MTV2 broadcast. (Do it right now, before you forget.) Here’s how the HW quarters shake out:

Neil Grove vs. Mike Hayes
Blagoi Ivanov vs. Zak Jensen
Eric Prindle vs. Abe Wagner
Mark Holata vs. Ron Sparks

Now, some fun facts:

- Blagoi Ivanov is that dude who outpointed Fedor Emelianenko in combat sambo in 2008, back when beating Fedor at anything seemed like a very big deal. He’s now 4-0 with 1 no-contest in his MMA career, and won his Bellator debut in March by TKO’ing William Penn in one round.

(Props: thereem.com)

In the latest episode of Alistair’s Overeem‘s web documentary “The Reem,” our hero takes a little business trip to Los Angeles and Las Vegas to see if America might be a good place to live someday. By the time he leaves, he has starred in a music video, met porn legend Ron Jeremy, beat up Antoni Hardonk for old time’s sake, watched two of his Golden Glory teammates kick ass at the first Muay Thai Premiere League event, bought a new suit, and signed a UFC contract to fight Brock Lesnar. That’s what you call efficiency. Check it out, you won’t be disappointed.

Well, The Bum Rush Radio Show is finally back in your lives after a brief hiatus. Whether or not that’s a good thing remains to be seen. Our relationship with you is like Sid’s was with Nancy; you can’t live without us, but sometimes we drive you insane and we’re cool with that. We’ll hide the knives and the heroin and we’ll continue to get along just fine.

Anyway, our special guest this week is acclaimed Xtreme Couture head boxing coach Gil Martinez who is in the final stages of preparations for Gray Maynard’s championship rematch with Frankie Edgar. We talk to Gil about his thoughts on the bout and we find out what he thought about the Ortiz-Mayweather debacle.

Also on the show, we formally meet our new part-time staff member Jared “DangadaDang” Jones as he, Ben and Mike discuss the top news of the week, last week’s UFC 135 event, and the last UFC on Versus card coming up tomorrow.

(Exhibit ‘G’ in the murder case against Dana White and the Fertittas)

In spite of the fact that Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva’s stock in the heavyweight division dropped a few points following his knockout loss to Daniel Cormier in the semi-finals of Strikeforce’s heavyweight grand prix, his manager, Alex Davis is confident that his client’s next fight will be in the UFC’s Octagon.

“He has a contract with Strikeforce, but Strikeforce is now controlled by the UFC and we’re watching Strikeforce fighters going to the UFC all the time,” Davis told TATAME in a recent interview. “UFC’s heavyweight division is big, but they could have even more [top talent] and I’m sure Bigfoot will be in the UFC real soon. There’s a lot of great fights for him inside the Octagon, and he’ll shine there.”

(At least Page won’t have to worry about this sort of thing anymore. Props to MMAFighting.com) 

I can already smell the rumors of a possible match with Kimbo. During a recent podcast with ESPN UK, former UFC light heavyweight champion Quinton “Rampage” Jackson stated that he plans to move to boxing at the end of his UFC contract, primarily to fight people that “aren’t scared.” On the heels of his 4th round submission loss to Jon Jones at UFC 134, many have speculated that this was just a case of Page watching The Secret a few too many times, but Jackson seems about as serious as he can be about it:

(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)

Add this to the list of explanations as to why Jose Aldo nearly fell apart in the last round of his title defense against Mark Hominick. As the above video illustrates, the UFC featherweight champ suffered through the worst weight cut of his career before UFC 129 in April. Aldo’s coach Andre “Dede” Pederneiras explains that Junior had packed on more muscle than he had in the past, and was forced to cut 6.6 more pounds on the day of weigh-ins. Aldo’s training partner Marlon Sandro guides us through the weight cut process, which involves a lot of weight loss cream and a hot bath (“it feels like your skin is melting”).

With 1.1 pounds to go, Aldo mentally breaks down, refusing to cut any more, damn the consequences. The video leaves us hanging for part 2 for some reason, but look, we all know what happened; Aldo made the weight, and showed obvious signs of fatigue in his fight the next day. No matter what happens in his title defense against Kenny Florian at UFC 136 on October 8th, Aldo’s days in the 145-pound division may be numbered.

Related: Five of the Worst Weight Cuts in MMA History

(Full gallery is after the jump.)

A 5’1 ball of solid muscle, Rin Nakai isn’t the first woman you’d expect to become an MMA sex symbol. And yet Nakai has become an object of fetishistic interest in her native Japan due to the risqué photos that she regularly posts to her blog. The 24-year-old judoka has racked up a 10-0-1 professional record (seven wins via stoppage) as a 145-pounder, competing in Pancrase, Smackgirl, and Valkyrie, and was crowned the Valkyrie Open Weight Women’s Tournament champion last November. Check out our gallery of Rin Nakai photos below, and let us know in the comments section — would you or wouldn’t you?

(“What is he doing with his face? Is that supposed to intimidate me?”)

According to a report by MMAMatrix.com, a welterweight match-up between Jake Ellenberger and Diego Sanchez is in the works for UFC 141 December 30 in Las Vegas.

Ellenberger leapfrogged to the front of the line of UFC welterweight contenders with his first-round knockout of Jake Shields at UFC Fight Night: Shields vs. Ellenberger two weeks ago. As such, it’s likely that the winner of the bout, if it happens, will be second in line behind Nick Diaz to face the winner of the UFC 137 showdown between Georges St-Pierre and Carlos Condit on October 29.

(Skip to 3:10 for the start of the fight) 

Since stepping in for the injury-prone Vitor Belfort against Cung Le, many of us have been wondering if this could be the last we will see of “The Axe Murderer,” and what a sad sight it would be to see him go. Well aware of the position he is in, Silva is training harder than ever, and in light of that, we figured we could showcase some of the brutal tenacity/soccer kicks that spawned our affection for ol’ Wandy in the first place.

(From today’s press conference. Above: Dominick Cruz vs. Demetrious Johnson. Below: Pat Barry vs. Stefan Struve. Props to MMAMania)

Demetrious “Mighty Mouse” Johnson and Pat Barry will spend all fight looking up nostrils when they take on tall-for-his-weight-class Dominick Cruz and tall-for-humanity Stefan Struve (respectively) this Saturday. Don’t forget to come back to CagePotato.com for round-by-round results from the Versus main card broadcast of UFC Live: Cruz vs. Johnson, starting at 9 p.m. ET. In case you’re curious, there’s a photo of Stefan Struve and Demetrious Johnson standing next to each other after the jump. Not for the faint of heart.

(Indeed. Props: ahura)

Last night I had the misfortune of seeing about 30 seconds of the CW reality show H8R. (That’s pronounced “hater,” grandpa.) In this particular episode, Girls Gone Wild creator Joe Francis tried to convince some chick that he wasn’t in fact the greatest douchebag of our generation. His primary defense was that the girl didn’t know him personally, and was judging him based only on the “character” she knows from GGW — you know, the character he created. Awful. Just awful. And yet, I’d love to see an episode of that show starring UFC light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones.

As soon as Jones won his belt, he immediately went from a widely beloved underdog story (“he learned his striking from YouTube videos, you guys!”) to a lightning rod for message-board criticism. Exactly why some fans seem to passionately dislike Bones is a topic that we’ll discuss more in depth on tomorrow’s episode of The Bum Rush. In the meantime, I decided to revive an old CagePotato feature — “What Your Favorite Fighter Says About You” and its sequel — and twist it to reflect today’s hate-crazed MMA climate. So, for example, if your least-favorite fighter is…

JON FITCH

(You know who had that look in his eyes? Chris Benoit.) 

Dave Herman’s recent failed pre-fight drug test and subsequent removal from his bout with Mike Russow has sparked debate across the web in regards to marijuana’s power (or lack thereof) as a performance enhancing drug. Some are saying Herman should have been pulled from the fight based on the illegality of the drug alone, a tough issue to deny. However, several studies have shown that certain strands of marijuana can provide a healing effect to the nervous system and could dramatically expedite the healing process of inflamed joints, which could prove incredibly beneficial to someone in the fight game.

Annie Appleseed Project, an alternative treatment foundation, has furthered research on the healing effect of marijuana, particularly to that of damaged nerves. They concluded that marijuana, in fact, can aid the nervous system beyond that of even morphine. Andrew Rice, a senior lecturer in pain at London’s Imperial College, had the following to say about marijuana’s ability to rehabilitate:

Just a friendly reminder that we’ll be streaming the UFC Live: Cruz vs Johnson Pre-fight Press Conference starting at 1:00 pm ET today.

On hand at The Newseum in Washington, D.C. will be main card fighters Dominick Cruz, Demetrious Johnson, Pat Barry, Stefan Struve,  Anthony Johnson and Charlie Brenneman.

Check out the web player after the jump.

(Video courtesy of Jim Rome)

When Jon Jones called bullshit on Steven Seagal’s claim that he was slated to meet with the UFC light heavyweight champ just prior to him making the walk to the Octagon to face Quinton Jackson last weekend at UFC 135, most of us chalked it up to “The Glimmer Man” being a raving lunatic or a senile old man.

According to Jones, although he’s a strange cat, he doesn’t think Seagal is as crazy as he leads people to believe and as he revealed during an appearance on Jim Rome’s radio show yesterday, he may have had ulterior motives for the meeting.

Jones worried that the Aikido 7th Dan might have been sent to spy on him by Lyoto Machida’s camp since a meeting with “The Dragon” is a likely inevitability.

(Come on. You’re telling me that’s not a pothead? / Photo via Sherdog)

Update: Herman only tested positive for marijuana. The report that originally stated he also tested positive for steroids came from a misinterpretation of his interview.

UFC heavyweight Dave Herman has confirmed that his scheduled UFC 136 main card bout against Mike Russow has been canceled, after his pre-fight drug tests came back positive for marijuana. Herman denies using the illegal substance. As he explained to Clinch Gear Radio:

“I went in to get in my drug test (on Sept. 15), and a week later, they called me and told me they lost my urine specimen. I had to come in and redo it. That was last week. I went back in that day. And [on Wednesday], they told me I failed. I said, ‘That’s impossible.’…[now,] Texas said they never lost it and the first one [tested positive] for drugs and the second was for steroids. I don’t even smoke…I haven’t even had a beer in two months.”

(That’s gangsta. For more gifs from episode 2, check out IronForgesIron.)

As the 16 fighters who survived the elimination round move into the TUF house, some of them hump each other excitedly, while others bury their anxiety in barbecue chicken. Here’s Louis Gaudinot, the green-haired guy: “Dana said the house is 15,000 square feet, but it’ll feel really small; it’s gonna feel like a closet. And I’m already feeling that.” Really? Already? Bro, you haven’t even dropped your bags yet.

After huddling with their assistants to analyze the fighters, coaches Bisping and Mayhem arrive for team selections. The coin-flip lands in Bisping’s favor after a dramatic roll across the room. The Count decides to take first fighter-selection rather than first fight-pick. As we all know, that’s a strategic blunder on par with getting involved in a land war in Asia. The teams break down like this…

Bantanweights
Team Bisping: Louis Gaudinot, TJ Dillashaw, John Albert, Josh Ferguson
Team Miller: John Dodson, Johnny Bedford, Dustin Pague, Roland Delorme

(Which one is the dead horse?)

CagePotato.com has learned that ProElite’s second show under its new ownership and management will happen November 5 at the iWireless Center in Moline, Illinois. Although no announcements have been made regarding the event, which is tentatively dubbed “ProElite II” or the show’s fight card, according to a published report,  former UFC heavyweight champions Tim Sylvia (29-7) and Andrei Arlovski (16-9) are both verified to be on the card, only not against each other just yet.

ProElite had originally planned to hold its next show back in Hawaii, but evidently decided that Illinois was a better fit, considering Arlovski lives and trains two hours west of Moline in Chicago and Sylvia is a part-time police officer in Milan, less than 15 minutes away from the venue.

According to the report, Sylvia will be taking on another former UFC champ instead, Pedro Rizzo in the show’s main event and Arlovski will square off with journeyman fighter Travis Fulton (247 – 48 – 10 1 NC ).

(Video courtesy of YouTube/HoosierAccess)

When Chris Lytle announced that he would be retiring after his submission win over Dan Hardy at UFC Live: Hardy vs. Lytle on August 14, he made mention that a future in politics was something that might be in the cards for him. Apparently the longtime Indianapolis firefighter was serious about the aspiration as he announced during a press conference earlier today that he will indeed be running for a seat in Indiana’s House of Representatives for District 28.

(“Dust in the wind / All we are is dust in the wind.” Photo via MMAFighting)

When Dana White first attempted to end Chuck Liddell’s MMA career in 2009, the move was met with mixed feelings by the MMA community. Though it was admirable to see a fight promoter put his friend’s health before profits, it seemed unfair that Liddell had no say in his own retirement. After all he gave to the sport, didn’t he deserve to go out on his own terms?

At the time, Liddell was riding back-to-back knockout losses against Rashad Evans and Mauricio Rua. He had reached the end of the line as a top competitor, and didn’t need any more concussions in his life. And yet, he convinced White to give him one last dance against Tito Ortiz. Then, Ortiz pulled out of their fight, and Rich Franklin stepped in and knocked Chuck out again.

In a way, it was the saddest knockout of Chuck’s career because of how well he was doing up until he lost consciousness. He was clearly motivated and in great shape — but after 12 years of standing and banging, it only took a single off-balance hook to shut his brain off.

I’m sure Dana White regretted the way the situation turned out, and the role he played in allowing Liddell to suffer another head-trauma. And I hope he learned a lesson that he can now use in dealing with Matt Hughes.

(Take it easy, Rashad. You don’t want to break this puppy, do you?) 

The medical suspensions list for UFC 135 was just released yesterday and included a couple surprising entries of note, mainly that of Jon Jones. The defending champ, who seemed to walk away from the match unscathed, was suspended 180 days, with the chance of physician clearance after 45 days. It makes you wonder whether the doctor’s found something significant enough to give Jones such a lengthy recovery time, or if it was simply a precautionary measure. Rampage Jackson, on the other hand, was suspended 60 days with no contact for 45.

Additionally off-putting was the suspension of James Te Huna, who was given a six month waiting period (or one month with a doctor’s clearance) following his quick knockout victory of Ricardo Romero, who was suspended for 60 days with no contact for 45. It also appears that Aaron Riley wasn’t fooling about his broken jaw, as he is out for 3 months minimum to heal that sucker up. Check out the full suspension list after the jump.

-Danga 

Georges St-Pierre might want to re-examine his choice of training partners for his upcoming UFC 137 bout with Carlos Condit on October 29. You would think he would be picking the brain of his friend and teammate Rory MacDonald, who was seven seconds away from upsetting the former WEC welterweight champ at UFC 115 before getting TKO’d by “The Natural Born Killer.” Instead, “Rush” is thinking outside the box and has brought in Dan Hardy, who hasn’t won a fight since 2009, to help him prepare for the only guy to have knocked “The Outlaw” out. Makes sense, right?

(Full gallery is after the jump.)

Zoe Emma James is a 20-year-old model from Derby, England, who was recently hired as a ring girl for British MMA promotion BAMMA. Man, do those guys know how to scout talent or what? Get to know her better on Facebook and Twitter — where she describes herself as a “Yorkshire Pudding Fanatic and general all around Bad Ass” — and check out more of our favorite Zoe James photos in the gallery after the jump. As usual, props to BabesofMMA for the tip!

UFC Live: Cruz vs. Johnson goes down this Saturday, featuring the Cody McKenzie of triangles, Paul “Sassangle” Sass. Only time will tell if the “Sassangle” proves more successful than the “Mckenzietine,” but just in case Paul is one of our many devoted readers out there, we figured we’d let 2009 ADCC double gold medalist,  2011 Superfight Champion, and human Jiu-Jitsu highlight reel Braulio Estima demonstrate one of the many inversions of the triangle.

(Sources inform us that the Octagon Girls for the UFC Japan show will be Chandella Powell, Rachelle Leah, and Hard Gay.)

So this is kinda weird. According to a new Yahoo! report, the UFC is planning to double-book themselves on the night of their February 26th return to Japan:

“When we go to Japan next year, we are going to be putting on a show at the same time in Las Vegas,” [Dana White] said…When asked how the company was going to handle a dual-show evening from a television standpoint, White just smiled and said, “You’ll see.”

Keep in mind that “you’ll see” may be code for “I have no fucking clue at this point.”

(Damn. Mandy Moore is looking *rough*. / UFC 135 crowd gif via caposa)

- What’s Next for UFC 135′s Winners and Losers? (NBC Sports MMA)

- Exclusive: Paul Daley Discusses Beef With BAMMA and His Desire to Return to the UFC (BleacherReport.com/MMA)

- Here’s That Strange and Awkward Moment From Last Weekend’s Strikeforce Challengers (MiddleEasy)

- EliteXC’s Gary Shaw Tried To Sign Fedor Emelianenko, But Wouldn’t Meet M-1 Global’s Demands (MMA Convert)

- Chuck Liddell Talks Retirement, FOX Deal and ‘Hawaii Five-O’ Cameo (MMA Fighting)

- Save the Day: MMAMania Interview Exclusive With Demetrious Johnson (MMA Mania)

- ‘UFC 135: Jones vs. Rampage’ Exclusive Photo Gallery (TheFightNerd)

- Jeff Monson Asks Pat Miletich, “How Can You Not Consider America a Terror Organization?” (FightOpinion)

- Charlie Brenneman: I Have Everything I’ve Ever Wanted Within My Grasp [Exclusive] (LowKick)

- Vitor Belfort Interested in December Dance Against Winner of Sonnen/Stann (Five Ounces of Pain)

- Dominick Cruz Lives Cheap, Enjoys Cruising in a Honda Civic (5th Round)

- UFC 135: Payout Perspective (MMA Payout)

(“Get a clue, Rashad. It’s not happening.”)

Within an hour today UFC president Dana White announced and then promptly recanted the news that Lyoto Machida would be squaring off with Phil Davis at UFC 140 in Toronto in December. According to White, the announcement was premature since, unbeknownst to him, Davis is still recuperating from knee surgery to fix the injury that forced him out out of his scheduled UFC 133 bout with Rashad Evans.

Luckily for Dana and UFC matchmaker Joe Silva, we have three viable replacements lined up for Machida and we won’t even charge our usual finder’s fee.

Agree or disagree with our line-up after the jump.

(Video courtesy of YouTube/TwisterEddie)

If  your jiu-jitsu association advocated the use of marijuana and its membership included video and movie producers, actors and musicians, wouldn’t you spend a Sunday hitting the bong and making an awesome movie trailer?

There’s no confirmation whether or not this movie, which features 10th Planet founder Eddie Bravo, his nemesis Renato Laranja and the voice of Scott Epstein, even exists or if the preview is just a clever ruse by the 10th PJJ faithful, but fingers crossed that it’s legit. According to Bravo, it’s an independent film called “Return of the Death Knuckle,” and it is indeed real.

As the dust settles from UFC 135, some of us out there must be itching to bet on fights that will not make us look like fools if we are wrong. Lucky for us, redemption lies around the corner, because this Saturday UFC Live: Cruz vs. Johnson goes down, and the odds are a hell of a lot closer than what we’re used to. Check out the fight odds below, then see if you can stomach our suggestions.

Main Card (courtesy of Best Fight Odds)
Dominick Cruz (-440) vs. Demetrious Johnson (+350)
Anthony Johnson (-180) vs. Charlie Brenneman (+158)
Matt Wiman (-210) vs. Mac Danzig (+175)
Pat Barry (-185) vs. Stefan Struve (+160)

Undercard (Courtesy of MMAValor)
Yves Edwards (-120) vs. Rafaello Oliveira (-120)
Michael Johnson (-240) vs. Paul Sass (+180)
Mike Easton (-130) vs. Jeff Hougland (even)
Shane Roller (-130) vs. T.J. Grant (even)
Josh Neer (-120) vs. Keith Wisniewski (-120)
Joseph Sandoval (-150) vs. Walel Watson (+120)

(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)

UFC 139 goes down November 19th at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, and the major players are convening at the San Pedro Square Market right now for a little press-conference action. Click “play” on the live YouTube player above to see Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Dan Henderson, Wanderlei Silva, Cung Le, and UFC president Dana White field questions from the media in attendance beginning at 1 p.m. local time.