(Aw man, he’s a Mormon? We just assumed he was a *normal* insane Christian, like Diego Sanchez. / Props: MMAJunkie)

From what we hear, Brazilian real estate is a buyer’s market right now. That’s good news for Diego Brandao, who earned enough bonus money last night to get his beloved mother a decent ranch house near all the good favelas. The UFC handed out $40,000 performance bonuses to the following TUF 14 Finale competitors:

Fight of the Night: Diego Brandao and Dennis Bermudez for their dramatic one-rounder, in which odds-on favorite Brandao started strong, then nearly got TKO’d, then pulled an armbar directly out of his ass with nine seconds left in the round.

Knockout of the Night: John Dodson, for generating an incredible amount of torque from that tiny body and smashing TJ Dillashaw in under two minutes.

Submission of the Night: Diego Brandao again, for armbarring victory out of the jaws of defeat.

And as we mentioned in yesterday’s liveblog, $25,000 “Best of the Season” bonuses were also awarded to these TUF 14 Finale competitors…

(Upkick me once, shame on you. Upkick me twice, shame on me. Upkick me six times…seriously, bro?)

From Nate Diaz‘s hilarious taunts to Lavar Johnson‘s brutalization of Pat Barry, here are the best moments from Saturday night’s UFC card in animated GIF form. Props to IronForgesIron, the UG, and TheBigLead. More good stuff after the jump.

(Brandao vs. Casteel @ Evolution 1, 10/30/10. Fight begins at the 1:58 mark and ends 40 seconds later. The ref is kind of a dick afterwards. Props: landsharkian)

As Johnny Bedford observed on Wednesday, TUF 14 featherweight finalist Diego Brandao is not unbeatable; in fact, he entered the reality show with a journeyman’s record of 13-7. But when he’s on his game, he’s as dangerous a fighter as you’ll ever see. Here’s a video from Brandao’s pre-UFC career, in which he starches Michael Casteel with a counter right hook within the first minute of their fight. It’s that kind of power that could give Dennis Bermudez serious headaches when they meet up at the finale show tomorrow night in Las Vegas. Was Michael Bisping right to predict future UFC stardom for the Madman from Manaus?

“Honesly, Dennis, it’s going to take more than few circumvallate papillae to frighten moi!” (Original images: MMADiehards.com & RazziMe/JohnPorter)

We’re just a few of months away from the UFC’s return to broadcast tv, but the ‘UFC on FOX 3′ card is still filling out.

When we last (and first) saw Nick Denis, he was caving in the skull of Joseph Sandoval via standing hellbows on the ‘UFC on FX: Guillard vs. Miller‘ card. That impressive 22-second debut has earned him a return bout against TUF alum Johnny Bedford. “Brutal” fell to season 14 champion John Dodson in the show’s semi-finals, but returned at the TUF 14 Finale to absolutely bulldoze future-flyweight Louis Gaudinot.

Two other TUF vets, Dennis Bermudez and Pablo Garza, will square off on the May 5^th card. Bermudez looked to be seconds away from finishing off Diego Brandao when the crafty Brazilian latched on an armbar and snagged the first ever TUF featherweight plaque. Garza lost his elimination bout to enter the season 12 Ultimate Fighter house as well as his WEC debut, but was brought to the UFC where he picked up consecutive first round stoppages over Fredson Paixao (via “Lawn Chair KO“) and Yves Jabouin. “The Scarecrow” is looking to bounce back from his second round submission loss to the streaking Dustin Poirier.

The rest of the card is after the jump.

(Nate Diaz will face Jim Miller in the main event of tomorrow’s big Fox card)

Almost all the fighters made weight this afternoon in New Jersey for the UFC on Fox 3 card taking place Saturday night. Check out the weigh-in results and full video of the proceedings below. Also, don’t forget to follow the action, play-by-play, tomorrow night here at CagePotato.

Main Card:

Nate Diaz 156 vs. Jim Miller 156
Johny Hendricks 170.5 vs. Josh Koscheck 170.5
Alan Belcher 186 vs. Rousimar Palhares 186
Pat Barry 244 vs. Lavar Johnson 253

Prelims:

Tony Ferguson 154.5 vs. Michael Johnson 156
John Dodson 126 vs. Tim Elliott 125
John Hathaway 169 vs. Pascal Krauss 169
Louis Gaudinot 126 vs. John Lineker 127 (Fined $1,200 for missing weight by a pound)
Danny Castillo 155 vs. John Cholish 155.5
Dennis Bermudez 145.5 vs. Pablo Garza 145
Roland Delorme 135 vs. Nick Denis 135
Mike Massenzio 184 vs. Karlos Vemola 185

Full Weigh-Ins Video After the Jump:

(The folder is fist-posing too, in spirit. Props: @WandFC.)

With filming for The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil starting next month in an undisclosed location, you may be wondering: “And dennnnnn??” So here’s a rundown of what we know so far…

— The season will feature two weight classes, featherweight and middleweight. Each bracket will feature 16 fighters to start, and an elimination round will narrow the talent down to eight fighters in each division, who will then move into the TUF: Brazil house.

— The show will air locally on the Globo channel in Brazil on Sunday nights starting March 25th, and will also be aired on FUEL TV in the U.S.

(It’s hard to argue that she didn’t earn it, but we’re sure at least a few of you will try your damnedest anyway. / Photo via Getty Images)

The California State Athletic Commission recently released the salary figures for UFC 157, which transpired last Saturday from the Honda Center in Anaheim, California. Topping the payroll was none other than Dan Henderson, who took home a cool quarter million despite dropping a close decision to Lyoto Machida in the night’s co-main event. Most of the salaries seem relatively fair considering the UFC’s recent cutbacks, but check out the full list after the jump and let us know who you think is “super fucking expensive” and who deserves to be paid a little more.

(Damn, Brittney, where’d you get those vintage Brawlin’ Buddies?)

It’s a good time to be Chad Mendes, Nation. Not only has he been all but cleared of the battery charges he was facing following a massive bar brawl in October, but the UFC apparently feels so bad for sacrificing his undefeated virginity to Jose Aldo at UFC 142 that they’ve thrown him three straight gimme fights against dudes who would be lucky to wash his jockstrap at Team Alpha Male.

First he got called out by Cody McKenzie, which somewhat justified their insane pairing at UFC 148 (which ended in just over 30 seconds, by the way). And last weekend, Mendes dispatched promotional newcomer Yaotzin Meza in just under two minutes at UFC on FX 6. That’s two fights at 36K a piece with a total fight time of under half a round. No wonder he calls himself “Money,” the dude’s somehow become the most efficient worker in the UFC. Think about that for a second, Potato Nation, then take a moment to wonder aloud why Mendes has been paired against TUF 5 runner-up Manny Gamburyan at UFC 157.

(Word has it that Torres attempted to lure Bowles’ sister into his “surprise van” after the weigh-ins. Big mistake, bro. / Photo courtesy of Getty Images.) 

We’re pretty convinced the real Brian Bowles died in 2011. Following his submission loss to Urijah Faber at UFC 139, Bowles vanished from the MMA scene without a trace and no one seems to know why. Go ahead, try and find a Brian Bowles interview, injury update, photo, credit card receipt, Twitter update or Facebook wall post dated to 2012. You will not. Brian Bowles was as much alive in 2012 as Caylee Anthony.

But unlike the subject of that distasteful and completely unnecessary comparison, it seems Brian Bowles has been given a second chance at life. That, or the Mangalor that is wearing his face has decided to give this MMA thing a try. In either case, Bowles has been booked against fellow WEC vet George Roop at UFC 160, which transpires on May 25th in Las Vegas.

Roop didn’t have a much better 2012 than Bowles, suffering a mouthpiece-ejecting KO to Cub Swanson in his only octagon appearance. This year has already proved more successful for the TUF 8 alum, who was able to outpoint Reuben Duran at UFC 158. Although if history is any indication, Roop’s 2013 is about to get a lot worse.

Also booked for UFC 160…

(Apparently Corassani treats tapping the same way he deals with flipping to the wrong page of a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Novel. Gif via ZombieProphet at IronForgesIron.)

This should come as no surprise, but none other than TUF 14 alum and all around jackwagon Akira Corassani has been booked to take on British striker Jason Young at the UFC’s inaugural trip to Sweden for its second UFC on FUEL event. Corassani, a Swedish born (the streets, specifically) Muay Thai striker, has trained with the likes of Siyar Bahadurzada, Frankie Edgar, and Eddie Alvarez, and made a name for himself on this past season of The Ultimate Fighter, bringing a combination of power punches and Jersey Shore-like swagger to the house before being choked into wonderland by eventual runner-up Dennis Bermudez in the semifinals.

Young, who has dropped a couple of close decisions to Dustin Poirier and Michihiro Omigawa in his octagon run, will likely be fighting for his job when he takes on Corassani. A word to the wise Jason: steer clear of the leg-locks on this one.

(“Do I *look* like I want to try on some slim-fit jeans today, you son of a bitch?!?” / Photo via FightDay)

After being hassled by The Man for two weeks due to a decade-old arrest, UFC heavyweight slugger Mark Hunt has successfully obtained his visa to travel to the United States for UFC 160 on May 25th, and will be departing from New Zealand sometime today. The UFC confirmed the news yesterday, and Hunt relayed the message himself with a quick tweet thanking God.

And so, Roy Nelson no longer needs to be hastily photoshopped into the poster. But the problem remains that Hunt is making the long trek to the States with less than a week to acclimate to the time-difference, which could hinder his performance. Will jet lag be the difference in this fight? Shoot us your predictions, and check out the complete lineup of UFC 160 after the jump…

(This is where we’d normally tell you Taters to keep it in your pants, but since Ronda’s barely keeping it it hers..)

Ronda Rousey, Liz Carmouche, and the rest of the 24 fighters competing at tomorrow’s UFC 157: One Small Step for the UFC, One Giant Leap for Womankind event will be hitting the scales tonight starting at 7 p.m. EST. It’s a card that is all but guaranteed to deliver thrills from top-to-bottom, especially in light of the UFC’s recently implemented “Dan Hardy Stipulation” that renders all UFC contracts null and void should the fighter not “bring it every fucking time.” I’m just reading the press release, folks.

Anyway, join us after the jump for a video of the weigh-ins along with the fastest goddamn results in the entire goddamn internet. Seriously, we dare you to find another MMA site that updates the results faster than we do. You will not.

(“Pose on that red carpet, Donald Cer-Ro-Nay!“)

The UFC has confirmed that the co-main event for UFC 150: Henderson vs. Edgar 2 (August 11th; Pepsi Center; Denver, CO) will be a pretty damn promising lightweight battle between Colorado native Donald Cerrone and Melvin Guillard. Both fighters are coming off of decision wins — Cerrone with his three-round thrashing of Jeremy Stephens at UFC on FUEL 3 in May, and Guillard with his recent win against Fabricio Cameoes at UFC 148.

Not only is the matchup compelling from an entertainment standpoint, there’s also a bit of backstory considering that the two men were longtime teammates under Greg Jackson, until Guillard jumped ship at the beginning of this year to train with the Blackzilians in Florida. (Here’s a photo of Melvin pretending to be Bigfoot Silva’s shadow.) After the fight was announced, Guillard referred to himself and Cerrone as “best friends,” while Donald simply described their relationship as “cool.” I mean, obviously Cowboy already has a best friend.

What a couple of weeks it has been for the avid Jiu Jitsu fanatic. Diego Brandao scored a brilliant last second submission over Dennis Bermudez to walk away with a UFC contract and a down payment on his momma’s new house, Frank Mir added the most prized arm of all to his collection (a feeling that Mir would later refuse to go into detail about, but we imagine felt something like this), and Jon Jones used his Stretch Armstrong genetics to choke out a Jiu Jitsu black belt in Lyoto Machida with relative ease. And with each beautiful, gruesome, or eye opening technique that graces the octagon, Ryron and Rener are here to make sense of it all.

Today, the Gracie brothers touch on Tony Ferguson’s slick omaplata attempt from his unanimous decision victory over Yves Edwards at the TUF 14 Finale as well as Brandao’s glass plaque-earning effort before breaking down possibly the most shocking submission finish in MMA history, Frank Mir’s come from behind kimura over Antonio Rodrigo Nogueria that absolutely destroyed the Brazilian’s arm, a picture of which can be seen after the jump:

(Success: Getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to do something you’d gladly do for free. Photo via UFC.com)

It wasn’t enough that Michael Bisping scored a mouth-shutting TKO victory over Jason Miller at the TUF 14 Finale, in which he out-struck Mayhem 150-38. Bisping also had the pleasure of earning nearly ten times as much cash as his rival. MMA Junkie released the salary list from Saturday’s TUF 14 Finale, which shows that the Count’s paycheck ate up 49% of the card’s $868,000 payroll (including disclosed bonuses). The numbers are below. According to our sources, Marcus Brimage already spent his sixteen grand on revolting sex acts.

Michael Bisping: $425,000 (includes $150,000 win bonus)
def. Jason “Mayhem” Miller: $45,000

Diego Brandao: $16,000 (includes $8,000 win bonus)
def. Dennis Bermudez: $8,000

(Props: Heavy via Cagewriter. / Bisping addresses his supporters at the 5:50 mark. )

At yesterday’s weigh-ins for the Ultimate Fighter 14 Finale, Michael Bisping did nothing to support his claims that there’s a somewhat decent person hiding underneath that bristly persona. The UFC middleweight contender missed weight by a quarter-pound — which he shed later — inviting boos from the crowd at the Palms in Las Vegas. After his opponent Jason Miller goaded the crowd further, telling them to “boo this man,” Bisping took the mic:

“I could give a fuck about getting fucking love. All I care about is smashing this dickhead’s head in. Tomorrow night, that’s gonna happen. Fuck you all.”

Our liveblog of the Spike TV main card kicks off at 8 p.m. ET. Check out the full weigh-in results from the TUF 14 Finale after the jump…

(Fickett vs. Prater in the final. Props for all vids: YouTube/ZombieProphet MMA)

It took Drew Fickett all of seven minutes, 38 seconds of actual fighting to cut a swath through the Shine Fights lightweight tournament on Friday night. Three fights, three choke-out victories for the Arizona fighter now apparently billing himself as “The Night Rider.” By comparison, Carlo Prater – Fickett’s opponent in the final – had already lost a three-round split decision, then won a two-round majority scorecard verdict by the time they met up in the evening’s last bout. Can’t blame Prater for looking a little bit “over it” by the time he and Fickett locked horns, in light of that.

After the jump, check out Fickett’s road to the final, including his ugly arm-in guillotine on Charles “Kid Kaos” Bennett. Seriously guys, just pick a nickname and stick with it …

(Round two of Dillashaw vs. Delorme, via IronForgesIron)

Roland Delorme’s foot is still as red and lumpy as Bruce Vilanch’s face. It hurts like a bitch, but at least he can’t transmit it to anybody else, whatever it is. And there’s still a good chance he’ll be cleared to fight, so fingers crossed.

Jason Miller brings in former Chute Boxe coach Rafael Cordeiro — who currently trains Mayhem at Kings MMA in Huntington Beach — to work with the Team Miller guys on striking drills. But Michael Bisping ups the ante, bringing in Tito Ortiz — his coach on TUF 3 — for a ground-and-pound clinic. “It’s not about the money or fame,” Ortiz tells the blue team. “It’s about us being men and seeing who’s the baddest guy alive.” Marcus Brimage is star-struck: “I was like, wow…that’s a big fucking head!”

Brimage and Akira Corassani are still harping on the fact that TJ Dillashaw asked to fight Delorme instead of Dodson, looking for an easy road to the bantamweight semi-finals. So Akira and Diego Brandao hatch a plan to get even with TJ. It’s a pretty simple plan, really — they plan to beat the shit out of him at practice.

(Good enough to beat up a former title contender. Not quite good enough to remain employed six months later. / Photo via Getty Images)

After losing to Diego Brandao by first-round arm-triangle choke at UFC on FUEL 9 last month, UFC featherweight Pablo Garza has been released by the UFC. Garza confirmed the bad news yesterday, saying that he will focus on coaching and competing in jiu-jitsu for the time being, although he didn’t rule out a return to MMA competition.

Though Garza kicked off his pro career with seven consecutive wins, he endured a couple of setbacks before making it into the UFC. First, he was selected for the TUF 11 lightweight cast, but lost a decision to Michael Johnson in the elimination round before making it into the house. After winning a couple more fights in his native North Dakota, Garza was brought back to the Zuffa fold as a featherweight injury replacement for Jason Reinhardt at WEC 51, and was quickly guillotine choked by Tiequan Zhang.

But the UFC gave him another chance, bringing him into the big leagues after the WEC closed its doors. Garza went on to score back-to-back wins over Fredson Paixao (via Knockout of the Night-earning flying knee) and Yves Jabouin (via Submission of the Night-earning flying triangle). A pair of losses to Dustin Poirier and Dennis Bermudez followed, putting the Scarecrow on thin ice again. But Garza redeemed himself by dominating Mark Hominick in a gritty decision at UFC 154 last November.

The April loss to Brandao sunk Garza’s UFC record to an even 3-3 — not the most impressive tally, but then again, all of Garza’s wins were pretty damn fantastic. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to keep him on the roster. Bummer. In other firing news…

(The punch may have missed, but Dillishaw’s stank bref definitely found its mark.) 

It is not a good time of year to be a struggling UFC fighter, Potato Nation.

Just a day after it was made public that Charlie “Big Hair” Brenneman (nickname pending) had been released from the UFC following a pair of losses to Kyle Noke and Erick Silva, the UFC has announced that four more UFC fighters will have to significantly cut back on their children’s wish lists this Christmas. Spoiler alert: Most of the names will not surprise you, unless you were unaware that some of them were fighting in the UFC in the first place, or even a person at all, which is likely the case with a couple of these guys.

And the nominees for saddest fighter of the day are…

-Michihiro Omigawa: Following an 0-2 stint in the octagon between 2007-2008, the DREAM and DEEP veteran reentered the UFC in February of 2011. Unfortunately for him, his second run didn’t go much better than the first. He would drop his first fight to future title challenger Chad Mendes by way of unanimous decision at UFC 126 and get absolutely screwjobbed out of a victory in his second fight against Darren Elkins at UFC 131. A UD victory of his own over Jason Young at UFC 138 would be his first and his last under the Zuffa banner, as he would suffer back-to-back unanimous decision losses to Iuri Alcantara and former WEC featherweight title challenger Manny Gamburyen at UFC 142 and UFC on FOX 4, respectively. Omigawa’s record currently stands at 13-12.

(“You maaaad, you maaaaad, you maaaaad!” Photo via MMAMania)

Tonight, TUF as we know it comes to an end. Before us lies a shadowy, uncertain world of live fights aired on F/X on Friday nights and international spin-offs. But no matter what comes next, you can feel secure in the fact that we’ll still be complaining about the show just as much as we always have, because we know no other way to live.

Welcome, friends, to our liveblog of The Ultimate Fighter: Team Bisping vs. Team Miller Finale. On the menu this evening — Diego Brandao and Dennis Bermudez battle to decide the first featherweight TUF winner in UFC history, while John Dodson and TJ Dillashaw do the same for the bantamweights. Plus, heavy-handed TUF 13 winner Tony Ferguson steps up against seasoned vet Yves Edwards, and in the main event, Michael Bisping looks to remove the smirk off the face of his latest rival, Jason “Mayhem” Miller, who will be making his first Octagon appearance in over six years.

Round-by-round results from the TUF 14 Finale main card on Spike TV will be piling up after the jump beginning at 8 p.m. ET. Refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest.

(It’s funny until you realize that his little dog is in that backpack. And then it’s absolutely hilarious. GIF via IronForgesIron)

We’re heading into the home stretch of TUF 14: Team Asshole vs. Team Goofball, and the bloom is definitely off the rose. At this point, I just want to see the coaches settle their beef at the finale show next month. I’d also like to see Diego Brandao whip some more ass. Other than that, I’m only watching/writing this out of habit. How many dumb pranks can grown men can play on each other? Even when they involve Mariachi bands, it’s just…I don’t know. There are more important things happening in our country right now.

The TUF house has reached a Heathers-level of cliquey-ness. You got the Bible thumpers, the card players, and the dudes with anger issues/crazy hair/dark skin. And hey, you know who Akira Corassani doesn’t like? That bitch-ass Bryan Caraway. “He’s like a little girl,” Akira says. “He wakes up in the morning, he takes like 25 minutes to make his hair.”

So, Akira sneaks into Bryan’s bedroom in the middle of the night and shaves off a piece of his hair. Caraway chases him to an upstairs balcony, where Akira is giggling with his bros. Instead of brawling with the whole gang, Bryan threatens non-specific vengeance sometime in the future. “Y’know, what we do in life echoes in eternity, and this right here I’m going to laugh about my whole life,” Akira says, COMPLETELY MISSING THE POINT OF GLADIATOR. Look, spoiler alert, Akira gets choked out at the end of this episode and it’s awesome. Sorry guys, I had to.

Tebowing: None of you are doing it right.

Another season of The Ultimate Fighter has come and gone, and we’re not certain what the future holds for it. The entire format of the show we knew and loved, then decided to ignore for a while, then were all like “Dude there’s no way Kimbo gets past Roy Nelson”, then went back to ignoring it when we were proven right, then decided “Well maybe Mayhem will be fun to watch” is about to change yet again. Raise your hand if you got lost during that last sentence.

If there’s one thing we understand at Cage Potato, it’s consistency. No matter how much the show changes, we’ll be around to give you our opinions on what to do with the finale’s biggest names. So let’s get to it, shall we?

Michael Bisping: Since losing to Wanderlei Silva back at UFC 110, Michael Bisping has gone 4-0 and established himself as a Top Ten Middleweight. Or at least that’s what I keep hearing, even though the guys he’s defeated in that time period have been on the lower to middle end of the middleweight division. In his post fight-interview with Ariel Helwani, Bisping hinted that his next fight has already been booked, and it’s against someone he hasn’t fought before. A fight against Alan Belcher makes sense, and should establish the winner as a legitimate contender in the middleweight division. Don’t act too surprised if the UFC uses Bisping as a litmus test for 7-0 (3-0 UFC) prospect Chris Weidman, either.

Photo courtesy of Getty Images

Make no mistake, no matter how last night’s main event was going to end, it was going to be an important moment in UFC history. For the first time in the promotion’s history, two female athletes would be competing in the UFC. Squash match or not, the historical significance of the fight and the freshly minted UFC Women’s Bantamweight title were enough to bump the fight up to main event status.

I’ve seen dozens of writers today write about how “predictably” the main event ended, but I can’t help but feel that this does a severe injustice to the fight we were treated to. Yes, it ended in a first round armbar victory for Ronda Rousey, and no, literally nothing else about this fight was predictable.

This is in large part a credit to challenger Liz Carmouche. Few people gave Carmouche any sort of chance to win, as clearly reflected by the betting odds for the fight. Yet for the first time last night, Carmouche was able to expose holes in Rousey’s game, and make the women’s champion look beatable. She wasn’t Rousey’s slightly-resistant grappling dummy – she was a very worthy challenger who almost finished Rousey with a rear-naked choke, and has teeth marks on her arm to show for it. Let’s all stop and admit that none of us expected this from her.

(‘I’m fighting who, now? You sure?’)

Remember when Nick Diaz and KJ Noons (along with KJ Noons’ dad) got into it after the last Elite XC event in Hawaii and it all seemed like a staged confrontation designed to build up a rematch between them for the July 26 show on CBS? And then remember how Elite XC announced that the event would be in Stockton, Ca., Diaz’s hometown, but instead of Noons, Diaz would be fighting Thomas “Wildman” Denny? Remember how weird and completely counter-intuitive that seemed?

Yeah, well, apparently Denny couldn’t believe it either. As he told MMA Rated, it just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense:

I was really surprised. I kinda think everybody agreed with that, you know the little thing that happened, the little eruption afterwards or whatever. Nick is a showman. I don’t know if you know; he means it all the time. But he comes off as kind of a jackass and a lot of people don’t think he has a lot of class in the sport, and that little eruption that happened afterwards and flipping people off and whatever, I thought, “Man, yeah, they’ll definitely book that”. But I guess Noons wants some time off and wants to take the fight serious, where Nick wants to fight as much as he can.

Good work, Elite XC. Even your fighters are baffled by your decisions.

Denny is doing his part to turn up the heat in advance of his bout with Diaz though, and he didn’t stop at calling Diaz “kind of a jackass.” No, he’s just getting started.

Here’s the main event from Friday’s ShoXC card, which ended with Malaipet Sitprapom kneeing Thomas Denny in the face while he was down, then dropping three illegal downward elbow strikes into the back of Denny’s head (5:53-5:58). Denny controlled the action up until then, nearly finishing the fight early with a rear-naked choke attempt and then causing some damage from the mount, but Malaipet was able to shake himself out of both positions. Skip to the 11:33 mark for Denny’s post-fight interview, where he voices his displeasure at the way things went down; a rematch looks likely.

Major ups to our new Blood Brothers at MMAScraps.com for providing the video. If you want to kill your productivity at work today, go there.

(Click chart for full-size version. For previous Databombs, click here.)

By Reed Kuhn, @Fightnomics

Last week, we started our series on UFC strikers by breaking down the smallest division in key striking metrics. This week, in time for the Featherweight title fight between Jose Aldo and Frankie Edgar at UFC 156, we’ll look at the 145’ers. A full explanation of the chart and variables is included below.

The Winners

Sniper Award: Cub Swanson has been on a roll lately and tops out as the division’s most accurate striker, landing 37% of his power head strike attempts. For perspective, that’s bordering on Anderson Silva-type accuracy, at least statistically. This has helped Swanson win three straight in the UFC, all by (T)KO, and pick up two straight Knockout of the Night bonuses.

Energizer Bunny Award: Southpaw Erik Koch has more than doubled the striking output of his opponents. But that wasn’t enough to stop the ground Hellbows from Ricardo Lamas on last Saturday’s FOX card. There’s no doubt about Koch’s skills, he’ll just have to wait longer to test them against the current champ.

Biggest Ball(s) Award: Andy Ogle may cry a lot when he’s away from home, but no one should doubt the size of his, ahem, heart. Though he dropped a split decision in his UFC debut against Akira Corassani, he managed to knock down the Swede despite landing only two solid strikes to the head. He’d better improve his accuracy and pull the trigger more often if he hopes to get past the similarly gun-shy yet powerful Josh Grispi at UFC on FUEL 7 next month. Other notable featherweights with knockdown power include Koch, Aldo, Dennis Siver and Dennis Bermudez.

Bisping helps Stephan Bass prepare for a fight by pounding on him all day, like you do. GIFProps: ZombieProphet/IFI

It’s double-header week, and there’s no time wasted with extraneous detail — we’re right into discussion of the second featherweight fight picks. Jon Dodson is still insider trading with his boys on Team Death Leperkon Lepracon Leapercorn Lucky Charms Mascots, and Louis Gaudinot passes along the scoop: Miller will announce Dennis Bermudez (Miller’s #1) versus Stephan Bass (Bisping’s #4). Bisping celebrates this intelligence coup by assigning Bass triple practice time. Most of this practice time consists of beating up Bass, blacking his eye in the process.

For the actual fight announcement, Bisping is so confident in his coaching to this point that he feels no need to actually attend the meeting. Miller puts a jersey on a sparring dummy and does an Australian accent, which is kinda close if you don’t really think about it. He goes on to confirm the fight we all already knew was coming.

By Elias Cepeda

The rematch contained slightly less constant action than the first engagement but Benson Henderson and Frankie Edgar put on another technical, evenly-matched lightweight title fight Saturday night in the main event of UFC 150. Henderson also walked away with another decision win over the man he beat last February to win the championship belt.

Perusing twitter and the forums last night and today, to say nothing of Edgar’s complaints after the split decision was announced for Henderson, it appears that many fans and fighters believed that “The Answer” should have gotten the nod from the judges. This writer scored it for Henderson but only someone with an agenda could deny that it was a close, hard to score fight.

Henderson opened up quickly in the first round, landing quick kicks to Edgar’s lead calf, bruising and tripping him up. Edgar scored a take down in the stanza but got caught in a good guillotine choke attempt by Henderson, before escaping.

Henderson charged forward and age a right hand right to the chin from Edgar, dropping to the mat. From there, Edgar controlled Henderson on the ground for most of the rest of the round with a front head lock. Edgar worked to get his own choke in or move to the back but Henderson defended well and survived the round.

Rounds three and four were close in terms of strikes landed, as was round five. In the last round Henderson clearly closed most aggressively and finishing more emphatically with strikes.

When the decision was announced for Henderson, Edgar stormed away. He and his team acted like he was robbed.

He was not.

Unfortunately, last Tuesday’s UFC on FUEL: Zombie vs. Poirier card all but completely derailed our recent run of luck with the Gambling Enabler (aside from the decision to purchase some Bud Light Platinums to celebrate another beautiful McKenzietine bet), but hopefully this weekend’s UFC 146 event, which features an all heavyweight main card for the first time in UFC history will help get things back on track. So without further adieu, may we present to you the tasty betting lines, brought to you courtesy of BestFightOdds, along with our brilliant/equally insane advice below.

Main Card
Frank Mir (+425) vs. Junior dos Santos (-550)
Cain Velasquez (-400) vs. Antonio Silva (+325)
Roy Nelson (-225) vs. Dave Herman (+185)
Shane del Rosario (+135) vs. Stipe Miocic (-155)
Lavar Johnson (+105) vs. Stefan Struve (-125)

Preliminary Card (FX)
Diego Brandao (-265) vs. Darren Elkins (+205)
Edson Barboza (-550) vs. Jamie Varner (+425)
Jason Miller (-145) vs. C.B. Dollaway (+115)
Dan Hardy (-130) vs. Duane Ludwig (+100)

Preliminary Card (Facebook)
Paul Sass (+170) vs. Jacob Volkmann (-215)
Glover Teixeira (-240) vs. Kyle Kingsbury (+180)
Mike Brown (-160) vs. Daniel Pineda (+130)

Thoughts…