When we last saw Maiquel Falcao and Andreas Spang in the cage with each other, the two nearly started brawling during a post-fight interview at Bellator 66. Anticipation for their main event clash at last night’s Bellator 69 from Lake Charles, Louisiana was high, even though Falcao initially missed weight for their bout. The dust has settled, and the event produced this season’s middleweight tournament champion, a close (borderline controversial) decision and much more.

The evening’s main event saw UFC veteran Maiquel Falcao dominate Swedish prospect Andreas Spang. Save for an early right cross that appeared to have Falcao in trouble, as well as an illegal knee from “Big Rig” that cost him a one point deduction on the scorecards, Maiquel Falcao controlled this entire fight. Already known for his Muay Thai prowess, Falcao utilized an ever-improving wrestling game on his way to the unanimous decision victory.

Immediately after winning this season’s middleweight tournament, Bjorn Rebney came to the cage to announce that Maiquel Falcao will be fighting Alexander Shlemenko, who was initially set for a rematch against Hector Lombard before he signed with the UFC, for the vacant middleweight title. Falcao vs. Shlemenko should be an interesting fight, especially if Falcao is healthy for it. At the post-event press conference, Maiquel Falcao revealed that he had been battling a flu leading up to his fight against Spang.

Yes, the headline is 100% accurate. Perhaps the third time really is a charm, as Marius Zaromskis and Wachiim Spiritwolf finally had a fight last night that didn’t end with an eye poke just seconds into the fight or a highly questionable stoppage. We know, we’re just as excited as you are.

But first, let’s go over the tournament bouts. In the evening’s main event, judo black belt Karl Amoussou made quick work of Jackson MMA’s Bryan “The Beast” Baker. After an early accidental eye poke from Baker, the two traded blows throughout the opening frame. Then, after a failed Super Kick^TM from Baker, Amoussou locked in a nasty heel hook that earned the submission just fifty six seconds into the bout. Seriously, that’s how this one ended. Take a look:

(Sorry Ben, I don’t think we can count those as “significant strikes.” GIF via ZombieProphet/BloodyElbow)

For the first time since his controversial technical submission of Ryan Thomas during his Bellator debut three years ago, Ben Askren has finished an opponent. Sure, it was one of those sort-of-assisted finishes where the doctor steps in between rounds to wave the fight off, but let’s not take anything anything away from Funky Ben, here: The undefeated Bellator welterweight champion smashed the living dog-poop out of Karl Amoussou for three full rounds last night, and might have permanently injured him had the fight gone on any longer.

It was a prototypical performance from Askren, who spent most of the fight on top of Amoussou, throwing down punches and elbows. Still, there seemed to be a greater sense of urgency from the champ in this fight, a little more intention with his strikes. He slashed open a cut above Amoussou’s eye with an elbow in the first round, and by the end of round three, Amoussou’s left eye was swollen shut and his face was a wet canvas of blood. The fight was mercifully stopped before the fourth round could begin, giving Askren a well-deserved TKO victory.

“I told you guys that it was just a matter of time before my hands got some power in them,” Askren said after the fight. “I dominate positionally, and my hands [have] power too. Welterweights anywhere in the world better watch out, I’m coming.” Askren’s next challenge will likely be the winner of this season’s welterweight tournament, which produced four semifinalists last night…

Karl Amoussou vs. Chris Lozano, courtesy of IronForgesIron.com

As dangerous as Cleveland can be as a city, it has struggled to field decent sports teams and produce champions (not to mention keeping them). Last night at Bellator 63, which gave viewers the Quarterfinal round of this season’s welterweight tournament, “The Cleveland Assassin” Chris Lozano looked to break the cycle and make a run at Bellator’s welterweight title. If you’ve been paying any attention, you already know what to expect.

Perhaps no one in MMA other than Chael Sonnen embraces his alter-ego more than Lozano’s opponent, “Psycho” Karl Amoussou, who had Lozano uncharacteristically angered with his psycho routine before the fight. While that didn’t translate to either man swinging for the fences at the bell, it did lead to an early finish for the French judoka. After Amoussou cut Lozano with a head kick, “The Cleveland Assassin” took Amoussou down and landed in his guard, which would be Lozano’s only offense for the fight. From there, Amoussou swept Lozano, mounted him and took his back to sink in the rear-naked choke. Karl Amoussou improves to 14-4-2 in his welterweight debut.

(Props: TheFightNerd)

Bellator has already proven that they have a zero-tolerance policy for tournament competitors missing weight, and this afternoon, Maiquel Falcao put himself in danger of being the second finalist to be disqualified this season.

During the weigh-ins for tomorrow’s Bellator 69 event at L’Auberge du Lac Casino Resort in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Falcao punished the scales at 188 pounds, three above his middleweight limit. He has been given two hours to sweat off the excess; if he doesn’t make it happen, his opponent Andreas Spang could win the Season Six Middleweight Tournament by default, earning a title shot against a cardboard cutout of Hector Lombard. Cross your fingers for a good result, because these two really need to squash their beef. UPDATE: Falcao made weight on his second attempt.

In other Bellator weigh-in news, two undercard fighters also came in heavy on their first attempts, and welterweight semifinalist Karl Amoussou made opponent David Rickels his bitch during the staredown. You can see a GIF of that rather embarrassing moment after the jump, along with complete weigh-in results from Bellator 69, which will also feature a 115-pound women’s match between Megumi Fujii and Jessica Aguilar.

(Best finish of the night: Luke Rockhold vs. Paul Bradley)

Takayo Hashi may have been touted as the second-best 135-pound female fighter in the world coming into her title fight against Sarah Kaufman at last night’s Strikeforce Challengers event in San Jose, but for most of the five-round contest she looked woefully outmatched. Kaufman’s superior standup ruled the night, as the undefeated Canadian — and new "welterweight" women’s champion of Strikeforce — dropped Hashi twice in the first round, and spent the rest of the fight chasing the Japanese grappling specialist around the cage, landing punches whenever she was in range.

Kaufman successfully avoided the occasional takedown and submission attempts from her opponent, and outside of a teep kick that found its mark on her face in the final frame, she made it through all 25 minutes relatively untouched. After the fight’s conclusion — a 50-45 decision on all three judges’ scorecards — Kaufman apologized to the fans for her inability to finish Hashi, and generously credited Hashi’s constant movement: "It was really hard to get a lot of clean shots on her consecutively,” Kaufman said. “I would have loved to have finished the fight, but I couldn’t have done any more than I did.”

Just look at these two–like a couple of wild dogs you can’t keep apart.

With two bouts and two unsatisfying stoppages already under their belts, Waachiim Spiritwolf and Marius Zaromskis are slated to once more climb into a cage and go through the motions of fighting before a freak injury leaves the viewing audience with a massive case of blue balls.

The pair first locked horns at Strikeforce Challengers 12, where an inadvertent eyepoke just seconds into the fight left Spiritwolf unable to continue. The duo reloaded and clashed once more a few weeks back at Bellator 68, where cageside doctors would call a halt to the bout between the second and third frames due to a cut between Spiritwolf’s eyebrows.

With one ‘No Contest’ and one questionable tally in the win column for Zaromskis, Spiritwolf will have his chance to settle the score on July 20^th at Bellator 72.

After the jump, season six Welterweight tournament finalists will tie up loose ends as well…

(Props: all elbows)

AllElbows.com‘s latest bit of King Mo-related video hype focuses on Mo’s last fight against Ryo Kawamura at Sengoku 7. It was the first time that Lawal wasn’t able to finish an opponent, and he explains that was because his knee was injured during the fight, not because he couldn’t destroy Kawamura if he wanted to. Blame Dean Lister. Now that Mo has gone through knee surgery and rehab, he’s ready to start knocking fools out again.

As you may recall, his next opponent will be Mark Kerr, the waaaaaaay-past-his-prime UFC/PRIDE old-schooler, who’s currently riding a four-fight losing streak. Kerr is a replacement for Don Frye, who disgraced himself by pulling out of the fight. The ridiculous squash match will headline M-1 Global’s "Breakthrough" event in Kansas City next Friday, which will be broadcast live on HDNet beginning at 9 p.m. CT. Other fights on the card include Karl Amoussou vs. John Doyle, and that weird sparring exhibition between Fedor Emelianenko and Gegard Mousasi. If you can find the motivation to DVR this thing at some point in the next week, congratulations — you are a hardcore MMA fan.

After the jump: A classic-rock soundtracked tribute to heavyweight fighters and the interconnectedness of all humanity.

(Sarah Kaufman gives us the score on her MMA career and what she expects in her title bout with Takayo Hashi on Friday night.)

Yesterday on Twitter our pals over at Fight Magazine suggested that you’d have to be a “a real degenerate” to bet on Strikeforce: Challengers fights. We see where they’re coming from. Betting on fights, sometimes between relative unknowns, could be construed as a sign that you’re the kind of maniac who will bet on anything, whether it’s a fight between two stray cats or a UFC main event. That might be true…if you lose those bets. My friends, the Enabler does not plan on losing this weekend. Not if he wants to keep his legs in good working order, and he really, really wants that.

The best lines on the internet come to us courtesy of BestFightOdds.com:

Sarah Kaufman (-575) vs. Takayo Hashi (+500)
Trevor Prangley (-350) vs. Karl Amoussou (+330)
Luke Rockhold (-185) vs. Paul Bradley (+180)
James Terry (-130) vs. Tarec Saffiedine (+130)
Raul Castillo (+101) vs. Yancy Medeiros (-111)

The breakdown…

(War Machine poses with the kids’ MMA class that he is somehow allowed to teach. Props: @WarMachine170)

Two interesting updates to Bellator’s sixth season, which begins March 2nd…

— After signing to the promotion in December, War Machine has secured his quarterfinal opponent for Bellator’s upcoming welterweight tournament. As he wrote on Twitter yesterday, “Fuck ya its on! My first fight in @BellatorMMA tournament will be March 30th vs. Karl Amoussou!! Gonna send him back to France in peices!!” It will be Machine’s first appearance since his impressive post-prison win against Roger Huerta in November.

Karl “Psycho” Amoussou (13-4-2, 1-1 in Bellator) is indeed French, and has also competed for M-1, Strikeforce, DREAM, and Pancrase. The Haute Tension product most recently scored a first-round TKO over Jesus Martinez in a 175-pound catchweight bout at Bellator 59 in November. Bellator’s Season 6 welterweight bracket will include Bryan Baker, Brian Foster, undefeated triangle-choke specialist David Rickels, and Season 5 tournament finalist Ben Saunders. War Machine is already looking forward to an emotional reunion with his TUF 6 castmate.

In other news…

(Alistair engages in a moment of reflection with his life-partner, Hilda. That’s the name of his sledgehammer. What, you didn’t think I was talking about the dumpy broad on the right, did you?)

Contradicting earlier reports, Alistair Overeem will probably not face Ricco Rodriguez at DREAM.15 next Saturday. Said Overeem’s trainer Martin De Jong: "If he’s going to fight, he’s probably not going to fight Ricco Rodriguez…We didn’t receive any contract. [DREAM] proposed Ricco Rodroguez, but they didn’t send a contract, and definitely we did not sign it." De Jong added that Overeem has no problem fighting Rodriguez, but they may skip DREAM.15 due to other issues with the promotion that he wouldn’t discuss.

Nevertheless, three additional fights were announced for the card today, bringing the current total to seven. They are…

(They can put you behind bars. They can fire you for being an idiot. But damn it, they’ll never take your sense of joy.)

On June 19th, War Machine (formerly known as Jon Koppenhaver) will finally make his Bellator debut, when he faces WEC veteran Blas Avena at Bellator 96. The fight will come four-and-a-half years after the short-fused welterweight was first signed by Bellator back in early 2009. Let’s just say their schedules haven’t matched up since then.

First, Machine was fired by Bellator for suggesting that President Obama — and every president after him — should be assassinated. Then, he embarked on a brief but rewarding career in porn which ended in a punch-up at a birthday party. Then, he spent a year in jail for one of his various assault charges. Then he had to go back to jail for one of his various assault charges, which led to the cancellation of a scheduled fight against Karl Amoussou. Then, he had to pull out of his next scheduled fight against Paul Daley due to a partially torn ACL, which pretty much takes us to the present day.

Now that War Machine is all healed up, he’ll allegedly be making his Bellator debut on the promotion’s 2013 Summer Series premiere on Spike TV, assuming he doesn’t beat up another civilian, or sustain another training injury, or get cut again for simply expressing his honest thoughts. Machine hasn’t competed since his TKO win over Roger Huerta in November 2011, while Avena recently snapped a two-year winless streak by TKO’ing Lenny Lovato at Bellator 91 in February.

Can War Machine rebuild his career in the #2 MMA promotion? And what the hell kind of name is “Blas,” anyway?

(Yeah, we’re not really stoked for this one either, Mo.)

Not too long ago, Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal signed a — I guess you’d call it groundbreaking — deal with both Bellator and TNA Wrestling after being released from Strikeforce following a positive test for steroids and an epic Twitter meltdown, a decision he is probably patting himself on the back for in light of recent events. Ever since, we have been quietly waiting to see which one of Bellator’s remaining light heavyweights Mo would square off against first, whether it was…what’s his face, or, uhh…*snaps fingers*…uh…God, I know this…

…

…Turns out, Bellator is going the Josh Barnett route for King Mo’s big debut, bringing in a complete outsider named *checks glasses* Przemyslaw Mysiala to conveniently get squashed just before confetti falls from the ceiling and Mo is declared the next challenger to whomever emerges victorious from the Christian M’Pumbu/Attila Veigh fight. And you better believe that some form of energy drink will be used to hose bitches down at some point in this ceremony, because it sooo will.

Bellator’s first event on Spike TV will take place Thursday, January 17th, at the University of California’s Bren Center in Irvine, California, and will be headlined by a pair of title fights. The promotion confirmed the news today, revealing that undefeated phenom Michael Chandler will make his first official lightweight title defense at the event (aka Bellator 85) against Rick Hawn, the 14-1 Olympic judoka who won the Season 5 lightweight tournament earlier this year.

Also on the card, featherweight champion Pat Curran — who’s 4-0 since dropping to 145 and is coming off his near-murder of Joe Warren — will be putting his belt on the line against explosive contender Patricio “Pitbull” Freire. Though Freire won all three of his fights in 2011, winning the Season 4 featherweight tournament, he wasn’t able to compete in 2012, partly due to injuries.

And that’s not all. During a Bellator/Spike TV conference call held earlier today, many more details about Bellator 85 and the promotion’s upcoming eighth season were announced. For instance…

(Props: YouTube.com/BellatorMMA)

The last event of Bellator’s fourth season went down last night in Lake Charles, Louisiana, featuring the finals of the light-heavyweight and featherweight tournaments. Christian M’Pumbu earned his way to the LHW finals by knocking out Chris Davis and Tim Carpenter, and it was business as usual against co-finalist Richard Hale. M’Pumbu dropped Hale once in the first round, but was unable to finish him with a D’arce choke. The Congolese-French standout didn’t make the same mistake twice; after scoring another knockdown in the third, M’Pumbu threw down leather until the ref was forced to stop the fight, picking up a $100,000 check and the title of Bellator’s first-ever light-heavyweight champion.

In the featherweight final, Patricio Freire edged out Daniel Straus to a unanimous decision, earning a rematch with champion Joe Warren, who he lost a split decision to last June. Full Bellator 45 results are after the jump…

(That little son-of-a-bitch is at it again… / ‘Shop courtesy of urdirt)

Alistair Overeem won’t be beating anybody up, but this Saturday’s DREAM event — which will be broadcast live on HDNet at 3 a.m. ET / midnight PT — will still be good for some late-night thrills, so set those DVRs, kiddies. In the main event, Shinya Aoki defends his DREAM lightweight belt (and attempts to bounce back from his humiliation in Strikeforce) against fellow Japanese mainstay Tatsuya "Crusher" Kawajiri, who’s on a four-fight win streak and hasn’t been submitted in five years. Also on the card, Gegard Mousasi and Melvin Manhoef headline that kinda-pointless mini-LHWGP, Mitushiro Ishida makes his featherweight debut against Daiki Hata, Michihiro Omigawa gets fed a can, and Gesias Cavalcante looks for his first win in three years against Katsunori Kikuno. If you’d like to make it interesting, head over to fightpicker.cagepotato.com (or apps.facebook.com/fightpicker) to make your predictions. This week’s pool-questions are…

(Takayo Hashi vs. Chisa Yonezawa @ GCM Valkyrie 2, 4/25/09)

After putting on the biggest women’s fight in history last year, Strikeforce is preparing to build women’s MMA even larger. According to a recent press release, Sarah Kaufman and Takayo Hashi will battle for the promotion’s first women’s 135-pound title at a Strikeforce Challengers event scheduled for February 26th at the Civic Auditorium in San Jose; tickets are on sale right now.

With a perfect record of 10-0 (eight via TKO), the hard-hitting Kaufman is one of the world’s best female fighters, and has been gaining recognition in Strikeforce thanks to the dominant decision victories she scored over Miesha Tate and Shayna Baszler in 2009. Takayo Hashi (12-1; 4 wins by submission, 8 by unanimous decision) has competed primarily in Japan, where she was one of the standouts of the SmackGirl promotion. Hashi most recently choked out Chisa Yonezawa at a GCM Valkyrie event last April, and avenged her only loss to Hitomi Akano in 2007. She’s known primarily as a grappler, while Kaufman is known primarily for beating the crap out of grapplers.

(Fight starts at the 4:22 mark. Props: MMA Linker)

As expected, Muhammed Lawal‘s pimpin’ ring entrance took longer than his actual fight against Mark Kerr last night at M-1 Breakthrough in Kansas City, with the flashy Team Quest product needing just 25 seconds to steamroll the fighter formerly known as "The Smashing Machine." King Mo pounced for a single-leg as Kerr tried to throw a leg kick, then took his 263-pound opponent to the canvas and started slugging him in the head until Kerr was knocked out. I guess the oddsmakers know how to do their jobs after all.

Also on the card, Fedor Emelianenko and Gegard Mousasi went through the motions with their "sparring exhibition," which never came close to looking anything like a real fight, except for the end when Fedor won by armbar. That video and complete results from the event are after the jump…

(It took forty minutes and 13 Vodka cranberries before War Machine realized that this wasn’t the Jenna Jameson cutout he had ordered.) 

Although Bellator’s current bidding war with Eddie Alvarez has snagged all of the headlines, the promotion actually does have a card worth discussing at the end of the month in Bellator 86. Including King Mo’s promotional debut and a headlining welterweight title fight between Ben Askren and…WAIT, WHERE ARE YOU GOING? DON’T YOU DARE LOOK AWAY FROM ME. Askren will be fighting Karl Amoussou, who stands a better chance at ending the most uneventful title reign in MMA history than most of Askren’s challengers so far. I’M SERIOUSLY YOU GUYS.

In news you might define as “exciting,” elsewhere on the card will be the first round of action in Bellator’s next welterweight tournament, which features such former tournament participants as Ben Saunders, Douglas Lima, and Raul Amaya taking on Koffi Adzisto, Michail Tsarev, and Jose Reyes respectively. Also booked for the tourney is cursed in America fighter and recipient of truly the worst beating of 2012, Marius Zaromskis, who will be squaring off against Brent Weedman. Nearly half of these participants have faced one another before (Saunders has fought Amaya and Lima, who has fought Weedman) and six of the eight men have been knocked out of a Bellator welterweight tournament before. I’m not sure what to do with that information, but there it is.

As we know, both War Machine and Paul Daley were pulled from the tourney following a knee injury and a pub brawl, respectively. And in the twisted nightmare this universe has truly become, War Machine was not responsible for the latter. Bellator 86 goes down from the Winstar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma on January 23rd.

And in UFC fight booking news…

Eric Prindle vs. Thiago Santos, fight ending low blow comes at the 2:07 mark. All videos in this post props to IronForgesIron.com

Coming fresh off of Last week’s action packed show, Bellator looked to keep building momentum last night in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The good news for Bellator is that, for the most part, the card delivered exciting, entertaining fights. The bad news for Bellator? That above video not only happened, but was supposed to be this season’s heavyweight tournament finale.

Rather, this season’s heavyweight tournament ends with a controversial no contest. On one hand, it would be anti-climatic to name a number one contender by disqualification from to an illegal kick. On the other hand, if Santos was aiming for the inside of Prindle’s thigh, it sure didn’t look like it. Prindle will meet Santos again to determine a contender for Cole Konrad, although a date for their next meeting hasn’t been announced yet.

Bellator’s “Like Water” promo has been updated. Can you spot the difference?* VidProps: BellatorMMA/YouTube

Bellator’s fifth season middleweight tournament gets underway tomorrow night, with live broadcasts on MTV2 and EPIX covering all the main card action. With some stiff competition from the UFC and the WBC, there may be considerably fewer eyeballs on the bouts in Hollywood, Florida, but don’t tell these guys. There’s going to be some action. Go back and read the preview if you’ve forgotten anyone, and let’s run down the CagePotato picks for the evening.

Cain Velasquez and Wanderlei Silva weren’t the only big winners over the weekend. Some of you managed to parlay the goings-on in Australia at UFC 110 into personal success with our MMA FightPicker, and unlike those poor suckers you were able to do it without ever leaving the comforting glow of your computer screen.

But before we get to shouting out some winners, we must answer the question, who was the superior Ben in this weekend’s FightPicker action? The answer is me (BF). I finished sixth in Journeyman Pool 30 #390 with 160 points, which doesn’t sound very impressive until you note that BG finished fifteenth with 130 points, coming in just ahead of Joe Bananas, who we can only assume is the owner of a discount electronics store known for its certifiably insane deals on everything from digital cameras to personal computers.

(Lucio Linhares highlight reel courtesy of norja01.)

Tucked away on the preliminary card of UFC 107 this Saturday will be two promising Brazilian up-and-comers, trying to make their names on MMA’s greatest stage. Will they prove that they belong there, or will they just be more chum for the Octagon’s sharks? Let’s meet ‘em…

LUCIO LINHARES (MW)
Experience: 13-4 record, with multiple appearances in M-1 Challenge and Finland’s Fight Festival organization. Is currently on a five-fight win streak, with all wins by stoppage and notable victories over Karl Amoussou and Sean Salmon.
Will be facing: Rousimar Palhares (9-2, 2-1 UFC)
Lowdown: A native of Ipatinga, Brazil, the 36-year-old Linhares grew up studying a variety of martial arts including kung fu and capoeira before discovering jiu-jitsu. Now, "the gentle art" is how Spartan makes his living. Linhares is highly-regarded as a BJJ instructor, and his annual seminars in Finland have garnered him the unofficial title of "Godfather of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in Finland." (He also competed in the M-1 Challenge as a ringer for Team Finland.) Though Linhares’s start in MMA came relatively late in life, he’s enjoyed great success recently thanks to an improving stand-up game. He describes Palhares as "my hardest opponent to date." However: "I know I have a good Brazilian jiu-jitsu and I am confident to face anyone in the UFC because this is the moment of truth for me."

(Photo via MMAWeekly)

By Elias Cepeda

American wrestler Ben Askren’s entry into MMA after the 2008 Summer Olympic Games seemed so full of promise and excitement. Here was one of the world’s best wrestlers deciding, in his athletic prime, to give up wrestling and devote himself to learning the MMA game.

Furthermore, Askren was known as having one of the most exciting styles in the NCAA during his college career. Add to this the fact that Askren seemed to take to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu very quickly — routinely entering Jiu Jitsu tournaments to stay sharp — and it seemed like he was destined for success.

Four years into his MMA career, Askren has undoubtedly achieved one type of success while another has thus far eluded him. All Askren does is win — he’s 10-0 with victories over some of the best veterans and prospects in the welterweight division. But he’s also become a polarizing and unpopular figure, criticized by pundits and fans as “boring.”

Askren has done his job as a highly touted blue-chipper, winning and winning some more, even earning the Bellator welterweight championship in the process. But his efforts have mostly been met with criticism in the public.

The hate hasn’t affected him, though. “No, not really,” Askren insists during a conversation with CagePotato. “Fans are fickle. I knew that coming in. I’ve never been worried about fan reaction.”

To put it mildly, I’ve been skeptical about Bellator’s non-title fights in the past. They’ve all been total squash fights, and light-heavyweight champion Christian M’Pumbu actually managed to lose his against Travis Wiuff back at Bellator 55. Last night didn’t exactly make me a believer in non-title fights, but I won’t act like I wasn’t impressed with lightweight champion Michael Chandler after his performance against Akihiro Gono.

Chandler followed up his brilliant fourth round rear-naked choke over Eddie Alvarez back at Bellator 58 with a quick TKO over Akihiro Gono. After catching Gono early with a straight right, Chandler pounced on a stunned Gono and rained down punches until he earned the stoppage. Michael Chandler improves to 10-0 overall, with six fights ending in the first round.

At the post-fight press conference, Akihiro Gono announced his retirement from MMA. Gono has lost three fights in a row, and his record now stands at 32-18-7. His most recent victory was a unanimous decision over Diego Gonzalez at Sengoku 12 in March 2010. While it’s never easy to watch an icon of the sport retire, it’s even harder to watch him continue to lose. Thanks for the memories, Magic Man.

(VidProps: YouTube/evilbyte)

Give the DREAM bosses some credit, these guys sure know how to build suspense into what otherwise might be a fairly straightforward and pleasing night of MMA fights. As it turned out, there was no surprise run-in from Alistair Overeem and the Japanese promotion with the fly-by-the-seat-of-its pants matchmaking style never found a fight for Ricco Rodriguez. We hope it paid for the flight and the sushi, at least.  On the bright side, DREAM finally did manage to convince Gegard Mousasi to put in the 31 seconds of work it took to defeat an overweight Jake O’Brien and Shinya Aoki likewise bounced back from an embarrassing loss in Strikeforce a few months ago to put a quick and typically stoic beating on Tatsuya Kawajiri.

Like “Sweet and Sassy,” Aoki called it an early night, withstanding some heel kicks to the face as he locked up an Achilles lock that secured the tap and appeared to damage his Kawajiri’s leg in just one minute, 53 seconds. A couple of days after possibly declaring his bi-sexuality at the event’s weigh-in (we assume he was being ironical), Aoki ditched his trademark colorful tights for relatively conservative board shorts and rushed from the ring following his win to get some lovin’ from his (possibly female) fiancé.

After the jump, O’Brien vs. Mousasi, where it will take you all of the first 15 seconds to see why the American had a little trouble making weight …

(That makes two of us who went commando today. Pic Props: Playboy)

By Jason Moles

After the post-fight press conference for Bellator 82, I was lucky enough to catch up with one of our all-time favorite MMA ring girls, Jade Bryce. When you’ve been around the business for any significant amount of time, you are rarely blown away during an interview — especially when you’re talking with the hired eye candy. Wouldn’t you know it, that’s exactly what happened Saturday night.

Ms. Bryce is one of the most knowledgeable and genuinely caring people in the MMA industry. During our conversation, we touched on topics ranging from her favorite fighters to her weakness for chocolate chip cookies. But it’s only when we broached the subject of what she wants for Christmas that her passion was truly enkindled. Check out the highlights of our little one-on-one below.

CagePotato: Hi, Jade, thanks for making time to speak with us. We have a few quick questions for you, which should help our readers get to know you a bit better. For starters, who is your favorite fighter?

Jade Bryce: Since I began with Bellator, I’ve always really loved Michael Chandler and the “Pitbull” brothers a lot, as well as Alexander Shlemenko. I also really like Douglas Lima and Ben Saunders, but yeah, my favorites have always been Shlemenko, “Pitbull” brothers, and Chandler. Oh! [Pat] Curran too. Which is weird because him and [Patricio] “Pitbull” are going to fight soon, so it’ll be a hard fight for me.

CP: For sure. Watching two of your favorite fighters punch each other in the face must be like torture to you. What about Ben Askren, do you think he’s going to defend his title successfully against Karl Amoussou?

JB: No.

CP: Wait, what?! You’re kidding, right? You might be the only person not from France to say that.

JB: I know, but I’m always the one to say, “I told you so.” Everyone else thought Eddie Alvarez was going to win against Chandler, but I had been saying for a year that Chandler was going to win. And no one believed me when it came to “Pitbull” or Chandler, and he has the belt now. I think Amoussou is going to do really well [in his fight against Askren.]

Remember: *this* is the guy that the middleweights are competing to fight. Hector Lombard knocked Vitale down twice with one punch. VidProps: BellatorMMA/YouTube

So anybody notice that I mentioned Bellator yesterday?  You did?   And you didn’t comment about how splendiferous Bellator is, and how much you like watching the fights, and in general how witty and good looking we are here at CagePotato?
Well that’s just rude.  I’m inclined to not even bother running down the other two tourneys planned for this season.  Really, it’s like you don’t care.

Oh, alright.  Come on in and we’ll have coffee and talk.  But no staying over.

(“Call me Aldo Montoya again, bitch!”)

By Seth Falvo (@SethFalvo)

When Nick Ring walked to the cage on Saturday accompanied by professional wrestling legend Bret “The Hitman” Hart, it was one more example of mixed martial arts’ quirky love affair with professional wrestling. Oh sure, we like to pretend that we have nothing in common with those peculiar Puroresu practitioners because our sport is real, both in terms of the violence and the personalities associated with it. Nonsense. With fake fighters crossing over to the real stuff, real fighters crossing over to the fake stuff, fake matches “borrowing” their outcomes from real fights, real promos “borrowing” from the classic fake stuff and multiple guys dabbling in both sports, the line between the two is arguably blurrier now than it was back when Ken Shamrock was ankle locking fools in the World Wrestling Federation.

It should come as no surprise then that we’ve seen our share of professional fighters attempting honest-to-God professional wrestling moves in real fights. We know, we know: We’re totally not supposed to be trying this stuff at home. But fortunately for us, the following brave men have ignored the countless warnings, the advice of their trainers and their own common sense to provide us with the most entertainingly reckless ways to injure their fellow men.

But before we break out the face paint and spandex, let’s establish how I’ll be ranking such absurd maneuvers. The moves will be ranked based on their immediate effectiveness, how true to form they stay to their kayfabe counterparts, and the competence of their opponents. Let’s face it: Even if you do something insanely cool and difficult from professional wrestling in an MMA fight, if you then get knocked out, you still look like a chump. Let’s also acknowledge that a punch to a downed opponent has no business being called The Worm without the accompanying theatrics. Finally, it’s a lot easier to pull off a complex move in a fight when your opponent totally sucks at fighting. Those are my rules, and if you’re not down with that, I got two words for ya: LET’S BEGIN!

(The “American Wacko” t-shirt, from TrashTalkinKids. Still waiting on my “Snot Jorgensen” tee, guys.)

Riding high on a two-fight win streak against Krzysztof Soszynski and Igor Pokrajac, Stephan Bonnar will likely take on yet another dude with a weird European name in his next appearance. Multiple sources reported today that the American Psycho will face aggressive Czech prospect Karlos “The Terminator” Vemola at UFC on Versus 5, August 14th in Milwaukee.

Vemola (8-1, all wins by first-round stoppage) made his name competing in England as a heavyweight, Donkey Kong-ing most of his terrified opponents in under two minutes. He suffered his first defeat in his Octagon debut at UFC 116, getting slept on by Jon Madsen for three rounds. Wisely, the 6-foot fireplug immediately dropped to light-heavyweight, and beat the living crap out of Seth Petruzelli, picking up a Knockout of the Night bonus in the process. Vemola was slated to return against Luis Cane at UFC 128, but had to withdraw due to a mouth infection.

Killer matchup, if you ask me. Battle-tested vet vs. young juggernaut — who ya got?