Rousey vs. Budd. Things get ugly about thirty seconds in. Props: IronForgesIron.com

Heading into last night, many people were calling Ronda Rousey the new face of women’s MMA. And why not? She is a decorated judoka who has finished all three of her professional fights in less than one minute. Rousey was given a step up in competition against Julia Budd at last night’s Strikeforce Challengers 20.

If you’ve followed Ronda Rousey’s MMA career at all, then you probably knew how the fight would look even before watching it. For those of you who are new to WMMA: Rousey quickly got Julia Budd to the ground. She established mount, and worked for an armbar. Julia Budd tried to fight through it, and got her arm snapped as a result. Total time? Thirty nine seconds. Forget the second round- Ronda Rousey is yet to see the second minute of a professional fight, having armbarred all four of her opponents less than one minute into the opening round.

(Jeez, I haven’t seen such poor fight choreography since Sonny Corleone went to town on that punk Carlo for beating on his kid sister.) 

If our past few posts are any indication, it doesn’t really matter what the subject of this article is, because you Taters will inevitably turn the comment section into a discussion on a feller who goes by dipsetkilla, whether he fucked your mom or not, and how gay you would be based on whether he fucked your mom or not. Personally, I think we should have dipset and bootystar (remember him?) engage in a winner-takes-all battle of incoherent superiority. Then again, dipset is probably hitching up his trousers and throwing a five dollar bill on my mother’s nightstand as we speak, so clearly I have a dog in this fight. Maybe I just miss bootystar and such whimsical gems as: “I bet the gladiator got asked cuz he was caught starring at the pork barrel sausage in the littereen next to his bald headed one yed jack of pades” but I digress.

Aaannnyyway…a pair of bouts have been added to Strikeforce’s stacked (LOL!) final card that will feature Luke Rockhold vs. Mr. Glass, Daniel Cormier vs. some dude, Josh Barnett vs. Imhotep, and Whoshisface vs. Whatshisname. We don’t mean to over-hype these fights, but needless to say, they will forever change your definition of the word “Superfight.”

(Video courtesy of YouTube/UliMorse)

Fedor has been taking his training for his last kick at the cat upcoming tilt with Dan Henderson next weekend seriously, enlisting the help of several top-tier training partners like his brother Aleksander and professional boxer Denis Lebedov to prepare for the former PRIDE and current Strikeforce champion.

(Before GSP and Carlos Condit, KJ Noons was by far the biggest pain in Nick Diaz’s ass. Photo via Esther Lin/Strikeforce)

Remember when Jorge Gurgel made the ominous claim that the losers at Strikeforce: Marquardt vs. Saffiedine would be out of a job? It’s starting to look like that rule maybe just applied to Jorge Gurgel. (Sorry, bro.) According to reports that have been coming out since the show, a couple of prelim fighters who fell short in their matches will soon be picked up by the UFC.

First up is KJ Noons, who lost to Ryan Couture in a decision so questionable that Dana White wondered if the coin-flip method would be more effective. It was Noons’s fourth loss in his last five outings — dating back to his rematch loss to Nick Diaz in October 2010 — but the UFC is giving the tough lightweight striker a chance to prove himself in the Octagon. As Noons told MMAJunkie yesterday, ”They said, ‘Heal up, and as soon as you’re healed up, then start training, and we’ll get you on a card.”

For Noons, a potential move to the UFC would represent a massive improvement to his career, and not just because of the increased visibility:

(Yeah, it’s basically a teacher’s salary, but putting a smile on Judo Gene‘s face makes it all worthwhile.)

Strikeforce paid out $368,000 in total disclosed salaries to the fighters who competed on Saturday’s Rousey vs. Kaufman card, with Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza eating up over a quarter of the total, the greedy bastard. Actually, Souza’s $94,000 paycheck was odd in that his win bonus was only about 30% of his to-show money, rather than the full 100% that almost everybody else on the Zuffa payroll gets.

The night’s biggest star Ronda Rousey only earned a $40,000 purse — I know, ladies, I know — though it was still enough to put her in second place on the event’s cash-money leaderboard. Check out the full salary list after the jump, and keep in mind that these figures don’t include additional revenue from sponsorships and undisclosed “locker room bonuses,” or deductions for taxes, insurance, and license fees.

Ronda Rousey: $40,000 (includes $20,000 win bonus)
Sarah Kaufman: $17,000

Ronaldo Jacare Souza: $94,000 (includes $22,000 win bonus)
Derek Brunson: $13,000

(Nick Diaz was right! If you listen close enough, you can hear the ocean!)

Last weekend’s Strikeforce: Tate vs. Rousey event gave us plenty to talk about, a rare feature of a Strikeforce card these days. Ronda Rousey officially became the most successful one trick pony of all time, Ronaldo Souza showed us that he is ever improving in the stand up department, and the Strikeforce matchmakers let Nazi pedophiles worldwide know that they could still earn a shot in the big time through hard work, *cough* rape *cough*, and dedication to your craft.

Nowadays, we all know that cash rules everything around us, so let’s first talk about the recently released salaries from this weekend’s “Tate vs. Rousey” card, as they are surprisingly generous for most parties involved. It’s good to know that all of Frank Shamrock’s hard work has paved the way for this new generation of fighters. Per usual, this list does not include any undisclosed/locker room bonuses or any of that noise.

Ronda Rousey: $32,000 (includes $17,000 win bonus)
Miesha Tate: $19,000

Josh Thomson: $80,000 (no win bonus)
K.J. Noons: $38,000

Kazuo Misaki: $50,000 (no win bonus)
Paul Daley: $45,000

Lumumba Sayers: $10,000 (includes $5,000 win bonus)
Scott Smith: $65,000

Ronaldo Souza: $92,000 (includes $22,000 win bonus)
Bristol Marunde: $10,000

Sarah Kaufman: $25,000 (includes $10,000 win bonus)
Alexis Davis: $4,000

Roger Bowling: $16,000 (includes $8,000 win bonus)
Brandon Saling: $5,000

Pat Healy: $22,500 (includes $5,000 win bonus)
Caros Fodor: $12,000

Ryan Couture: $10,000 (no win bonus)
Conor Heun: $8,000

Join us after the jump for our thoughts on the payout, along with a look at the medical suspensions from the event. 

(Get it?) 

Heading into arguably the most anticipated women’s MMA match of all time (that’s right, I said women’s), former Olympic bronze medalist Ronda Rousey had a mountain of claims to back up, a mountain only made higher by the fact that her meteoric run to a bantamweight title shot had left the general public with more questions than answers in regards to her skill set. In her four fight career, the woman had never seen what the second round, let alone the second minute, of a MMA contest looked like. So we were left to ponder: how would her striking, stamina, and suffocating Jiu-Jitsu attack hold up against the more experienced champ in Meisha Tate?

Well, as it turns out, we still don’t know much about the newly crowned women’s 135 lb. champion, and that may just be the scariest thing about her. Tate tried to answer a couple of these questions early, coming out throwing wild haymakers with ill intentions. Rousey was able to ride out the storm and secure a takedown, drawing an ominous “Oh shit!” reaction from the viewing audience, at least where I was. That statement was echoed tenfold when Rousey managed to secure her first armbar, which I’m still pretty positive did most of the damage to Tate’s arm. However, where referee Herb Dean would have let out his own, “Oh shit!” before stopping the fight right there, referee Mark Matheny was determined not to find himself in the middle of a Steve Mazagatti/Sarah D’Alelio controversy, adhering to a strict “snap then tap” policy for Ms. Tate. That policy would come into effect just a couple minutes later, when Rousey managed to secure the fight ending armbar that can only be described as “Palharesian.”

(Props: shosports)

Last night’s Strikeforce card was a memorable one — even though there were a couple aspects of the show that we’d love to forget. Now that the dust has settled, let’s take a look back at Tate vs. Rousey’s thrilling highlights and awful lowlights…

The Good
- First and foremost, this gif from the weigh ins. Oh, Ronda. [*flexes butt seductively*]

- Ronda Rousey‘s title-winning performance against Miesha Tate. We finally learned what Rousey’s “Plan B” is when she’s unable to armbar you within the first minute — unsurprisingly, it’s another armbar. Rousey kept her head when Miesha stormed out at her in the beginning of the fight, calmly extracted herself from bad positions on the ground, and didn’t get discouraged when her first nasty armbar attempt failed to break Miesha’s elbow. Instead, she relied on the judo expertise that has carried her to a title shot in less than a year of professional MMA competition, and got the inevitable snap/tap at 4:27 of round 1. During her post-fight interview, Rousey proved that her heat-seeking personality doesn’t turn off just because the match is over. (Yes, she holds grudges, and yes, she still thinks Tate sucks.) A meeting with former champ Sarah Kaufman is next, but I can’t be the only one looking ahead to a possible 135-pound superfight against Cris Cyborg.

- Ronaldo Souza‘s striking. In the past, Jacare’s occasional tendency to keep fights standing has struck me as a frustrating betrayal of his bread-and-butter. (See also: Demian Maia.) But against Bristol Marunde, Souza’s striking looked just as dangerous as his grappling; his ferocious overhand rights and unconventional kicks brought to mind other Brazilian bangers like Rafael “Feijao” Cavalcante and Edson Barboza. Jacare is still evolving as a fighter, and Luke Rockhold should watch his back.

(“You want to go somewhere else? That creepy fat guy has been staring at us all night.” / Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle. For more pics from this set, click here.)

Tonight, we’re gonna have ourselves a real good time, we feel ali-hi-hi-hiiiive. Ronda Rousey — the lightning-rod heel-champion of women’s MMA — will attempt to defend her Strikeforce 135-pound title against former champ Sarah Kaufman, most likely by first-round armbar. (The winner will face Cris Cyborg immediately afterwards in the parking lot.) Before that, we’ve got a bunch of men’s fights that seem way less interesting by comparison. For instance, former Strikeforce middleweight champion Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza is in the co-main event spot against 9-1 middleweight Derek “The Human Blanket (!)” Brunson, while Tarec Saffiedine, Roger Bowling, Lumumba Sayers, and Ovince St. Preux round out the crew of featured fighters who you might have heard of before.

Handling the thankless job of spelling out all these names in tonight’s liveblog is CagePotato weekend warrior Anthony Gannon, who will be providing round-by-round results from the Showtime main card broadcast after the jump, beginning at 10 p.m. ET. Refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest and please make your presence known in the comments section.

(Scott Coker: “Whooaa.” That other dude: “Niiiiiiice.” / Photo courtesy of facebook.com/StrikeforceMixedMartialArts)

Welcome, friends, to the most bonerrific highly-anticipated women’s bantamweight fight in MMA history. Seven months after winning the Strikeforce 135-pound strap, Miesha Tate will attempt to make her first title defense against arm-snapping fire-cracker Ronda Rousey. And that’s just the cherry on top of a loaded fight card that also features two former Strikeforce champions (Josh Thomson, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza), a pack of crowd-pleasing sluggers (Paul Daley, Scott Smith, KJ Noons), and the return of former PRIDE welterweight grand prix champion Kazuo Misaki.

Handling our liveblog for this evening is Steve Silverman, who will be posting round-by-round results for the Strikeforce: Tate vs. Rousey main card after the jump starting at 10 p.m. ET. Refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest, and please toss your own brilliant opinions and observations into the comments section.

It may be five years too late for the winner of tonight’s Fedor vs. Henderson bout to gain anything other than bragging rights, but that isn’t stopping us from being excited. Those of you who saw yesterday’s link dump already know that Fedor is only seven pounds lighter than he was when he fought Antonio Silva. Even though the scale doesn’t show it, Fedor looks more athletic than we’re accustomed to seeing him. Of course, if you’ve been paying attention you aren’t too surprised. Dan Henderson made weight as well, tipping the scales at 207 pounds.

To get an idea of how small Fedor is for a heavyweight, skip to about the two minute mark. Even though Fedor has the sixteen pound weight advantage, you wouldn’t know it by looking at him standing next to Hendo. Henderson, who pretty much came into this fight at light heavyweight, appears to be the same size as Fedor. And remember, Dan Henderson isn’t exactly the Anthony Johnson of the light heavyweight division.

Everyone else on tonight’s card made weight for their fights. Yes, this includes Paul Daley, who weighed in at 171 pounds for his fight against Tyron Woodley. Full results, courtesy of mmafighting.com, are after the jump.

(Nam Phan vs. Mike Budnik. Props: eze32101)

No need for a lengthy preamble — you’ve already seen the first five minutes of the Ultimate Fighter: Team GSP vs. Team Koscheck season premiere, and you know how these things generally go down. We’ve got 28 lightweights, battling for 14 spots. Dana White addresses the troops, Bruce Leroy giggles with anticipation. It’s the elimination round, where the RFFs (real fucking fighters) are separated from the pretenders. Let’s get it.

Marc Stevens vs. TJ O’Brien 
Stevens wrestled at the University of Buffalo when Josh Koscheck was the assistant wrestling coach there. Kos calls him an "okay wrestler." Stevens immediately lands a huge overhand right, then jackhammers O’Brien on the ground until the ref steps in. We later learn that the 13-second TKO is the fastest stoppage in TUF history. "Remember me now?" Stevens asks Koscheck.

Spencer Paige vs. Steve Magdaleno
Paige’s striking is as good as advertised, as he lands a mix of attacks in round 1. Magdaleno ends the round on top, working some ground-and-pound, but it might not be enough to steal the round. They start round 2 swinging for the fences before Paige starts blasting Magdaleno with knees. Magdaleno shoots on Paige and dumps him. Magdaleno looks for an arm triangle, then goes back to abusing Paige from the top. Magdaleno drops to guard when the action goes standing again, and possibly blows the fight, as Paige finishes strong with strikes from the top. Paige takes the unanimous decision.

The Hendo Alarm Clock ($19.95): Guaranteed to wake you up from the deepest of sleeps. (Pic: Strikeforce.com)

Waking up this morning I had no idea of the war being waged in comment sections and MMA forums throughout the night. I should have expected it, really, given the inexplicable fervor with which fans both exalt and denounce Fedor Emelianenko. My two cents on the stoppage: Dan Henderson hit Fedor with several full-force, illegal punches to the back of the head. They were to the back of the head because Fedor’s face was buried in the canvas. They were full-force force because Fedor’s arms lied limply at his sides, gently tucked below his slightly-less-chubby-than-usual torso. We can argue about “The Last Emperor” recovering and rolling over as Henderson was waived off, but there’s no debating what led referee Herb Dean to step in. Watch it in slow motion, watch it a lot.

That’s all the time I’ll devote to the main event; both men’s legacies were built long before they entered Hoffman Estates, and what transpired last night did little to change that. The real story is what’s ahead for last night’s winners and losers, and where Strikeforce as an organization is headed.

(Michelle “The Karate Hottie” Waterson puts Tyra Parker to sleep in 80 seconds.)

Main Card:
Duane Ludwig def. Sam Morgan via submission (strikes), 2:01 of round 1
Frank Trigg def. Falaniko Vitale via unanimous decision
Donnie Liles def. Pete Spratt via submission (rear naked choke), 1:59 of round 3
Billy Evangelista def. Luke Caudillo via unanimous decision
Carlos Zevallos def. Andre Walker via TKO, 4:48 of round 1
Michelle Waterson def. Tyra Parker via submission (rear naked choke), 1:20 of round 1
Tyler Toner def. Ricky Johnson via TKO, 3:44 of round 2

Undercard:
Drew Dober def. Lumumba Sawyers via KO (punch), 0:16 of round 1
Alan Gomez def. Jordan Goodwin via unanimous decisio
Eric Galvin def. Jeremy Malaterre via split decision
Turrell Galloway def. Brett Tillis via submission (rear naked choke), 1:21 of round 1
Aaron Trujillo def. Haven Torres via TKO, 2:59 of round 1

And the award for Best Vagina-Ear goes to:

(If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t trying…)

The problem with GSP picking favorable matchups all season is that he’s eventually going to be stuck with one that isn’t so favorable. For the last match in the round-of-14, his #7 draft Dane Sayers will automatically be fed to Sako "Psycho" Chivitchian, a crazy Armenian with world-class judo skills. St. Pierre says he wanted Dane to fight last so they’d have more time to work with him. A few weeks might not be enough; Sayers snuck through the elimination round thanks to his heart, but didn’t show a whole lot of skills.

Two lucky losers will soon be getting picked for the wild card fight, and everybody’s jockeying for it, except for Spencer Paige, who’s out of action for three months with a broken hand. Bummer, brah. Aaron Wilkinson is all banged up from his war with Michael Johnson, but he still wants it, and he’s clearly the most deserving. Wilkinson doesn’t think Jeff "Waster" Lentz should get a second chance, since he’s just been sitting around drinking and chewing tobacco. Jeff vows to piss on Aaron’s bed.

Our hero J.C. Skarbowsky returns to advise Dane, "Good is not enough, you have to be perfect." Everybody is calling Dane "Red Horse" this episode. Red Horse is his Indian name; he’s part Blackfoot and Chippewa. (On his mother’s side, we would assume.) Says Skarbowsky: "Koscheck’s not from the States, [Dane's] from the States. Koscheck needs your permission to come here."

(Tyra Parker and Michelle Watterson, reppin’ hard for the females. Photo courtesy of MMA Weekly.)

Just two weeks after holding their second show at the Playboy Mansion, Strikeforce is putting on another exciting MMA card, this time at the Broomfield Event Center in Broomfield, Colorado; you can watch the action live tonight on HDNet beginning at 10 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. PT. Headlining the festivities is a rematch between UFC/KOTC/Strikeforce vets Duane “Bang” Ludwig (16-8) and Sam “The Squeeze” Morgan (19-11). Morgan, who has lost four out of his last five fights, scored a first-round knockout of Ludwig at a Ring of Fire event in 2005. Ludwig hasn’t competed since losing to Takanori Gomi at Sengoku 1 in March.

The co-main event will be a middleweight brawl between broadcaster/t-shirt designer/fighter Frank Trigg (17-6) and Hawaiian grappler Falaniko Vitale (26-8), who has been inactive since winning a four-man X-1 tournament in January. Also notable is the Strikeforce debut of Denver’s own Michelle “The Karate Hottie” Watterson (3-2), a former castmember of Fight Girls who also spent time as a swimsuit model. She’ll be facing Tyra Parker (0-1), who came in a full four pounds over the 112-pound weight limit during yesterday’s weigh-ins, and will have to pay a portion of her fight salary to Watterson. The full lineup for Strikeforce: Payback is as follows:

MAIN CARD (Professional Bouts)
Duane Ludwig (165) vs. Sam Morgan (164.8)
Frank Trigg (183.8) vs. Falaniko Vitale (185.6)
Donnie Liles (170.8) vs. Pete Spratt (170.8)
Luke Caudillo (155) vs. Billy Evangelista (155)
Michelle Waterson (111.4) vs. Tyra Parker (116)
Andre Walker (202.4) vs. Carlos Zevallos (205.4)
Tyler Toner (146) vs. Ricky Johnson (143.6)

UNDERCARD (Amateur Bouts)
Lumumba Sawyers (171.2) vs. Drew Dober (167.8)
Jordan Goodwin (157.6) vs. Alan Gomez (155.6)
Jeremy Malaterre (159.4) vs. Eric Galvin (160)
Brett Tillis (141.8) vs. Turrell Galloway (139.2)
Aaron Trujillo (122.8) vs. Haven Torres (126.4)

Spike has revealed the full cast of 28 lightweights who will be appearing on The Ultimate Fighter: Team GSP vs. Team Koscheck, which premieres September 15th at 10 p.m., following UFC Fight Night 22. Of course, 14 of these guys will be eliminated in the first episode, so watch this trailer and get to know them while you still can. Some of the competitors jumped out at us, for various reasons…

The guys we’ve actually heard of: Nam Phan is a nine-year veteran of the sport who has competed for Strikeforce and Sengoku. Mike Budnik has already had a stint as a 155′er in the WEC, but was released after three straight losses to Shane Roller, John Franchi, and Rafael Dias.

The guy with the horrible nickname: Paul "The Wheel" Barrow. Christ. That’s even worse than Nick "The Promise" Ring.

Impressive stat alert: Cody McKenzie has finished his last nine opponents via first-round guillotine choke. That does indeed make him the #2 guillotine-choker in the world, among active fighters; only Travis Fulton (12) owns more.

The inevitable "crazy hair" guys: Jason Brenton (green hair), Alex Caceres (Yagerfro), Jeff Lentz (red hair), Marc Stevens (mohawk), Dane Sayers (red mohawk).

Full cast list is after the jump…

(“Fedor, it’s an honor to fight you. And Scott, no matter what happens tonight, I’ll be violently sodomizing you later.” Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle. For more photos from this album, click here.)

There might not be much on the line in the grand scheme of things, but make no mistake — Fedor Emelianenko vs. Dan Henderson is a superfight. It’s rare that two MMA fighters with so many combined accolades step into the same cage to do battle. Thanks for coming by tonight and watching it with us.

Also on the card: the 135-pound women’s title fight between Marloes Coenen and Miesha Tate, and a pack of heavy-hitting supporting players like Robbie Lawler, Tim Kennedy, Paul Daley, and Scott Smith.

Live round-by-round results from the Showtime broadcast of Strikeforce: Fedor vs. Henderson will be piling up after the jump beginning at 10 p.m. ET. Refresh the page for all the latest and let your thoughts be heard in the comments section, even if they’re relatively stupid thoughts like, “DAAAAYYUM HE GOT NOCKED THE FUGGOUT!!1!” Come on in…

(“Look kid, I’m gonna find the man who did this to you. And when I do, so help me God, I’m gonna dock him one point for shorts-grabbing.” / Photo of Stout vs. Edwards aftermath via ESPN)

With a little help from the Potato Nation, we spent the last couple days gathering videos of the nastiest, ugliest, most-painful looking knockouts and submissions from this year. Finding 25 of them was the easy part. (Damn, MMA fighters. You seemed especially angry this year. Problems at home?) Putting them in order was a little more challenging.

Obviously, Frank Mir snapping Nogueira’s arm at UFC 140 was the people’s choice for #1. But how do you rank a head-kick knockout against a spinning-backfist knockout, when they both leave their victims zombie’d on the mat with their eyes open and their arms in the air?

So here’s what we’ll do. Instead of arranging these brutal stoppages in some arbitrary order, we’ll arrange them in groups. Use the links below to navigate through the sections, and take a moment to appreciate the human devastation that our great sport has caused in the last 12 months. And all this without a single death! Enjoy…

(Ben Goldstein)

- Page 1: The Perfect One-Shot (Or Two-Shot) Knockouts
- Page 2: The Savage Striking Onslaughts
- Page 3: The Gruesome Submissions
- Page 4: Fancy Kicks and Other Insanity

In June 2010, we posted a list of the ten greatest fighters who had yet to take a loss. By November 2011, none of their perfect records were still intact, proving once again what a cruel bitch this sport is. Half of the fighters on our original list — Shane Carwin (#1), Megumi Fujii (#2), Ryan Bader (#6), Evan Dunham (#7), and Lyle Beerbohm (#10) — have even lost *twice* since then. So we decided to start over from scratch and come up with a new ranking of undefeated MMA fighters. Check it out, and let us know who you think will hold onto their ’0′ the longest. -BG

#1: DANIEL CORMIER (10-0, six wins by first-round stoppage)

Notable victories: Jeff Monson at Strikeforce: Overeem vs. Werdum (UD), Antonio Silva at Strikeforce: Barnett vs. Kharitonov (KO R1), Josh Barnett at Strikeforce: Barnett vs. Cormier (UD)

Next fight: TBA

The former collegiate wrestling star and Olympic competitor went through hell to get to where he is today. Less than three years after kicking off his MMA career, Cormier battled his way to a career-defining matchup against ex-UFC champ Josh Barnett — a catch-wrestling savant with four times as many fights on his pro record as Cormier — in the finals of Strikeforce’s Heavyweight Grand Prix. But Dan didn’t need to turn the meeting into a grappling match. As he also demonstrated against Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva in his previous outing, Cormier packs enough speed and punching-power to win fights with his striking alone. It’s only a matter of time before he enters the UFC to take on the best in the world, and we have a feeling he’ll make an immediate impact.

#2: MICHAEL CHANDLER (10-0, eight wins by stoppage)

Notable victories: Patricky Freire at Bellator 44 (UD), Eddie Alvarez at Bellator 58 (sub R4), Akihiro Gono at Bellator 67 (TKO R1)

Next fight: TBA

Michael Chandler is the perfect example of how a tournament can transform a fighter from unheralded prospect to breakout star. After winning his first two Bellator appearances by swift first-round stoppage in 2010, Chandler was invited to participate in the promotion’s season four lightweight tournament. The Xtreme Couture product sliced through it, starting with a first-round submission of Polish prodigy Marcin Held, and ending with a decision win over knockout artist Patricky “Pitbull” Freire in the finals. Then, Chandler did the unthinkable — he took the lightweight belt from Eddie Alvarez, choking out the formerly untouchable Bellator champ in the fourth round of an insane Fight of the Year candidate last November. (A follow-up non-title match against Akihiro Gono was little more than a one-minute showcase of his killer instinct.) In eight months, Chandler went from 5-0 up-and-comer to newly-minted champion with a win over a top-ten ranked opponent. Is it okay if we use the “meteoric rise” cliché, just this once?

In the early days of The Ultimate Fighter, simply spraying water on a sleeping person was considered a brilliant prank. But after 14 seasons, the bar has been steadily raised for in-house trickery, to the point where even the coaches are now gleefully stripping cars of their tires. We thought we’d pay tribute to the TUF prank tradition by running down the most infamous pranks of the show’s history. Enjoy, and let us know if we’ve left out any of your favorites…

The Pink Room (Season 10)

See, this is what I’m talking about. Any moron can piss on a bed — but it takes a man to spend all afternoon painting walls pink and arranging stuffed animals in vaguely sexual poses. The best moment is at the very end, when Rashad Evans comes to the realization that the pacifier he’d been sucking on had definitely been up Tiki’s ass at some point.

See also: The Chickenmobile, The Team Portrait

(Garza picking up the first UFC win in Ontario in impressive fashion.)

After racking up nine straight wins in the regional circuit, Pablo Garza suffered the first loss of his career under the bright lights of the WEC. Determined that he belonged in the big show, “The Scarecrow” made his way to Las Vegas to try out for The Ultimate Fighter 12, but failed to make it into the house when eventual finalist Michael Johnson knocked him out of the competition in the qualifying round.

Garza walked away from the show determined to improve. He was given another shot to prove that he belonged in the Octagon at the TUF 12 finale and he took the opportunity and ran with it as he knocked out Fredson Paxiao 51 seconds into the opening frame with a picture-perfect, $30,000 Knockout of the Night garnering flying knee.

Riding the momentum of his impressive UFC debut in December, the 27-year-old Fargo, North Dakota native wanted to make another statement in his follow-up fight last weekend at UFC 129 in Toronto against Yves Jabouin. It took him just 4:31 to silence the Canadian crowd and earn himself another performance bonus — this time for Submission of the Night and to the tune of $129, 000.

We spoke to Garza yesterday and touched on a number of topics including  his win over Jabouin Saturday night, what he plans to do with his latest bonus and what his family thinks about his career path.

Check out the interview with the fast-rising featherweight after the jump.

(Hick-Jitsu is no match for Drunken French Muay Thai.)

Alex Caceres has gone full heel. For some reason, he decides to put bleach in Nam Phan‘s fabric softener. Michael Johnson borrows it to do a load of delicates, and freaks out when he learns the truth. "Why would you run the risk of fuckin’ up someone’s whole wardrobe like that?" he asks. Caceres explains that it was meant for Nam, which begs the question — what the hell did Nam Phan ever do to you, bro? "I got a love/hate personality," Caceres says later. "That’s why I don’t have many friends." 

As Team GSP rides to practice, Cody McKenzie spits dip-juice into an empty Red Bull can. It’s the most country thing I’ve ever seen in my life.

GSP brings in another special guest for his guys. Very special. Jean Charles Skarbowsky is a French kickboxing savant who sleeps three hours a night and gets drunk before every practice. Georges advises the guys that if you respect him, he’ll respect you; if you go hard to prove a point, he’ll kill you. "Please be careful, he had a long ride from Paris to get here," GSP says. Hmm, he doesn’t look like much. But there he is, tossing around the entire team and dropping everybody with liver shots. "You cannot have the same lifestyle as Jean Charles and be an MMA fighter. In Thailand they smoke and drink and fight every day." And let’s not even get into the transsexual thing…

(The beginning of the Johnson/Wilkinson battle from last night. You can watch the rest here. Props: SignofBelief)

Alex "Bruce Leroy" Caceres may have impressed us in last week’s fight, but he’s making no friends in the house by bragging about his victory non-stop. While hanging out with the defeated Jeff Lentz, he says that Jeff may have been "underesterating my talents and skills," and claims that every head kick bounced off his afro. Lentz manages to avoid strangling the bastard, but the other TUF guys are quickly losing patience.

GSP brings in wrestling world champion Guivi "Gia" Sissaouri, to work with his squad. Homeboy is sick on the mat. It’s a great little master-class for the guys, but Georges has another visitor coming in later that will make Gia look like small potatoes. (Hint: Face tattoos, tigers.)

Down 0-1, Koscheck is playing catch-up. His fighters already seem to be breaking down, physically and emotionally, so Kos makes it clear that they need to toughen up and quit ass-dragging in practice. Training seems to improve after that.

It’s fight announcement time, and since Team GSP won last week, they retain control of the picks. St. Pierre selects Michael Johnson (his craftily-obtained #1 draft pick) against Aaron Wilkinson (Koscheck’s #6 pick??). GSP is obviously looking to take Koscheck’s heart with a brutal victory, but is it a wise strategy to waste your ace on the other team’s weakest link? (Keep in mind that Jeff Lentz was Team Koscheck’s #7 pick.) Still, a badass wrestler vs. a British guy. This seems gift-wrapped for the red team.

(Crappy, TV-shot video of the Alex Caceres vs. Jeff Lentz fight, courtesy of TheMMAResource.)

After last week’s trial by fire, it’s time for the 14 UFC hopefuls to move into the house and get comfy. And boy is the new TUF house classy. The dining room has a chandelier in it and everything.

Alex "Bruce Leroy" Caceres and Jeff Lentz down some shots right away. They’re both characters. Jeff’s a chain-smoker from Jersey with a dye-job, and says he’ll never tap, not even to an armbar. (Pay attention! This will be important later!) The guys are apprehensive about the cigs and booze that Lentz is constantly consuming, but Jeff says he’s just playing with them, and he actually has gas for days. I mean, he’s clearly a nicotine addict and probably has a drinking problem on top of that, but it’s all just a persona, y’know? As for Alex, he can play the harmonica, he once killed a gator with his bare hands, and he nearly murdered a deer, too. But as they say, man is the most dangerous game.

In advance of the team selections, Coach Josh Koscheck has every guy in the house ranked, 1-14. He’s got Michael Johnson at #1, Marc Stevens at #2, Sako "Psycho" Chivitchian and Sevak Magakian at 3 and 4. Koscheck loves those Armenians, bro.

Greg Jackson has been here before with Rashad Evans on TUF 10, and now he’s Georges St. Pierre‘s consigliere. He advises Georges to go after the first matchup rather than the first fighter, if possible. GSP knows that Koscheck likes Michael Johnson, so he gets an idea to try a little gamesmanship. "We’ll see if he’s smart," GSP says. Koscheck, as it turns out, is not smart.

(‘I’m here to eat some hummus and kick some ass. I am all out of hummus.’)

Mac Danzig may be one of the most accomplished fighters yet to win Spike TV’s The Ultimate Fighter, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t feeling the same pressure to live up to the hype that other winners have labored under. His submission victory over Mark Bocek on his first UFC pay-per-view this past Saturday was a good start to his UFC career, but Danzig is hoping that it’s just the beginning.

In this exclusive Cage Potato interview Danzig talks about the price of celebrity, about his future in the UFC’s lightweight division, and about his hard-fought victory in Montreal.

CagePotato.com: First of all, congratulations on your victory. Looking at this matchup beforehand, it seemed like you were a pretty heavy favorite, 5-1 according to some of the betting lines. Were you expecting Mark Bocek to be as tough as he was?

Yeah, I knew it would be a really tough fight. I thought it had potential to be tougher than it was. The betting lines don’t really mean anything to me and I try not to look at them. I was kind of pissed when I did see them, actually, because I thought to myself, ‘Man, they’re not giving this guy enough credit.’

It’s kind of a tough situation for me because everyone’s just expecting me to steamroll this guy. He didn’t have a big name and so people didn’t realize how tough he was. It’s really a no-win situation because people just expect me to win and if I don’t it really messes up my status in the sport. If I do win, it’s like, hey, no big deal. But I knew how tough he was. He and I have a common opponent, this guy named John Mahlow, and he took me to a decision while Mark Bocek submitted him in the first round. So I knew what he was capable of and I knew it was going to be a tough fight.

Toward the end of the fight when he was cut and his eye was swelling up pretty badly it looked like you were able to land the straight right at will, like he couldn’t see it coming at all. Was that something you noticed right away and did you try and exploit that?

When I first cut him with that knee and I saw how bad it was I thought there was a chance they might stop it because of the cut. But I wasn’t going to wait around for that to happen. I wanted to finish him. It was a pretty nasty cut, though. The blood was squirting about two feet out at one point, so I was thinking to circle to my right and stay on his left side where he might have trouble seeing.

When the doctors checked him out he got a little breather and he came back in there with a sense of desperation, trying to swing for the fences and get a knockout. I felt like I was on my way to setting up a pretty good knockout before they stopped it to look at the cut, but who knows.

Going into this fight – your first since winning The Ultimate Fighter – what was the pressure like? Were you feeling that burden of being a TUF winner?

(Video courtesy YouTube/218DeShawn)
If you pay attention to the small details in life, chances are you noticed the clip at the end of last night’s premiere of The Ultimate Fighter 12 that showed a brief glimpse of Josh Koscheck being his endearing self as he appears to grab a Team St-Pierre member by the throat before a scuffle ensues.

Middleeasy made a slowed-down gif of the video above and it turns out that the dude Kos rape chokes is either a somewhat rotund crew member or a random guy who wandered in off the street wearing a TapouT shirt in GSP’s team colors. Whatever the case is, it’s likely just another instance of a set-up scenario or creative editing to make JK look like the bad guy. It all seems very "WWE" to me. He nearly crack a smile as he confront the Biz Markie lookalike who likely hasn’t been a lightweight since junior high.

Check it out after the jump and judge for yourself whether or not the fracas seems staged.

MMA Fightline is saying that sources close to M-1 Global have confirmed the following:

…they received an offer from Art Of War to set up a fight between Fedor Emelianenko and Pedro Rizzo. M-1 was uninterested in the offer however and it was promptly rejected. No further details were given as to the reason.

There’s certainly got to be more to this story than a simple turn down. Maybe it’s the actual offer, because it doesn’t seem like M-1 has got something better in its back pocket. Pedro “The Rock” Rizzo is 16-7 and became the Art Of War’s heavyweight division champ back in September via TKO over the musically-challenged and horribly-tattooed Jeff Monson. Since this Couture thing looks miles down the road, The Rock would be a logical fight for Fedor – especially to the pea-brained nay sayers that say he never takes a tough fight.

(Josh Koscheck and Marc Stevens run down last night’s episode with host Stephan Bonnar in the latest installment of "The Aftermath." Warning: The editor forgot to bleep out Koscheck’s numerous F-bombs. Props: UltimateFighter.com)

The official title of this episode is "KOS in a Commotion." There’s nothing funny about rape-choking a male nurse, but we’ve always appreciated a good pun.

Dane Sayers is bummed that he was robbed of a wild card spot. After all, he lasted two rounds against Sako Chivitchian, and Marc Stevens didn’t even last 20 seconds against Cody McKenzie. As Jonathan Brookins explains, "It’s supposed to be reserved for the guy that put on the best performance…some people like the cucumber better then the pickle, I don’t know." But Stevens is the "obvious pick" according to Dana, I guess because he knocked some dude out in the elimination round. We’ll see how far that gets him. Coach Koscheck thinks Marc has a lot of "po-tential" that he didn’t get to show, because he got submitted "kind of early." Kind of!

Alex Caceres tweaked his back during his round-of-14 fight against Jeff Lentz, and is unable to train as hard as the other guys. Michael Johnson just thinks he’s lazy. They argue about it at the house, and Caceres explains that he needs to save his body for his next fights, and promises that when it’s time for him to fight MJ, he’ll be training, believe that. The gauntlet has been dropped, son.

(Jonathan Brookins’s lateral drop even worked on Jose Aldo, back at WEC 36. No one is safe. Props: NHB USA)

We’ve officially entered the quarterfinals, and last night’s episode gave us two of ‘em: Sako Chivitchian vs. Jonathan Brookins, and Cody McKenzie vs. Nam Phan. But you already know what happens in the McKenzie/Phan fight, right?

At the house, Sevak Magakian explains to his bro Sako that he has to redeem the Armenian race and beat Brookins, who is representing the Fraggle race. "Sak you gotta do this bro," Sevak says. "You gotta beat him, whatever it takes. I couldn’t do it, now you have to do it…There’s not gonna be two Armenians gonna lose to the same guy…you’re gonna fuck him." Wow, that’s some threat. Magakian has clearly been studying at the Wanderlei Silva school of trash talk.

Coach GSP wants to train his quarterfinalists like he trains when he’s about to fight — one training session a day, no more hard sparring or hardcore workouts. The focus is tactical now. He wants to make the guys feel hungry, like they’re not training enough, and build up their aggression for the fight.