(Jeff Lawson lives like he fights: Balls to the wall.)

Sorry for missing last week’s blog. I have been traveling a lot and haven’t had the chance to sit down and write much.

"Parce!" The name turns my stomach. Honestly, I can’t believe that I have to continuously see this wretch on TV and write about him. He certainly has received his fifteen minutes. And hopefully after this I don’t have to waste the oxygen in my lungs to speak about the cantankerous fellow, or the typing power in my fingers to peck away at my keyboard, giving him any more notoriety than he has already stolen from every other deserving member on the show.

"Parce" (that is "Pierce" said with a British accent) came from a day when all of the Americans were playing pool together except him. Yes, even Jason "I bang my head against the wall" Dent was kickin’ it with the team. I decided that even though there was much disdain toward the fellow, I would invite him to come down to join our dysfunctional group. I yelled to Pierce, who was upstairs at the time, to come down and play pool with us. I called and called, but was not answered. Then it hit me! I turned to the other guys and said, "Oh, he can’t understand me." Then I started yelling in a British accent (a poor one at that) "Parce! Come down here good chap. Parce!" Looking back at the guys I explained that he could only understand words if spoken like a Brit. So that’s how that whole thing got started.

In which Santino calls B.S. on Michael Bisping‘s jet-lag excuse, shares some insight on Frank Lester (pictured above, with jacked-up teeth), and hints that we’ll soon be seeing one of the biggest turncoat-acts in TUF history.

***

I am not so sure Captain Britania had suffered the amount of jet lag as he would lead us to believe. I mean, seriously, we had been filming for two to three weeks by that point and all the other coaches of the land of the rising Brit had figured out their sleeping schedules just fine. Booze-lag would be my assumption, as we had heard of him being in bars/clubs quite frequently from reputable sources…our coaches! Not all of them, but a couple. The best part of hearing about the head UK "piss-artist" (look it up as it has a different meaning in the UK as what you are thinking) is all the run-ins he had with our Jiu Jitsu coach, Pancho. Pancho, or Pantcho as he would end up spelling it (he’s right off the boat and doesn’t exactly have the best understanding of our language) got into a verbal joust with "Michael Bitchbing," as Pantcho would say, and almost got into a bit of a fist-a-cuffs exchange one night at a club.

(The UFC garage-door backdrop — never a good sign.)

Team U.S. lightweight Santino Defranco gives us the inside scoop on Cameron Dollar’s tall tales, Jason Dent’s future as a presidential assassin, "black on black crime," and the quarterfinal fight that knocked him out of contention on Wednesday’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter.

***

From one of the greatest movies of all time, "You don’t mow another mans lawn."

That statement still holds true today, especially when you are going to announce to the world, on live television mind you, that you slept with your best friend’s wife. Bad form man. Very bad form. I am a married man and the thing I hold "most" sacred in this world is my marriage. There is nothing and I mean NOTHING more sacred to me than my wife and the bond we share. If I found out that my best friend(s) were sleeping with my wife I would live out the rest of my days behind steel bars or in solitary.

Anyways, now that I’m done with being creepy myself, back to the show.

(You think that’s gay, just wait ’til you see what they did to Andre Winner‘s rainbow-colored booty-shorts.)

Ricardo Feliciano abuses the English language, Cyrille Diabate abuses alcohol, and more behind-the-scenes nuggets from Wednesday’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter, courtesy of Team USA lightweight Santino Defranco.

***

Jason Dent and Frankie Lester are officially part of the "Independent Americans". The fighters from the USA, myself included, were by no means a cohesive unit like the UK fighters. Team UK ate together, with head chef and cooking captain Dean Amasinger at the helm. They played together, participating in sports, WWE-style wrestling matches, and other limey-esque games generally led by England’s bouncer of the year and lead playwright, Dave Faulkner. And, with my new knowledge, thanks to modern technological devises such as cameras and tele’s, I have seen that they trained together, led by the "Gov’na" himself, Michael "TV will show how I can throw a tantrum" Bisping". The American counterparts, on the other hand, would have little to do with one another.

To the defense of the seemingly megalomaniacal Americans, we had just met each other and were now being recorded 24 hours a day by camera crews, some of whom had handlebar porn-staches and even went to the extreme of hiding in our closets in the middle of the night. That was a bit awkward for us. Team UK, however, had almost two weeks to get acquainted with each other before filming began. Team USA was not afforded that luxury, as we fought and were immediately thrown in a house with an angry, drunk hobbit. We were getting to know every one’s personality and idiosyncrasies during the first few weeks of filming. There was, however, a common ground of distaste between the Yanks, personified by the "Count", Michael Bisping.

(Not pictured: A plate of fish n’ chips n’ skulls.)

…in which Mr. Defranco moves into the house, meets Junie Rob, and continues to establish himself as a highly creative nickname-giver. Check out Santino’s gym at www.southwestmma.com.

***

Riddle me this reader: What has an insatiable need for negative attention, loves booze like dogs love chasing tails, and comes in pairs? That’s right. You’re all correct (except those from Kentucky, who still consider reading a sign of witchcraft)…It’s a Browning! Spike and the UFC got all they could ask for and more with the short-lived time Junie Jr. was on the show. What I am wondering is: Does their mother cringe at the sight of her children acting like complete donkeys on national television? Does she hope to someday be able to adopt a child from a third-world country who has some comprehension of etiquette? Who knows? What I do know is that Junie (turned younger brother Rob’s manager) encouraged him to act like an idiot. He told him to go nuts in the house and get his 15 minutes of fame. Unfortunately, Rob adhered to his brothers words of "wisdom", as you viewed on the tele.

I walked into the house after all the rest of the fighters, as I was being tended to by those medical types at the hospital after my hoofing received by the mini pony. I knew not any details of the personalities that awaited me behind the doors of the massive Ultimate Fighter house. And as I walked through the doors for the first time I was greeted by a drunk man that was slurring his words. At first acquaintance, I was unaware if he was a "limey" or an "American Eagle" as his words were nearly incomprehensible. The little fellow then proceeded to ask me, "Who are you? Are you an American? You have two choices, you can get egged or drink a beer." My response was, "That’s not even the slightest choice. Give me a beer." Then, as our stumbling friend made his way to the fridge for beer retrieval, I scurried my self out the back door and down the stairs to meet up with my other roommates.

Like Gerald Harris and Efrain Escudero before him, Team USA lightweight Santino Defranco has the great honor of blogging his reactions to each episode of The Ultimate Fighter: U.S. vs. U.K. every Thursday right here on CagePotato.com. Here’s what he had to say about last night’s episode, in which Santino first met Dana White (aka Lord Humungus), and dug waaaay deep to get his first victory on the show. Enjoy.

***

I was completely at peace with the fact that I was about to go through with the most tumultuous event in my life — fighting to get into a house, where I would be cut off from the rest of the world (no TV, music, magazines, books, correspondence with my wife and family) for six weeks, all the while being filmed 24 hours a day to be broadcast on national television. Then Dana White came in, and all that calmness I spent weeks preparing went out the window.

When Dana White walks into a room he’s noticed. Not only is he a physically imposing figure being around 6’2" and probably 250lbs, but he is a man of power. The latter is by far more intimidating than the former. Knowing that this bald human basically holds my future in the palm of his hand, turns me from an "Ultimate Fighter" to a child waiting to see if he is going to be praised or punished for whatever questionable deed has been done.

As Dana lined us up the nervousness that embodied that room was something fantastic. You could see people smiling, laughing, biting their cheeks, fidgeting, and even in Pierce’s case…fainting. Don’t be fooled by those swash-buckling tricksters, all was done out of nervousness, including my own silence, which, as the show continues you will see is a rarity.

("Back, and to the left…back, and to the left…")

With Jason Pierce pulled from the competition due to a combination of staph infection and bitchassness, Team USA needs to replace him with one of their eliminated welterweights. Mark Miller tells Dana White that he’s down to fight, but he has a broken nose ("It’s just a nose, I’m not getting any prettier"), and privately he wonders if he’s ready, since he hasn’t been able to train since his last fight. Frank Lester wants it bad, but his face is an absolute mess, with two black eyes, an aching nose, and a row of missing teeth.

Santino interrogates Pierce about why he isn’t fighting. Pierce claims that he totally tried to stay in the competition, but Dana looked at his leg and said he couldn’t fight — which is not exactly what happened, and the guys know it. Damarques thinks Pierce should be stripped of his TapouT gear. Lester furiously shadow-boxes.

(Shawn Tompkins works out with Wanderlei Silva.)

Here’s a story from over the weekend that fell through the cracks during our full-court-press of UFC 82 coverage yesterday. Remember when the IFL announced it had changed the name of Team Xtreme Couture to Team Tompkins out of respect for Couture’s legal situation with the UFC? Turns out, it didn’t go down like that. Randy Couture has a much different version of the events on the Xtreme Couture blog. Dig:

On January 8 we submitted a list of seven (7) fighters to the IFL that would be available to fight in the IFL event from the Xtreme Couture gym. The fighters were: Dennis Davis 145lbs (16-8), Jay White Heavyweight (2-5), Phil Friedman Heavyweight (1-0), Eric Uresk 155lbs (2-3), Josh Haynes 185lbs (8-8), Johnny Hendricks 170lbs (3-0), and Karina Taylor 135lbs (0-1).

The IFL informed us that Dennis Davis would be booked to fight a prelim bout against Ian Loveland and that none of our other fighters would be utilized. According to the IFL none of our fighters were a proper matchup for Mario Sperry’s team of Brazilian fighters. The IFL intended to field a team of Benji Radach (who due to injury was replaced by Josh Haynes), Santino DeFranco and Lew Polley. Radach had been a member of Shawn Tompkins’ Anacondas team, while DeFranco and Polley are from American Top Team.

Lew Polley and Santino DeFranco are tremendous athletes and excellent fighters. However, they are members of American Top Team not Xtreme Couture. American Top Team is a great squad and by all means seem to be deserving of having their own team in the IFL. We have 35 athletes that train in our Las Vegas gym and proudly wear the Xtreme Couture patch on their shorts during fights. Yet the IFL decided to field a team called “Xtreme Couture” without putting any Xtreme Couture athletes on the team. The Patriots didn’t show up in the Super Bowl with a bunch of players from the Packers. Why would the Xtreme Couture name be put on the line and not be represented by Xtreme Couture fighters.

It is because of this that the team name was changed to ”Team Tompkins”.

DeFranco and Polley lost their fights, and Josh Haynes won, so nyeh nyeh nyeh on you, IFL. It’s kind of shocking that they would reject the guys that Randy Couture wanted to compete for his gym, and replace their actual fighters with ringers. When Couture signed on to field a team for the 2008 season, I figured that the IFL would bend over backwards to keep him happy. But they had their own plans, and now Randy’s like “I’m done with these jokers, let Tompkins worry about it.” The main reason we were excited about the IFL’s new camp vs. camp system was the idea that we’d be seeing the relatively unknown guys that each coach had hand-picked to represent their gyms. Unfortunately, the new season isn’t any less artificial than the last. Oh well; maybe they can get their shit together in 2009.

There’s another notable recent post on the Xtreme Couture blog which mentions Ken Shamrock swinging through the gym to work out when he was in town for the IFL event: “The World’s Most Dangerous Man tells us he hopes to fight Kimbo and his brother Frank after his March fight in the UK.” Could we be seeing Slice/Shamrock on CBS this summer? Cross your fingers and toes, because that would be huge — not only as a ratings draw, but because Kimbo would finally get the challenge he deserves.

What do y’all think, Kimbo by KO or Shamrock by leg-lock?

(Josh Haynes picked up six grand for “bringing the pain.”)

Since we spent so much time yesterday looking at the generally impressive bonuses and salaries for UFC 82, it seems like a good idea to check out the IFL’s payouts for comparison. MMA Weekly has obtained the salaries for Friday’s IFL season opener, which are below. The IFL event brought 4,280 people to the Orleans Arena, with only 1,606 of those people actually paying for their tickets. The total live gate was $102,120, and the total disclosed fighter payroll was $165,500.

CHAMPIONSHIP BOUTS
Ryan Schultz ($26,000, including $14,000 win bonus) def. John Gunderson ($9,500)
Roy Nelson ($24,000 including $14,000 win bonus) def. Fabiano Scherner ($7,500)
Ryan McGivern ($10,000 including $4,000 win bonus) def. Matt Horwich ($12,000)

MAIN CARD
Alexandre Ferreira ($16,000 including $8,000 win bonus) def. Lew Polley ($4,000)
Jake Ellenberger ($15,000 including $7,500 win bonus) def. Pat Healy ($7,500)
Rafael Dias ($7,000 including $3,500 win bonus) def. Santino De Franco ($5,000)
Josh Haynes ($6,000 including $3,000 win bonus) def. Leopoldo Serao ($4,000)

PRELIMINARY FIGHT
Ian Loveland ($7,000 including $3,500 win bonus) def. Dennis Davis ($5,000)

What’s the sadder number — $12,000 (the guaranteed salary of the event’s highest-paid fighters, Schultz and Horwich) or 2,600 (the number of seat-fillers that the IFL had to bring in to make the joint look crowded)?

(Rich isn’t looking at you, tough guy. He’s looking through you.)

American Top Team fighter and New Jersey boy Rich Attonito is the latest “Ultimate Fighter” guest blogger for Cage Potato, following in a rich history that features former contestants such as Gerald Harris, Santino Defranco, and season eight winner Efrain Escudero. He’ll be giving us his thoughts and reaction to each episode, so make him feel welcome and remember to check back every Thursday for his inside take on things. To learn more about Rich, and to hear his pretty solid Schwarzenegger/Jersey Shore impressions, watch this short video.  If you missed his elimination fight last night, watch this.

It was 6.00 a.m. when I arrived curbside at the airport in Ft. Lauderdale. The sun was starting to rise and it was the start of another typically beautiful day in South Florida. However, I was about to embark upon an extraordinary journey far from typical. I hugged and kissed my wife goodbye, knowing I was not going to see her for six weeks if everything worked to plan.

Before I knew it the plane had taken off and I was watching the palm trees and beaches shrinking beneath me until they were out of sight. I arrived hours later in Las Vegas, where the sky was covered in dark clouds and rainy weather. I could see snow and cloud cover on the peaks of all the surrounding mountains. The continuous rain seemed to only get worse, creating small floods and soaking everything in sight. This is not the Las Vegas you see on the postcards. It reminded me of the weather I got used to for so many years growing up in New Jersey. I thought to myself that this was great fight weather; it put me in the mood to kick someone’s ass.

(Official book trailer via poundforpoundmma)

CagePotato contributor Brian J. D’Souza has spent years covering MMA around the world, interviewing some of the most compelling personalities in the sport. His new book Pound for Pound: The Modern Gladiators of Mixed Martial Arts focuses on five MMA legends — Georges St-Pierre, BJ Penn, Anderson Silva, Mauricio Rua, and Fedor Emelianenko — taking readers through their humble origins, rise to fame, and the daily agonies that fans never get to see. It’s a fascinating first-hand look behind the curtain, from a journalist who completely immersed himself in the sport in order to return with some never-before-told stories. We’re thrilled that our good friend Brian was able to pull this thing off, and we highly recommend that you check it out for yourself.

We’ve excerpted the intro and first two chapters of Pound for Pound after the jump, which cover Georges St. Pierre’s unlikely emergence as an MMA contender, and how Wagnney Fabiano and Victor Vargotsky became critical to his early development. Take a look, and if you want more, please buy a copy at one of the links below.

Paperback:
- www.amazon.com/Pound-Modern-Gladiators-Mixed-Martial/dp/0988149303
- www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pound-for-pound-brian-dsouza/1114013524

eBook:
- www.amazon.com/Pound-Modern-Gladiators-Martial-ebook/dp/B00AQPZGE4
- www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pound-for-pound-brian-dsouza/1114013524
- www.kobobooks.com/ebook/Pound-Pound-The-Modern-Gladiators/book-N7TYdIt2qUinoo4aMGe0qA/page1.html
- www.smashwords.com/books/view/266927

TUF 9.8 Stoppage and Kara DioGuardi Strips Down – Watch more Funny Videos

Last night, doe-eyed heartthrob Kris Allen pulled out a stunning victory over scream-queen Adam Lambert to become 2009′s American Idol. The two-hour-plus finale broadcast included guest performances by Kiss, Carlos Santana, Cyndi Lauper, Brian May/Roger Taylor, and a near-death Rod Stewart, and Kara DioGuardi ripped her clothes off for charity, which was fucking epic (I know, I’m sorry), and my God that woman is like the new Elaine Benes, and I mean that in the best possible way.

Directly after, on a fledgling cable channel called Spiked Television (I think?), there was a new reality show about what happens when 16 guys who live together in a house stop being polite and start getting real. Half of them had strange accents, and a fight broke out at the end.

This is their story.

Team USA didn’t exactly get off to a promising start on the second elimination episode of The Ultimate Fighter: U.S. vs. U.K. last night. Welterweight Jason Pierce fainted during the show-opening lineup (but won his first fight anyway), making him the new Phillipe Nover. Lightweight John David Shackleford showed up with a damn herpe on his head (and was immediately dismissed), making him the new Paul Bradley. Welterweight Christian Fulgium was kicked off for not making weight, making him the new Jason Guida. And Steve Mazzagatti couldn’t decide if he wanted to stop fights early or late, so he decided to do both, making him the same old Steve Mazzagatti. Here’s how the elimination-round matches went down:

Mark Miller (WW) def. Kevin Knabjian via TKO, round 2

Richie "The Choking Tomato" Whitson (LW) def. Paul Bird via submission (rear-naked choke), round 1

Santino DeFranco (LW) def. Waylon Lowe via submission (rear-naked choke), round 2

Jason Pierce (WW) def. Steve "Red Nose" Berger via decision

Cameron Dollar (LW) def. Tom Hayden via submission (rear-naked choke), round 1

Damarques Johnson (WW) def. Ray Elbe via TKO (mount ‘n’ murder), round 1

The Ultimate Fighter 9 – Episode 5 Highlights – Watch more Funny Videos
(The ends of the Defranco/Winner and Johnson/Amasinger fights.)

Last Night’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter treated us to two quarterfinal matches — as well as a total breakdown within Team U.S. and the mysterious disappearance of Michael Bisping. "Wiggity Wack" (the episode’s actual title, according to my DVR) began by showing us just how fractured the Americans were becoming. Jason Dent implores his team to be mature after their first loss in episode 4, and Cameron Dollar basically tells him to stuff it, then tells the team about the 70-80 girls he’s humped, including his friend’s wife. (Hope your friend knew about that before the show, player.) Meanwhile, Team U.S.’s Jason Pierce and Team U.K.’s David Faulkner bond in the hot tub over their shared nerdiness, with Pierce predicting they’ll be friends after the show.

(Cyrille the Snake’s early kickboxing highlights. Props: Gorgeous PX)

UFC 114: Rampage vs. Evans goes down this coming Saturday in Las Vegas, with two new faces casting their fates to the wind in the prelims, both of whom have peripheral connections to TUF 9. Who will survive and what will be left of them? Get to know the guys below, and swing by MMA Fightpicker to make your UFC 114 predictions…

CYRILLE DIABATE (LHW)
Experience: 16-6-1 record competing around the world for promotions like Cage Rage, 2H2H, PRIDE, and ShoXC. Has won nine of his last ten fights, with eight of those wins coming via stoppage in the first two rounds.
Will be facing: Luis Cane (10-2 w/1 no-contest, 3-2 UFC)
Lowdown: A veteran kickboxer and mixed martial artist, "The Snake" has been putting the hurt on people since the ’90s. Diabate spends part of his time training at Team Quest in Temecula, and appeared on TUF 9 last year as Team USA’s striking coach, but is doing most of the preparation for this fight in his native France. Standing 6’6", he tends to rely on his endless reach and striking prowess, but says he’s been concentrating on wrestling recently to become a more complete fighter. He hasn’t lost an MMA match since September 2006, when he was nearly stomped to death by Mauricio Rua at PRIDE Final Conflict Absolute.

(Ryan “The Lion” Schultz G-n-P’s John Gunderson.)

Last night at the Orleans Arena in Vegas, 3,931 fans watched the IFL kick off its 2008 season with three title matches – lightweight, middleweight, and heavyweight – in addition to their camp-on-camp battles. Ryan “The Lion” Schultz, who won the lightweight title back in December when he beat the shit out of previously undefeated Chris Horodecki, retained his title by earning a unanimous decision over John Gunderson. “The Lion” claimed recently that Gunderson had been offered this fight many times, but had neglected to take it until now. The champ held a strong position through much of the fight – which was fought on the ground for the most part. Both Schultz and Gunderson had chances to end the fight with a choke early on, but neither could execute it.

Heavyweight Roy “Big Country” Nelson also successfully defended his belt by getting a TKO over Fabiano Scherner at 3:20 in the first round. “Big Country” has been improving his striking and this fight showed that as he unleashed a barrage of rights to get a stoppage.

(“Big Country” has a celebratory seizure.)

One title did switch hands and it happened the night before the ex-champ’s wedding, too. Matt Horwich put his middleweight title on the line against Ryan McGivern, which made for the best fight of the night. Horwich almost ended it via armbar in the second round, but the bell saved McGivern’s ass. Horwich almost went down himself in the fourth when McGivern drilled him with a flurry of strikes, but “The Fighting Hippy” held on. In the end, a unanimous decision gave the middleweight crown over to McGivern, ending a two month run as champ for Horwich. Hope he ices his face for the sake of the wedding pictures – he didn’t grow the mohawk out for nothing.

(Boooooooo! U-S-A! U-S-A!)

Yahoo! Sports has revealed the 32 castmembers for the upcoming season of The Ultimate Fighter, which will pit a group of American fighters (coached by Dan Henderson) against a group of fighters from the U.K. (coached by Michael Bisping). Featuring welterweights and lightweights, "TUF 9" will premiere on April 1st, directly following UFC Fight Night: Condit vs. Kampmann. Here’s what Yahoo! dug up about the upcoming crop of UFC hopefuls.

After the jump: the rest of the American fighters, and Team Bisping.

(‘Just ignore him.  He’s trying to get a reaction out of us. Let’s not give him the satisfac…dammit, I looked. Now I’m confused about everything.’ Photo courtesy of Promma.)

Today is a very special day.  No, not because of some lame April Fool’s pranks, but because we get to break up the soul-sucking monotony of the week with an evening of free fights (which we’ll be liveblogging, of course) followed by the premiere of a new season of "The Ultimate Fighter" that’s hell bent on re-fighting the Revolutionary War (and guess who won that son of a bitch).  In the latest edition of Ben vs. Ben we debate the merits of the show, tonight’s fight card, and so much more.  Enjoy.

Besides the main event, which fight are you most looking forward to at UFC Fight Night: Condit vs. Kampmann?

BG: Call me a TUF rube, but I’m really curious to see how Junie Browning does against Cole Miller. On paper, Miller subs out the Lunatic even worse than Efrain Escudero did. But who knows? The Junie we saw on the last season of The Ultimate Fighter was a guy who didn’t come from reputable camp, didn’t concern himself with cardio training, and acted like a psycho for the benefit of the cameras. Feel free to still hate him, but he’s really not the same guy anymore. He’s woodshedding at Xtreme Couture these days, and he beat the living piss out of Dave Kaplan in his last outing. Judging from recent interviews, you get the sense that Miller is writing Browning off as a joke, in the same way that many fans are. That could turn out to be a really bad idea.

BF: You freaking TUF rube, you.  Okay, I’ll admit to a certain level of curiosity about the Miller/Browning fight, particularly since Miller has taken to insisting that Junie is the worst fighter this side of Allen Berube.  But I don’t really feel like it’s going to be the best or most interesting fight.