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.

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.

(Saunders-Lima, via Zombie Prophet)

While every fight fan in North America turned to FOX to catch the UFC’s broadcast debut, then made their way to pay-per-view to witness boxing’s continued fall from legitimacy, the family members of Bellator’s fighters and people hoping to catch reruns of “Daria” headed over to MTV 2 for the conclusion of their Season 5 welterweight and middleweight tournaments.

Ben Saunders opened his match by trying to take Douglas Lima’s head off with a series of kicks, but when those failed to meet their mark the two fighters clinched and headed for the cage where they’d jockey for position and trade a few obligatory knees and punches. Thrice referee Yves Lavigne separated the pair only to see them return to the fence and grind the fight to a halt. With under a minute left, Lima caught a kick and slammed Saunders to the mat but was instantly swept and mounted. “Killa B” closed out the round in control and dropping a score of hard, short elbows on Lima’s skull. Saunders drove in for the clinch at the onset of round two, but yet another break by Lavigne gave Lima the space he needed to work. “The Phenom” slipped a Saunders right and countered with one of his own. That one punch would be enough. Saunders crumbled to the mat and Lima followed up with hammerfists until shoved away. Lima’s effort earned him the tournament championship, $100 G’s, and a shot at Welterweight Champion Ben Askren.

(Props to http://www.youtube.com/BFCLUV for the vids.) 

While we were all watching Frankie Edgar score possibly the biggest win of his career this past weekend, a few of you might have missed some great fights over at Bellator 53, which saw “The Arm Collector” collect yet another arm and Douglas Lima pick up a B-E-A-utiful knockout over Chris Lozano. But just in case your appetite for fights remains insatiable, we’ve searched the internet to find the welterweight semi-final match between UFC veteran Ben Saunders and Luis Santos and the featherweight tournament qualifier bout between Ronnie Mann and Kenny Foster to hold you over for a while. The sound is a little off for the later of the two, so if you’ve got a problem with it, take it up with our HR department.

-Danga 

(Videos via IronForgesIron)

When you’re fighting a guy nicknamed “The Arm Collector”, who has won twelve of his sixteen victories by armbar, you might spend extra time working on your takedown defense. And maybe resist the urge to stick your arms out during the fight. I emphasize “you”, because Darryl Cobb, the middleweight who fought Giva “The Arm Collector” Santana on the undercard of Bellator 53 last night in Miami, Oklahoma, did not have the same gameplan. Giva Santana is now 17-1 in his MMA career, his only loss a split-decision at the hands of Bellator veteran Jaime Jara.

In main card action, Ben Saunders picked up his fourth straight victory since being bounced from the UFC by submitting Luis Santos in the third round. Killa B showed off a much more well-rounded attack than what we’re accustomed to seeing from him, thoroughly out-grappling Santos for the entire fight. In other welterweight tournament action, Douglas Lima picked up a brutal second round knockout against Cleveland native Chris Lozano. Lima has now won eight straight fights, and will meet Ben Saunders at Bellator 56 on November 12 to determine the winner of the welterweight tournament.

(Chris Lozano jacks Brent Weedman with an uppercut during their three-rounder at Caesars Atlantic City. Photo via Bellator)

Bellator’s fifth season kicked off last night, featuring the quarterfinals of their latest welterweight tournament. Still undefeated since his release from the UFC last year, Ben Saunders grabbed his second Bellator victory — and a spot in the semi-finals — in classic “Killa B” fashion, abusing Chris Cisneros for two rounds before ending the bout early in the third frame with a storm of knees from his infamous Thai clinch. Former MFC welterweight champion Douglas Lima also impressed in his promotional debut, winning a unanimous decision over Steve Carl.

On a less-triumphant note, former Bellator standouts Chris Weedman and Dan Hornbuckle ate their second-consecutive losses at the event. Weedman, who ran through his first four opponents under the Bellator banner before getting outpointed by Jay Hieron at the Season 4 Welterweight Finals, fell short once again against Chris Lozano. Weedman took the first round easily on the strength of a knockdown and a slam-takedown, but Lozano controlled the next ten minutes and won a unanimous nod from the judges. Earlier in the evening, Dan Hornbuckle was thoroughly handled by season Brazilian vet Luis “Sapo” Santos.

Above is the decidedly high-def looking promo for Bellator’s fifth season, kicking off on September 10th in Atlantic City, New Jersey. I mention the spiffyness of the visuals because one of the few complaints that I’ve ever leveled at BFC is the standard definition broadcasting. When the trailer was released a few weeks ago, I honestly thought it was just a little accidental irony.

Nope. A couple of days ago, it was announced that Bellator season five tournaments will be broadcast in HD baby! Now go dig out your cable programming guide and try to determine if you have EPIX. I’ve never heard of it, but apparently it’s an actual channel somewhere, so I’m going to call DISH Network and start offering them money until they can confirm that I’ll see Bellator in 1080p.

If you’re not excited about the upcoming season, watch that video again. You may not realize it, but that’s Bruce Lee talking about being like water. It’s some deep philosophical type shit, and it’s pretty much him guaranteeing that he’s going to join a tournament and wreck shop. Seeing the founder of Jeet Kun Do step away from his acting career and FINALLY step into the cage is going to be sick, and I’m looking forward to putting an end to all that speculation about how good he’d be.

(For an actual preview of two of the four planned tournaments this season, come on in past the jump.)

If you watch carefully, you can see his Soul flashing a peace sign when it flies out.  (VidProps: Bellator)

If you listened to this week’s edition of the Bum Rush (you did, right?), you know that some of us were really looking forward to Bellator action this weekend, and some of us were unconvinced.  But when guys are pulling off stupid-rare submissions and handing out beatdowns on the weekly, we say those naysayers are just stupid neenerfaces.  You go ahead and contemplate how much time we’re spending with preschool kids while you click the “Read More” link below, then share your comments about just how awesome Bellator is.  Hyperbole and ridiculous analogies will win you style points, and haterific comments will probably inspire ReX13 to bestow an insulting website upon your login.  That asshole is just way too sensitive sometimes.

Ben Saunders Comes To Fight! First Win Post UFC – Watch more Funny Videos

Released by the UFC in August following back-to-back decision losses against Jon Fitch and Dennis Hallman, TUF 6 welterweight vet Ben Saunders returned to action this Saturday at World Extreme Fighting in Kissimmee, Florida, scoring a dominant first-round submission-via-strikes victory over Elijah Harshbarger. ‘Killa B’ was justifiably amped-up after the win, and spoke to our pal Remington Reed about the fight and his future goals. A couple highlights…

(Killa B gets worked by Dennis Hallman at UFC 117. Photo courtesy of MMAFighting.)

Following back-to-back unanimous decision losses to Dennis Hallman at UFC 117 and Jon Fitch at UFC 111, Ben Saunders (8-3-2, 4-3 UFC) has been released from his UFC contract. The American Top Team welterweight confirmed the news on his Twitter page, where he wrote the following:

Sorry everyone I tried to fight my best these past two fights but ended up getting out worked… the UFC has officially cut me… the good news is they told me to work on my wrestling and ground game and then come back… So that is all I am going to be doing… improving dramatically and show them I belong. It was a honor to fight for the @UFC and I will make it back into the mix in due time… no one ever said my dream of getting that belt would be easy… in fact I was denied it as even a possibility and told I was crazy since I was a kid… look how far I have gone feeding off the doubters and haters… it just makes me that much more hungry… I’ll be back! There isn’t a doubt in my mind.

(Jake Ellenberger, seen here working for his money like a sucker.)

Those among us who aren’t pro fighters might think that Jake Ellenberger got a pretty sweet deal today. Because Ben Saunders volunteered to step in for Thiago Alves against Jon Fitch on late notice, Ellenberger now doesn’t have to do any work on Saturday night, and yet he still gets paid as if he had fought and won. Seems like a clear-cut ‘Nice, Playa‘ situation if we ever saw one.

But according to what he told Cagewriter, Ellenberger is still a little bummed about training for weeks just to end up a spectator in Newark this weekend:

"I was disappointed. Ben Saunders asked for the fight, Dana liked that, so our fight took a backseat. …It took me by complete surprise."

(Ben Saunders: 170 pounds of knees, elbows, and unfortunate facial hair.)

With Thiago Alves out of UFC 111 due to brain irregularities, the UFC has tapped Ben Saunders to take on Jon Fitch just two days before the event. This means that Jake Ellenberger, who was originally scheduled to face Saunders as a replacement for the nauseatingly-wounded Martin Kampmann, is now screwed out of the fight he worked his tail off to prepare for. The upside is, he’s reportedly still getting his show and win money, all for doing nothing more than being cool about the whole thing. Looks like the wings and beers at a Newark-area Hooters are on Ellenberger tonight.

So what does this new match-up mean, aside from more changes to our UFC 111 FightPicker? For Saunders, it means a chance to step up in the ranks with a more high-profile victory. TMZ reports that Dana White has said he’ll give Saunders a title shot if he beats Fitch, which seems like a move that would sure piss off Josh Koscheck and Paul Daley with a quickness. Fitch has less to gain with a win over Saunders than with one over Alves, but at least he can call up his AKA teammate Mike Swick to get some scouting info on the lanky striker.

Kudos to the UFC for making lemonade out of this unfortunate batch of irregular lemons. Guess it helps to have a roster of fighters willing to scramble their plans at the last minute to accommodate your wishes.

(Photo courtesy of twitter.com/martinkampmann)

The poor bastard you see in the picture above is UFC welterweight contender Martin Kampmann, who had to pull out of his UFC 111 fight against Ben Saunders on Tuesday due to a stomach-turning gash over his right eye, which he suffered in training. (Damn, those Xtreme Couture guys need to take it easy with the broken-glass kickboxing matches.) Kampmann hopes to return to the cage in May. Saunders, who’s coming off his first-round knockout of Marcus Davis at UFC 106, will now take on Jake Ellenberger, who’s fresh off his TKO victory over Mike Pyle. In other UFC matchup news…

— According to a report on MMA Weekly, TUF 7 winner/Master Tweeter Amir Sadollah will compete next against undefeated Judo specialist Dong Hyun Kim at UFC 114 (May 29th, Las Vegas). Sadollah is riding back-to-back unanimous decision wins against Phil Baroni and Brad Blackburn; due to injury, Kim hasn’t competed since his decision win over TJ Grant at UFC 100 last July.

(Ben Saunders’s clinch: Not where you want to be. Photo courtesy of ESPN.)

According to MMA Weekly, welterweight contenders Martin Kampmann and Ben Saunders have agreed to meet at UFC 111 (March 27th, Newark). Both fighters recently bounced back to the win column after suffering knockouts in previous fights: Kampmann scored a first-round submission over Jacob Volkmann earlier this month after getting smoked by Paul Daley at UFC 103, while Saunders is coming off his first-round knockout of Marcus Davis at UFC 106, after being on the wrong end of a TKO against Mike Swick in June. UFC 111 will be headlined by the championship doubleheader of Georges St. Pierre vs. Dan Hardy and Frank Mir vs. Shane Carwin. In other UFC fight-booking news…

— Speaking of Marcus Davis, the Irish Hand Grenade will look to snap his two-fight losing streak at UFC 113 (May 1st, Montreal) against Canadian welterweight Jonathan Goulet, who returns to the Octagon for the first time since his 33-second knockout loss to Mike Swick at Fight for the Troops in December 2008.

("Bones" and "Osteoporosis" warm up before UFC 100. Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle.)

According to reports on MMA Madness and The Garv, UFC light-heavyweights Jon Jones and Matt Hamill have agreed to face each other on the main card of the TUF 10 Finale (December 5th, Las Vegas). One of MMA’s most exciting prospects, Jones (9-0) most recently submitted Jake O’Brien at UFC 100, following decision wins over Andre Gusmao and Stephan Bonnar. Hamill (6-2) could be Bones’s toughest test yet. The TUF 3 vet has won back-to-back fights since his loss to Rich Franklin at UFC 88, scoring a TKO over Reese Andy at UFC 92 and a devastating head kick KO of Mark Munoz at UFC 96. It will be the first of a new four-fight deal for Jon Jones, who’s now splitting his time between Tristar Gym and Greg Jackson’s camp.

(Did you know that "MMA Fix" from RawVegas.tv is on actual TV in Canada via The Fight Network?  Well you do now.)

UFC president Dana White joined Forrest Griffin and Kenny Florian on an episode of “Dr. Phil” that will air next Thursday, May 14.  They were apparently there to talk to people about good types of MMA and bad types of MMA.  For example, fighting in a sanctioned MMA event after diligent training at a respected gym: good.  Superman-punching your little brother while he watches cartoons: bad (but hilarious).  Dana White will presumably drive this point home by telling them to “knock it off, you fuckers.”  Then Griffin and Florian will break down in tears and admit that all they’ve wanted was Dana’s approval.  Group hug!   

In other news…

(War Machine slips into a brief trance.  This is why we say no flash photography around him, people.)

- Competing at last night’s XMMA event in Montreal, the fighter formerly known as Jon Koppenhaver earned a submission victory over previously unbeaten Guillaume “El Toro” Delorenzi via rear naked choke.  When reached for the comment, the citizens of the world replied, “War Machine?  That guy who threatened the president on MySpace?  He fights?”

- Mike “Quick” Swick will face Ben Saunders at UFC 99 in Germany, according to Five Ounces of Pain.  Saunders last competed against Brandon Wolff, the fighter War Machine refused to face due to fears that he might be both good and relatively unknown, thus earning his dismissal from the UFC.  Using his height and a series of brutal knees, Saunders made quick work of Wolff at "Fight for the Troops."  Now he gets Swick in Germany.  Why not.

- After insisting that he’s been in negotiations with Strikeforce to give this MMA stuff a try, it seems as if Hasim Rahman is even more full of shit than we suspected.  Strikfeforce’s Mike Afromowitz told MMA Fanhouse there has been “no dialogue” with Rahman or his manager about a fight with Kimbo Slice, as Rahman’s manager had claimed.  Maybe by ‘talking to Strikefore’ he really meant ‘watching old Strikeforce fights on the internet?’  As for Kimbo, Afromowitz described those talks as “ongoing.” 

(No man has seen Xavier Foupa-Pokam’s real face and lived.) 

— As previously rumored, WEC welterweight champ Carlos Condit has signed on to face Martin Kampmann in the main event of UFC Fight Night 18 (April 1st, Nashville). Brock Larson, who Condit was originally scheduled to face in a title defense at WEC 39, will also be competing on the Fight Night 18 card, likely against UFC newcomer Jesse Sanders. Larson has fought twice in the UFC, losing a decision to Jon Fitch in 2005, and winning a decision over Keita Nakamura in 2006.

— Denis Kang, who took an upset loss to Alan Belcher in his Octagon debut at UFC 93, will try to redeem himself in front of his fellow Canadians at UFC 97 (April 18th, Montreal). Kang will be taking on Xavier "Professor X" Foupa-Pokam, a French Cage Rage/Palace Fighting Championships vet and UFC first-timer who has won his last seven fights by stoppage. 

— Undefeated TUF 6 standout Ben Saunders has been forced to drop off the UFC 96 card due to a foot injury, and has been replaced by Tamdan McCrory. Saunders was originally supposed to face welterweight submission specialist Dustin Hazelett — who most recently submitted McCrory via armbar at UFC 91 — until Hazelett dropped off the card with an undisclosed injury and was replaced by 5-0 prospect Ryan Madigan. So now we’ve gone from Saunders vs. Hazelett to McCrory vs. Madigan. The world is not fair. 

(NERD FIGHT!!! Photo courtesy of UFC.com.)

For those who are particularly sensitive to spoilers — even when they technically aren’t spoilers at all — results from the “Seek and Destroy” undercard are after the jump.

Related: UFC 87: The New Guys

(Tyson Griffin could potentially settle his grudge with Nate Diaz in July. Photo courtesy of MMAWeekly.)

— Ultimate Fighter 6 semi-standouts Ben Saunders and Jared Rollins will meet at UFC 86 (July 5th, Las Vegas). Saunders, who has been working out with the death squad at American Top Team, most recently defeated Dan Barrera via unanimous decision at the TUF6 finale last December, while Rollins suffered a third-round TKO loss during his “Fight of the Night” against Jon Koppenhaver on the same card.

— Tyson Griffin will likely be fighting at UFC 86 as well, against a yet-unnamed opponent that could be Nate Diaz. Diaz recently called out Griffin after his star-making triangle-choke of Kurt Pellegrino at UFN 13, and the UFC might give the baby his bottle, so to speak.

— The TUF 7 finale card on June 21st is turning into a full-fledged Fight Night, with three fights booked (so far) that don’t involve the show’s castmembers. Besides the previously mentioned main event between Diego Sanchez and Luigi Fioravanti, Josh Burkman will take on Dustin Hazelett, and Marvin Eastman claims that he’s fighting fellow middling middleweight Drew McFedries; the match will be the last one on the Beastman’s UFC contract. Burkman vows to retire if his fight against Hazelett goes to a decision.

(Seriously, click it.)

A new link on UFC.com (shown above) is soliciting applicants for the eighth season of The Ultimate Fighter, which will apparently focus on the big boys and the wee ones. The link takes you to TUF‘s standard application; the deadline is just two weeks from now, so if you’re actually thinking about giving it a shot, get movin’. Or just sit on your ass and let life pass you by, either way.

In other Octagon news…

— Jason “The Punisher” Lambert will likely be returning to the cage at UFC 85 (June 7th, London) against Luis Arthur Cane. Both men are coming off of losses — Lambert due to an out-of-nowhere comeback knockout at the fists of Wilson Gouveia at UFC 80, and Cane due to an illegal-knee disqualification loss against James Irvin at UFC 79.

— Lanky TUF 6 weirdo Ben Saunders may be returning to the Octagon at UFC 86 (July 5th, Las Vegas, headlined by Rampage vs. Forrest). Saunders is 5-0-2 professionally, and has been training with the murderer’s row at American Top Team.

— Speaking of ATT fighters, Marcus Aurelio may actually be facing UFC newbie Ryan Roberts at UFN 13 rather than Jim Miller. Spencer Fisher is definitely still injured.

(Props: MMA Junkie)

“I wouldn’t say it’s encouraged, but [the producers] told us how extreme we could go. They just didn’t want us breaking windows or burning down the house or anything like that. I don’t understand all the negative attention about it, honestly. I see a lot of people complaining. Some of these guys on the show were even saying it’s disrespectful and things like that. In the back of my head, I’m like, ‘What are you talking about?’ People build houses 10 times the size of that house just to blow it up for movies and stuff. This is a TV set. This is how we look at it. This isn’t someone’s house. As long as it’s fixable, it’s not really a big deal. You put 16 fighters in one house with nothing to do — and then they give us alcohol after losing fights and stuff? Well, stuff’s going to happen. Most times it isn’t done to entertain the people watching at home. It’s done to entertain ourselves because we have absolutely nothing to do in that house.”

Source: MMA Junkie

On last night’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter, Tommy proved once again that it’ll take a lot more than geyser-like cuts and fully executed submission holds to make him tap. After a dominating win over Ben Saunders last night, Tommy’s persona went from “strong farm boy” to “invincible cyborg,” and all of a sudden he’s a dark-horse candidate to win it all.

So first of all, the upper-deck thing, which resulted from Troy, War Machine, and Richie sitting around drinking instead of going to practice. After some time spent destroying the house, Troy and War get the idea to poop in the tank of Team Hughes’s shitter. (For the record, it was War’s poop, and Troy handed him the toilet paper.) Billy Miles discovers the prank and tells his teammates; Jared freaks out, kicks down a door and confronts War with the repeated question of “Who shit in our toilet, dog?” When he doesn’t get a satisfying answer, he knocks off War’s hat. War responds by tackling Jared, and a brawl ensues. Luckily, nobody is injured, and those responsible for the upper-decker are ordered to clean the toilet. It is the first — and possibly last — time a toilet is ever cleaned in the TUF house.

Of course, the real excitement comes from the fight between Tommy and Ben, who enter the Octagon somewhat less than 100%. Tommy’s still-wrecked face looks like it could split open at any moment, and Ben wakes up sick on the day of the fight (maybe from the fecal particles floating in the air from the upper-decker?). Round one starts with Ben securing a thai clinch on Tommy and working him over with knees to the body. Tommy takes Ben to the mat, but finds himself being assaulted from the bottom. Ben takes Tommy’s arm and rolls over into an arm-bar that would make Richie Hightower yelp for mercy: