(After defeating Silva by a shocking first round KO, Rush will remove his mask to reveal that HE WAS KEYSER SOZE THE ENTIRE TIME. Photo courtesy of Fighters.com)

Earlier this week, Georges St. Pierre’s former manager, Stephane Patry, wrote a column where he revealed the champion’s “secret plan” for ending his MMA career in three fights. We don’t read French (not because we can’t, just out of principle…’Merica!) so we relied on MMA Fighting’s Mike Chiappetta to give us the details.

Patry wrote that on Jan. 11, while dining with St-Pierre and a few other friends at a restaurant in the city, the group discussed his fighting future. And during that time, according to Patry, St-Pierre discussed a “detailed” and “intelligent” plan that would take him possibly to the end of his career.

It would consist of only three fights: his Saturday night UFC 158 bout against Nick Diaz, one more title defense against Johny Hendricks, and then, the long-awaited super fight with middleweight champion Anderson Silva.

Chiappetta followed up with St. Pierre and his head trainer, Firas Zahabi, but both of their memories seemed to be fuzzy about that night, so many, many months…well, a month ago, basically. ”I don’t know,” Georges told Chiappetta, “I don’t know. I don’t remember saying anything like this. I don’t think so. I’m focusing on Nick Diaz right now.”

How convenient, Georges. I’m not calling you a liar, I’d just like to know WHERE YOU KEEP THE MISSILE CODES, SECRET AGENT MAN.

(“No way! You were the completely innocent victim of a vast conspiracy aimed at soiling your reputation TOO?! Somebody call Lance, we’ve got some work to do.”) 

You know, just once I would like to hear an athlete take full responsibility for their actions without needing an hour-long Oprah special to do so. I realize that as fans, we often refuse to acknowledge that the people we falsely idolize are capable of wrongdoing, but if the athletes that continue to get busted for banned substances/steroids/stevia were truly concerned about their fanbase, they probably wouldn’t be trying to cheat the system in the first place.

So you’ll excuse my rush to judgement, but suffice it to say, I ain’t buying the conspiracy theory that former Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Rafael “Feijao” Cavalcante laid out in a recent interview with Globo Esporte. As you might recall, Cavalcante tested positive for Stanozolol in the aftermath of his win over Mike Kyle last May, and was subsequently denied an appeal by the California State Athletic Commission in the months that followed. Although if you were to ask Rafael, he would tell you that the blood — or rather, the urine — is on the CSAC’s hands:

The organizers wanted to harm me. I had conducted a test in Brazil a week before the fight. I would not be so stupid to take any banned substance, the type of anabolic they claimed I took in fact makes a person gain weight. I’m already a heavyweight, would not take that. 

The urine sample was manipulated. When the form was submitted, it was dated on May 18, 2012, but in reality the sample was collected a day later on may 19. When we checked the form more carefully, we saw that there was another mistake. The collection was made at the HP Pavilion, where the event was held, but in the form it says collection was made at the hotel where we were staying.

(“I drink coconut water because it’s the world’s greatest natural source of electrolytes. Plus, Obama has been putting cyanide in our tap water since March 2010. Open your eyes, people.” Photo via Esther Lin/Showtime)

By George Shunick

One of the more enjoyable aspects of MMA — and the athletes who participate in it – is that even as the sport has grown exponentially in popularity over the past half-decade, the personalities that comprise it have remained extraordinarily candid in their interactions with the general public. It keeps fighters down to earth relative to athletes in other sports — Chris Kluwe excluded — and creates a sense of community between the fans and fighters that is unique to MMA. Of course, every now and then, a fighter (or promoter) will take things a step too far.

Take Ronda Rousey. Just the other day she caught heat for saying that Georges St. Pierre, the most dominant champion in welterweight history and arguably the most complete fighter in the sport, was only famous because he was attractive and Canadian. After the ensuing outcry, Ronda clearly gave the matter a lot of thought and decided to be more conscious of what she said in public forums…and proceeded to tweet an “extremely interesting must watch video” suggesting the Sandy Hook massacre of 20 children and 6 adults in December was the product of a government conspiracy to push anti-gun legislation. Amidst a storm of criticism, she eventually took down the tweet hours later.

Let’s be clear: This is probably the single largest public relations blunder any prominent professional fighter has committed since Quinton “Rampage” Jackson lived up to his nickname. Rousey originally justified it by saying “I just figure asking questions and doing research is more patriotic than blindly accepting what you’re told.” Which is an interesting thing to say, considering she just blindly accepted what a YouTube video — presumably constructed by a reactionary paranoid living in his mom’s basement — told her, despite an overwhelming amount of evidence to the contrary.

(“Hey sweetheart, you ever seen the missing frames from the Zapruder film? Would you like to?”)

If MMA folks sometimes seem a little suspicious that The Man is out to get them it’s because there was a time in the sport’s short history when The Man really was out to get them, and not just in the Rampage-Jackson-on-the-55-Freeway kind of way. A number of factors, including efforts by finagling lawmakers to kill MMA in the late ’90s and the glut of misinformation about the sport that still percolates in many mainstream media reports, have created a bit of a bunker mentality among its hardcore supporters.

At this point, when events fall apart, judges issue hinky decisions or another fledgling organization goes under, some of us are all too quick to assume that it’s the work of sinister forces beyond our control. Whether true or not, MMA’s past is rife with rumors of secret plots, backroom deals and widespread collusion.

In light of that, here are CagePotato.com’s Top 10 MMA Conspiracy Theories. Many of them you’ve probably heard before, but perhaps a few will be new to you. Some are ludicrous, while others probably contain a kernel of truth. At least a few are enough to make a man question everything he thought he knew about life and the universe around him.

The truth is out there, motherfuckers.