(Please enjoy this Roy Jones Jr. boxing highlight video. And then, please remember that all those fights happened a very long time ago, in a very different sport than MMA)

Sadly, we may be closer than ever to an Anderson Silva vs. Roy Jones Jr. fight. On Thursday, Dana White told MMA Junkie that the former boxing pound for pound champ is coming to UFC 162 this Saturday in Vegas to discuss fighting Anderson Silva in the UFC.

Yahoo! Sports’ Kevin Iole also confirmed with Jones Jr. that he is meeting with White to discuss fighting “The Spider” under MMA rules in the UFC. Jones Jr., of course, is a future hall of fame boxer that is at least ten years out of his prime.

For years, Jones Jr. looked unbeatable but over the past ten years he has lost seven times in fifteen outings, four of those losses coming by way of ugly KO or TKO. The forty four year-old needs to give up fighting of any kind for the good of his health.

Jones Jr. has been so far gone for so long that, even in 2009 when Silva was vocal about wanting to box him, it seemed like a dangerous proposition for the former Olympian. Add a half decade and MMA rules into the mix and a Silva vs. Roy Jr. fight sounds almost masochistic.

For whatever reason, thogh, Anderson Silva has kept Jones Jr.’s name in his mouth for years, now. Often times it looked as if he used the threat of boxing Roy as a bargaining chip with the UFC but this is the first time that White has seemed at all open to the idea of his middleweight champ fighting Jones Jr. and they are talking about doing it in MMA.

As we all know, if White wants to put together a sham boxing vs. MMA bout in the UFC, he can get it done. We’re not sure what Silva or White think they will accomplish by trotting out yet another sadly brain-bruised former boxing champion to the Octagon and having a UFC legend beat them with ease, but it now appears that this “super fight” might be the only one we’re getting with Silva anytime soon.

Then again, this is far from the first time Jones Jr. or Silva have campaigned for this fight. Heck, it isn’t even the first time Jones Jr. has said he’d go to a UFC event to watch Silva in person and try to make a bout happen. Despite all that, the fight has never happened.

Let’s hope it still won’t. Ultimately, we can’t blame promoters for being promoters and fighters for being fighters.

How can Dana White ignore two huge names saying they want to fight each other and make him a lot of money? How can we fault fighters like Roy for wanting to fight, even when they are far removed from their prime?

Ultimately, it will be the responsibility of any and all athletic commissions to not allow this fight or any like it to happen.

UFC 162 takes place this Saturday in Las Vegas and organization President Dana White has released his first video blog of the week leading up to the event. It’s pretty good.

In it, UFC Hall of Fame fighter Chuck Liddell teaches TUF finalist Uriah Hall how to set up his deadly over hand right punch, as well as wrestles around with Mike Tyson and Royce Gracie. Liddell protege Glover Teixeira gets to meet Tyson, a hero of his and Uncle Dana personally makes the streets of Vegas safer.

Enjoy the vlog in between charred meat sessions today, all you American taters. For our Canadian friends – enjoy work, suckers!

Crap. I guess I’m working today too…and without that whole socialized health care benefit to boot.

Still, ‘Merica!

(Weidman watches and comments on Anderson Silva vs. Stephan Bonnar live, last year in Brazil. Video via YouTube.com/fueltv)

On Monday, UFC President Dana White told MMA Junkie that, should middleweight champion Anderson Silva lose his title defense against Chris Weidman this Saturday at UFC 162 in Las Vegas, “I’d do the rematch the next fight.”

White went on to explain why Silva’s title defense against Weidman might just effectively be a warm-up match for the champion. “[Silva] hasn’t lost in the UFC ever, has beat everybody. He loses that fight, he’s the guy for a rematch if he wants it.”

While a decision like this could be perceived as indicative of the UFC desperately wanting to keep Silva champion and of their willingness to do just about anything to make sure that happens, immediate title rematches are not without precedent and are, in fact, becoming quite common in the organization. (These kinds of rematches also have a long tradition in boxing, where bout agreements often include automatic rematch clauses for champions.)

Silva certainly deserves one based on past accomplishments, as White suggested, but a rematch could also just be good business. For his part, Weidman is certainly not surprised by White’s announcement. The #1 contender has already says that he expects to have to face and beat Silva twice. Heck, his coach Matt Serra had to do the same thing when he beat Georges St. Pierre in 2007.

(“It’s an ‘undisclosed locker room bonus,’ okay? That means we don’t tell the media, we don’t tell the IRS, and we especially don’t tell my wife.” / Photo via TerezOwens.com)

For years, the UFC’s end-of-night performance bonuses have rewarded fighters for outstanding battles and finishes in the Octagon, as well as given fans a metric to determine which fighters are the most consistently entertaining. But now that more and more fighters are publicly coming out to blast the promotion’s pay scale, UFC president Dana White says he’s thinking about ending the practice altogether, and using that money instead to bump the guaranteed salaries of lower-tier fighter. As he explained to media yesterday:

“The bonuses were something we’ve been doing out of the kindnesses of our (expletive) hearts,” White said. “That’s not something that was ever done or structured. We started doing it and that was it. It was something we liked to do, thought it was a cool thing to do. Apparently people don’t like it. They want the lower-level guys to get paid more money.”

Asked to clarify if this was really a move the promotion could make in the not-so-distant future, White answered emphatically.

“(Expletive) yeah, it could happen,” White said. “That’s what I’m thinking about doing. All the (expletive) lower-level guys think they need their money boosted. Everyone thinks it’s not enough money, so that’s easy to do.”

This, of course, is nothing more than a transparent bluff, on par with your father threatening to “turn this car around, goddamnit!” 30 minutes into a family road trip. Now that Dana has suggested that the UFC will transform its pay structure — sacrificing those $50,000 end-of-night awards to fatten the paychecks of prospects — here’s what he expects will happen next:

(“Apologize or Dana will do WHAT to my butt?” Photo via OTM.)

By Elias Cepeda

Looks like someone got a call from their boss. Former Strikeforce fighter Tim Kennedy is set to make his UFC debut July 6th against Roger Gracie but made news yesterday for an interview he recently gave in which he criticized UFC fighter pay.

“It’s a good thing I have another job because the UFC doesn’t pay very well,” he told GrappleTalk Podcast.

“Anybody who accepts [fighters being underpaid] as a reality of the sport is sad and pathetic,” Kennedy went on. “I hope this isn’t the reality of the sport. If it is I should probably go do something else, like empty trash cans. I’d make more money than I do now.”

It didn’t take the middleweight long to regret his words, however, and he issued an apology to UFC brass for the interview through his facebook fan page yesterday. “I recently made comments regarding fighter pay. The intent of these statements was to highlight that professional fighters incur significant expense associated with their preparations to fight and that fighter compensation is still not on par with other major sports,” Kennedy began.

If there’s anyone that Dana White gets pleasure out of verbally tearing down in the media more than Roy Nelson, it’s Steve Mazzagatti, the (formerly) porn-stached, cool as a cucumber veteran UFC official who has given us such avant-garde decisions as “Eye Poke Equals a TKO,” “Flying Head Kick? 40 More Punches to Convince Me” and “Tap 10 Times For Assistance.” The Baldfather has stated on numerous occasions that he doesn’t think Mazzagatti should even be watching MMA — which is all the more astounding when you consider all the crazy shit DW has said and done to try and sell a pay-per-view before — and even gone as far as to unofficially dub Mazzagatti “The Worst Referee in the History of Fighting.” In a world where this was allowed to happen, that’s a pretty bold claim.

As it turns out, Mazzagatti found himself at the center of controversy once again last weekend when he basically handed over his reffing duties to Josh Burkman during his WSOF 3 clash with Jon Fitch. After clipping Fitch early (like somebody here predicted he would), Burkman locked in a tight guillotine that put Fitch to sleep just over 40 seconds into their headlining bout. Burkman then proceeded to roll his unconscious opponent over and stand over him triumphantly before Mazzagatti decided to step in. It was perhaps the first walk-off submission in MMA History, and for some reason, you all are pissed about it.

Although White and Fitch have been involved in a war of words ever since the AKA product was released from the UFC, at the end of the day, it’s safe to assume that White wishes no ill will towards the former title contender. And being that Mazzagatti is higher up on White’s hit list than Fitch, the UFC Prez recently laid into the veteran ref for nearly 10 straight minutes at the UFC 161 post-fight media scrum. It was, quite honestly, the harshest takedown we have seen since Neal Page’s “Chatty Cathy” criticism of Del Griffith.

We’ve placed the full video of Dana’s rant above. After the jump, we’re going flush our last remaining scrap of credibility down the toilet in an attempt to do the unthinkable: defend Steve Mazzagatti. We know, we know.

By Elias Cepeda

Roy Nelson made history last night at UFC 161. No, he didn’t become just the second man in UFC history to score four consecutive first round knockout wins as I’m sure he hoped he would.

According to UFC President Dana White, “Big Country”, with the help of Stipe Miocic, instead set a record that is incredibly detrimental to his own health.“Roy Nelson broke a UFC record tonight: 437 significant strikes absorbed without being knocked out.  It’s a new UFC record,” White said.

We originally reported that number based on White’s statement. So did many other outlets, including MMA Weekly, Yahoo! Sports and MMA Fighting. A look over at FightMetric, the official statisticians for the UFC, however, reveals that Nelson absorbed only 106 strikes from Miocic.

White was probably using hyperbole to underscore a couple points about Nelson – how tough he is, how badly he got beaten, etc. – but it is telling that his 400 + strikes number didn’t strike many in the media as too far off.

Miocic knocked Nelson around that badly. And we’ve seen it happen before to the outspoken heavyweight.

Nelson probably should have taken a contract extension deal when it was offered to him by the UFC. He probably should not have fought Miocic just six weeks after his prior fight, a win over Cheick Kongo, and Nelson definitely shouldn’t be fighting in the heavyweight division.

Folks who respect and admire Nelson have been calling for the morbidly obese fighter to drop down to light heavyweight for years.

Forget all that.

Nelson has the height and frame of a tall lightweight or normal welterweight fighter. But instead of living a healthy lifestyle and fighting at, say, 170 pounds, the man has often had trouble of making the heavyweight limit of 265 pounds.

Roy Nelson clearly has a problem, and it isn’t just the fact that he can’t ever seem to be more than a punching bag any time he fights a top heavyweight – though it is related. The charismatic and gifted fighter has a consumption problem.

(And with a snap of his fingers, Homeless Santa vanished from our lives, leaving behind only the crumpled wrapper of the Carolina BBQ Tendercrisp we had left for him on the armoire.)

It wouldn’t exactly be earth-shattering news to tell you that Dana White is not a fan of Roy “Big Country” Nelson. In fact, the President of the UFC has stated exactly that to pretty much anyone who will listen, time after time after “he’s a f*cking idiot.”

The fact that Nelson was one-half of the coaching duo at least partly responsible for the worst season of TUF in recent memory (at least ratings wise), surely doesn’t increase his stock in the eyes of The Baldfather, but with “Big Country” knocking out contenders left and right, it’d be insane to let him slip through your fingers, right? Well, according to DW, Nelson’s bout with Stipe Miocic at UFC 161 this weekend may be his last in the UFC:

UFC President Dana White used the contract circumstances as a way to explain the pairing of Nelson and Miocic, which looked odd when announced five weeks ago.

The fighters were headed in different directions. Nelson had just defeated Cheick Kongo and ascended to No. 5 in the heavyweight rankings two months ago while Miocic was coming off the first loss of his career and hadn’t fought in nine months.

Slated to fight newcomer Soa Palelei on the preliminary card, Miocic found himself promoted into the Nelson bout on late notice. It was a necessary move, according to White, because of the terms of Nelson’s contract.

“He’s on the last fight of his deal and we owe him a fight,” White said. “He’s not giving us any extensions.”

White reported that the UFC offered Nelson an extension that he turned down, prompting the boss to blast the fighter by referring to him as “the smartest guy on Earth” and “a (expletive) genius.” 

By Elias Cepeda

The past week or so has been an exciting one for fans of Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. It’s also been a little bit of a worrisome one as well.

Jackson has gushed about his new deal with Bellator and the TNA Impact professional wrestling organization. He says he’ll only be asked to fight when he wants to, that he’s excited to finally get to try out a long-time love of his — pro wrasslin’ — and that the Viacom family that owns Bellator might create opportunities for him on television and in movies, through their Paramount pictures movie house.

Jackson left the UFC earlier this year, not just on a three-fight losing streak, but also embittered by what he felt was poor treatment from the organization. Likening promoter/fighter relationships to that of personal, romantic ones, Jackson told CagePotato last week, “…me and Bellator, we tongue kissing right now, baby.”

The fan in me has a soft spot for Jackson. Like many of you, I’ve watched him fight for over a decade. He’s always done so with courage and in exciting fashion. Back in the day, “Rampage” may have also been the most accessible top fighter in the world. There was a time where he set up a phone line specifically for fans. He made the number public and waited for calls. When they came in, he’d pick up whenever he was available, and chat with whoever wanted to talk to him.

Not a whole lot to dislike about a guy like that, right? So, if Jackson has found a new, better situation for himself, where he feels happy, no one can begrudge him that.

The thing is, we’ve seen this situation play out before with the fighter. Being enamored with an organization before ultimately souring on them, and feeling rejected and disrespected when it was all over. While with Pride, Jackson often seemed quite happy. He defended the Japanese promotion in public and compared it favorably to its competitor at the time, the UFC.

By the time the UFC signed Jackson, however, he acted as if it was a life-saving event. I remember speaking with Jackson near the end of his Pride tenure and again shortly after he’d signed with the UFC.

At that time, Jackson didn’t only express satisfaction with his new UFC contract, he spoke of Dana White as if he were a personal friend who had saved him and done him a favor. Six or so years later, Jackson and White routinely trash each other publicly.

During a media conference call last week, Jackson said that Bellator promoter Bjorn Rebney is a guy who “gets it,” and is the type of boss he’s been waiting for his entire career. Jackson says that things are different this time around.

(Liddell’s decision to retire involved sober discussions with those closest to him)

Our favorite corporate Zuffa desk jockey, Chuck Liddell, recently fielded questions in Brazil from fans and discussed his decision to retire in 2010. At that time, the former light heavyweight champion had lost three straight, all by TKO or KO, and five out of his last six fights.

UFC President, and Liddell’s one-time manager, Dana White publicly said that the legend should retire and since that time, it has been widely assumed and reported that White coerced or talked The Iceman into hanging up his gloves. However, Liddell told fans that when he met with White in the fall of 2010, he’d already decided on his own to quit.

“I talked to my family, my coaches, and then I went to Dana,” Liddell recounted for fans. “I talked to Dana. Dana and I actually went to dinner, and he thought I was going to ask him to fight again. I came to dinner, and I said, ‘You know what? I’m done.’ He was relieved.”

“I asked him to just hold off for about three months and give me some time to get adjusted to it before I have to talk to people about it because it was a hard decision for me,” Liddell went on.

While the decision to stop competing professionally was a tough one for the fighter, he says that he realizes that leaving when he did and not sustaining more damage was the right thing to do. ”I love fighting, and I didn’t want to stop, but it was the right decision at the time between my coaches and my family,” Chuck said.