(Similar to Georges St.Pierre, MMA pundits, and most fans heading into UFC 129, Dana White was looking right past Jake Shields.)

2011 is approaching it’s final hour, Potato Nation, and when we typically take a look back at the year that was, we often lump things in terms of the very best, and more often than not, the very worst. But even though it has been arguably the biggest year in the sport’s History, it hasn’t gone without it’s fair share of snoozefests, sparring matches, and fights that simply didn’t live up to their own hype. For every Rua/Hendo, there was a Torres/Banuelos, so to speak, that kept us from having a full-on Chuck Liddell style freak out. It’s not that these fights made us angry, it’s just that they failed to make us feel anything.

In a way, they were actually a good thing for the sport, as they raised our appreciation for the epic slugfests, the back and forth brawls, and the technical battles to new heights. So it is for these unsung heroes that we bring you The Ten Most Forgettable Fights of 2011, presented in chronological order.

#10: Jacob Volkmann vs. Antonio Mckee

We know what you’re thinking, Potatoites, you’re thinking, “My God, it’s only been a year since this clown (dis)graced the UFC with that performance?” Well the answer is yes, and almost to the exact date. On January 1st at UFC 125, Anthony Mckee made his long awaited debut in the UFC. And when we say “long awaited,” we mean by none other than Mckee himself. You see, Anthony Mckee followed the James Toney method of trolling his way into the UFC through a shitstorm of self absorbed and ridiculous claims, despite only claiming seven finishes in his previous thirty contests. Well, DW took the bait, and threw Mckee humble wrestler and future threat to Homeland Security, Jacob Volkmann, for his big debut.

(Props, I guess: Fightlinker on Vimeo)

…because Tom Lawlor and Kyle Kingsbury have. Boy, have they ever. This regrettable booze-fueled moment is the latest example of what I’ve started calling the “Nick Ring Theory” (previously known as the “Seth Petruzelli Theory“): At a certain point, pretending to be gay to get a rise out of people becomes a lifestyle choice in itself. But they seem happy, so who am I to judge?

Related:
- Dana White to Gay UFC Fighters: It’s Safe to Come Out Now
- Strangely Arousing Photos of the Day: Natasha Wicks’s Nasty Road-Rash

(“I’m gonna puke…I’m gonna puke.”)

Following his UFC 139 victory over Kyle Kingsbury Saturday night, Stephan Bonnar wasted no time in planting the seed for his next fight. “The Ultimate Fighter 1″ runner-up, who has racked up a recent three-fight winning streak, told reporters that he would love a step up in competition.

“I’ve always wanted to fight [Quinton] ‘Rampage’ [Jackson],” Bonnar said. “You know, I’ve got a few wins now and maybe (I can) get a big name [next].”

Earlier in the week, “The American Psycho explained to Heavy.com that facing Jackson would be his “dream fight.”

“He’s good, he’s a big puncher, he’s tough. But he does have holes in his game,” Bonnar pointed out. “He’s really famous. ‘The A-Team’ movie, talk shows – everyone knows who he is. Fighting him, it’s going to be a huge fight. Forrest [Griffin] got a close win over him, [Keith] Jardine fought a good fight with him. I feel like I could fight him good.”

(In a way, we were all the “Screaming PRIDE Lady” that night. / Photo courtesy of Esther Lin, MMA Fighting)

By Jason Moles

The suits on Wall Street keep whispering about a ‘Halloween indicator‘ and how now is not a time to sell; rather we should sit back and let our riches mount. Call it what you will, but millions watched UFC on FOX and UFC 139 and concluded the same thing: Most fighter’s stocks are rising steadily. Even if you’re not sure which is the true Fight of the Year from this weekend — Dan Henderson vs. Marucio Rua or Eddie Alvarez vs. Michael Chandler — you’ll know how to safeguard your hypothetical MMA portfolio’s worth after playing another round of ‘Buy, Sell, Hold’.

Stephan Bonnar: Buy

It’s hard to believe that any TUF veteran could take nearly a year off from the sport and return with the engine firing on all cylinders, but Stephan Bonnar did just that. The BJJ schooling he dished out was almost as surprising as his apology to Josh Koscheck for making those damn shirts. Even that wasn’t the most unexpected thing to happen; one judge gave the ‘American Psycho’ a 30-25 victory. Grab hold of any unclaimed stock before he starts getting big fights and Dana declares him “in the mix.”

Party Like a Rockstar also came out in 2007. Your mind = Blown. Props: Fox Sports

I’m willing to bet that more than a few sports writers have pointed out that four years ago, Dan Henderson vs. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua would have been just as worthy of main event status as it was last night at UFC 139. That four years later, we’re still willing to pay to watch guys like Wanderlei Silva, Cung Le, Urijah Faber, Stephan Bonnar and Miguel Torres. That last night’s event appropriately enough took place in Strikeforce’s old stomping grounds in San Jose. For that matter, I’m pretty sure you heard all of that stuff at some point from Mike Goldberg and Joe Rogan last night.

I tried to avoid those clichéd observations, but they’re too appropriate to ignore. As fans of mixed martial arts, we’ve been waiting at least four years for a fight between Pride legends Dan Henderson and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua to come together. Yet for as long as we’ve wanted to see this fight, what we were given last night was worth every second of the wait.

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

(Eder Jones wins fight, loses pie-eating contest.)

This Friday marks the official start of Autumn, and like clockwork, I’m catching a goddamned cold. There’s something about the change of seasons that seems to wreck my immune system, which has grown frail due to a life of solitary blogging and poor hygeine. So as I chug my Airborne/orange juice cocktail, let’s all take inspiration in these six men, who were way worse-off than I am now, and still managed to kick ass.

GEORGES ST. PIERRE
vs. Thomas Denny @ UCC 12, 1/25/03

Method of victory: TKO (cut), 4:45 of round 2
In his own words: ”I took the fight and I was really sick. I was so sick, after the first round I thought I was going to fall unconscious. And I told my cornerman, I’m like, listen, when the second round will start I will try a high kick in the beginning and if I don’t knock out my opponent, I want you to throw the towel. My cornerman look up at me like this, he said ‘Georges, I don’t have a towel, you’re gonna die in the ring.’

And I got so angry, I was like, I can’t believe this guy, he’s supposed to be my friend, he wants me to die in the ring. So I stood up, I hear the [bell], I fought through it, and by some kind of miracle I was able to cut the guy and to TKO him and the referee stopped the fight. I was completely exhausted. That was my toughest fight.”

(“…and that’s the ‘bleeding robot’. For my next impression — the ‘bleeding hula girl’.”)

Two pivotal light-heavyweight matchups have been added to UFC 139: Velasquez vs. Dos Santos, November 19th in San Jose. First, in the night’s “no pressure” match, Ryan Bader and Jason Brilz will both try to snap their two-fight losing streaks. Bader is skating on thin ice after being utterly ass-handled by Jon Jones in February, then getting choked out by Tito Ortiz in the upset of the year. Brilz kicked off his losing skid with a valiant effort against Lil’ Nog, followed by a far-less-impressive 20-second knockout loss to Vladimir Matyushenko at UFC 129. Winner keeps their job. Loser…well, who knows anymore?

(Bader beat him. K-Sos beat him. Lawlor beat him. Now he’s one of the toughest prospects in the light-heavyweight division — proving once again that shaving your head is always a good career move. Photo props to UFC.com)

Not to pee-pee on Tony Ferguson‘s parade, but winning The Ultimate Fighter is no guarantee of success in the UFC. On the other hand, getting eliminated while in the TUF house is no guarantee of failure either. In fact, some of today’s most dangerous UFC contenders are guys who entered the promotion through the reality show, but didn’t even get to fight for the glass trophy. In the wake of Saturday’s TUF 13 Finale, here’s how I’d rank the Top 10 non-finalists from The Ultimate Fighter, based on their current standing in the promotion…

#1: Gray Maynard

On TUF: Was choked out by Nate Diaz in the semi-finals of season 5.
These days: Drew with Frankie Edgar in his first lightweight title challenge in January, but will get another crack at the belt later this year. His pair of title fights against Edgar follow an eight-fight win streak in the Octagon, which included a decision win against Diaz in a rematch last year.

#2: Josh Koscheck

On TUF: Lost a split-decision to Diego Sanchez in the semi-finals of season 1.
These days: A perennial top contender in the welterweight division, Kos will be one of the front-runners for the belt if GSP ever leaves the division; until then, he’ll just have to be content with being “right up there.”

And to think, Tony Ferguson is the asshole of the group. Image via yfrog

Winning The Ultimate Fighter may no longer signify that you’ll be a force in your division for years to come. Or even a relevant name in your division. Or even that you have job security. But it does mean that you now have a six figure contract with the UFC, and if you happen to knock the other guy out in the process, you’ll pocket an additional 40k for “Knock Out of the Night” bonus. See? The show hasn’t completely lost its luster.

Pettis, and his hopes at a title shot, come crashing down (pic: MMAFightNews.net)

Judging from the sparse commentary throughout last night’s live blog, most of you were out sipping $20 Manhattans and discussing the latest issue of The New Yorker while a few of us sat on the couch watching free cage fights and loathing ourselves. It’s cool. You know what you did was wrong, and you came back home to us. We forgive you, and we’ll give you the gist of what went down.

It only took three minutes and fifty four seconds to send ten weeks of buildup crashing to the mat. The bout between Tony Ferguson and Ramsey Nijem was competitive, with both men finding a home for their hands, but Ferguson was able to employ his collegiate wrestling experience and the time spent with Lesnar’s camp after the show to dictate the fight and set the pace. Following a couple of successful takedowns, Ferguson flipped Ramsey’s switch with a left hook and Season 13 of The Ultimate Fighter crowned its asshole champion.

(Kyle Kingsbury is wearing that rainbow fanny-pack in honor of all the brave men and women who gave their lives defending our freedom in the Candyland-Disco War of Sissystan. / Photo courtesy of CombatLifestyle. For more photos from this album, click here.)

TUF 13 reaches its conclusion tonight, with “Stripper” Ramsey Nijem facing off against “Jerkwad” Tony Ferguson for the mythical six-figure contract and glass trophy. Plus: Anthony Pettis makes his official UFC debut against Clay Guida in a guaranteed thriller with lightweight title implications, the suddenly-badass Kyle Kingsbury looks to put Fabio Maldonado’s 11-fight win streak to an end, and much more.

If you’ve got nothing better to do, it’s not a bad way to spend a Saturday night. (If you do have something better to do, count yourself lucky, and come back later to let us know what the outside world is like.) The action is already underway at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas — and streaming live on Facebook — but we’ll save the spoilers until the end of the night, because some of you crybabies get sooooo sensitive. Round-by-round results from the Spike TV broadcast will begin to pile up after the jump starting at 9 p.m. ET; refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest.

Dammit, who are all you guys again?

Say what you will about The Ultimate Fighter (not like you need an invitation), but the finale shows tend to be pretty damn fun. This season, we actually have two fairly solid finalists, a dynamite co-main in Pettis-Guida, plus a handful of other matchups calibrated for striking showdowns and crowd amazement.

Here’s a quick and dirty rundown of the fights scheduled for this weekend, with a few of those fancy moving pictures that you like so much. Who ya got?

Ramsey Nijem

VS

Tony Ferguson

Well, either this fight is the one you’ve been waiting for, or you’re just wondering what these two nobodies are doing on your UFC card. Tune in to find out which guy gets a contract with the UFC. (Spoiler Alert: It’ll be both of them.)

A number bookings for upcoming UFC events have being reported by various sources in the past 24 hours.

Heavy.com broke the news yesterday afternoon that former CagePotato.com The Ultimate Fighter 11 blogger Rich Attonito will try to prove the theory that Matt Brown has incriminating blackmail-worthy photos of UFC matchmaker Joe Silva when he attempts to hand the Seattle, Washington fighter his fourth straight UFC loss at the TUF 13 finale on June 4 in Las Vegas. Attonito will be hungry to rebound from a unanimous decision loss to David Branch he incurred at the TUF 12 finale in December.

(Props: Heavy)

The UFC handed out $40,000 performance bonuses to five fighters following UFC Fight Night: Marquardt vs. Palhares, including two separate "Submission of the Night" awards. The honorees are:

Knockout of the Night: Brian Foster, for his 67-second storming of Forrest Petz, which was the lone stoppage on the preliminary card. Petz now drops to 0-2 in his current UFC stint, and will most likely be shown the door.

Submission of the Night (1): Cole Miller, for dropping Ross Pearson with punches in the second round of their fight, then icing him with a rear-naked choke. Miller has scored the SotN award in three of his last five appearances, and officially enters the UFC Performance Bonus Leaderboard. 

Submission of the Night (2): Charles Oliveira, who pushed his record to 14-0 with a huge win over TUF 8 winner Efrain Escudero, secured via standing rear-naked choke in the third round. Though he had trouble getting Escudero to the mat in the first two frames, Oliveira showed off his tenacity in the victory, as well as some impressively unorthodox striking.

Fight of the Night: Kyle Kingsbury and Jared Hamman, for their fast-paced three-round brawl in the prelims. Despite a third-round rally from Hamman, Kingsbury’s domination and damage in the first two frames secured him 29-28 scores from all three judges.

Some other notes on the fights…

If the name Razak Al-Hassan means anything to you at all as an MMA fan, there can only be one reason.  He’s the guy who, when locked up in a tight armbar against Steve Cantwell at last December’s UFC Fight For The Troops, decided to go ahead and let his arm get popped on national TV by an enthusiastic sadist.  It was grotesque, it was sort of dumb, and it was a learning experience.  Maybe.  At least, you’d think that after suffering an injury that sidelined him for several months Al-Hassan would have a healthy appreciation for the necessity of the tapout.  Talking with the Las Vegas Sun (via Cage Writer) that does not appear to be the case:

Although the injury kept him out of training for four months, Al-Hassan says that he wouldn’t have done a thing differently looking back on the fight.

“At this level, with this kind of opportunity, I want to make sure that I do everything in my power to win,” he said. “I’m pretty infamous for the injury now, but I’d rather go out like that, than to not be remembered at all.  At least fans know that I’m going to bring it and I’ll go out on my shield any day of the week.”

(Come on now, Antonio, that simply isn’t true.)

Let the drunken debauchery begin again. After Dave Kaplan’s fight, Tom Lawlor decided to get drunk with Kaplan. They began to drink each other’s piss, which in itself is just disgusting. But these guys were downing them like shots of tequila. The sad thing is they did not even show the grossest part. Kyle Kingsbury took a plate and a towel into the bathroom and came out with nice big hot steamy Lincoln Log on a platter. He told the guys he would give some cash to whoever eats it. Tom held a piece up to his mouth but couldn’t go through with it. The pot kept getting bigger with us all chipping in, but no one went through with it. I hope they put that on the DVD…GOOD TIMES.

To quote Smokey from Friday — Kaplan “got knocked the Fuck out, Man!” That was even funnier watching it than hearing about it. Kaplan is an extremely smart guy but sometimes I question his intelligence by first asking for someone to “try” and knock him out. Second for not admitting that he got knocked out knowing full well it was on camera. There is one issue with Kaplan and that is he will not admit when he is wrong. He’s a bit delusional. He can’t get knocked out, he is the best looking guy in the house, and he gets more chicks than anybody. The list could go on.

The prank on Krzysztof Soszynski was pretty funny and only fitting since he initiated the pranks-before-fights ritual. It didn’t take much time for us to put all the stuff in his room. It was funny to see that his teammates didn’t help. His prank in return actually made his team upset too. It must have taken a lot of time but everybody in the house was affected. Krzysztof had to take all the stuff in himself.