Man…Bryan Caraway is gonna be piiiiiiissssseeddd when he gets word of this little development.

You might not have heard about this, but the Nevada State Athletic Commission’s Steroid and Drug Testing Advisory Panel was held in Las Vegas over the weekend, and among the primary issues discussed was that of the acceptable threshold for marijuana metabolites in a given fighter’s system that the UFC currently allows, specifically on an international level. You see, since the UFC usually acts as its own regulatory body in foreign countries, an issue has recently emerged regarding the discrepancy between their acceptable level for metabolites  – 50 ng/mL — and the newly-deemed acceptable level of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) — 150 ng/mL.

Fortunately, UFC Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Marc Ratner revealed during the panel that the promotion’s threshold will now be raised to meet the level of WADA’s. He spoke with MMAJunkie, then presumably passed one to the left hand side:

“When we self-regulate around the world, we are going to go the WADA standard of 150. So we’re starting that immediately.”

Ratner also told MMAjunkie.com the Brazilian MMA Athletic Commission – or Comissao Atletica Brasileira de MMA (CABMMA) – which regulates UFC events in Brazil, has also agreed to the same standard and will make the change at next week’s UFC on FUEL TV 10 event in Fortaleza. Brazilian commission officials later confirmed their decision.

You may be asking yourself, “What exactly does this threshold change mean for UFC fighters moving forward?”

(Riddle poses with Anthony Johnso…er…Christopher “Big Black” Boykin, a guy so cool that he forces the *fighters* to fist pose in pictures with him. Via Riddle’s Twitter.)

TUF 7‘s Matt Riddle may lack the ability to rid his body of marijuana metabolites in time for a scheduled fight, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that he lacks his own strict moral code. Case in point, following Riddle’s second positive post-fight test for the banned substance at UFC on FUEL 7 and subsequent firing, Riddle told reporters that, should the UFC suddenly want him back after he racks up six or seven wins in the next year or two, he would probably turn them down. It was a bold statement to make, especially considering the ”sickening, depressing nightmare” life outside the UFC has been described as by people like Todd Duffee, who have actually had to experience it.

But as we often (and somewhat ironically) say, “actions speak louder than words.” And if Riddle was seeking to eliminate even the possibility of a UFC return down the line, he has successfully pulled it off. It has recently been announced that Riddle’s Legacy FC contract has been bought out by Bellator, which if recent reports are any indication, is where he shall now remain for the rest of his natural life. Riddle will thusly be participating in the promotion’s upcoming Season 9 welterweight tournament, as he told MMAJunkie:

I had so many options after I left the UFC, but knowing that I was able to compete in a tournament against guys like Paul Daley, Ben Saunders and Douglas Lima, signing with Bellator was an easy decision. This division is just so stacked, and being able to fight in a tournament makes it even better. Bellator is doing a lot of great things right now (Author’s note: Gee, I wonder what he’s REEFERring to *tap dances off stage*), and I want to be a part of it.

“Oh, you’ll be a part of it alright…FOREVER!!!  MU HU HA HA HA!” – Bjorn Rebney by way of Ben Goldstein.

Bellator’s welterweight tournament is set to get under way starting in the fall, although no specific dates or venues have yet to be named. Anyone give Riddle a decent chance of making some waves in his new promotion?

-J. Jones

(Nick Diaz just released footage of a pretty sketchy situation that he encountered before the UFC 158 weigh-ins. Read more about the so-called “Canadian loophole” right here.)

Marcus Davis Claims Waachiim Spiritwolf Suffered a Panic Attack and Was Never Kneed in the Groin (MiddleEasy)

UFC VP Marc Ratner Asks Commission to Revisit Rules Concerning Marijuana Usage (BleacherReport)

Matt Riddle Says Dana White Is ‘Just a Juice Monkey Who’s Bald, Who Doesn’t Know Sh** About Business’ (stephaniejoplin.com)

Another Team Lloyd Irvin Member Was Charged With Rape in 2008 (BloodyElbow)

Promoters Say MMA Fighter Charles Rowan Faked Death (ESPN)

Does Bigger Mean Better for Anthony Johnson? (MMAFighting)

A Complete History of Players Who Won Both NCAA and NBA Championships (Complex)

March Madness: The 10 Best NCAA Tournament Upsets in History (MensFitness)

Terrible Non-Rap Stuff Made by Rappers (EgoTV)

The Most Amazing Real Life Wilderness Survival Stories (DoubleViking)

The 50 Funniest TV News Captions Ever (WorldWideInterweb)

Ranking The ‘Air Bud’ Films By Plausibility (FilmDrunk)

RIP Black Lululemon Yoga Pants (Break.com)

(When Keepin’ it Real Goes Wrong: Breakdance Edition. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.) 

Like the mighty osprey as it descends from the sky to feast on a trout, the fallout from Matt Riddle’s UFC on FUEL 7 bout with Che Mills was swift and fierce. Not only was Mills lambasted/fired for putting on a piss-poor performance, but Riddle was similarly bashed by Dana White for his efforts in victory and released from the promotion shortly thereafter (following his second failed post-fight drug test). Despite the setback, Riddle stated that he was happy to finally be freed from the hypocritical bonds of Zuffa to crush some cans, so much so that he would probably never come back to the UFC if they asked him to.

In either case, it looks like Riddle will be given plenty of opportunities to do just that in the Texas-based organization Legalize It Legacy Fighting Championships, which Riddle announced he had signed a multi-fight deal with over the weekend via Twitter:

You have to appreciate how Riddle, being the witty bastard that he is, managed to reference both his recent quotes about beating his kids and the State of Texas’ history with blood baths in one masterfully written tweet. That’s what he was doing, right?

And in other news, Riddle’s opponent at UFC on FUEL 7, Che Mills, has successfully landed on his feet as well…

(And this is the face he will make after he does.) 

Since being released from the UFC following his second positive test for marijuana in his past three fights, TUF 7 alum Matt Riddle has been doing his damnedest to burn every last bridge that might possibly connect him to the organization he has literally built his entire professional MMA career in. And while Riddle succeeded in raising some interesting questions regarding the UFC’s policy of hiring and firing fighters during his recent interview on The MMA Hour, he also succeeded in completely sabotaging any potential of a return trip to the sport’s highest promotion, which according to him, is something he would prefer:

What I see happening is, a year or two from now the UFC calls me back after I’ve won probably like five or six fights, hopefully. And I’ll probably, at the time, say, ‘No.’ Because I really don’t like the direction they’re taking the company. They’re firing high-level talent so they can have lower level talent just scrap, and they’d rather have a brawl than a good technical fight. I think that’s going to be their downfall, because the fans are getting more educated. They’re getting smarter, and they don’t want to just see a slugfest and two retarded guys with brain damage bleeding everywhere.

Dana White’s response was expectantly blunt. Get it? Blunt? Be honest, that pun is so great you’d probably beat your kids in a fit of jealous rage if you weren’t so goddamn stoned.

Much more from this interview after the jump. 

(Matt’s actual marijuana card, via @riddletuf7)

For the second time in less than a year, UFC welterweight Matt Riddle has tested positive for marijuana in a post-fight drug test, spurring the UFC to release him from his contract. Riddle’s latest failed test followed his split-decision win over Che Mills at UFC on FUEL 7 in London on February 16th, which came just seven months after his 90-day marijuana suspension following his UFC 149 win over Chris Clements. That victory was later changed to a no-contest, and it’s likely that Riddle’s latest win will be overturned as well.

Riddle was already on thin ice with the UFC because of the quality of his recent fights. Here’s Dana White calling him out by name while discussing the UFC’s decision to cut Jon Fitch: “Riddle fights just like Fitch. Has been lately, anyway. He went from being super exciting to now he wants to grab your legs and hold you down.”

Riddle had long maintained that he doesn’t use marijuana to get high, but for therapeutic purposes. As Riddle explained on The MMA Hour last October:

“I do smoke but I’m not smoking to get stoned. I’m smoking so I can finally relax, sit back and just not worry about things. People, maybe they did it in college one way, but for a guy like me, for a professional athlete that goes through what we go through, it’s medicine for me. Maybe for some little stoner sitting on the couch playing XBox, for him, it’s a drug. For me, it’s medicine…

(It’s kind of offensive that the UFC promos keep referring to Barao as a “monster.” He’s a human being, okay? An aggressive, scary human being whose mother just happens to be half-cthulhu / Photo via MMAJunkie.)

Today at the Wembley Arena in London, UFC interim bantamweight champ Renan Barao and 22-year-old phenom Michael McDonald will do battle to determine who’s truly the greatest 135-pound fighter in the world, at least until Dominick Cruz finally heals up and puts an end to this ridiculous charade. Alright, so an interim title might not mean much in the grand scheme of things, but it’s still a damn good fight, and the rest of the card features a crowd-pleasing assortment of slugfests and future stars.

Leading us through today’s UFC on FUEL 7 liveblog is Alex Giardini, who will be laying down round-by-round results from the main card broadcast after the jump beginning at 3 p.m. ET. Refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest, and please share your own thoughts in the comments section.

(Ladies, you are not prepared to deal with Matt’s “O-face.” You just aren’t.) 

Matt Riddle is on the fast track to replacing Michael Phelps as the most motivated stoner on the planet Earth, you guys. After fighting just once in 2011, Riddle put together a 3-1 record in 2012 (well, 2-1 and 1 NC if you’ve ever sucked dick for weed before) and already has his first fight for 2013 lined up. The man with one of the sunniest dispositions in the sport will be taking on butter-toothed Brit Che “Beautiful” Mills at UFC on FUEL 7, which goes down from the Wembley Arena in London, England on February 16th.

On the heels of a disappointing victory via injury over Duane Ludwig at UFC on FUEL 5, Mills will be looking to extend his octagon record to 3-1 with a victory over Riddle, who is fresh off a unanimous decision victory over John Maguire at UFC 154. Although Riddle has developed for putting on exciting brawls in his last few performances, he might want to avoid these kind of shenanigans against a power striker like Mills, who proved to Rick Flair-impersonator Chris Cope that he is not a fan of theatrics in his UFC debut.

(Watch Randleman transform from Bruce Banner into The Incredibly Vengeful Hulk at 30 second mark.) 

Back in August, we ran with a story on former UFC heavyweight champion and recently retired (at least according to his Wikipedia page) martial artist Kevin Randleman, who threatened to “rip a piece off” that “pussy” Matt Riddle via Twitter for allegedly disrespecting his wife back in the day. It’s not that we didn’t believe Randleman, it’s just that we were a little puzzled that Riddle, who always struck us as the Corky from Life Goes On of the MMA world (specifically, Corky during his “Fight the Power” phase), would even posses the ability to verbally berate anyone other than those “butter-toothed Brits.”

But whatever Riddle did say to Randleman’s wife must have been a doozy, because in his recent interview with MiddleEasy, Randleman absolutely lost his shit when Riddle’s name was brought up, calling him a “bitch ass motherfucking pussy” (4 STRIKE COMBO!!) among other things. Making it all the more hilarious was the fact that Randleman’s profanity-laden rant came less than 30 seconds after he discussed what it was like to finally be a role model for his son now that he was removed from all the negative publicity he’s received in the past. You just don’t see that kind of irony everyday.

After the jump: The low down on what allegedly led to the beef between Riddle and Randleman, as told by a UGer claiming to be a former ring announcer for Pure MMA.

(This guy? A smoker? Impossible.)

Following his submission-of-the-night victory over Chris Clements at UFC 149, Matt Riddle tested positive for marijuana, according to a new report from MMAJunkie. The Calgary Combative Sports Commission suspended Riddle for 90 days retroactive to the July 21 event, which means the TUF 7 vet will be out of action until…well, today. Crisis averted.

For UFC fighters — most of whom don’t compete more than once every three months anyway — the 90-day suspension is more of a “hey bro, not cool” kind of gesture, rather than something that’s actually punitive; all it really prevented Riddle from doing was taking an ill-advised short-notice fight directly after his last appearance. Then again, the UFC still hasn’t scheduled his next fight, so maybe they’re going to make him stew for a bit. Riddle’s just lucky this happened in Canada rather than Nevada, or he could have been out of action for an entire year.

Of course, this raises an obvious question: If Riddle was smoking weed before his last fight, what kind of drugs was he on when he fought Sean Pierson? The LSD that Paulo Filho makes in his bathtub?

(Who said “Huuuge bitch!” behind my back?! Who said it?!) 

As anyone who has married friends will tell you, no matter how funny it is to let said friend complain about how terrible/annoying/insufferable their wife is, you are never to make fun of said wife unless given a direct order to do so. Apparently something of this nature went down between Kevin Randleman and Matt Riddle recently, as Randleman recently unleashed nothing short of a deluge of threats aimed at Riddle over Twitter, citing alleged comments Riddle had made to his wife as his reasoning for wanting to “rip a piece off” the TUF 7 alum.

Just check out the anger in the tweets that await you after the jump. A line has clearly been crossed.

(Matt Riddle: So cool that he can make fun of British people while paying tribute to them at the same time.) 

To put it as politely as possible, UFC 149 was a pessimist’s utopia (not to mention an ad-libbers). Cheick Kongo brought the same lackluster gameplan into his fight with Shawn Jordan as he did against guys like Paul Buentello, Matt Mitrione, and Travis Browne, more or less proving that Frank Mir made good on his promise to “change Kongo as a fighter” back at UFC 107. Personally, I was not around to catch the abortion of a “fight” that was Lombard/Boetsch live, but my heart goes out to those of you who were. Lombard’s performance was so outright bizarre that if he were to come out with a Rampage Jackson-esque conspiracy theory about Canadians poisoning his food in the next couple of days, I would be inclined to believe him.

But amidst all of the despair, the dreck, and the gloom, there was one man who simply refused to be held down: Matt f*cking Riddle. Perhaps no one defies the pessimistic nature of many, if not most, MMA fans in the online community more than Riddle, who has shown a willingness to throw a winning gameplan aside for the sake of the fans entertainment on several occasions. Wide-eyed and perpetually grinning throughout nearly all of his fights, Riddle most closely resembles this generation’s Chris Lytle, and his balls to the wall performance against Chris Clements undoubtedly proved that, win or lose, he is main card material.

But greater than his sunny disposition, greater even than the split second securing of that arm-triangle choke in the third round, was the hilarious rant he delivered at the UFC 149 post-fight press conference. When asked why he wanted a piece of Dan Hardy by a reporter, Dana White made a halfhearted joke about the fact that Riddle hated British people, totally unaware of the Spicolian jeremiad that was about to follow.

A video of Riddle’s call out, along with Hardy’s response, awaits you after the jump. 

Fact: You had a 63% better chance of seeing a fight at a Calgary Flames game than you did at UFC 149, according to a study I made up for this caption. Props: The Calgary Sun

When I first sat down to write this aftermath, I wrote five paragraphs of a Jim Cornette rant about how dreadful the main card of UFC 149 was to sit through. Even the most jaded UFC fan boys – the types who comment “Its fights stop complaneing ur not real UFC fan if u dont liek this TapouT tribal tatz NEVER BACK DOWN!!!!!” on YouTube videos of Jacob Volkmann vs. Antonio Mckee- would be hard-pressed to say that UFC 149 was worth watching, let alone paying for. Then I realized that that wouldn’t be fair. Not because a longwinded rant about boredom isn’t a fair assessment of the main card, but rather it isn’t fair to the fans to force them to relive the lowest of the low points from last night. We can all agree that the less that is written about the main card, the better.

So in that spirit, I give you the first ever Cage Potato Fill-In-The-Blank aftermath. Simply pick one of the applicable fighters listed below and plug his name into the blanks. The result will be a mostly accurate analysis of both his performance last night and the future ramifications brought on by it. Enjoy.

Applicable Fighters*: James Head, Brian Ebersole, Cheick Kongo, Shawn Jordan, Tim Boetsch**, Hector Lombard.

I know that the Polly Pessimists and Debby Downers who make up the MMA media are often too hard on fighters, but in this case it’s well deserved: The performance of __________ at last night’s UFC 149 absolutely sucked. He let a golden opportunity slip through his fingers, and seemed perfectly content with this while doing so. If last night was a first date with a perfect ten, then he showed up in sweatpants, took her to Whataburger and then asked for gas money on the ride home.

We don’t have an easy way to break this to you, so we’ll just come out and say it: Afghan knockout artist Siyar Bahadurzada has been sent to live with our friend who owns a farm upstate. He’ll be able to frolic in an open field to his heart’s desire, and he’ll have plenty of friends to play with. Because of this, he won’t be fighting at UFC 149 against Chris Clements.

Just kidding, he’s out with an undisclosed injury. What, you actually believed your parents when they told you your dog was living on a farm upstate? That’s adorable.

(No, no, not THAT kind of ultimate fighter.) 

Seven years. Fifteen seasons. The Ultimate Fighter has been a part of our lives for nearly a decade, ladies and gentlemen, and not only is it still going strong, but it has spread at the rate of your average zombie apocalypse. With the first international installment of the hit reality show already under way, TUF has seemingly evolved beyond its counterparts, transcending even that of the sport in it’s ability to excite, and often inspire its audience. Sure, the next season of Jersey Shore will feature a piss drunk pregnant woman and a possible probable cokehead and will therefore rule the ratings from here to eternity, but The Ultimate Fighter has something better to bring to the table than fabricated drama. Mainly, sweet ass knockouts.

Seven years of sweet ass knockouts, to be precise. That’s the entire length of Tommy Callahan’s college career.

With these knockouts, we’ve seen underdogs pull off upsets, loudmouths get their comeuppance, and the emergence of future superstars. So in honor of what has already been a KO-ridden season of TUF, we decided to watch every season back to back, and determine the BEST knockout from its respective season. Enjoy.

You know the deal by now, Potato Nation. Dana White’s first video blog for UFC 144 takes a look back at the aftermath of UFC 143, as has become the norm. So we’re going to skip the fancy introduction and get right into it.

(1:43) -  Matt Riddle has to be one of the nicest guys in the UFC, bar none. Talk about a guy that loves his job. And a metaphorical fist bump is due to Henry Martinez for putting on a hell of a fight on such short notice. DW states that he originally thought this match-up was “the worst mismatch in UFC History.” How quickly we all forgot Silva/Leites.

(2:36) - Poor Edwin Figueroa‘s testicles.

(2:44) - Apparently Bruce Leroy kicked Figueroa so hard in the balls that he forgot how many times he kicked Figueroa in the balls. Irony? Either way, we agree that a two point deduction seemed a little harsh. Then again, Caceres likely destroyed any of Figueroa’s future plans to have children, so we’ll call it even.

(Maybe this is why the Condit fight ain’t happening?)

According to Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director Keith Kizer, an unnamed fighter that competed on Saturday night’s UFC 143 card in Las Vegas had a drug test come back positive for an unspecified substance.

Here’s Kizer’s quote from an email we received today:

“Thank you for the many email and phone calls.  I am still waiting for all the steroid and drug test results to come back.  We did have at least one positive test.  I will send out an email later today on that matter.”

“Where I come from, people who lose close fights retire.” Props: UFC.com

While watching UFC 143 from the comfort of my favorite dive bar last night, I knew that MMA fans would be waging war on the internet over the fights that went the distance. Between the two point deduction that cost “Bruce Leroy” his fight against Edwin Figueroa and Josh Koscheck’s close fight with the “undeserving” Mike Pierce, I knew that I could expect a long-winded, philosophical debate over what constitutes a fight and what doesn’t- whether abstract concepts like “control” and “aggression” mean more than punches thrown, and whether takedowns earned and stuffed negate an inferior striking display. Naturally, this debate would include a lot of ad hominems and off topic ranting, because that’s just par for the course online.

And that was before the main event of the evening, which saw Carlos Condit earn a close decision over Nick Diaz. Carlos Condit used backward and lateral footwork while outstriking Nick Diaz, yet many fans felt that Nick Diaz should have won the fight. Before the fight even ended, the debate already began on whether “Octagon control” necessarily means “the guy moving forward”, and whether counter-punchers should automatically be considered less aggressive than their opponents. Judging from the comments sections of today’s articles, that debate won’t be ending any time soon.

Benjamin Disraeli once said that there are three types of lies: Lies, damned lies and statistics. For the time being, let’s move our arguments about last night’s fights past the first two. Let’s now turn our focus towards the statistics from last night’s close decisions. FightMetric’s breakdowns of Riddle vs. Martinez, Figueroa vs. Caceres, Koscheck vs. Pierce and, of course, Diaz vs. Condit have been published, and are available after the jump.

For Jake Ellenberger, the best part about his victory last night has to be his arrival in the UFC’s welterweight division. With a quick, convincing victory over Jake Shields, Ellenberger has set himself up for better opponents, more attention from the fans and the media and the better paydays that accompany those things. The second best part? The 55k Knockout of the Night bonus he picked up in the process, of course.

Submission of the Night honors went to T.J. Waldburger for his first round triangle choke against Mike Stumpf. Initially, Waldburger appeared to have Stumpf caught in an armbar. When Stumpf managed to escape, Waldburger pulled off a textbook transition to a triangle choke. The win gives T.J. Waldburger his 11^th victory by submission.

Travis Fulton vs. Jeremy Bullock: just what the hell did they expect to happen?

“Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” -Samuel Beckett

Keeping those words from the first collection in our hearts, we’ve assembled the second installment of moments in MMA that some of us (mostly the athletes involved) would like to forget. The rest of us, we want to see those moments saved forever, preferably in a graphic format that loops endlessly.

First, get your mind right with a fight video from the dark ages of MMA, when any human with a pair of pajamas and some Tae Kwon Do could try that crazy ultimate fightin’ stuff. It was 1998, and Travis Fulton had already had over sixty fights. His opponent was Jeremy Bullock, a skinny guy that probably really liked Bruce Lee movies. Make sure to watch Bullock’s interview, where he shares his keys to victory with everyone, including Fulton. Also watch the fight, where Fulton shares his love for a good pro wrestling-style chokeslam with everyone, including Bullock. (Reportedly, Bullock thinks Bruce Lee is a fucking asshole these days.)

Once you’re done with that piece of history, come on in and we’ll share more moments of infamy, awkwardness, stupidity, and shame. It’s Fail GIF time, kids; let’s party.

As always, big ups, props, and mad respec’ to the GIF masters and the websites that host them: Chris Bunch o’ Numbers, Uncle Justice, Damn Severn, Zombie Prophet, Caposa, UpstandingCitizens, MMA-Core, IronForgesIron, and MMATKO. If we forgot you, it’s not on purpose.

And if neither pulled out? My God what a beautiful baby!

The fight cards for UFC 130 and UFC on Versus 4 are undergoing some minor renovations. It was announced yesterday that both Matt Riddle and Cody McKenzie have sustained injuries forcing them from their respective bouts.

(Pierson and Riddle’s three-round battle wasn’t enough to win FOTN, but Riddle did go home with the $100 Snot Rocket of the Night bonus. Photo courtesy of MMAFighting.com.)

The performance bonus payouts for Saturday’s UFC 124 event were notable for several reasons: For the first time ever, the UFC allowed fans to choose the "Fight of the Night" in an online vote. Update: The FOTN and Knockout bonuses were $100,000 apiece — the largest bumps since UFC 100 — and two separate [$50,000] Submission of the Night awards were handed out, which meant the total bonus money added up to $400,000, half of which arguably went to the wrong guys. Here’s how the UFC 124 bonuses shook out, in order of most deserving to least deserving…

Submission of the Night #1: Jim Miller, for surviving the relentless grappling offensive of Charles Oliveira, then ending the fight himself with a kneebar just shy of the two-minute mark. Submitting the young, formerly undefeated jiu-jitsu phenom is a major accomplishment for Miller, and should hopefully earn him a fight with a big name in his next outing.

Submission of the Night #2: Mark Bocek, for his first-round triangle choke of Dustin Hazelett (who’s no slouch on the ground either). The way that Bocek set up the triangle from the top then rolled underneath Hazelett to secure it was pretty freakin’ brilliant.

(Back from the grave: James Irvin yesterday [left], and in March [right]. Photos courtesy of CombatLifestyle)

Spoilers after the jump…

(He’s damn near a middleweight at this point. Photo courtesy of MMA Weekly.)

— Brandon Vera, who will be facing Keith Jardine at UFC 89 (October 18th; Birmingham, England), is currently walking around at 202 pounds. “My whole outlook on everything has changed,” he told UFC.com. “I am serious about this stuff now. It’s my diet, and my strength and conditioning coach, the 2004 Judo Olympian Rhadi Ferguson, it’s everything. It’s going to be bad for the 205ers, man. Bad. News.” At this rate, Vera will weigh-in at 197 and de-hydrate down to 189 by the night of the fight, because he’s a total genius. In other Truth-news, Vera was held at gunpoint Saturday morning at the home of world champion grappler Lloyd Irvin, but Irvin disarmed one of the two gunmen and scared off the other. Full story here…

— Georges St. Pierre has signed with CAA Sports, a division of entertainment/sports mega-agency Creative Artists. CAA, along with St. Pierre’s manager Shari Spencer, will work to secure marketing and endorsement opportunities for Rush. Said Spencer: “Georges’ appeal transcends the Octagon and I am confident that together we can introduce Georges, and the entire sport of MMA, to a wider audience.” As MMA Payout described the signing, “It may not seem like much now, but in one year it could be remembered as a seminal moment in the sport’s development.”

— Ricardo Almeida has suffered a mystery injury and will not be able to fight former IFL middleweight champ Matt Horwich at UFC 90 (October 25th, Chicago). Replacing him will be Dan Miller, another former IFL middleweight champ. It will be Horwich’s first fight in the UFC and the second for Miller, who choked out Rob Kimmons at last month’s UFC Fight Night 15.

— TUF 7 goofball Matt Riddle, who won his first professional fight with a unanimous decision over castmate Dante Rivera in June, will be returning to the Octagon at UFC 91 (November 15th, Las Vegas) against Ryan Thomas, who lost his UFC debut against Ben Saunders at UFC 87.

— MMA Weekly hears that the TUF 8 finale on December 13th will be headlined by a fight between Nate Diaz and Clay Guida.

— Luke Thomas weighs in (heavily) on our “Broken Jaws and Double Standards” article. (BloodyElbow)

— A first-hand account of Jesse Taylor’s Palace Station rampage, courtesy of Matt Riddle. (MMA Junkie)

— Brazilian PRIDE/Cage Rage vet (and Thiago Silva’s roommate) Edson Draggo just wrecked himself in a motorcycle accident. (Sherdog)

— The next Strikeforce at the Playboy Mansion event will go down September 19th, and will feature Kazuo Misaki, Renato “Babalu” Sobral, the winner of Thomson/Melendez, and (hopefully) Evangelista “Cyborg” Santos. (MMARated)

— Ironically, the Shamrocks are the unluckiest clan in MMA. But that didn’t stop 18-year-old Lion’s Den product Jeff Shamrock (Ken’s nephew) from signing a multi-fight deal with Strikeforce. (FiveOuncesofPain)

— “Lay and Pray” vs. “Hit and Run” (Fightlinker)

— Joachim “Hellboy” Hansen is looking for a sponsor. (Japan MMA)

— 8 countries with weak pesos but hot women. (WallStreetFighter)

— Pictures of the chick that Mini-Me banged on that sex tape. OMFG, little Verne in his U of M onesie is presh! (Holy Taco)