(Video courtesy of YouTube/FightHubTV)

FightHub TV caught up with former IBO and The Ring Magazine light welterweight boxing champ Ricky Hatton recently in the UK to get his take on MMA and according to “The Hitman” he’s come around in his opinion of the sport.

“At first mixed martial arts wasn’t seen as too popular, but more and more it’s getting bigger and bigger all the time. And the more and more yo look into it…at first I thought it was just people rollin’ about on the floor huggin’ each other, but that’s far from it. As it’s getting more popular, when you actually look into it scientifically there’s a lot more to it. It’s not just about standin’ there and usin’ your feet and usin’ your fists,” he explained. “It’s about gettin’ your opponent on the floor, puttin’ him in a certain move, which is a work of art in its own right. The more and more popular it’s gettin’ it’s not become just a part-time thing now. It’s a professional sport and I’m sure I speak for the mixed martial arts people as well as the boxing people in saying that these people — the nutritional people — are the best probably even more so than in boxing because it’s a lot more physical than boxing, isn’t it? I can say slowly but surely, the more I’ve watched it I’ve become a bit of a fan.”

(Compared to some of the things he’s experienced in boxing, Jeff Lacy (right) is excited to work with a serious, sober professional like Nick Diaz.)

Credit Jeff “Left Hook” Lacy, his camp and promoter for continuing to act like this proposed boxing match with Nick Diaz is a done deal, even though our suspicion is that Diaz and Cesar Gracie are just using Lacy and Co. to turn up the heat on Zuffa, LLC. Don’t get us wrong, we totally believe that Diaz is down to fight the former super middleweight champion … but likely only if the UFC can’t or won’t make a bout with Georges St. Pierre happen in the near future. Whatever the case, Lacy and his people are getting a nice publicity rub off this.

Case-in-point, Lacy got himself invited on ESPN 1100 in Las Vegas with Steve Cofield this week, where he sounded pretty dumbfounded that Diaz would want to “step into his ring,” but said he was totally willing to take advantage of the situation. In fairness, Lacy was actually somewhat complementary of MMA, saying he’s become a big fan, but then went on to compare the striking in our sport to glorified Toughman competitions. Lacy’s quotes are after the jump.

(“Must…not…show…joy.” Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas.)

Nick Diaz came one step closer to his grumpy transition toward a boxing career today, as a press release was distributed claiming that Jeff Lacy has officially signed to box Diaz this fall. A former IBF super-middleweight champion, Lacy was one of the guys who Gary Shaw dismissed as an irrelevant opponent for Diaz, but when you have a 1-0 record in boxing (as Diaz does), beggars can’t be choosers. In fact, Diaz is just as irrelevant an opponent for Lacy when you think about it, but whatever.

No date or venue has been named yet, although the event will be titled “Breaking History.” (Good. As long as we have the important stuff locked down, everything else should fall into place on its own.) Said promoter Don Chargin in the press release: “This is a very dangerous fight for both men. Not only is this fight dangerous but stylistically it is very intriguing. I expected more resistance from fight fans and media in regards to this match-up but it’s amazing as to the hundreds of calls and e-mails I’ve received from fans on both sides wanting to see this match-up take place. I’ve received more than a few inquiries from some other very high-profile boxers that want to step up and fight Nick. Its been a real whirlwind…

(Man, I can’t wait until Diaz lays into Larry Merchant for being an instigating little bitch.)

Nick Diaz‘s quest to leave MMA for boxing because his life is a living hell has already hit a minor speed-bump. Though Diaz’s trainer/manager Cesar Gracie revealed that they’d already “signed on the dotted line” for a match against veteran pugilist Fernando Vargas, Gracie updated his story yesterday evening, telling MMAJunkie that Vargas is a no-go:

“We were talking about Vargas, but the thing is, I just came under some information that Vargas apparently has some kind of medical issue where he’s not able to pass the test any more, and he could be retiring. Vargas was very interested, but unfortunately, if he can’t pass the test, he can’t pass the test.”

The Gracie camp is now trying to set up a match with Jeff “Left Hook” Lacy, a 33-year-old former IBF super middleweight champion who has lost three out of his last four outings. Meanwhile, boxing promoter Lou DiBella is jockeying for a match between Diaz and Sergio Martinez, the Ring World Middleweight Champion who’s considered one of the best pound-for-pound boxers in the world. Like Diaz, Martinez has more talent than credible opponents at the moment — but it’s hard to imagine that fight being sanctioned anywhere outside of Poland.

(Bob, could you use this staircase to show us where boxing is today compared to, say, thirty years ago? PicProps: Pacquiao-Margarito.com)

The last time we heard from boxing promoter and cantankerous old white dude Bob Arum he essentially dismissed MMA types as “a bunch of skinheads who like to roll around like homosexuals.” In other words, Dale Carnegie this guy is not. Good news is, Arum managed to keep the homophobia under wraps this week when he and prized possession Manny Pacquiao sat down with USA Today writers Sergio Non and Scott Zucker. Unfortunately, when the topic of MMA came up, Arum continued to weirdly define his objections to our sport on the basis of race. It’s almost as if he’s trying to distract us from something else … something like realizing his words are just the impotent flailing of an old man who realizes his place in the world grows smaller each day …

“I don’t want to demean UFC, because they’ve done a marvelous job of marketing,” Arum said, in response to a question from Non about the record-breaking ticket sales in Toronto for UFC 129. “But it’s the same audience over and over. It’s white males, and they have never been able to expand their demographic … Hey, this country is becoming more and more Hispanic, and it’s growing (more) African-American (in the) audience. So the future success of UFC is limited. The success of boxing is not, because boxing reaches those groups. The only demographic that boxing has lost is the white, young males, period.”

(Vitor Belfort is so badass that Mike Tyson wears his t-shirt. Meanwhile, James Toney’s shirt has been discounted from $49.98 to "free with any purchase at the Salvation Army.")

Since James Toney allowed himself to be humiliated (for a large paycheck) in a cage-fight at UFC 118, it’s only fair that a representative from the UFC should let Toney try to redeem himself in a boxing ring. Could an MMA star hang with a boxing champ with 12-ounce gloves, no leg kicks, no takedowns, player? If Vitor Belfort gets his way — and we sincerely hope he does — the MMA vs. boxing freak show timeline may get a unique new chapter. As the Phenom tweeted this weekend:

"Dana let me fight James Tony on 6 round boxe Mach I think I can catch him with my speed…Dana will be the 1 boxing match in Ufc I promise he will fell my power and we will show the world the a Ufc fighter can do better"

Okay, we all know that the UFC isn’t in the business of putting on six-round boxing matches, historically speaking. But giving Vitor a day-pass to box James Toney outside of his UFC contract sounds like great publicity to me. I know the dude has a #2 middleweight contender’s match lined up for November, but come on, Belfort wins this fight nine times out of ten and goes home to his nude model wife completely unscathed. And it shouldn’t surprise you that the Dark Emperor is down with the idea…

(VidProps: YouTube/Goossen Tutor Boxing)

Honestly, most of this video with James Toney from Saturday night is totally unintelligible. Unfortunately, it’s also reportedly the only post-fight interview with “Lights Out” since, like the true sportsman we all know him to be, he no-showed the official UFC 118 press conference after his embarrassing loss to Randy Couture. Toney may not have been man enough to face the MMA media after throwing zero standing punches en route to tapping out to Couture’s side check choke – pretty sure that’s what it was – three minutes, 19 seconds into the first round, but he did make time to sit down with Rodney Hunt from Goossen Tutor Promotions, a company that represents Toney in boxing. So, yeah, an in-house interview with a paid yes man. You probably know where this is going …

What’s the best way to get an ancient boxing promoter to go off on a hilariously offensive rant about MMA?  Send a young whippersnapper like Ariel Helwani to a press conference with a microphone and a shirt without a tie, then have him just mention the UFC and watch the bullshit fly.  Following up on Dana White’s shot at the boxing world this week, Arum comes right back with his own attack on MMA, calling it a sport for skinheads who like to see homosexuals rolling around the mat together.  That he said this to Helwani, an ardent MMA-lover who happens to have a shaved head but who also happens to be Jewish (and married, to some poor woman, no less), is what we’re going to go ahead and call poetic justice.

Arum goes on to level all the usual accusations against MMA.  He says the fighters can’t throw a punch or take one, that the audience is all redneck white guys, that the UFC isn’t selling nearly as many pay-per-views as they claim, and that the Charleston will never go out of style (that last one may have just been implied, but you get the point).  Basically it’s nothing you haven’t heard during Thanksgiving dinner at your grandfather’s house, only Arum stops just short of calling the internet a form of black magic. 

(Props: CBS Sports via Bloody Elbow)

"It takes true skills to be in the sport of boxing, and mixed martial arts is for beer-drinkers. Boxing is for everybody. I mean, you can’t take my shoes off and take my shirt off and just throw me in a cage. You do that with animals, you don’t do that with humans…In boxing, we know who’s dominating. Black fighters and Hispanic fighers is dominating in this sport. And this is not a racial statement but [Ed. note: Here comes the racial statement] there’s no white fighters in boxing that’s dominating, so they had to go to something else and start something new." — Floyd Mayweather, Jr.

What’s ironic is that even in MMA, the two best fighters in the world are Quinton Jackson and King Mo. Also in the interview, Money Mayweather says that his duckery of Manny Pacquiao is due to the fact that Pac-Man isn’t his own boss, and that the recent murders of Steve McNair and Arturo Gatti have scared him off women for a while.

As for Money’s criticisms of MMA, what can you say, really? There’s some people who will never appreciate our sport because it’s done by shoeless people in a cage, and because an MMA match has less rounds than boxing, and because the only thing in the world that requires skill is punching, and because MMA was invented by frustrated white boxers, apparently. When the criticisms are lobbed by boxers themselves, or people who discuss boxing for a living, you can’t really take it too personally.