(You know, Cub, in bull riding this would have been considered a victory. Photo courtesy of Newsday.)

— According to an interview on intheguard.tv, WEC featherweight/human highlight-reel Jose Aldo says he’ll be getting a much-deserved shot at Mike Brown‘s belt at WEC 45 (November 11th, location TBA). Aldo has racked up five consecutive TKO/KO victories during his stint in the WEC, most recently slicing Cub Swanson’s head wide open in 8 seconds at WEC 41 last month. Brown made his second successful title-defense at the same event, out-pointing Urijah Faber in a classic five-rounder to pick up his tenth straight win. 

— With Strikeforce middleweight champ Cung Le out of action due to a blossoming acting career, Scott Coker has announced that Jake Shields will fight for the organization’s interim middleweight title in October; the exact date, location, and Shields’s opponent will all be announced later. Shields has long been known as one of the best welterweights in the world, but his first-round choke-out of Robbie Lawler last month proved that he could be very competitive at a higher weight. Plus, his homey’s already got the welterweight division on lock…

(Props: "Card" on the UG)

Now that we know who’s going to be in the upcoming UFC game, it’s time to look at how those fighters will throw down within the "virtual Octagon." In the above video, 2009 Undisputed producer Neven Dravinski takes us through weak and strong strikes, and the various ranges they can be delivered. The GSP Superman-punch KO of BJ Penn at 0:09-0:12 makes us smile every time we see it.

Below: One day left until Jason Guida gets a giant reality check — but for the time being, he gets to be talk about how he’s "all over [Lashley's] mind" and how he actually feels bad for him, because the former WWE star has to jump in the deep end right away without being built up first. (*Cough*) Skip to the 2:18 mark and smell the magic.

After the jump: King Mo‘s pimp-ass post-Sengoku press conference.

(Props: FightTrend)

- Muhammed Lawal def. Ryo Kawamura via unanimous decision
- Hatsu Hioki def. Chris Manuel via submission (armbar), 4:12 of round 1
- Nam Phan def. Hideki Kadowaki via TKO, 3:09 of round 1
- Jim York def. James Thompson via KO, 4:33 of round 1
- Michihiro Omigawa def. L.C. Davis via unanimous decision
- Marlon Sandro def. Matt Jaggers via submission (arm-triangle choke), 2:57 of round 2
- Masanori Kanehara def. Jong Man Kim via unanimous decision
- Chan Sung Jung def. Shintaro Ishiwatari via submission (rear-naked choke), 4:29 of round 1
- Ronnie Mann def. Tetsuya Yamada via unanimous decision
- Nick Denis def. Seiya Kawahara via TKO, 2:36 of round 1

Notes:

— King Mo was yellow-carded in the second-round for poking Kawamura in the eye twice. He dominated the fight with his takedowns; one judge scored the fight 30-24 for Lawal.

— The second-highest-ranked featherweight in the tournament, L.C. Davis, lost to the fighter with the worst record. Yes, we’ll be updating that Power Rankings page soon. Red-hot prospects Marlon Sandro and Ronnie Mann may have a spot on it shortly.

— The night’s other notable upset belonged to Nam Phan, a middling lightweight who dropped a weight class to be in the tournament and wound up knocking out former Shooto champ and top-15 featherweight Hideki Kadowaki.

— James Thompson went back to doing what he does best: Getting KTFO’d. His traditional fight-opening gong-and-dash nearly sent him flying out of the ring.

("The Year of the Mo: Part One," courtesy of Esther Lin.)

With no UFC event scheduled until April 1st’s UFC Fight Night: Condit vs. Kampmann, the MMA world feels like a bit of a wasteland lately. But if you get HDNet in your cable package, you’re in for a treat. Sengoku: Seventh Battle goes down Friday at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium in Tokyo, and will be broadcast live on HDNet beginning at 3 a.m. ET/midnight PT. (So, late Thursday night, in other words.) A replay is scheduled for Friday night at 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m. PT, in case you forget to set your DVR, or you’re too poor to afford one or something.

Sengoku 7 features the first round of the league’s featherweight grand prix — which includes #7-ranked featherweight Hatsu Hioki, undefeated Nova Uniao prospect Marlon Sandro, UFC vet Michihiro Omigawa, and former Shooto champ Hideki Kadowaki — as well as a headlining light-heavyweight scrap between King Mo and Pancrase vet Ryo Kawamura, and James Thompson‘s latest attempt to participate in a fight that doesn’t turn into an utter fiasco. The official bout order is after the jump, courtesy of Nightmare of Battle. Will any of the gaijins fail as hard as David Gardner did at the last DREAM show? Tune in to find out!

(Images courtesy of MoSpace)

So, Maggie from Cage Writer came across the top photo of Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal‘s amazing new tattoo, which she found on his MySpace page. A cursory visit to that page reveals a nearly non-stop cavalcade of awesomeness — honestly, such a welcome and uplifting change of pace from the reliable sadness of myspace.com/warmachine170nhb. I mean, just look at Lawal’s "About Me" essay:

(Props: Facey)

Our boy Matt S./"Facey" just sent us the second installment of his brilliant MMA highlight reel project, where he complies the best moments from each month into a single, convenient video. January ’09 had more than its share of killer moments, from Jose Aldo‘s knee-knockout and people’s-champ celebration at WEC 38, to the string of near-lethal KOs at "Day of Reckoning," to Jon Jones’s utter tooling of Stephan Bonnar, to Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal’s call-and-response bit at Sengoku 7. You can check out more of Matt’s work at FightFace.blogspot.com.

Below: A fan-shot video of Akihiro "Oh No" Gono‘s legendary ring-entrance at UFC 94. After the jump: The latest video trailer for UFC 95: Sanchez vs. Stevenson. Man, they’re really playing up the "London is rainy" angle…

(Props: BloodyElbow)

(Kitaoka vs. Gomi)

Not that Sengoku lightweight grand prix winner Satoru Kitaoka was some scrub that Takanori Gomi was going to run over, but few people expected Kitaoka to give the Fireball Kid the quickest loss of his career. Yet that’s what happened today at Sengoku’s "Rebellion 2009" card in Saitama, Japan, as Gomi found himself on the painful end of a heel-hook before the two-minute mark. That makes it five impressive wins in a row for rising star Kitaoka — who is now Sengoku’s lightweight champion — and the third loss in five fights for Gomi, whose legendary reputation takes another tough hit.

In the event’s middleweight championship bout, Jorge Santiago put Kazuo Misaki to sleep with a rear-naked choke at the 3:26 mark of the fifth round; if Misaki made it to the bell, he would have likely won the decision after a grueling war that saw the "Grabaka Hitman" dominate Santiago with his striking.

In heavyweight action, Antonio Silva’s suspension-defying matchup with Yoshihiro "Kiss" Nakao ended in disappointing fashion, as Nakao’s knee gave out early in the first round after a couple of brief exchanges. Also, heralded up-and-comer Dave Herman took his first loss after being overwhelmed by punches in the second round of his match against Korean PRIDE vet Mu Bae Choi. Full results and more videos are after the jump…