Randy Couture and Fedor Emelianenko met for the first time on Friday for an Affliction commercial shoot that also included Georges St. Pierre, Quinton Jackson, boxer “Sugar” Shane Mosley, Eagles defensive tackle Mike Patterson, and, unbelievably, Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine. HDNet’s Inside MMA was on hand to capture the action:

So, good video, but we could have probably used a little more fake sweat. The Fight Network has more on the shoot here, reporting that the whole thing was one big love-fest, which culminated in the fighters exchanging phone numbers and vowing to hang out again real, real soon. Could there be wedding bells for this beefy bear-pair? We’ll stay on the story and let you know when we hear more. Until then, keep it off the record, on the QT, and very hush-hush!

UPDATE, 12:15 p.m.: And here’s the poster…

(Not funny.)

— Bas Rutten starred in the best YTMND page of all-time. (last link)

— MMA Girl Joanne enchanted us with an exclusive video interview.

— We got overly emotional about Gina Carano.

— EliteXC signed two members of the Shamrock family. Unfortunately, neither one was Frank. We marveled at Ryan’s physique and gave Ken some encouragement.

— The UFC filed a lawsuit against Randy Couture. Your move, Natural.

— We solicited your predictions for the Kimbo Slice/Tank Abbott fight, then liveblogged their press conference.

— We counted down the best fights that didn’t take place in a ring or cage.

— We put $1,000 up for grabs in the Serious Pimp t-shirt design contest.

— Instead of predicting UFC 80‘s winners, we predicted the bonuses. (Reminder: Come back tomorrow at 3 p.m. ET for the UFC 80 liveblog. Good times guaranteed.)

— We coped with a slow news day.

Have a great weekend, people. Stay hungry.

Okay, I’ve got some bitch slapping to do. I can’t stay silent any longer. I’ve sat back and read the message boards around the MMA universe and listened to the lame ramblings of supposed MMA experts on a subject in the forefront of everyone’s mind. It could happen. It probably will happen at some point.

Who can beat Fedor Emelianenko?

While this is certainly a legit question/dead horse waiting to be beaten and should be at the top of every MMA dinner topic – and who hasn’t had several of those, right? – I’m fucking sick and tired of the lame-fucking-ass answers that keep floating around cyperspace and are shit from the mouths of these MMA ‘experts’. Check out some of the answers coming from the MMA world’s message boards:

-”A heavyweight Sean Sherk”
-”A bigger BJ Penn”
-”GSP, if he were a heavyweight”
-”Chuck Liddell”
-”Ricco, in his prime”

I’m losing my faith in humanity.

When we last discussed Zuffa’s lawsuit against Randy Couture, our only source was an article in the Las Vegas Review Journal. Now, thanks to TMZ, we’ve seen the lawsuit with our own eyes (it’s conveniently PDF’d for you here). And after reading it, we immediately remembered why we never went to law school. But we were able to pick up a few interesting details:

— The lawsuit is seeking damages in excess of $50,000, not $10,000.

— Zuffa has hired Donald J. Campbell and J. Colby Williams as their representation.

— The lawsuit implicates Sherdog as the medium by which Randy Couture first began “implementing a tortious scheme and artifice whereby he and others acting on his behalf [fabricated] a false and fictitious history of events in which Couture was purportedly lied to and otherwise purposefully abused by Zuffa in a series of bad faith acts and unfair dealings.” Bastards! They get all the publicity!

— The parties who conspired with Couture are the “Does and Roe Corporations LLC” I think that means “to be named later,” but I’m no lawyer, and Google comes up with nothing, so I’m not 100% clear. But anyway, the lawsuit is referring to the people who hooked him up with HDNet so he could air his grievances in a public (or at least cable TV) forum. The accused “sought to maximize the damage inflicted upon Plaintiffs by arranging with HD Net TV to broadcast Couture’s remarks live and to later rebroadcast them during the course of an MMA event being presented by an UFC competitor.”

— Part of the financial judgement the UFC is seeking is to repay the costs that they incurred when they had to hold their response press conference (satellite uplink, production trucks, personnel, etc.).

— “Zuffa will further suffer a loss of prestige within the MMA community which will produce the consequential effect of inducing others not to deal with Zuffa.” Well, they may have a point there…

— Zuffa seems to accept Couture’s resignation from the organization on October 11, 2007, but argues that a one-year Restricted Period — in which he isn’t allowed to promote any events, programs, products or services related to unarmed combat — immediately kicked in. Couture’s sponsorship of the IFL’s “Xtreme Couture Team” was “the most recent and notorious” beach of “his covenant.”

See? Even better than NyQuil!

(Couture and a pre-Headblade Dana White.)

The Las Vegas Review Journal has reported that lawyers for Zuffa have filed suit alleging that Randy Couture’s comments about the UFC have led to significant financial losses for the company, and that he is in breach of his contract. The lawsuit is complicated by a “conspiracy” charge, claiming that other people worked with Couture to intentionally inflict harm on the UFC, and the breach-of-contract refers specifically to a stipulation that prohibits him from engaging in “direct or indirect competition” with the UFC for a year after he leaves the organization. Couture’s sponsorship of a team in the IFL may violate this, and Zuffa is seeking an injunction to prohibit him from continuing his participation. According to the article, “The lawsuit seeks damages in excess of $10,000 and states that the amount of both compensatory and punitive damages would be proven at trial.”

Said Dana White:

“What’s really tough for me, to be honest, is we have been friends for a very long time,” White said. “The hard part is that he is not living up to his obligations. Captain America is not keeping his word.”

An appropriately mysterious post was published yesterday on M-1 Mixfight, the Russian propaganda arm of M-1 Global. Titled “Fedor to Los Angeles,” it reads:

Fedor Emelianenko, Vadim Finkelstein and Apy Echteld will leave for Los Angeles on Thursday, 17 where they are going to meet with Affliction representatives. Also Fedor plans to meet Randy Couture there to discuss things in person. All the details of the meeting will be revealed soon.

Besides locking down Fedor’s involvement as a t-shirt model, those “things” they’ll discuss will likely include the details of their superfight-to-be. Finkelchtein (M-1 Mix Fight’s president, Emelianenko’s manager) and Echteld (M-1 Global’s VP of fighter development) could very well — dare we say it — be flying out to L.A. to sign Couture to an M-1 contract, which would surely provide the Natural with more freedom and at least as much money as his UFC contract (which, again, he’s not even close to being released from). Or at least that’s the rumor we’d like to believe. If Randy and Fedor are getting together just to see the handprints at Mann’s Chinese Theatre, do some roller-blading on the Venice Beach boardwalk, and hit up Knott’s Berry Farm, we’re going to be very upset.

More details to come…

(Not really sure who these guys are. But you just might see some of them fight in the IFL this year.)

When the IFL announced that it was shifting focus from its fairly arbitrary city-based team format to a more natural camp system, it seemed like a good idea — but only if the nation’s top fight camps agreed to play along. If we were stuck watching Mario Sperry’s Worldclass MMA crew face off against Ian Freeman’s UK posse every show, there would be problems. Fortunately, the IFL has scored the biggest coup possible, locking down the involvement of Xtreme Couture. Now, obviously you’re not going to see Forrest Griffin and Wanderlei Silva doing battle in the IFL ring, but it’ll be interesting to see the young, hungry kids that Randy sends in to represent his Las Vegas collective. Just as Pat Miletich proved there’s more to Bettendorf than Tim Sylvia and Jens Pulver during the Silverbacks‘ steamrolling of the IFL, we could potentially be witnessing the first wave of solid professional fighters to be forged completely under the guidance of Randy Couture and Shawn Tompkins.

The IFL’s 2008 season kicks off in Las Vegas on February 29th [Ed. note: Oh shit it's a leap year again?] and will feature the Xtreme Couture camp, Matt Lindland’s Team Quest (formerly known as the Portland Wolfpack), Ken Shamrock’s Lion’s Den, and one more yet-to-be-named team.

Despite its plummeting stock value, the IFL is still making all the right moves in terms of its product and could potentially turn its fortunes around in 2008. If team-based MMA was to ever catch on, this is how to do it. Ask yourself, what would be the better showcase of fresh MMA talent — a bunch of guys who send in videotapes to get on a reality show and are chosen for their “colorful personalities” (i.e., The Ultimate Fighter), or a competition between guys who really want to compete and are hand-picked by the greatest living legends in the sport. If you honestly care about the next generation of MMA fighters, you’ll be watching. Now if they could only replace that silly boxing ring with a cage…

Chuck Liddell officially became a star at UFC 52 (4/16/05), avenging his previous loss to Randy Couture and taking the UFC’s light heavyweight belt, which he would go on to defend four times. Then somewhere along the line he discovered clubs and cough syrup, and the next thing you know he’s losing a decision to Keith Jardine. Let’s see if the Iceman can reclaim his past glory this Saturday at UFC 79 against Wanderlei Silva. Though Wandy’s knees might have other plans…

8. Fedor Emelianenko vs Josh Barnett
As Emelianenko climbed to the top of the PRIDE heavyweight ranks, the only fighter who eluded one of his signature ass-whippings was the one big name he never fought: the Baby Faced Assassin, Josh Barnett. When his name came up as a possible opponent for Fedor at Yarennoka!, our heart skipped a beat. Then, reality set in. Fedor would most likely do to Barnett what he does to everyone else — turn him into a human punching-bag for 2-15 minutes depending on how hard his skull is — but Barnett is an A-level fighter and it wouldn’t be fair to count him out against anybody (even though we just did).

7. Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic vs. Andrei Arlovski
While every other heavyweight match the UFC books seems to feature Tim “Xanax” Sylvia, the organization’s two most exciting stars are sitting on the bench. Anytime you put two offensive powerhouses — neither of whom has much of a chin — in a cage together, you’re guaranteed to see fireworks. It doesn’t matter that Cro Cop is coming off of back-to-back losses and there really wouldn’t be anything on the line; fans would kill to see these guys bash it out.

Quote of the week, from Randy Couture via the Houston Chronicle:

“We got an official offer from M-1 to the UFC to do a co-promotion for the Couture-Emelianenko fight, and they (UFC) rejected that offer. Really, the only thing standing in the way for that fight right now is Dana and the UFC. Obviously, M-1 is happy to do a co-promotion like that. It only serves to help them. I think the UFC is looking at it the other way, and it’s like why do we want to help out another organization? The fans want to see that fight. At some point, you have to put that first.”

First, the boring stuff — Jason Miller defeated Tim Kennedy in a unanimous decision and Frank Trigg submitted Edwin Dewees via kimura in the first round at Saturday’s HDNet Fights: Reckless Abandon show. Check back later for videos of both matches…

The real action came from a series of statements made through the course of the night. In order of importance:

1) Randy Couture hopes to fight Fedor Emelianenko as early as October 2008. In an interview during “Reckless Abandon,” Couture said the following: “Unless the UFC wants to do a co-promotion with M-1 and make the Fedor fight happen, I’m going to have to wait ’til my contract expires. I have no intention of breaching that contract — that expires in July, my employment contract expires with them in October, so I would assume that the soonest you’d see me fight Emelianenko would be in October.” At a post-event press conference, he said “I have a contract with the UFC that I have to honor. I can’t breach that or I’ll end up in litigation, so I don’t intend to do that.” Asked for his take on the upcoming Emelianenko/Hong Man Choi fight at Yarennoka!, Couture said, “I hope it goes successfully for him because I want to be the first one to beat him.”

2) A fight between Ken Shamrock and Frank Shamrock is on the horizon. In a separate interview with Ken Shamrock during the HDNet Fights broadcast, Ken addressed the rumors of a match between him and his semi-estranged adoptive brother: “We’re gonna make that happen. It’s not a dirty thing, we don’t hate each other. Fact is, I respect what he’s done with himself, so I’m looking forward to getting in there, and me and the brother doing a little sibling rivalry in the ring…I don’t know where we’re gonna do it yet…but it’s gonna happen.”

Sorry ladies — he’s married!

(UFC Girls via MMA Fever)

In his meeting with Dana White last Tuesday, Randy Couture turned down a proposed title defense against Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 81. Most likely, Nogueira will instead face Tim Sylvia for the UFC’s vacant heavyweight title.

Man, fuck you Randy. I know it’s not totally your fault that the UFC’s heavyweight division is so thin that Tim Sylvia — a guy who nobody likes to see on fight cards — gets so many goddamned title shots. But this is not helping. You have one more fight left on your contract. One. Suck it up. Or, you can just play with your stupid little puppy all day and squander the golden years of your fighting career on an acting boondoggle, and eventually fall into obscurity. You know, whatever’s best for the fans.

The UFC held a media conference call yesterday to pump up UFC 78, and since I wasn’t around to liveblog it — I know, disappointing, right? — you’ll have to settle for this recap. Dana White, Michael Bisping, Rashad Evans, and Houston Alexander were in attendance, and the audio from the call can be heard here.

Among the revelations…

— Dana White has officially offered Randy Couture a title defense against Antonio Rodrigo “Minotauro” Nogueira. The match would fulfill the last fight on Couture’s UFC contract; he isn’t technically in violation of that contract unless he turns the fight down. Couture texted White on Sunday and they are planning to discuss it next week. Nogueira is a former PRIDE heavyweight champion who won his first UFC fight in July via unanimous decision against Heath Herring. Never, ever do a Google Image Search for “Nogueira.”

In the market for a pre-owned vehicle? Well heads up, because Randy Couture is auctioning off the limited edition H2 Hummer that Dana White gave him for participating as a coach on the first season of The Ultimate Fighter. The bidding is supposed to start today, so go to Xtreme Couture for details and a full photo gallery of the vehicle in question. It hasn’t been confirmed if Randy is selling off the Hummer to make room in his garage for a more environmentally conscious Toyota Prius, or if it’s just a petty “fuck you” to Dana White, but we’re guessing it’s the latter.

[Refresh page every few minutes to read the latest verbal brutality from Dana and the gang (and my own take on it). Enjoy.]

Today at 1 p.m. PT, UFC prez Dana White and UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta will hold a press conference to address recent statements made by Randy Couture and answer questions for the media. MMAjunkie.com reports that UFC’s chief financial officer John Mulkey will also participate in the press conference, hopefully to illuminate some of the mystery behind the UFC’s signing bonuses, “locker-room bonuses,” and pay-per-view percentages. The press conference will be streamed live on UFC.com; stay tuned for wild liveblogging action, which will hopefully run a lot smoother than last time.

Everything you need to know to start planning your week…

Tuesday, 10/30
CBS, who just paid tribute to Randy Couture on Shark, will feature the man himself as a guest star on The Unit, another series I’ve never seen. The show airs at 9 p.m., and Couture will reprise his role as “Sgt. Strickland.” Also, UFC 71 and 72 are released on DVD.

Wednesday, 10/31
It’s Halloween, and I’m dressing as Mystery. On The Ultimate Fighter, a frustrated, whiny Matt Hughes berates his team and asks them to give him one good reason why he should stay on the show as their coach. I think he learned that technique from Vince Lombardi.

Friday, 11/2
Attention drunks! Atlanta honky-tonk Wild Bill’s is hosting Wild Bill’s Fight Night 12, featuring Rhomez Brower, Brent Weedman, and an appearance by Forrest Griffin. Biker attire is prohibited.

Saturday, 11/3
Undefeated 19-year-old phenom Chris Horodecki headlines the 2007 IFL World Grand Prix at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, IL, while the all-female MMA outfit Fatal Femmes Fighting comes to the Ontario Convention Center for “War of the Roses.”

Sunday, 11/4
Total Combat 24 goes down at Oceanside, CA’s Show Palace. Also, Stewie kills Lois on Family Guy.