(Jon…erg…just hear me out…*duff*…if we make it to round 2 *duff**duff*…I promise you no less than 20 thousand more buys. Jon?) 

At first glance, the pay-per-view numbers that just came in for UFC 159 don’t seem all that terrible. Truth be told, it would be near impossible to declare the event’s 550,000 estimated buys anything less than a success. However, when you realize that the sole reason the fight was booked in the first place was to cash in on the Chael Sonnen circus act, that 500k kind of pales in comparison to the 925,000 UFC 148 pulled in. In fact, it’s pretty much in line with the average Jon Jones-headlined pay-per-view, save his 700k-earning fight with Rashad Evans at UFC 145. MMAFighting’s Dave Meltzer reports:

Preliminary estimates for UFC 159, headlined by Jon Jones’ successful light heavyweight title defense against Chael Sonnen, indicate pay-per-view buys coming in between 520,000 and 550,000.

There was hope for bigger numbers in the days after the fight, due to the strong ratings of UFC 159 shoulder programming. The weigh-ins were the second-highest rated since Fuel began airing. The event also drew the highest ratings for post-fight coverage of a pay-per-view on Fuel. Prelim match ratings on FX were 32 percent above average.

The number would be the company’s second largest of 2013, trailing UFC 158, with Georges St-Pierre vs. Nick Diaz, but ahead of the now No. 3 event of the year, UFC 157, headlined by Ronda Rousey vs. Liz Carmouche.

So yeah, the event was a success by most standards, yet it only managed to pull in 70,000 more buys that Jones’ UFC 140 title defense against Lyoto Machida, who Jones once begrudgingly referred to as “my lowest pay-per-view draw of the year.” For some reason, this image seems to sum things up nicely.

(“When I first started The Blackzilian Reverse Diet, I was just a scrawny welterweight fighting in the sport’s highest promotion. But just LOOK AT ME NOW!) 

It would be no hyperbole to say that The Blackzilians are less a training camp and more a black hole (PUNS!) of suckitude that is slowly draining the last remaining scraps of talent from its fighters before it inevitably spits them out as empty, dry husks void of any discernible skills whatsoever. Alright, there may be a little hyperbole in that statement, but to say that the members of The Blackzilians have been underperforming since the camp was established in 2011 is no exaggeration. Alistair Overeem just had his head treated like a speed bag at UFC 156, Rashad Evans just put on his worst performance in years (at the same event, no less), and Melvin Guillard has dropped 4 of his past 5 fights including an inexplicably timid performance in what was supposed to be a grudge match against Jamie Varner at UFC 155. 

That’s not to say that The Blackzilians are doing everything wrong, it just appears that they are relying on the pure talent of their fighters to lead them rather than a team of disciplined coaches. But in light of the recent criticisms aimed at the camp from news outlets across the MMA blogosphere, whateverweight Anthony Johnson — fresh off a unanimous decision victory over Andrei Arlovski at WSoF 2 – told MMAJunkie that said criticisms are “unfair.” Here’s why:

Every team has losses. Losses don’t define who you are.

People always want to talk about the losses, not the wins. Everybody talks about Rashad’s loss. Everybody talks about Alistair’s loss. But Vitor Belfort is one of my training partners. He just high-kicked Michael Bisping (for a knockout win). You all talked about that for five minutes. You’re all still talking about the losses we had. What about the wins we had? 

True, Anthony, we should be talking more about the wins you guys had. The problem is that those wins are coming fewer and farther between than with the guys over at Team Hammer House.

It’s sometimes easy to forget that the cultures of our professional sports are not isolated from the rest of society, and that the two affect each other. This is easy to spot when looking at the issue of LGBT rights: the same way that professional athletes are still hesitant to accept a gay teammate, a person can still be fired for being gay in twenty-nine states. Progress is slowly being made on both fronts, as last week, NFL athletes Chris Kluwe and Brendon Ayanbadejo filed a Supreme Court brief arguing that not only is California’s Proposition 8 unconstitutional, but also that professional athletes have an important role in promoting tolerance in society.

The outspoken equal rights advocates [Author Note: By the way, if you haven't read Kluwe's rebuttal to Maryland state delegate Emmett C. Burns Jr., who tried to persuade the Baltimore Ravens to stop Ayanbadejo from voicing his stance on gay marriage, go read that now.] have recently caught the attention of one of our sport’s most popular fighters, Rashad Evans. Evans has not only signed their brief, but he also issued a strong statement in support of gay marriage. As he told Outsports:

“I’ve never been a homophobe, never understood what that is all about. I knew some people who were gay and never cared about their sexuality. But at the same time, I didn’t fully understand the issues around gay people until my friend BA started telling me about his full public support for gay marriage. We talked about the issue and I decided its not enough to not be against a minority, if you want things to go better for them you have to speak up with them.

(Wow! Booster seats and sporks at McDonalds looked really weird back in the old days. Photo via idahogirlinalaska)

By Nathan Smith and Josh Hutchinson

Being a “contributor” for CagePotato.com is kind of like being a barback at a seedy nightclub in Tijuana. We stock the bar with booze, ice, and clean glassware while staying in the shadows hoping to God that we don’t get yelled at. We try to help out wherever we can so the star bartenders (Ben Goldstein, Jared Jones, Elias Cepeda and Seth Falvo) can toss bottles of shitty Tequila like juggling pins while they pour fruit-flavored cocktails to semi hot chicks that they will inevitably hump later on. A contributor cleans up puke, empties ashtrays and eats shit from all the “made men” (both writers and tenured comment section dick-heads) here at CagePotato but it really is a great gig. Can you imagine the sloppy seconds that Danga sends our way?

Needless to say, most of the day-to-day MMA related news topics are taken care of by the staff writers and that leaves aspiring dipshits like me and Hutchinson to try and come up with a fresh or entertaining story idea on our own. Well, this idea is not fresh but it could be entertaining (at least my portions will be, but I have hope for Hutch since he is the guy who brought the word “dicknailed” to the CP). When Jon Fitch was released from his UFC contract last week, I wanted to write a piece on which higher profile fighters I would cut next if I were part of the UFC brass. Because opinions are like buttholes, Hutch had a thought to debate several of the choices in a YAY or NAY style. Before anyone starts hollering about Clay Guida, Jake Shields or the entire cast from the first season of The Ultimate Fighter (that means you Koscheck) take note that we agreed on more than we disagreed and in the spirit of pointless arguments opted to leave the most obvious offenders out. Let’s get started.

FRANK MIR – last disclosed salary: $200,000

(Photo via MMAWeekly)

(Keep in mind that Rashad makes $300,000 to show. Flowchart rules are officially in play. / Photo via USA Today Sports)

As confirmed by UFC president Dana White, the UFC will make its first visit to the Canadian province of Manitoba for UFC 161, which is slated for June 15th at Winnipeg’s MTS Centre. Two big-name light-heavyweight bouts are already tied to the card.

First up, Dan Henderson will try to bounce back from his split-decision loss against Lyoto Machida with a match against Rashad Evans, who could also use a little redemption following his own low-energy loss to Antonio Rogerio Nogueira at UFC 156. That defeat made it back-to-back losses for Suga, who previously fell short in his title challenge against Jon Jones. (Fun fact: The “Blackzilians” team that Evans belongs to currently holds a record of 12-15 in the UFC, with only Michael Johnson batting above .500.)

Speaking of Lil’ Nog, the Brazilian vet will be carrying a two-fight win streak into the Octagon with him at UFC 161 when he faces Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, who’s coming off his defeat against Alexander Gustafsson. The fight will come eight years after Rua won a decision against Nogueira in their first meeting at Pride Critical Countdown 2005, during the quarterfinals of PRIDE’s 2005 Middleweight Grand Prix — and apparently, these guys have been jawing about a rematch for some time now. But of course, Shogun isn’t the young phenom he used to be, and Nogueira definitely has some miles left in him. Any predictions for the rematch?

In their other lives, UFC stars Chael Sonnen and Rashad Evans suit up and become television analysts for Fuel TV. It was in this role Saturday night that Chael Sonnen experienced the latest negative consequence of his mouth writing a check his…well, in this case I guess it was a check that Dan Henderson’s ass couldn’t cash.

Before UFC 157, Sonnen the analyst said that he’d lick Rashad Evans’ shoe if his long-time Team Quest training partner Henderson lost to Lyoto Machida in their featured bout Saturday night. After Machida won a split decision over Henderson Chael made good on his promise and made sweet mouth love to Evans’ shoe.

Yes, that was a needlessly disgusting sentence and this post is somewhat pointless in the grand scheme of Saturday’s historic event. But you’re a damn liar if you’re telling me you didn’t press ‘play’ on the video above to watch ‘The American Bad Ass’ French kiss Rashad’s boot once you read the headline.

In related news, Henderson isn’t surprised that one of the judges managed to somehow think he won the fight against Machida, he’s apparently upset that all three didn’t.

“I won the fight, but not officially. I hit him whenever he wanted to fight. He ran away most of the time,” Hendo said at the UFC 157 post fight press conference.

Listen, the fight was close-fought and the judges had to pay attention but there is no question that Machida landed the harder shots and more often, mostly thwarted Hendo’s wrestling while doing more with his own offensive wrestling and ground work than the former two-division champ did. Yes, Machida made Henderson whiff with many of his leaping over hand rights and left hooks but I’d hardly call that “running.”

Was Henderson surprised that his opponent would try to strategically stay out of range until he was ready to throw his own shots? Had he seen Lyoto Machida fight before?

(Rashad’s best days as a fighter may be behind him, but the man has mastered the art of walking away from fictional explosions.)

Despite what the title implies (or outright states, whatever), I don’t honestly think that Rashad Evans is making more than he is worth at this point in his UFC career. The man is a TUF winner, a former champion, and a relatively marketable draw who consistently resides in the upper-echelon of the division. That being said, when I came across the salary figures for UFC 156 and noticed that Evans had walked away from his unanimous decision loss to Antonio Rogerio Nogueira with an event high 300K, that was the first thought that entered my mind. I apologize for deceiving you and will see myself out.

But before I go, I’ll say this: The figures for UFC 156 were pretty standard, with everyone not named Chico Camus and oddly enough Ian McCall clearing five figures. I guess it’s hard to consider “Uncle Creepy” a UFC bust when the poor bastard’s making less than the average TUF alum to fight.

The full list of salaries is after the jump, along with our whimsical analysis, so check them out and let us know what you think in the comments section. Per usual, these numbers are void of any locker room bonuses, PPV cuts, training expenses, licensing fees, etc.

Photo via Getty Images

“I don’t think that was supposed to happen.”

That was the text I received this morning from a friend who is very much a casual MMA fan regarding last night’s UFC 156. Even though I assumed that my friend was talking about the end result of Bigfoot vs. Overeem, that statement could just as easily apply to almost any other fight on the card. We’re all familiar with the cliché that any fighter can beat anyone else on any night at this level, but we rarely see the underdogs win as frequently – and as convincingly – as they did last night. Simply put, it was an awful night for the guys who were supposed to win.

So let’s start off with the fight that went exactly as we all assumed it would: Jose Aldo defeated Frankie Edgar by a close, yet unanimous decision. Naturally, Edgar grew stronger as the fight went on. And naturally, the fight was close enough to justify an immediate rematch if one were to be booked (it probably won’t but who knows), because that’s just how Frankie Edgar fights work.

It’s impossible to be disappointed with Frankie Edgar’s effort in any given fight, and last night was no exception. Edgar provided Aldo with his stiffest challenge to date – after the champion returned from the longest layoff in his career, mind you – but Aldo was simply the better fighter.

(“The name’s Frankie. I fight dudes twice.” Photo via MMAFighting)

Tonight at UFC 156 in Las Vegas, Jose Aldo goes for his fourth-consecutive UFC featherweight title defense, while former lightweight champ Frankie Edgar attempts to become the third fighter in UFC history to pick up a belt in two different weight classes. And that’s just the cherry on top of a stacked Super Bowl Eve card, which is loaded with big names and high stakes from start to finish.

Also on the menu: Alistair Overeem returns from suspension to clinch his heavyweight title shot with a win over Antonio Silva, while a victory for Rashad Evans over Lil’ Nog could set him up for a middleweight title fight against Anderson Silva for some reason. Plus, Jon Fitch and Demian Maia look to continue their recent surges in the welterweight division, while Joseph Benavidez and Ian McCall square off at flyweight because honestly, who else are those guys going to fight?

Round-by-round results from the Aldo vs. Edgar pay-per-view card will be stacking up after the jump beginning at 10 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. PT, courtesy of George “Bigfoot” Shunick. Refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest, and please toss your own thoughts into the comments section.

(Dear God, can you imagine how funny this is going to look when Silva puts his creative spin on it?) 

Before we begin, I’d like to take a quick poll: What is getting more annoying, the fact that Rampage Jackson continues to air out his dirty laundry with the UFC ad nauseam, or that everyone involved in deciding Anderson Silva’s next opponent continue to talk circles around us?

First it was Luke Rockhold. Then it was Michael Bisping. Then it was a film career. It was never Chris Weidman, until recently when it was Chris Weidman. And then, likely because Ed Soares is secretly suffering from Symphorophilia, it was Cung Le. And now, according to a recent interview with Dana White, it’s Rashad Evans, because he’s a thing:

A lot of people think Chris Weidman is the #1 contender right now. If Rashad made a move from 205 down to 185, it’d be safe to say he’s now #1. If Rashad won on Saturday night and wanted to go to 185, we would consider that. 

As much as I’d like to use this opportunity to get on my soapbox about the UFC’s recent insistence on matching up their champions with challengers from entirely different weight classes based solely on name value, I’d rather like to applaud Dana for actually considering Evans here. For starters, he would at least be theoretically coming off a win in this scenario, and that in and of itself is more than the UFC has been capable of delivering in recent times.

On the other hand, can you imagine how humiliating this must be to the fighters of the middleweight division? These poor bastards just don’t seem to have it in them to string together enough wins/talk enough trash to get their own champion on board for a title fight, to the point that the president of the promotion has been forced to find guys who would damn near kill themselves making weight just to fill in the void.

By Dan “Get Off Me” George

The first pay-per-view event of 2013 is set to kick off this weekend from the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, and with it comes a lot of questions about the fighters involved. Can Frankie Edgar show Rashad Evans that dropping down a weight class to fight for a title is a wise decision? Will Alistair Overeem manage to stake his claim for #1 contendership without screwing everything up again? Will Dana White finally get the revenge he’s always wanted by strangling Steve Mazzagatti to death after he blows a call during the main event?

All these questions and more will be answered in just two short days, so follow us after the jump as we highlight one bout from the undercard and all the main card bouts in order to ensure that you start off the new year with a little extra cash in your pocket. All betting lines come courtesy of BestFightOdds.

Preliminary Card: 

Jacob Volkmann (-380) vs. Bobby Green (+315)

Volkmann is about as predictable as fighters come: a wrestler with limited striking who has no qualms about grinding out a 3 round decision. At 155lbs, all of Volkmann’s fights have ended up on the ground, so this may boil down to whether or not Green will be able to submit Volkmann off his back like Paul Sass was able to do at UFC 146. At -380, I am willing to bet that Volkmann is able to avoid getting caught by Green’s submissions and score a decision win.

Main Card: 

Joseph Benavidez (-245) vs. Ian McCall (+205)

A Team Alpha Male fighter in a non title fight is generally a safe bet, but Benavidez sitting at -250 is a little too rich for my tastes, however. Ian McCall is as durable as they come and even though he has had a rough go in life (especially of late), he has the speed and craftiness to give Joseph all he can handle. The prop bet that this fight goes the distance is the safest bet here.

(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)

UFC 156 goes down this coming Saturday in Las Vegas, featuring the featherweight title fight between Jose Aldo and Frankie Edgar, Alistair Overeem‘s return against Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva, Rashad Evans vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, and a whole mess of supporting talent. Check out the extended trailer above, and ask yourself the following…

- How likely is it that Edgar will become the third UFC fighter in history (after Randy Couture and BJ Penn) to become a UFC champion in a second weight division?

- Is anybody buying the idea that Bigfoot’s size and power will be a challenge for Overeem?

- What would Rashad Evans need to do, hypothetically, to convince you that he deserves another crack at Jon Jones?

- The UFC injury curse has been eerily quiet lately, with very few withdrawals of marquee fighters over the past two months. So, were Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta justified in throwing those virgins into the volcano?

And now that we have your attention, you might as well watch this stuff too…

(Quick poll – Which is funnier: Miller’s hair or Shields’ attempt at a mean mug?) 

You can hate on the over-the-top theatrics of professional wrestling all you want, but there’s no denying the sport’s influence on the world of MMA. Do you think we would have ever seen Jonathan Ivey break out “The People’s Elbow” in a fight if The Rock hadn’t done it first? And how about that Chael Sonnen character, who we would all just write off as another boring wrestler if not for his Billy Graham-esque heel routine? The list goes on and on, but greater than the signature moves, greater even than the whimsical trash-talking pro wrasslin’ has inspired in our great sport, is the post-fight cage confrontation.

It has been responsible for some of the most unintentionally hilarious highs and Gus Johnsony lows that MMA has ever seen, yet we can’t seem to look away when such an inherently silly situation is presented in the aftermath of a fight. The UFC clearly understands this, and in an effort to set up everyone’s dream match of Anderson Silva vs. Jon Jones Georges. St. Pierre, both the UFC and Silva’s manager have hinted that not only is the middleweight champ going to be in attendance at UFC 154, but should St. Pierre emerge victorious, the two will face off in the cage and lay the foundation for the next great MMA superfight. So with that in mind, we’ve compiled a brief, albeit memorable, video tribute to the post-fight confrontation. Enjoy.

Before we even get into the awesome that is UFC Tonight’s recent “Fighter Trivia” episode, I just want to put it out there that I will beat any of you in any game show trivia challenge. Any of you. When I was in college, the only channel my RCA 630TS television received was The Game Show Network. Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune, Family Feud, Double Dare, right down to the early pioneers of Press Your Luck, Match Game, Pyramid, and The Price is Right were at my disposal on a near 24/7 basis. When I wasn’t browned out in an alleyway looking for a jar of marmalade and bus ticket to Santa Fe, you could assume I was getting my trivia knowledge on with Brawlin’ Bob and the gang.

So you can imagine my excitement when I came across this gem of an idea Fuel TV devoted an episode of UFC Tonight to, with Ariel Helwani playing the proverbial Bob Eubanks role. The premise is simple, a group of fighters are subjected to what I assume is five rounds of trivia (there aren’t videos of all 5 rounds to confirm/deny this) covering everything from their knowledge of The Ultimate Fighter to that of pop culture. They are paired up for certain rounds, but mostly are forced to go on their own until one man is declared the winner.

For the inaugural segment, Michael Bisping, Rashad Evans, Dominick Cruz, and Kenny Florian were chosen as participants. Spoiler alert: Cruz doesn’t know sh*t about sh*t, and Bisping knows more about Dora the Explorer than we would have ever imagined.

After the jump: Two snippets from the show in which Florian forgets that Bisping and Evans fought at UFC 78 (along with the rest of the world) and Cruz fails to identify Bruce Springsteen by his nickname. Unforgivable, Dom.

(We’ll give you an A for effort, Rashad, but we don’t think you have the..ahem… skin tone to pull off Sloth from The Goonies this Halloween.) 

For those of you who were hoping to see Rashad Evans test the waters at middleweight, it looks like you’ll have to keep waiting, because it has been reported by the Brazilian outlet SporTV that Evans will be facing off against Antonio Rogerio Nogueria at a TBD event planned for Super Bowl weekend in Las Vegas.

Prior to his failed light heavyweight title bid at UFC 145, the TUF 2 winner scored big victories over Phil Davis — who trounced Nogueira back at Ultimate Fight Night 24 — and Tito Ortiz — who was defeated by Lil’ Nog in December of last year. Following hsi win over Ortiz, Nogueira recently called out Forrest Griffin — who lost his title to Evans at UFC 92 and defeated Ortiz in his last appearance — but was beat out for the spot by the last man to defeat him: Phil Davis. So according to MMA math…I’m illiterate.

(It’s not that Rashad hasn’t been training — it’s that he’s only been training in the loosest, most Hawaiian sense of the word.)

Has Glover Teixeira become the most ducked fighter in the UFC? Mauricio “Shogun” Rua allegedly wanted nothing to do with him. Stephan Bonnar refused to fight him on the basis of twitter count. And now Rashad Evans has admitted to turning down a proposed match against the Brazilian light-heavyweight up-and-comer at UFC 153, due to the short-notice nature of the fight.

If you’ll recall, Teixeira was originally supposed to face Quinton Jackson at the October 13th event in Rio, before Rampage went down with an elbow injury. The UFC then asked Evans to come in as a replacement, but couldn’t make a deal with him. As Evans explained on the UFC on FUEL TV 5 post-fight show:

“They offered me a fight, but it was against Glover Teixeira and I only had three weeks to fight and I haven’t been training. I was like, ‘no way, not with that notice in Brazil.’”

Perhaps the fans weren’t as supportive of this choice as Rashad was expecting them to be, because he got on twitter yesterday to explain himself even further:

(Props: FightSportTV via Reddit/MMA)

In June 2004, a young cat named Rashad Evans (just 2-0 at the time) entered an eight-man Gladiator Challenge light-heavyweight tournament, held over two nights in Colusa, California. Though the above highlight reel presents his three fights in slightly different order — the third match against Bryan Pardoe actually took place first, during the quarterfinals — it does an admirable job of showing how Evans used to utterly clown the regional competition in his early career.

Check out how he puts his hands behind his back against the hapless Hector “Sick Dog” Ramirez, or the classic Sugar-shake he does at 0:48 against Jaime Jara. Of course, Evans backed up the showboating by tagging his opponents at will and tossing them around like children. Evans was picked up for the second season of The Ultimate Fighter directly after this tournament performance, where he won the heavyweight bracket, doin’ his thang the whole time.

And FYI, the song in the highlight reel is “Sugar” by Betty Everett. Great choice, video highlight-maker.

(Seriously? Not even *one* vote for Jason Guida?)

The 16th season of The Ultimate Fighter kicks off tonight on FX, and while we wouldn’t exactly say we’re looking forward to it, the premiere of a new season always puts us in a reflective mood. In this week’s installment of the CagePotato Roundtable, we’ll be paying tribute to our favorite cast-members in TUF history, and joining us today is a very, very special guest — Luke O’Brien, an award-winning journalist whose work has appeared in Rolling Stone, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Fortune, and many other outlets that are much more respectable than the one you’re reading right now. (I first discovered Luke through his excellent MMA reporting for Deadspin.)

Shoot us your own favorite TUF guys in the comments section, and if you have a topic for a future Roundtable column, e-mail us at tips@cagepotato.com

Luke O’Brien

Has there been a more unlikely TUF champion than Amir Sadollah? In 2008, the Persian-Irish surgical technologist came out of nowhere — or in his case, Richmond — to win the seventh season of the show by beating All-American wrestler C.B. Dollaway. Sadollah armbarred Dollaway not once, but twice. Before that, he triangled Matt Brown, who oozed tough. And before that, he TKOd Gerald Harris, who certainly looked tough. At the time, Sadollah had never had a pro fight. Not one. I liked him immediately. Not because he was an upstart, a little doughy around the middle and a bit of a lumberer. There were purer reasons that drew me to a fighter who walks out to Iranian techno music.

For one, he had a mullet. This wasn’t the unaware bumpkin coiffure found in many stretches of this country. Rather, it was a curated flange of keratin that complemented the smirk often playing on Sadollah’s face. It was a mullet that, like its owner, didn’t take itself too seriously. A mullet that grasped irony. And irony has always been in short supply on TUF. The premise of the show — quarantine 16 fighters for a month in a house stocked with unlimited amounts of booze and see what happens — is absurd, although I guess you could say the same about all reality television. As much as I enjoy TUF, the only way I can fully appreciate it is at a sardonic remove. Sadollah allowed me to do that.

(Seen here: One of the fighters who still has a chance of competing at UFC 153.)

Let’s face it: There is little more we can say to convey our disappointment in the disintegration of UFC 153. The card began solid enough (see above), then it got a little less awesome, then it got significantly more awesome, and now it is resting in a state of awesome limbo that it may never return from, which is not really awesome at all if you think about it.

With rumors flying that everything from Wanderlei Silva vs. Chael Sonnen to Rashad Evans vs. Anderson Silva at a catchweight is being eyed as the replacement main event for UFC 153, it got us thinking:

What fight would you, the fans, like to see as the new main event of UFC 153?

We’ve placed a few of the most likely options after the jump, but feel free to choose the “Other” option and give us your picks/reasoning in the comments section. The sky is the limit, but we must warn you, we’ve already asked Dana to consider Zimmer-Martinez II, and he gave us a resounding “maybe.”

-J. Jones

Vitor Belfort‘s storied career has been marked by frequent changes in teams and training camps, and his nomadic journey has now led him to the South Florida super-team known as the “Blackzilians.” According to a statement released by Belfort’s management team, Belfort will prepare for his surprise title shot against Jon Jones at UFC 152 (September 22nd, Toronto) alongside the Blackzilian team, with none other than Rashad Evans as his head coach. The team was previously led by Mike Van Arsdale, who parted ways with the camp late last month.

“This is the most important fight of my life, so the time is perfect to join [manager] Glenn Robinson and the Blackzilians and their world class training camp at JACO Hybrid Training Center in Delray Beach,” Belfort said in a press release. “I will have the best trainers and the top fighters in the sport including Alistair Overeem and Rashad Evans helping me prepare for this title fight. I will run my whole training camp at JACO and will win the belt for my fans, family and the Blackzilians in South Florida.”

Belfort hasn’t competed since his submission win over (now) Blackzilian teammate Anthony “Rumble” Johnson in January. “The Phenom” went on to coach The Ultimate Fighter Brazil opposite Wanderlei Silva and the two were set to rematch this past summer before Belfort broke his hand in training and had to pull out.

(The season three premiere of MMA Inside the Cage, featuring 12 killer knockouts from MMA events across the world, sent in by fans. Check it out and vote for your favorite right here.)

- Jon Jones Offers Up His Take On Saturday’s Light Heavyweight Bouts (Fightline)

- Nate Diaz Will Get the Next UFC Lightweight Title Shot (MMAJunkie)

- Dana White Thinks Matt Hughes, Forrest Griffin Should Retire (MMAFighting)

- UFC on Fox 4 Judo Chop: The Real Signature Moves of Lyoto Machida (BloodyElbow)

- Frankie Edgar’s 155 Reasons, Episode 1: ’155 Reasons In Defeat’ (HeavyMMA)

- “Great, another UFC ring girl with no ass.” (Facebook.com/CagePotato)

- Dana White: ‘Maybe You Do Rashad vs Weidman and the Winner Gets a Title Shot’ (BleacherReport/MMA)

- Olympic Weightlifter Kendrick J. Farris Will Pump You Up (MadeMan)

- The Get Back Into Training Workout (MensFitness)

- 20 Cool Things Buried in Lava (EgoTV)

- If Celebrities Had Three Boobs… [GALLERY] (WorldWideInterweb)

- This Is the Coolest Volleyball Play We’ve Ever Seen (DeadSpin)

They see me trollinnnnnn’. They hatinnnnnn’. Props: Sherdog.

Those of you who have been clinging to the notion that Anderson Silva’s manager Jorge Guimaraes would change his mind about Chris Weidman being an “amateur kid” can officially let that ship sail. Ariel Helwani caught up with Guimaraes yesterday, and even though he clarified that the “amateur kids” comment was a translation error, he still does not see any value in an Anderson Silva vs. Chris Weidman fight for the time being. Via MMAFighting:

When specifically asked about the “amateur kids” comment:

JG: Well, there was a little lack of communication. I spoke to Tatame Magazine in Brazil and it got lost in translation. I have a lot of respect for Weidman. He’s a great fighter, but what I meant is that the fight doesn’t make sense. He has nine fights – impressive fights – but it’s half of the number of fights that Anderson has in the UFC. I think he’s just a little not ripe enough, but it’s up to the organization to tell [us] who is a good opponent for Anderson.

Check after the jump for the full quote and interview

(Photographer unknown. Level of badassery incalculable.)

For this installment of the CagePotato Roundtable, we invited a few of our photographer buddies over to discuss our all-time favorite MMA photos. Judging by our selections, shots of agony and defeat have a special attraction to them. I think it’s because they allow us to get close to an incredibly intense, transcendent moment, without having to experience the pain of it. And isn’t that why we love MMA in the first place? Our special guests for today are…

- Lee Whitehead, author of Blunt Force Trauma & The Mammoth Book of Mixed Martial Arts. You can see more of his work at www.leewhitehead.com, on Instagram, and on Twitter @leewhiteheadmma.

- Jon Sluder, who shot Bellator 34 for us back in October 2010. Check out his recent highlights at Sluder.net.

- Jason Wright, who shot UFC 119 for us back in September 2010; if you follow us on Facebook, you recently saw one of his highlights from that night. You can see more of J-Dog’s work at jasonwrightphotography.com.

Disclaimer: There’s a short list of MMA photographers who have asked us to stop posting their work on this site due to copyright issues, and a couple of contributors to this week’s column happened to select photos taken by those photographers. We’ve used stand-ins in those cases, with links to the actual photos. Also, we don’t know why BJ Penn is so heavily represented in this column. The guy always seems to be in the right place at the right time.

Lee Whitehead

(Click image for larger version.)

I have many favorite photos from all the years shooting MMA but this one has to rank amongst the very top purely because of all the flack and accusations of photoshop manipulation with the blood spurt; professionals can spot a ringer, and this ain’t one. The disappointing thing is that all negative comments detract from our main strength as MMA photographers — to understand the sport, spot smaller nuances, read the timing, and capture a key defining moment in a fight. To me, this brief slice of time from UFC 80 serves as the perfect reminder of how dominant BJ Penn was in his prime.

(Thanks to tufentertainment.net for the fitting logo.)

By Nathan Smith

With the recent announcement that Roy Nelson and Shane Carwin have been named as the coaches for the next installment of The Ultimate Fighter series, the MMA universe immediately launched into a full-blow orgasmic ticker-tape parade complete with tons of flying confetti and a marching band belting out death metal tunes. Once I heard the news, it was as if my life instantaneously turned into a beer commercial and the entire Potato Nation was invited. There was a rad pool-party, barbeque, a plethora of hotties, endless alcohol, and an overall quest for fun.

Well . . . . . actually, none of that happened. In fact, when word spread that Nelson and Carwin would helm the next season of TUF, it was officially filed under “WTF?” Judging from the comment section, most of the CP brethren didn’t care for the choices either. TUF is coming off a season that saw the ratings dip lower than they ever had, which could partially be blamed on the move to FX and the dreaded Friday night time slot. Regardless of the variables for the ratings drop, something drastic needs to be done, but is anybody really convinced that Carwin and Nelson are the answer to TUF’s slow and painful demise? Let’s start from the beginning and take a look back to see if this runaway train can be coaxed back onto the main rail.

The Season That Started it All 

The inaugural season of TUF featured future Hall of Famers Chuck Liddell and Randy Couture as the competing coaches who would go mano y mano at the PPV after the season finale. For fans of the UFC, that was good enough for most to initially tune in for the Fertitta-funded experiment. It still remains the best crop of young talent and personalities to ever grace the show; future stars like Forrest Griffin, Stephan Bonnar, Josh Koscheck, Chris Leben, Diego Sanchez, Mike Swick, Kenny Florian, and Nate Quarry were all complete unknowns vying for stardom in a fledgling sport. You mix in the whole “fatherless bastard” angle and the show was off and running even before the awe-inspiring climax between (pre TRT) FoGrif and The American Psycho. Even before that, we were treated to the greatest speech of all time that has since been condensed into a few words. “Do you wanna be a fighter?” Though there were other memorable moments from the seasons that followed, Zuffa should have quit while they were ahead because it would never be this good again. The unrefined personification of immature talent, undeniable aspirations and gonzo-sized balls oozed from the boob tube during every episode.

(In honor of MMAInsidetheCage‘s 100th episode, they put together their 100 favorite knockouts featured on the show. Incredible.)

- Forrest Griffin: ‘Tito [Ortiz] Was Jon Jones Before There Was A Jon Jones’ (Fightline)

- After Nearly Losing Toe In Training Injury, Tim Kennedy Set for Second Crack at Belt (MMAFighting)

- Rashad Evans Willing to Drop to 185 Pounds for Fight With Anderson Silva (FiveOuncesofPain)

- Ronda Rousey Featured Nude in ESPN Body Issue (HeavyMMA)

- Ahead of Title Shot, Strikeforce’s Nate Marquardt Says He Feels Great Without TRT (MMAJunkie)

- Melvin Guillard Exclusive: A Man Living in Memory of His Father (BleacherReport/MMA)

- Video: Chuck Norris Imports Gracie Family in 1988 to Train Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
(MMAMania)

- ‘Ted’ Star Mark Wahlberg is Greater Than the Sum of His Parts (MensFitness)

- The Man’s Guide to Survival in a Post-Apocalyptic World (DoubleViking)

- 6 People Who Will Ruin Your 4th of July Party (HolyTaco)

- An In-Depth Profile of a Lady Who Makes Fart Fetish Videos (FilmDrunk)

- Hey, Have You Seen That Video of the Bulgarian Sprinter’s Leg Shattering? (Break.com)

(Well, this is the funniest MMA video I’ve ever seen. All hail the genius of prebek.)

- Inside the Octagon With Clay Guida [VIDEO] (SI.com)

- Brett Rogers Talks to Us About Bellator, TRT and That Whole Domestic Abuse Thing (MiddleEasy)

- Fedor Emelianenko, and the Complicated Legacy of a Simple Man (MMAFighting)

- UFC Axes Typical Tryout Format for ‘The Ultimate Fighter 16′ (MMAJunkie)

- The 20 Biggest MMA Stories Thus Far in 2012 (BleacherReport/MMA)

- UFC Heading Back To Brazil For UFC 153 (Fightline)

- 5 MMA Moves That Get You Ripped (MadeMan)

- Exclusive Titan Fighting Championship 23 Photo Gallery (HeavyMMA)

- How Do Children Learn Persistence? From Their Fathers (MensFitness)

- The 50 Funniest Bikini Photos Of All Time (WorldWideInterweb)

- Kate Upton Cat Daddy’ing With Jimmy Fallon (TurdFergusonBlog)

- Lessons From a Self Made Millionaire: Meet Adam Carolla (DoubleViking)

- Billy Beane and the Oakland A’s: Life After Moneyball (Grantland)

(A stranglehold on the competition, or on the sport in general?) 

We don’t know about you, but as we were watching last weekend’s UFC on FX 3 event in our various states of drunken stupor, we couldn’t help but notice a few glaring observations. The first was that the term “dicknailed” will always be both appropriate and hilarious when describing knockouts like the one Mike Pyle delivered on Josh Neer in the first round of their welterweight affair. The second revelation, however, was much more disheartening. As we looked past the fighters and into the stands, it was pretty shocking to see how little of a crowd was actually in attendance. “What is this, a Super Fight League card?” we said to ourselves, then collectively tweeted to one another like a bunch of snickering high school girls. But the simple truth is, our Stalter and Waldorf attitudes were nothing more than a defense mechanism, a cover, if you will, for something we feared might be happening: The UFC is stretching themselves a little thin.

Sure, UFC on FX 3 was as under-promoted as it was lacking any sort of star power, so much so that I will personally admit to all but completely forgetting about its existence until BG reminded us why we should be stoked in the first place. And sure, as with this season of The Ultimate Fighter, the fact that the card was scheduled for a Friday night surely didn’t help gain any new viewers either (a move that should most certainly be retracted next season if TUF ever hopes to recover ratings wise). Be that as it may, the real problem with last weekend’s card was certainly not that of the fight quality (because they were all great fights), but rather part of the looming, aforementioned oversaturation problem the UFC may find themselves facing. And here’s why.

(The fighters of UFC 145 meet perhaps the single greatest interviewer of all time. Props to Creative Loafing for the vid.)

It’s good to be king, Potato Nation. We sure don’t need to tell that to Jon Jones, who walked away from UFC 145 with not only his pretty non-replicated belt, but a cool 400K for his troubles. As Pepper Brooks would surely tell you, that’ll buy one hell of a blumpkin. Not to be outdone, Rashad Evans picked up $300,000, which he immediately invested in a double D sized ocular implant. I know it probably gives you more confidence, “Suga,” but you’ll lose respect from the soccer moms is all we’re saying. Combined, the night’s main-eventers took in just over half of the total disclosed salary, which rang in at $1,241,000.

Check out the full list of salaries, along with our thoughts, after the jump. Per usual, these numbers do not include things like locker room bonuses, PPV cuts, insurance, licenses, taxes, etc., nor do they include the $65,000 end of the night bonuses handed out to those who earned them.

(Above: Rashad Evans licks his hand and wipes his butt…
Below: …and pays dearly for it. / Props: )

We bid a final farewell to Saturday’s UFC event with a roundup of the 11 best GIFs from UFC 145, courtesy of The UG and IronForgesIron. Enjoy, and click here for previous MMA GIF coverage.

(Was this photo taken with a fish eye lens? Get it?! A FISH EYE LENS!! *crickets*) 

Yowza. As if we needed further proof, Rashad Evans sent out this tweet earlier today, confirming once and for all that Jon Jones does is fact have the nastiest elbows in the game. At least he took it in stride, stating the following:

I went 2 UFC 145 in Atlanta and I had the best seat in the house & all I came back with was this fat eye! Wth! I hope those of u that went came back with better souvenirs than I did! =)

Brandon Vera feels your pain, Suga. And then some.

Though Evans only received a week suspension, he might want to consider sitting out a little longer while he waits for that baby to deflate. ‘Shad was one of fourteen fighters from Saturday’s card to earn just a seven day suspension for cautionary reasons. Brendan Schaub and Che Mills received 45 day suspensions for their (T)KO losses, where Miguel Torres earned a 60 day suspension for his knockout loss to Michael McDonald. Torres must also undergo a CT scan before he is cleared to return to action.

But worse than Schaub, worse even than Torres, was the indefinite suspension Mac Danzig received for the gnarly ankle injury he suffered in his unanimous decision victory over Efrain Escudero as a result of a first round heel hook. Word has it that while this was occurring, Rousimar Palhares went on a bloodthirsty rampage through Brazil that resulted in the deaths of no less than 400 people.

Check out the photo of the damage, compliments of Danzig’s twitter, along with the full medical suspensions, after the jump.