(Bryan Baker putting the stomp on Jeremy Horn and cancer. Photo props Fight!Mag)

Bellator came back around to Louisville, Kentucky last night with a passel of pint sized contestants in the first bantamweight championship field, a middleweight fight featuring Bellator regular Bryan Baker and a man who has somewhere over 9000(!) fights at Moneyweight, and the standard assortment of young up and comers looking to have a breakout performance. Come on in and we’ll find out who’s going to the bantamweight tourney finals, who is bouncing back from serious illness, and who has a juvenile sense of humor.

You know who has the juvenile sense of humor? You do. But we dig that about you. Check it out: through pure coincidence (or epic matchmaking radness), Bellator’s thirtieth show features a card full of fighters with somewhat suggestive nicknames.

Just try to skim the names and not picture them working for Vivid Entertainment. (PS: You just lost the game.) (PPS: I’m sorry Mom, I was raised better than this.)

Ok, then: Fights!

(A tough night in so many different ways. Photo courtesy of SI.com)

Even our supercomputer had trouble dealing with the data from a bizarre main event at UFC 97.  We had to hit it with a broomstick a couple times just to keep it chugging.  Not a great Saturday night for the UFC, but at least it’s over now.  Let’s see who’s up and who’s down.

Anderson Silva -129
Against Cote, the computer was willing to cut him some slack based on past performances.  But two lackluster showings in a row, followed by an inability or unwillingness to comprehend why fans might have been unsatisfied, that equals a big drop.  Is this the Silva we can look forward to from now on?

Thales Leites -176
You get the opportunity of your lifetime and spend most of it flopping onto your back?  We think you’re going to regret that decision.  How Leites thought this strategy might yield a victory is a real mystery.  What the UFC can do with him now is another.

A slightly hungover-looking Miguel Torres showed up to co-host this week’s edition of ESPN’s "MMA Live," and despite looking like he wants to throw up a couple times he does a pretty good job.  I mean, he’s no Kenny Florian, but MMA’s best internet TV show is such that they can plug almost anyone into the fighter seat and Jon Anik and Franklin McNeil can carry them across the finish line.  Anyone, except Stephan Bonnar, who shows up midway through this episode to stare blankly and stumble through sentences like a robot that is running out of power.

One of the more interesting topics in this episode is whether the delay in the Brock Lesnar/Frank Mir heavyweight showdown helps or hurts Lesnar.  Given his relative inexperience with MMA (particularly the old submissions game, if you know what I mean), you might think that more time in the gym would only benefit the big man.  But Torres offers the fighter’s perspective, suggesting that what will really benefit him is getting in the cage as soon as possible and becoming a better fighter through experience.

What are your thoughts, Potato Nation?  Does this rescheduling give Lesnar more time to develop, or does it simply screw with his training schedule?

Last night’s episode of The Ultimate Fighter didn’t waste any time before getting into the fights, so we won’t either. Here’s how Block B of the round-of-32 shook out:

Wesley Murch vs. John Polakowski (155): Murch is a Brit who quotes Winston Churchill. Polakowski is an ADHD-sufferer who loves hugging people. Murch takes Polakowski down right away, finds nothing from top position, then goes for a heelhook and loses it. Polakowski gets on top and passes to side control, but Murch works his way out and stands up. After a good knee from Polakowski, the fight moves back to the ground where Murch takes Polakowski’s back. Polakowski reverses and ends up in Murch’s guard. Back on the feet, Murch throws a kick and falls to the ground; the round ends with Polakowski on top, throwing punches. It turns out that Murch seriously effed up his shin when he connected with the kick, but he decides to soldier through it, stiff upper lip and all that. Limping badly at the start of the second round, Murch throws a flying knee, then collapses in agony. Polakowski freaks out as if he just knocked out BJ Penn, sprinting around the cage then bouncing out to hug Nogueira, Dana White, and Mir. Mir is visibly disgusted.

Shane Primm vs. Sean O’Connell (205): Primm and O’Connell fought with an intensity usually reserved for the 155′ers. Primm strikes first with nasty knees in a clinch, while O’Connell pressures Primm with takedown attempts and a slam. Primm rolls from his back and works hard to get an armbar. O’Connell frees his arm and briefly tries for a guillotine before the fight goes standing again. Primm lands more knees from a tight clinch, then pulls O’Connell down with a kimura. Primm scores the mount, and O’Connell rolls, allowing Primm to take his back and sink the rear-naked choke. Primm thanks Mir for the coaching. Prediction: Mir’s “NIIIIIIIIIIICE!” is going to become as annoying as Matt Serra’s “Y’GOTTA BREATHE!”

Ido Pariente vs. Efrain Escudero (155): Escudero scores a takedown after some sparring, and tries to set up a darce choke. Pariente gets up and shoots in for his own takedown, but Escudero has his neck wrapped up. The fight goes to the ground, and Escudero takes Pariente’s back and secures the rear-naked choke. Pariente tries to hang in, but he’s eventually forced to tap.

(Photo courtesy of Tom Casino @ ProElite)

The dust has barely settled from the EliteXC/Strikeforce event — and what an event it was. For those on the Kimbo watch, he did make a showing during the broadcast and for some reason thought he was in San Francisco. FYI, the fight was in San Jose, and Kimbo also didn’t reveal who he would be fighting on May 31st. Anywho, we all know the headlining event was a war between Frank Shamrock and the undefeated Cung Le. So in the spirit of theatrics, we’ll save the main event results until last.

Let’s get to the quick results:

– Joey Villasenor and Ryan Jensen battled in a slow stand-up fight that garnered boos from the audience due to boredom. Villasenor dropped Jensen once, but the fighter came back and rocked Joey with some shots of his own. Just before the end of round one, Villasenor ends it on a KO. Wake me up for the next fight.

– Mike Kyle fought Wayne Cole for about 42 seconds. The crazy bastard tapped out due to an armbar at that mark in the first round. Cole picked up a well-deserved submission win.

– Gilbert Melendez took on Gabe Lemley in a title fight. Gilbey rocked it in the first, which was mostly on the ground. Herb Dean stopped the fight in the second when Melendez took it to the ground and pounded the piss out of Lemley.

– Drew Fickett versus Jae Suk Lim — which was supposed to be Drew Fickett versus Jake Shields until the latter pulled something in his back — ended early in the first via a guillotine choke. The win gave Fickett another notch in his impressive 33-5 belt.

(YAMMA’s next “Super Fight” contestants.)

— You guys rocked it again as we gave away our last copies of Chuck Liddell’s Iceman: My Fighting Life. And don’t forget to contribute to the latest challenge we tossed at ya’.

— The EliteXC paid Kimbo serious cheddar. The other fighters not so much. But at least they attempted to ‘splain their $1 payday.

— YAMMA added to their “Old Farts Throwin’ Down” debut event.

— We continued shaking our heads at the Xyience mess.

— Kimbo videos got some play, including episode two of “WWKD?” and a Showtime Short.

— Sick submissions. Believe it.

— UFC Fight Night 13 was upped to three hours and gained another fight.

— News came at you in nuggets, morsels, bits, and small potatoes.

— Wandy and Baroni made love, not war.

— MMA reality series continued to be churned out of the crap factory.

— We talked chicks – and CP reader Anonymous obviously has a score to settle with Kim Couture.

Enjoy the weekend. We’ll do this all again next week!

MMA wunderkind Chris Horodecki tacked another win onto his unbeaten record on Saturday with a split-decision over Bart Palaszewski at the IFL’s World Grand Prix. Horodecki came out strong in the first round, hammering Palaszewski with sharp combinations and briefly knocking him to the mat, but the second frame was all Palaszewski, who dominated his younger opponent with ground-and-pound and a guillotine choke attempt that Horodecki managed to slip out of. This was the decisive final round:

It was the second time the two lightweights faced off in the IFL, the second time that Horodecki walked away with a close decision, and the second time that Palaszewski wasn’t happy about the result. (“I have no idea what I could have done to win a decision against Chris,” he said. “He looks like he was in a car wreck and I look fine.”)

Well, it looks like my educated guess was correct on this one, as Team Hughes dropped another match on last night’s The Ultimate Fighter, putting them in a 5-1 hole and giving all control of the quarterfinal matchups to Team Serra. I just didn’t expect the loss to result from awful coaching, an oversized hand and a demonic possession.

How hated, exactly, is Tim Sylvia? Let’s put it this way: He got booed more after his win over Brandon Vera on Saturday night than Anderson Silva did after knocking out Rich Franklin in Ace’s hometown of Cincinnati — while Silva was wearing Pittsburgh Steelers colors. Now that’s hate.

Scoring a unanimous decision over the good-humored, charismatic Vera in a fight that generally consisted of the two men clinching on their feet against the fence, Sylvia did nothing to change his image as a boring fighter who relies on his size to win matches. But you gotta feel for the dude; it can’t be fun to get booed at weigh-ins, and to have Brandon Vera explain to the crowd after the fight, “he’s a nice guy once you get to know him.” (Vera, it should be said, didn’t look too impressive against the Maine-iac, was responsible for most of the clinching that made the fight so dull, and should probably give up the ice cream and drop down to light heavyweight.)