(Kimbo performing a dramatic retelling of the Samuel L. Jackson narrated “Go the Fuck to Sleep” by way of Tay Bledsoe.)

Youtube Sensation/UFC vet/pornstar confidant Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson will be looking to improve his professional boxing record to 4-0 come March 24th, when he welcomes former MMA fighter Mike Glenn to the boxing world at the O’Reilly Center in Springfield, Missouri in a card dubbed Fight Night Returns.

Since being ousted from the UFC following a second round TKO loss to Matt Mitrione at UFC 113 and subsequently calling it a day on his MMA career, Slice has scored three straight victories inside the boxing ring, the first two of which came via brutal one punch knockout inside the first round. It appeared as if the future Spike TV host was destined for WBA dominance, until he ran into personal fitness trainer and boxing newbee Charles Hackmann. Although Hackmann came into the bout on just a day’s notice, he managed to make it the distance with Kimbo and nearly finished him in the second round. The win, to say the least, was not impressive.

( UFC contract: $Millions,  30-day suspension: $0, Becoming a bigger heel than Josh Koscheck for sucker punching him after the bell: PRICELESS)

Paul Daley is lucky he didn’t sucker punch Josh Koscheck in Nashville.

Otherwise, he likely would have received a much heftier punishment for the May 8 infraction than the 30-day suspension the Quebec athletic commission — the Régie des Alcools des Courses et des Jeux (Regulators of Alcohol, Racing and Gaming) — sentenced him to in his absence at a hearing in the French-Canadian province today.

Sherdog’s Loretta Hunt is reporting that the suspension may not even affect the British welterweight who fought on the July 18 Impact Fighting Championships card where he submitted Daniel Acacio and who is slated to take on Jorge Masvidal at Shark Fights 13 on Sept. 11 — two days AFTER his suspension ends if it begins immediately.

(Photo courtesy Esther Lin/Fanhouse)

In his first public interview since losing his UFC light heavyweight title to Mauricio "Shogun" Rua at UFC 113 last weekend, Lyoto Machida told Brazilian televison station, Globo Esporte, that he is in no hurry to fight for the belt he owned for 11 1/2 months. Besides healing from a fractured orbital bone sustained in the fight Saturday night that may require surgery,  Machida wants to take the time to analyze tape of the loss and shore up any weaknesses before stepping back into the Octagon with Rua, or whomever holds the strap when he is ready to fight for it again in approximately ten months to a year. 

"I don’t care who has it; I want to have the opportunity to fight for the belt. If it’s Shogun I’m ok, I’ll enjoy the win more. That punch really got me and in this division it’s really damaging to get hit with a punch like that. When it gets you, it’s really damaging. My plans are to fight for this belt in a year or less — maybe more like 10 months. To regain the belt has become my new dream."

Props: The "PAUL DALEY ROMOSHOP CHALLENGE" thread on the UG, and inspired by this classic. Two more good ones are after the jump.

By the way, Paul Daley has already landed on his feet following his recent firing by the UFC. According to a new report on MMA Weekly, the British sucker-punch artist is fighting on a pay-per-view show in Australia in July — this one, maybe? — and is currently in talks with DREAM, Sengoku, and MFC. Well good for you, Paul. You can’t buy that kind of publicity.

("Holy crap. Do my eyebrows really look like that?")

So here’s what we know: Josh Koscheck will be playing the fraggle-haired heel in Georges St. Pierre’s next title defense. Kimbo and Semtex are dunzo. Mauricio Rua’s next opponent will be determined by UFC 114′s Rampage vs. Rashad feature. Matt Mitrione and Joey Beltran could face each other at UFC 117 in August, which sounds about right. As for the rest of last weekend’s winners and losers, their fates are still to be determined. Not saying you need any help, Joe Silva, but if things are piling up at UFC headquarters, allow us to offer a few suggestions…

Lyoto Machida: If Antonio Rogerio Nogueira can get through Jason Brilz later this month, Machida vs. Lil’ Nog is the fight that makes sense. A win for Machida would be a perfect rebound against a dangerous, highly-regarded striker, while a win for Minotoro would convince fans that he’s a title threat worth caring about. Even though they’re both members of the Black House collective, Machida hasn’t ruled the match out.

Alan Belcher: He wants Anderson Silva. Isn’t that precious! Still, there’s no denying that Belcher is a rising star with some great recent wins under his belt. My first instinct would be to put him against Michael Bisping if the Count is victorious against Dan Miller at UFC 114. But there’s something just a little too obvious about that. If Belcher can handle Anderson Silva, surely he’d have no problem with Demian Maia, right? Tremendous upside for Belcher, and a good tune-up for Maia, who needs to re-locate his formerly fearsome jiu-jitsu.

("God, I hope he didn’t drink out of my water bottle before I sat down.")

Michael Bisping was asked today by MMAFighting’s Ariel Helwani to give his thoughts  on fellow UK fighter Paul Daley’s post-UFC 113 attack of opponent Josh Koscheck and let’s just say that "The Count" was much less supportive of his countryman than expected.

"What can I say? It was one of the stupidest things that I have ever seen. Paul’s a very talented young man, he’s got a bright future ahead of him and he was getting his UFC career off to a fantastic start and it’s a shame to see a few seconds of madness ruin such a great potential career," Bisping told Helwani. "But this is a professional sport and we’re professional sportsman, you can’t act like that. I, myself, have done years and years of interviews and things like that, talking about how we’re not thugs, we’re professional athletes, we’re martial artists. Behavior like that just plays into stereotypes. It’s just a bit of a shame, really."

(Heavyweights and generic metal-riffs, baby. If this doesn’t get you amped up, then YOU’RE A PUSSY! YEAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!! Props: shosports)

Though he made a valiant effort in his FightPicker Head-to-Head debut — correctly predicting that Shogun would win by stoppage, Joe Doerksen would score an upset over Tom Lawlor, and Sam Stout would pick up another Fight of the Night bonus — Mike Russell’s excessive love of his Canadian countrymen (and Paul Daley for some reason) proved to be his undoing, as he was edged out by BG, 8-6. Not that getting eight out 13 pool-questions right is anything to brag about. (Aaron Rampey is LOL’ing at our sorry asses right now.) But hey, it was a tough card to predict, with some very surprising outcomes. Did any of you run the table and get every question right?

If you came out ahead this week, why not take your PotatoChip surplus and go extra-big for the current pools, which focus on Strikeforce: Heavy Artillery. Featuring the heavyweight championship fight between Alistair Overeem and Brett Rogers, the event goes down this Saturday at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, and will be broadcast live on Showtime starting at 9 p.m. ET. We’ve also included a few questions related to Shine III: Worlds Collide, which is headlined by former boxing champ Ricardo Mayorga taking on Din Thomas. Check out the questions after the jump and pick well, my friends…

(Shogun quietly killing all fighters’ future use of lame excuses why they didn’t perform in important fights)

One story that has been buried by the Paul Daley sucker punch debacle is that newly-crowned UFC light heavyweight champion Mauricio "Shogun" Rua went under the surgeon’s knife for an emergency appendectomy just seven weeks ago. The estimated recovery time for the procedure is between four and six weeks, but knowing that the most important fight of his life against Lyoto Machida was rapidly approaching, Rua returned to light training just two weeks after surgery and hard sparring after four.

In spite of his abridged training camp, Shogun made quick work of Machida, stopping the previously unbeaten and reputedly invincible former champion in 3:35 of the opening frame of their second official meeting Saturday night at UFC 113 in Montreal.

(Props: WatchKalibRun)

It wasn’t shown on Saturday night’s pay-per-view broadcast, but Jason MacDonald‘s return to the Octagon at UFC 113 didn’t exactly go as planned. Midway through the first round of their prelim fight, John Salter scored a takedown against MacDonald, whose left leg snapped underneath him in horrifying, Joe Theismann-esque fashion. The result? A broken tibia and fibula, and a dislocated ankle. Get well soon, Jason. "The Athlete"’s overall UFC record dropped to 5-6 following the TKO loss via injury, while Salter picked up his first UFC win. And as you can see, he was pretty damn pleased with himself.

MacDonald wasn’t the only fighter who left Montreal busted up. Patrick Cote broke his right hand in his losing effort against Alan Belcher — a terribly unfortunate outcome for a guy who was already coming back from a year-and-a-half of injury inactivity.

(Photo courtesy Esther Lin/Fanhouse)

Recently unemployed fighter Paul "Semtex" Daley released the following statement Sunday evening through the UK-based Telegraph newspaper, apologizing for his post-fight attack of opponent Josh Koscheck at Saturday night’s UFC 113 event in Montreal, Quebec:

(Props: MMAFighting)

Even in victory, Josh Koscheck managed to officially become one of the greatest MMA heels of all time on Saturday night, first with his apparent acting job following Paul Daley‘s illegal knee attempt, and then with his kiss-off to the Montreal crowd, vowing that the Penguins would defeat the Canadiens in the NHL Eastern Conference semi-finals, and that he would whoop their beloved GSP when they meet later this year.

In this post-fight interview with Ariel Helwani, Koscheck explains that his emotions got the better of him, and he’s sorry for his behavior during and after the fight. Just kidding! Instead, Kos makes a number of bold statements, few of which will endear him to the fans:

(Video of the Daley/Koscheck cheap shot, courtesy of LynchTheGrynch; sorry about those first eight seconds, guys.)

In case you missed the press conference, the big news coming out of UFC 113‘s post-event aftermath is that Paul Daley and Kimbo Slice have been released from the UFC. Daley suffered his first loss in the Octagon after being smothered by Josh Koscheck for three rounds in their co-headlining bout last night, then followed it up by slugging Kos after the bell (see above). As Dana White explained to reporters, the poor decision earned Daley a permanent ban from the UFC:

As for Kimbo, his lopsided loss to rookie TUF 10 vet Matt Mitrione was enough to seal his fate. But unlike Daley, White has nothing but respect for the former YouTube brawler:

Remember to check out the live post-fight presser here at around 1:00am EST. The player is after the jump. 

(Canadian Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg will be calling the action from Quebec) 

UFC 112 is live tonight from La Belle Province and we’ll be starting round-by-round updates starting at 10pm EST.

As much as people complained about it from the get-go, the card is pretty damn good. I’m predicting that a lot of the lower profile guys are going to steal the show tonight and some of the bigger name guys are going to disappoint. 

Regardles of who wins, who loses and whose FightPicker picks shock Potato Nation and makes them a giant among men, this should be one of the better shows we’ve seen in a while

A lot of questions will finally be answered in Montreal tonight, like:

Who wins the Machida-Rua do over? 
Will Koscheck really try to stand with Daley?
and 
Will Kimbo eat Meathead with his bread? 

Get on your Canadian tuxedos, grab a bottle of Molson and refresh often; it’s time, eh.

(Kimbo Slice works the pads in preparation for UFC 113 and talks about Meathead being a Meathead. Props: YouTube.com/UFC) 

Bas Rutten travels to the Far East to learn the secret of the Seven Crane Kick. There were no survivors. (Tokyo Five)

UFC Preview Show With Pat Barry (MMAFighting)

Dana White vows to make up for UFC 112 with the fans (MMAJunkie)

Brazilians Weigh in on Machida-Rua II (Tatame)

UFC Lightweight Champ, Frankie Edgar Dogged by Win (TorontoSun)

UFC 113 MMA Live Special (Sherdog)

Silva to vacate title and move to 205 if he beats Sonnen and Belfort 
(MMAJunkie)

DFW’s UFC 113 video blog #1 (YouTube/UFC)

World’s Strongest Man Wins at KSW 13 (MMAFighting)

Paul Taylor Out, Canadian Newcomer  Holst in Against Gunderson at TUF 11 Finale (MMAJunkie)

Beatles-Zombie movie in the works (ScreenJunkies)

10 Indie Awesome Comedies You Missed (MadeMan)

25 Worst Moms Ever (HolyTaco)

Model Denise Milani (Chickipedia)

Nascar Skydiver Crashes (AllLeftTurns)

British Political Hopeful Beats Up Hoodlums on the Campaign Trail (NothingToxic)

Asylum Round-Up: Naked News and Bizarre Piercings (Asylum)

Jack Nicholson Bitches Out a Ref (ScoresReport)

(We’re assuming he couldn’t find a big enough cross to do Kimo Leopoldo. Top pic courtesy of seandiesel.)

The rumors are true, folks. Not only will the winner of tomorrow night’s welterweight co-headliner between Josh Koscheck and Paul Daley earn a shot at Georges St. Pierre’s belt, but that fighter will also get to do a tour of duty opposite GSP on the next season of The Ultimate Fighter. Dana White confirmed the news today before the UFC 113 weigh-ins at the Bell Centre in Montreal. TUF 12 will begin filming in a few weeks, and is slated to premiere on September 15th. 

As for the results of today’s weigh-ins, the numbers are after the jump. No real surprises, although the weight differences in both heavyweight bouts were close to 30 pounds. Plus, Tom Lawlor showed up to the weigh-ins as Dan Severn, following previous weigh-in tributes to Just Bleed Guy and Harold Howard.

Just a friendly reminder that you can watch the weigh-ins here at 4:00pm EST as long as the stream has been ironed out since yesterday’s press conference debacle.

Video player after the jump.

(Hopefully the judges can decide who won, not just who didn’t lose enough this time around.)

According to Mauricio Rua’s muay thai trainer, Andre "Dida" Amade, they are expecting Lyoto Machida to take the fight to the ground to avoid taking the amount of damage he took from Shogun the last time the two met.

In an interview with Sherdog, Amade, who imitated Machida’s karate style for sparring sessions with his fighter throughout his camp in Brazil, says he and the rest of Shogun’s coaches are betting the farm that Lyoto will rely heavily on his black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu to ensure he retains his title.

“For Lyoto it is not very good to stay standing. He knows that his karate is not going to defeat muay Thai. In my coach’s opinion, he will want to work his jiu-jitsu with Shogun. I think he will not fight muay Thai because he saw that in the last fight he was badly hurt and was not effective. So I think he will want to work his jiu-jitsu. We already have the strategy to beat Machida. In [the last] fight, we used a strategy for Shogun to kill Machida’s game and our tactics worked,” Amade said. “We just had not counted on the judges. Shogun is hungry for this fight, and we are already feeling the taste of the belt. Shogun shows in each training session the desire to beat Machida. I do not want to be in Machida’s shoes because Shogun will take this belt with his kicks.” ”

(Video courtesy YouTube/UFC.com)

Okay, I made the quote up, but this short clip of K-Ferg talking about all of the bodily fluids and waste products he’s going to beat out of "Meathead" Saturday night is an instant classic.

After watching the clip at the press conference yesterday, Lyoto Machida’s dad raised a glass of piss and toasted Kimbo’s prediction. According to manager Ed Soares, the senior Machida is purported to have said, "I’ll drink to that," but Shogun’s translator informs us that the translation was not correct.

He revealed that he actually said something to the effect of, "I am interested to know what the sap of a black oak tastes like. Will the athletic commission be handing out samples of the leftover specimens?"

(Kos Ross is not impressed by your picture.)

Fan-made Photoshop contest to pick a new hairdo for Josh Koscheck: FREE

Kinko’s glossy color copy of winning entry (pictured below): $1

Look on Koscheck’s face when he is presented with the photo: PRICELESS

(Photo courtesy of twitter.com/danawhite)

Here’s another reason to pay attention to the fights this weekend: At today’s UFC 113 press conference, Dana White confirmed that the winner of the co-headlining bout between Josh Koscheck and Paul Daley will be the next challenger to Georges St. Pierre‘s welterweight belt.

I’d actually be interested to see how Koscheck does in a rematch with GSP. He has the wrestling skills to stuff a takedown here and there, and his hands are more powerful than the champ’s. As long as he doesn’t focus on taking St. Pierre down like he did during their first fight in 2007 — and failing, and failing, and failing — he could keep things competitive. But my God, if Daley wins? Be prepared for the 25-minute sequel to GSP vs. Hardy that nobody asked for. Here’s the irony: Paul Daley really does have one-punch knockout power; he’s everything that the UFC hyped up/exaggerated Dan Hardy to be. The problem is, Semtex is notoriously weak on the ground, and GSP would have no trouble putting him there. We already know how this story goes, and no amount of hyperbolic promotion is going to change the outcome.

It hasn’t been officially confirmed that the Koscheck/Daley winner will coach TUF 12 opposite GSP, but rumors are pointing in that direction, and both fighters would be open to the opportunity.

Random thought: Jake Shields‘s first match in the UFC (fingers crossed) should be Paulo Thiago, and that match should produce a title contender. Discuss.

The UFC will be conducting a pre-fight press conference today from Montreal ahead of their UFC 113 "Machida vs. Shogun 2" event at The Bell Centre Saturday night and Cage Potato will be broadcasting the event in it’s entirety live here at 2:00pm EST.

The fight card for the event is as follows:

UFC 113: Machida vs. Shogun II

The Bell Centre
Montreal, Quebec, Canada

MAIN CARD
Lyoto Machida vs. Mauricio "Shogun" Rua (Light Heavyweight Title Bout)
Paul Daley vs. Josh Koscheck
Jeremy Stephens vs. Sam Stout
Kevin "Kimbo Slice" Ferguson vs. Matt Mitrione
Alan Belcher vs. Patrick Cote

PRELIMINARY CARD
Joe Doerksen vs. Tom Lawlor
Marcus Davis vs. Jonathan Goulet
T.J. Grant vs. Johny Hendricks
Joey Beltran vs. Tim Hague
Mike Guymon vs. Yoshiyuki Yoshida
Jason MacDonald vs. John Salter
—–

Just a reminder that you must have Microsoft Silverlight installed on your computer to be able to view video on the web player that will appear after the jump.

("Trust me bro, you’ve never had piss until you’ve had it out of a coconut." Photo courtesy of Sherdog.)

After a disappointing performance at WEC 48, the Gambling Enabler is ready to do what it does best: Make even larger, more desperate bets in order to break even. We’ve got UFC 113 coming up this weekend, and you can’t win if you don’t play. As usual, we’ve compiled the most favorable betting lines courtesy of BestFightOdds.com. Confused about what the numbers mean? Then punch yourself in your stupid balls and read this first.

MAIN CARD
Lyoto Machida (-174) vs. Mauricio Rua (+160)
Josh Koscheck (-215) vs. Paul Daley (+218)
Sam Stout (-180) vs. Jeremy Stephens (+162)
Kimbo Slice (even) vs. Matt Mitrione (-102) 
Alan Belcher (-110) vs. Patrick Cote (+105)

PRELIMINARY CARD
Tom Lawlor (-475) vs. Joe Doerksen (+400)
Marcus Davis (-450) vs. Jonathan Goulet (+400)
Johny Hendricks (-450) vs. TJ Grant (+350)
Tim Hague (-205) vs. Joey Beltran (+200)
Yoshiyuki Yoshida (-240) vs. Mike Guymon (+235)
Jason MacDonald (-155) vs. John Salter (+135)

Who wants to make some money the easy way? (Or potentially lose it, because anything can happen in a fight?)

 
(Props: Nicole B.)

UFC 113 goes down this Saturday at the Bell Centre in Montreal, featuring the long-awaited light-heavyweight title rematch between Lyoto Machida and Mauricio Rua, and the potential #1 welterweight contender’s match between Josh Koscheck and Paul Daley. (Plus, Kimbo Slice and a whole lot of Canadians.) We’ll be liveblogging the pay-per-view broadcast starting at 10 p.m. ET; come early to ensure seating.

If you feel like testing your prediction skills against the Potato Nation this week, please head over to MMA Fightpicker by Friday, enter some pools, and make your educated guesses on how the card will play out. The full question list is after the jump…

Related: Become a FightPicker fan on Facebook!

(Props: YouTube.com/UFC)

First, there’s the Matt Mitrione you thought you knew from TUF 10: The house snitch, the crazy guy, the brain-damaged faker, the unbearable heel of a TUF season in which we all expected Wes Sims to be the unbearable heel. In this promo for Saturday’s UFC 113 event in Montreal, Mitrione (who will be facing Kimbo Slice) acknowledges that most people who watched him on the show think he’s a "straight douchebag." However: "I’m misread quite often…I’m probably a little bit cooler than most people give me credit for." Sure Meathead, it was just the editing, right?

It seems like the UFC wants Kimbo to be the good guy in this matchup. Slice has given up sex, smoking, and drinking for his training camp, which makes him as good a role model for the children of the world as anybody else. But then there’s this video profile from IndySportsNation, which reveals a few things we didn’t know about Mitrione…

(Koscheck came to Montreal to kick ass and chew bubblegum. Fortunately for Daley, Josh brought plenty of bubblegum.)

Either Josh Koscheck is doing his damndest to keep upcoming opponent Paul Daley guessing about his game plan for their UFC 113 meeting or he has realized that going toe-to-toe with a guy whose hands are nearly as effective at making people’s heads spin and putting them to sleep as a Brent Brookhouse editorial, is not the best idea in the world.

Less than a week away from the May 8 bout in Montreal and Kos is giving ostensibly different answers when asked how he is planning to face "Semtex."

 
(It looks like Tito isn’t the only UFC fighter who keeps his pimp hand strong.)

I don’t know if it was due to boredom from hearing the the same old answers and cliche quotes regurgitated back to me by fighters, but a while back I began asking interview subjects strange arbitrary questions and have been paid back in kind with strange arbitrary answers.

Some notable anecdotes I’ve been told:

– No matter if he’s at home, on a bus, on a plane or on a train, Pat Barry can only fall asleep while wearing a pillow case tied around his head.

– Eric "Red" Schafer has a stalker in his hometown in Wisconsin. He is male and likes to break into his car and sniff his shoes and gym clothes.

– Jason MacDonald was originally slated to be on TUF 3, but was beaten by Kalib Starnes at an event in British Columbia just before the final selections were made for the show and was replaced by "The Running Man" that season.

Following his controversial split-decision loss to Aaron Simpson at UFC Fight Night 20, Tom "The Filthy Mauler" Lawlor was ready to bounce back to the W column against fellow TUF vet Tim Credeur at UFC 113 (May 8th, Montreal). But an injury has forced "Crazy" Tim off the card, and now Filthy Tom will be facing Dirty Joe — Joe Doerksen, who has a 1-5 lifetime record in the UFC, but is getting another shot after racking up five straight wins in promotions like Sengoku and King of the Cage. We sent our friend "Skanky" Remington Reed to track down Lawlor at his gym in Orlando, The Jungle MMA & Fitness, and discuss how he copes with tough losses, the method behind his memorable cage entrances, the runaway success of his "Lawlormania" t-shirt, his weather-based prediction for Machida vs. Rua II, and the question everyone else has been afraid to ask: Between him and Seth Petruzelli, who’s gayer? Enjoy… 

(Loiseau demonstrating what he would like to do to Quebec officials who won’t grant him a license to fight in the province)

Well, it seems that Quebec’s athletic commission, The Régie des Alcools, des Courses et des Jeux (Regulators of Alcohol, Racing and Gaming), is overstepping its boundaries at the cost of the livelihood of one of its province’s own fighters.

David “The Crow” Loiseau was brought in by the UFC to face John Salter on the undercard at UFC 113 May 8 as a late replacement for the injured Nick Catone. Having lost decisively to Ed Herman in front of a hometown crowd in Montreal in his last attempted UFC comeback at UFC 97 a year ago, Loiseau was relishing the opportunity to get back into the Octagon to try to earn a steady slot on the Las Vegas-based promotion’s roster.

(Video courtesy YouTube/UFC.com)

When it comes to trash talking, fighters typically fall under one of three categories: those who rely on their pre-fight banter to make up for their inferior skill set, those who don’t necessarily need to talk smack, but do because they have the skills to back up their mouths and those who should stick to fighting and leave the posturing to the pros.

Set to lock horns at UFC 113 May 8 in Montreal are two of the sport’s smack talking idiot savants, Josh Koscheck and Paul Daley. Both definitely can sell fights without saying a word, but the entertainment value of hearing the two of them go at it verbally before either throws a punch, is nearly as good as the fight itself will likely prove to be.