(Equinso Ocha: Always holding the black man down.) 

We could be wrong, because he speaks with a comprehensibility that would give a stenographer an aneurysm, but it definitely sounded like boxing great/MMA not-so-great James Toney just called former UFC light heavyweight champion Quinton “Rampage” Jackson a “slave” in a recent interview with EsNewsReporting.com. Granted, he also claims that the UFC paid, and is still paying him, a grand total of 1.5 million dollars for his UFC 118 “fight” against Randy Couture, a notion that we know is complete and utter bullshit, but listen to what he had to say when asked about Rampage’s recurring plight with the UFC:

That’s what you get for being a slave to the white man. Don’t be scared. Step up and speak for yourself. That’s why I got paid the million-and-a-half dollars and am still getting paid by the UFC. You know what I’m sayin’? The highest paid fighter ever. You feel me, fat boy? Me. And you been there…what, twenty years and you’re getting paid pennies? While I make millions?

Rampage, if you wanna fight me boy? Come on down to the gym and I’ll give you a job first. …you could be the sparring partner. I pay $50 for a sparring partner.

First off, if you supposedly got paid $1.5 large at UFC 118, why is it that you only pay your sparring partners a measly fifty dollars? Who looks like an asshole now? You, Mr. Toney, that’s who.

Check out the video interview, along with our best attempt at transcribing it to English, after the jump. 

("This isn’t going to end well, I can feel it.")

 Well, the Chael Sonnen PED case just got a whole lot stranger.

According to a report by Sports Illustrated’s Josh Gross, Sonnen indicated to California State Athletic Commission officials who administered his pre-fight drug screening urinalysis that he had taken a banned substance that might show up in the test.

That’s pretty much the nail in the coffin of his UFC career if true, but Chael being Chael will likely blame it on this guy with the Hispanic accent who has been impersonating him in interviews:

(Pic props: lookoutawhale via the UG)

(Who’s the tough guy? PicProps: Fight! Magazine)

File this under Least Surprising News of the Week: In the wake of getting thoroughly outwrestled by Gray Maynard at UFC 118 last month, Kenny Florian is vowing to make some wholesale changes in his training. Florian says he’s hired a wrestling coach from Boston University to help him with his grappling, so that he won’t get held down en route to a unanimous decision loss again anytime soon.

And frankly, this is a good example of yet another reason why KenFlo is one of the more likable fighters in all of MMA. Rather than taking the Dan Hardy approach — where you respond to your team’s multiple wrestling-based losses by publishing a screed in the local newspaper where you insist that (and, yes, this is an exact quote): “The problem is there’s beginning to be too much wrestling in the UFC Octagon, not too little of it in the (Team Roughouse) gym,” – Florian is opting to actually do something about it, trying to get better and keeping his dream of one day holding a UFC title alive.

(Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke. PicProps: MMA Weekly)

You know how it goes in MMA circles: When two guys have beef they settle it with a 15-minute therapy session inside the cage. Next thing you know, problem solved. Hugs and high-fives all around. It’s pretty much the best formula we know of for conflict resolution that doesn’t involve some bullshit like talking or mutual understanding or compromise. Hence, those terrible “Fighting Solves Everything” T-shirts you see around sometimes.

Not so with the ongoing Joe Lauzon vs. Gabe Ruediger kerfuffle, however.

(That’s actually ketchup on James’s head. Randy tackled him so quickly that he didn’t even have time to put down the hot dog he was eating. / Photo courtesy of MMAFighting.com)

The UFC paid out $1,608,000 in disclosed salaries and bonuses to the fighters who competed at UFC 118, according to figures released by the Massachusetts State Athletic Commission. James Toney‘s whopping $500,000 salary led the payroll, putting him well ahead of fellow headliners Randy Couture ($250,000) and BJ Penn ($150,000). For you math aficionados out there, Toney earned over $2,500 per second in his UFC debut, which ended due to submission at the 3:19 mark of round 1. (Now calculate how much money you make per second at your job. Isn’t that hilarious?)

Keep in mind that the figures below don’t include additional compensation from sponsorships, undisclosed "locker room" bonuses, or cuts of the pay-per-view revenue that some UFC stars have in their contracts, which means that Randy Couture could have theoretically ended up with a bigger paycheck than James Toney. You know, if that helps you sleep at night.

Frankie Edgar: $96,000 (includes $48,000 win bonus)
def. B.J. Penn: $150,000

Randy Couture: $250,000
def. James Toney: $500,000

Demian Maia: $68,000
def. Mario Miranda: $8,000

Gray Maynard: $46,000 (includes $23,000 win bonus)
def. Kenny Florian: $65,000

(VidProps: BJPenn.com, "The, uh, Home of MMA")

Fear not, those of you who thought you sniffed a subtle hint of finality in BJ Penn’s initial melancholy video statement after his UFC 118 loss to Frankie Edgar. “The Prodigy” says he ain’t done. Sure, it sounded bad when Penn started “thanking the fans for their support over the years” in that first vid – and the depressing elevator music didn’t help, either – but according to Penn’s latest melancholy video statement he wants another fight ASAP and plans on “jumping back in the gym” as early as tomorrow. Or, is it today? Beats me. What time is it in Hawaii, anyway?

“I’ve just been hanging out these last couple of days,” Penn says here. “But I’m going to stick to what I said about being as active as I can … Let me try to contact the UFC (to) get a fight as soon as possible. Luckily, I didn’t get any injuries (against Edgar) … I can still build off my last camp. I didn’t go out, I didn’t party or anything (Ed. Note: I should hope not). So, that’s it. I’m going to jump in the gym tomorrow and go full blast, back training again.”

So that sounds encouraging. Make no mistake though, these are dark times in Hilo.

(We know that expression. Looks like somebody needs a James Toney upset to hit their $42,500 parlay bet. Check out more exclusive photos at FightMagazine.com’s UFC 118 photo gallery.)

Some selected highlights from our friends around the MMA blogosphere. E-mail feedback@cagepotato.com for details on how your site can join the MMA Link Club…

– After Perfect Performance at UFC 118, More Tests Await Edgar (Versus MMA Beat)

– Kenny Florian Says Dana White Is ‘Dead Wrong’ About Him ‘Choking In Big Fights’ (MMA Convert)

- Wanderlei Silva Recovering, Hoping for February Return vs. Leben or Belfort (MMA Fighting)

– Roger Huerta vs. Eddie Alvarez set for non-title fight at Bellator 33 (Heavy.com/MMA)

– Mark "The Smashing Machine" Kerr now sells cars in Scottsdale, Arizona. (MiddleEasy)

– Fan Opinon: Top 10 Personalities in MMA (LowKick)

– Tito Ortiz and Shaquille O’Neal face off at the UFC Fan Expo in Boston (Watch Kalib Run)

– Brett Rogers to Return Against Ruben "Warpath" Villareal Next Month in Halifax (Five Ounces of Pain)

– If Don Frye Says You Should Watch Shark Fights, You Should (MMA Scraps)

(Word Life? Nevermind. Cena is brilliant. He can communicate without the use of verbs, adjectives or pronouns.)

Before all the Pro Wrestling fanatics jump all over me for the title of this post, read the quote below, then take a deep breath and think about things in perspective.

Cena, who is a native of Newbury, Massachusetts, was asked about what he thought about the UFC coming to Boston last weekend, likely by an oblivious reporter ,who, like many mainstream scribes, think that MMA and WWE are just variations of the same acronym. Why else would you ask a wrestler to talk about a sport that has as much to do with his profession as hunting does to being a butcher? 

Here’s Cena’s well thought out reply which likely earned him a bonus from Vince McMahon:

"It’s just not something that particularly interests me," Cena told The Boston Globe ahead of UFC 118. "UFC is where boxing was years ago, and I was never really into boxing, either."

In town for last night’s WWE "Monday Night Raw" at the TD Garden, Cena said he prefers professional wrestling because it’s "regulated entertainment that’s safe for anyone to enjoy." And UFC? "It is what it is," he said. "It can be pretty over the top, and it’s not something I’d want my children to watch."

(Photoprops: CageWriter)

Thanks to everybody who submitted captions for yesterday’s Beatdown contest; the general consensus was that Marcus Davis looks like a cross between E.T., Rocky Dennis, Sloth from The Goonies, the Elephant Man, and one of several characters from Total Recall. So who will go home with a copy of Beatdown (out today on DVD and Blu-Ray)? First some honorable mentions…

LikeTheWhiskey: This is what happens when you say "I’m a Yankees fan" in Boston.

Sudos KFC: the only thing the townsfolk would later agree on was that Quasimodo was never seen in the 209 again.

Dirt: "The doc said I’d look 10 years younger"

MoTropolis: "I think I’m allergic to getting punched in the face repeatedly."

Contraband:
The Stockton Makeover!
Get yours today!
Just call 1-800-420-DIAZ

dxhernandez: Shortly before, the man to the left began to have an acid flashback from two hits of acid he had dropped at a 1985 KISS concert. As Marcus Davis approached he looked on with horror while trying to differentiate between reality and "fuuuuuuuu……"

ReX13: "Don’t be scarred, homey"
[Ed. note: As an increasingly visible contributor to CagePotato, we'll say that ReX is disqualified from winning contests for a while. But come on, how brilliant is that.] 

And now the winners…

(Doug "ReX13" Richardson [right] spends time with a wheelchair-bound guest at the expo. If we put a smile on that poor, rotund man’s face, then the whole trip was worth it.)

As the Boeing 757 descends in to Boston Logan Airport, I look out the window and contemplate the path that’s led me here. One year ago, I was just another guy on one of the world’s most popular MMA blogs. Now, I’ve ducked out of work for a couple of days to attend the UFC’s Boston Fan Expo as a guest of my favorite website. I’m not just a fan; I’m taking what I hope to be another step toward actually working as a writer. Somewhere down there, Ben Goldstein is carrying around an exhibitor pass that has my name on it. I claim my baggage, which is split evenly between electronics and clothing, and hustle out to catch a taxi. A Ugandan cabbie asks for my destination, and speeds away toward the Hynes Convention Center. I pepper him with questions (because that’s what I do when I meet people) but he’s not in the mood to talk, so I settle back for the short ride and get my first look at Boston. Mostly, I get a good view of the results of the Big Dig, Boston’s massive twenty-five year freeway improvement project that has six lane highways routed under the Boston Harbor. Once we leave the turnpike, however, the views of the Harbor and the Charles River are incredible. Everything is vibrant, people and dogs are everywhere, and there isn’t a cloud in the sky.

We find my hotel, and I spend very little time settling in. It’s Thursday, and I’ve gotten it in my head that I’m needed. I walk to the Hynes Center, and mange to locate Ben after a few texts and a phone call. We shake hands, and walk back to booth 2017. There, Ben shows me the signage he’s already erected, and the swag he’s brought to entice the hordes that will descend upon us tomorrow. On one side is the punch machine, a simple carnival game that most of us have seen plenty of times. Ben hits the start button, and rips a nice right hook at the bag. "You take boxing classes, right?" I ask. "Yeah," Ben says, "Muay Thai." I help him with a few last minute touches, including checking on a table rental for the booth, but most of the work is done. Ben checks his watch, and announces that there’s really nothing left to do here: "Wanna go get a drink?"

(There he goes again, trying to steal the victory. Photo courtesy of CageWriter)

Here’s what we know: Frank Edgar will make his next title defense against Gray Maynard, who routed Kenny Florian on Saturday night. Dana White is done with James Toney, even though James Toney might not be done with MMA. Nick Osipczak, John Salter, and Gabe Ruediger could very well be receiving "Dear John" letters from the UFC as we speak. As for UFC 118‘s other winners and losers, their fates are yet to be decided. But as usual, we have a few opinions on the subject…

BJ Penn: The Prodigy spent 2007-2009 destroying all the top talent in the UFC’s lightweight division, then looked completely uninspired in two consecutive fights against Frankie Edgar. Either Penn has fallen off his game dramatically or Edgar is just a terrible style matchup for him — and we won’t really know the answer until Penn’s next fight. What’s obvious is that lightweight has been Penn’s most effective weight class in general, and going back up to 170 would be a terrible idea, especially while Georges St. Pierre still rules the roost. The UFC should give Penn a rebound fight against a name opponent who’s a little further down the ladder, but will test BJ’s desire to fight. That’s right, folks, it’s time for BJ Penn vs. Takanori Gomi II. Gomi is born-again after starching Tyson Griffin; add in Gomi’s history with Penn, and you have a co-headliner that any pay-per-view card would be lucky to have.

(VidProps: YouTube/Goossen Tutor Boxing)

Honestly, most of this video with James Toney from Saturday night is totally unintelligible. Unfortunately, it’s also reportedly the only post-fight interview with “Lights Out” since, like the true sportsman we all know him to be, he no-showed the official UFC 118 press conference after his embarrassing loss to Randy Couture. Toney may not have been man enough to face the MMA media after throwing zero standing punches en route to tapping out to Couture’s side check choke – pretty sure that’s what it was – three minutes, 19 seconds into the first round, but he did make time to sit down with Rodney Hunt from Goossen Tutor Promotions, a company that represents Toney in boxing. So, yeah, an in-house interview with a paid yes man. You probably know where this is going …

(Props: YouTube.com/MaplePictures)

We’ve been waiting patiently since last winter, and the moment is finally upon us: Beatdown, starring Rudy Youngblood, master thespian Michael Bisping, Bobby Lashley, Heath Herring, Mike Swick, Eric Balfour, and Danny Trejo, will be released on DVD and Blu-Ray tomorrow. Check the synopsis:

Brandon, a respected street fighter, is forced to flee the city after his brother is murdered and the money that was supposed to be paid back to a local gangster is stolen. While lying low at his father’s house in a small Southern town, Brandon soon gets involved in the local underground cage-fighting circuit. With the help of Drake Colby, a former MMA champion, Brandon devises a scheme to bring a massive payday, if they are able to survive.

We have eight copies of the flick to give away, in two separate caption contests. If you want one, check out the gnarly UFC 118-related pic after the jump and follow our instructions…

(Please princess, let me up!!   photo credit: USA Today)

It appears that the James Toney experiment has gone the way of the Kimbo Slice experiment, as UFC president Dana White announced at the UFC 118 post-fight press conference that the promotion is done with boxer crossover fights.

"It’s been a fun ride with James," White said as if delivering a eulogy about Toney’s dead UFC career. "It’s been very interesting. He’s a nutty guy." 

White pointed out that he didn’t go out looking for the fight, but when it came knocking on his door, he figured, "Why not?" 

"Listen, I didn’t try to sell this thing as, ‘Tune in on Saturday night, and you’re going to see the most spectacular battle and a war…I basically said what I was hoping would happen. Anything can happen in a fight. James Toney picked this fight. We’re not after boxing," White explained. "We’re not trying to attack boxing. I love boxing, and I thought this question was answered back in 1993, but I’ve got to be honest, as we got closer to the fight, my stomach hurt, and I was a little dizzy and I was nervous."

(Now who’s the princess??)

Wow! We had a few pick-ems and a few surprises tonight at UFC 118, but overall it was a great card.

BJ didn’t have an answer for "The Answer" and Couture had a simple, yet effective one for "Lights Out," namely, take him down and expose his weaknesses on the ground.

Love him or hate him, Gray Maynard proved he is the number one lightweight contender and we might just see him walk away from his next bout wearing UFC gold.

Anyone who didn’t like this card is either a boxing fan or a BJ Penn fan.

Here’s the post-fight press conference after the jump.

 
(So at $1,000,000, you payin’ me $4,219 a pound, sucka!!)

Well, Potato Nation, tonight’s the night we’ve been waiting for for months. The question on everyone’s mind will finally be answered: "Is Will Forte really leaving Saturday Night Live?"

OK so maybe that’s not the question on everybody’s mind, but it’s definitely bugging Will’s agent and his parents.

Ben and ReX13 are off schmoozing at the UFC Fan Expo, where I would have been as well if I could cross the border (more on that at a later date, but I will tell you it involves a bar brawl and a Bruce Lee instructional book I’ve owned since I was 13) and  Chad Dundas is off the grid attending an Amish wedding, which leaves me here to supply you guys with some play-by play action from tonight’s festivities in Boston.

The co-main event will undoubtedly produce some differing opinions on James Toney’s place in the grand scheme of the UFC’s heavyweight division and the main event should decide whether or not BJ Penn simply had an off night in Abu Dhabi.

Before we get to it, we’d like to announce the winner of our Boston UFC Fan Expo. The winning ticket is #031014. If this is your number, send photographic proof to contest@cagepotato.com and we’ll hook you up with a $100 gift card to MMAWarehouse.com.

Here’s a glimpse of our uber-popular booth from the expo. Don’t let VivaHate’s nonplussed expression fool you, everyone had a blast this weekend and we got a ton of footage and interviews from fans and fighters.

Results and play-by-play after the jump.
Strap in and get ready. It’s sure to be a rocky ride.

(“Yeah, I get it, ‘UFC 124: ‘Expendable,’ that’s really funny … no, seriously, I’m laughing on the inside.” PicProps: Sherdog)

Look, I didn’t mean to get you all in a tizzy with that crazy stuff I said earlier. Rest assured, gentle reader, odds are very good that Randy Couture applies one of his world-renowned Brazilian Joint Locks to James Toney tonight and takes home an easy victory, probably sometime in the first round. After that, we’ll all have our fun with Toney, figuratively poking him in his airbrushed belly as we ship him off to wherever it is old boxers go to die. We’ll all probably act very smug and superior on our Twitter accounts for a few days, too.

Deep down, though, Couture’s victory will not cure my unease. For some while now, I’ve been wondering if the worst thing that could happen to Randy Couture at this stage in his career would be for him to beat James Toney at UFC 118. This is all just conjecture mind you, but I can’t escape the notion that whoever wins tonight might ride a groundswell of mainstream publicity right into a fight with Jon Jones, probably at the UFC’s end-of-the-year (or maybe Super Bowl weekend) pay-per-view.

(Keep laughing, KenFlo. It won’t be so funny when “Lights Out” brings the side check kick down to 155. PicProps: Heavy.com)

Sunday morning, you wake up. Splitting hangover headache. You roll over and nausea sweeps through your body. You will yourself not to puke. “Where am I,” you think, “and who is this fat chick?” The night before is a total blur. There are significant gaps. You remember being at the bar, yelling unintelligible shit at a TV. Some guy you don’t know kept buying you shots. You might’ve left a bunch of voicemails for that girl you like. After that you must – wait — then it hits you. Holy fucking shit. Randy Couture fucking LOST to James Toney last night.

Scary though huh, PotatoNation? Consider the above paragraph a kind of public service announcement. Some don’t-let-this-happen-to-you type shit. Here at The Potato we are nothing if not realists. We believe wholeheartedly in expecting the best while preparing for the worst, or whatever the terrible cliché says we ought to do. For that reason, it’s probably a good idea that we all spend a few minutes considering the possibility that Toney might actually beat Couture at tonight’s UFC 118. You know, just in case. It won’t be easy, but we can get through this together.

(Video courtesy YouTube/10thplanetjj.com)

- Frankie Edgar pre-UFC 118 interview (heavy)

- The most bootylicious athletes (bleacherreport)

- A glimpse of CagePotato’s EXTREMELY popular UFC Fan Expo booth (twitpic)

- John Cusack to play Edgar Allen Poe in "The Raven" thriller (screenjunkies)

- Reality show: Edgar vs. Penn II (fight!)

- 20 hilarious goth fails (break)

- Toney’s purse pegged at between $750,000-$1-million (yahoo!sports)

- Besides common sense, science also points to Couture winning (sportscience)

- Top 10 ways to befriend the bartender (askmen)

- Toney says he’s seen fear in Couture’s eyes (mmafighting)

- Dream job: Scores gentleman’s club GM (mademan)

- Shogun’s Octagon return delayed until mid-2011 (versus)

- 2010 big 10 college football preview (scoresreport)

- Amy Winehouse’s guide to everyday living (holytaco)

- Exploring the various Carmelo Anthony trade scenarios (bullz-eye)

- Mayhem Miller vs. Sakuraba and more goodness announced for DREAM 16 (middleeasy)

(If you don’t look in his eyes, Randy, you won’t be hypnotized into standing and trading with him.)

Just a reminder that the weigh-ins for tomorrow night’s brouhaha in Boston will be live here at 4:00 pm. 

A number of questions will be answered, like:

Is James Toney really in shape?

Did Gabe Ruediger really quit cake?

Will Chandella give Arianny the stink eye for getting a Playboy cover?

UFC media player is after the jump.

(Video courtesy YouTube/MMAFighting)

There must be something in the water in Boston that’s making the fighters turn on Ariel Helwani. First BJ Penn questioned the MMA Fighting reporter about whether or not he liked him and now we have James Toney wrestling the microphone from Helwani after asking him if he dislikes boxing and calling him a clown.

"This guy’s a clown right here…Give me the goddamn mic….Give it to me," Toney said as he struggled to pry the microphone from Helwani’s hands.

When he finally did get the mic from Helwani, Lights Out tried to sign off from the interview.

"This is James Toney Reporting for this goddamn station, whatever it is," Toney deadpanned. "I’m outta here."

(Video courtesy YouTube/The FightNetwork)

The Fight Network does a decent job demonstrating the juxtaposition between the UFC 118 main and co-main events. On one had we have BJ Penn trying to regain his title from current UFC lightweight champion, Frankie Edgar who will be fighting tooth and nail to hold onto his belt and his ranking in the UFC’s 155-pound class. On the other hand, you have James Toney fighting for the pride of boxing against the sport of MMA, although his logic of what winning his fight against Randy Couture will actually prove is flawed.

In the videos above and below, a variety of professional boxers and mixed martial artists (as well as a smattering of actors sprinkled in for good measure) weigh in on this weekend’s two biggest fights.

(Video courtesy YouTube/UFC StannFan1)

The hype behind this weekend’s James Toney-Randy Couture showdown has focused largely around the "Is MMA better than Boxing?" quandary, which, up until this point has never really been answered, and in my opinion really won’t be answered by this fight.

The question really should be "Who would win in a fight between a top-tier boxer and a top-tier MMA fighter?"

(Like "Good Will Hunting," without the smart one. PicProps: CombatLifestyle.)

Given the location of this weekend’s card and the company’s insistence on promoting the co-main event as a “UFC vs. boxing,” spectacle it’s a bit surprising we haven’t heard more from Marcus Davis leading up to UFC 118. Davis after all is a former professional pugilist who made the transition to MMA long before James Toney began mastering the art of the “side check kick.” But maybe because he’s just 3-3 in his last six fights and his upcoming bout with Nate Diaz is scheduled to be first on Saturday’s PPV card, the “Irish Hand Grenade” hasn’t grabbed many headlines as the Octagon prepares to storm Beantown.

Davis did however sit down for an equal parts funny and scary interview with MMA Junkie this week. In it, he discusses how he made his bones in the hardscrabble world of the small-time Boston boxing scene in the late ’90s and basically makes his life sound like the plot of an unproduced Sylvester Stallone movie. You know, back before Sylvester Stallone movies were just a collection of one-liners tied loosely together by scenes of shit blowing up.

(Photo courtesy of MMAWeekly)

By CagePotato.com contributor Elias Cepeda

Gabe Ruediger (17-5) spent years developing a solid reputation as a talented submission fighter, racking up an impressive record and finally reaching the UFC. Then, with a loss in his debut and an embarrassing short-lived stint on The Ultimate Fighter 5, which saw him get KO’d by a scale and not an opponent, he saw it disintegrate in just a few months’ time.

That was in 2006. Since that time, Ruediger has had neck surgery, switched up teams, won and finished his last six fights, and has now found himself back in the UFC as he steps in for an injured Terry Etim to face another TUF 5 vet, Joe Lauzon. Gabe talks with CagePotato about how he survived becoming a laughing-stock and why he thinks Joe Lauzon is a “good kid,” but still wants to kick his ass.

CAGEPOTATO.COM: Gabe, you are filling in on short notice for Terry Etim to fight Joe Lauzon. The two of you, as well as his younger brother Dan, have been talking back and forth with each other for years. How did this fight finally come about?
GABE RUEDIGER: [UFC matchmaker] Joe Silva approached us after my last fight and said that he wanted to bring me back but that it was hard to find a proper place for me with the lightweight division being so deep. They were unsure of what to do with me and wanted to give me a fight if they could find a really good matchup for me in terms of it being compelling. But I was in a good position at that time because all the major organizations were interested in me so I understood and was fine with that. When Terry Etim had to pull out of the fight with Joe and they called me I was more than thrilled and I think Joe was more than thrilled. The fight has a good back story to it.

(This is actually where the UFC press conference is being held. No kidding. Inside that historic room, in front of the busts of those great American patriots, James Toney will tell Randy Couture "I’mma whip y’muhfuckin ass, prinsiss, y’fill’me." Photo courtesy of twitter.com/ArielHelwani)

Dana White, Frankie Edgar, BJ Penn, Randy Couture, James Toney, Kenny Florian, and Gray Maynard will appear and take UFC 118-related questions from the media at the Faneuil Hall in Boston today beginning at 3 p.m. ET. You can watch the proceedings live in the player after the jump. Go Red Sox.

(No word yet on whether Penn plans to file a formal complaint against the bacterium that screwed him out of the title at UFC 112. PicProps: ESPN)

After the jump you’ll find a slickly produced video blog from the folks at ShootMedia – which we’re led to believe is just part one of an on-going series — that chronicles BJ Penn taking his training camp for UFC 118 from his beloved Hilo, Hawaii to California, where he spent the final four weeks before his 155-pound title rematch with Frankie Edgar. “BJ’s a fighter and he always wants to be on top,” says Penn boxing coach Jason Parillo at the tail end of the vid. “When you take him off the peg of being on top, we get an animal.”

While for the most part, this piece comes off as a fairly standard training blog – BJ doesn’t do anything particularly animalistic, though there is one scene of him getting after it on the rowing machine – it’s clear that Penn’s training partners appear here for one reason and one reason only: So they can say all the stuff the former lightweight champ wants us to know, but doesn’t want to actually say himself. Case in point: Taking on the topic of the sinus infection said to hamper his performance at UFC 112 in Abu Dhabi.

(Photo courtesy of ChampionsBoston.com)

As many of you know, CagePotato.com will be in Boston this week for UFC 118 and the UFC Fan Expo. To commemorate the occasion, CP’s dedicated superfan-lackeys Viva Hate and ReX13 have organized a Potato Nation meetup on Thursday night for folks who live in Beantown or will be visiting for the fights. (Seriously, they made a Facebook page and everything.) Here are the details…

When: Thursday night, from "8:30 or so" onward
Where: Champions, a very classy-looking sports bar located on the second level of the Boston Marriott Copley Place (110 Huntington Ave.), with an astounding beer selection and more TV screens than a drunk person could possibly count.
What: Drinking; lots of drinking. The opportunity to hang out with your Internet friends. Trying to convince the waitress to put one of the TVs on Fox Sports Net so we can watch Bellator.

If that’s not enough to get you out to Champions, we have one more thing to share…

(Nick Thompson is stretchered to safety after getting smoked by Taisuke Okuno at Sengoku 14. Check out FIGHT! Magazine‘s exclusive gallery of photos from the event right here.)

Some selected highlights from our friends around the MMA blogosphere. E-mail feedback@cagepotato.com for details on how your site can join the MMA Link Club…

– BJ Penn Hopes James Toney Does Well Against Randy Couture (MMA Convert)

– Facing your "Mirs": Where do Lashley and King Mo go from here? (Watch Kalib Run)

– 5 Things To Watch For At UFC 118 (Heavy.com/MMA)

– Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua’s Return Delayed Until Mid-2011 (Versus MMA Beat)

– Why Nick Diaz vs. ‘Mayhem’ Miller Is the Fight Strikeforce Needs Now (MMA Fighting)

– Exclusive Interview With Bellator Middleweight Tournament Winner Alexander "Storm" Shlemenko (LowKick)

– Outstanding Wrestlers and the Lessons Learned (Five Ounces of Pain)

– Kickboxing Legend Andy Hug, R.I.P. (MMA Scraps)

– This Rampage vs. Machida trailer will be the greatest thing you will see today, guaranteed (MiddleEasy)