(Does this look like a dude who should be deprived of what he wants? Pic: Sherdog)

As avid readers of our keen, in-depth statistical analysis, we know that you know that we know that Jake Ellenberger is currently riding a four-fight win-streak in the UFC. After going to Toronto and knocking out short-notice opponent Sean Pierson (just like we told you he would) last month Ellenberger remains undefeated since his split decision loss to Carlos Condit in his Octagon debut (a fight he appeared to be on his way to winning before gassing out) way back in September, 2009. Now that he’s home in Nebraska rehabbing the hand he broke on Pierson’s face, Ellenberger is going back to basics, returning to a strategy he adopted some months ago: Trying to trash-talk his way into a fight with Jake Shields.

Except here’s the difference: If not for that original loss to Condit at UFN 19, people might just be talking about a 5-0 (in the UFC) Jake Ellenberger as a potential top candidate to get a welterweight title shot one of these days soon. So now that Ellenberger is soaring and the Shields hype-wagon has been slowed a bit by his do-nothing performance against Georges St. Pierre at UFC 129, maybe this booking wouldn’t seem so crazy. Hmmmm?

(Video courtesy of YouTube/MiddleEasyTV)

- Pat Barry blows his top at Brock doubters (FightersOnly)

- The top 29 cities to visit (AskMen)

- The Gina Carano sweepstakes (Fightlinker)

- 10 things that repel women (MadeMan)

- Zuffa’s Twitter policy is a matter of playing with fire (MMAOpinion)

- Win an AOC Aire black LED monitor (GameFront)

- Brock Lesnar says fans can be like pulling a tampon out of a drain (DeathClutch)

- ‘Real Steel’ trailer (TheRugged)

- Anonymous former Pacquiao training partner says he injected Manny with roids (Thisis50)

- 25 story lines to introduce Ashton Kutcher to Two and a Half Men (HolyTaco)

- HDNet and It’s Showtime ink deal; K-1 soon to return (MMAFighting)

- Deniro to play most sinister role yet: Bernie Madoff (ScreenJunkies)

- NFL players seeking $707 million in damages (TheScoresReport)

(Pic: MMA Soldier)

It was rampant speculation time across the interwebs on Friday, after yesterday’s announcement that Brock Lesnar’s diverticulitis has returned with a vengeance. “Is Brock done?” we all wondered aloud. Is Carwin vs. dos Santos actually a better fight? Can the UFC rebound from a couple of weeks that saw the main events of UFC 130, 131 and 133 all go up in smoke? And, dear God, are Urijah Faber and Dominick Cruz next to suffer some bizarre malady, causing a reshuffling of the only PPV still left in one piece? Nobody knows.

What we do know is this: Brock Lesnar turns 34 in July and twice now since 2009 he’s seen his career indefinitely sidetracked by being the world’s only millionaire athlete to get a near fatal disease from not eating enough vegetables. Age has never been particularly kind to jumbo-sized athletes and even for a professional wrestler, Lesnar’s job history has been pretty flighty over the years. So, while we can’t say with any kind of certainty that his MMA career might be over over, Lesnar’s second bout with a strange digestive infection nobody had ever heard of before two years ago can’t exactly be considered a good thing. Apparently, the first time he went through this the UFC forgot to tell us that diverticulitis is something that sticks around for the rest of your life. Whoops. But we digress. What it all means for Lesnar, dos Santos, Carwin and – most importantly – you, after the jump.

(“OK, if we didn’t call your name, it means we had no idea you even worked here. Anyway, you’re fired too.”)

Kind of like the husband who assures his loving wife he’s only going to have “a couple of beers” with the boys after work, we suspect when Dana White told us back in March that Zuffa, LLC was “not planning any changes” inside Strikeforce he probably really believed it at the very moment the words came out of his mouth. But just as that husband somehow ends his night trying to explain there was no way he could’ve known that 14-year-old prostitute was actually an undercover policewoman, so too does it turn out White’s definition of “business as usual” actually means, “in two months we’re going to lay off 85 percent of you guys.”

(Video courtesy of YouTube/MiddleEasy)

It took a while, but Antonio McKee has finally played the race card against the UFC when attempting to explain why he was dropped by the promotion after just one loss in the Octagon.

McKee spoke to Layzie the Savage from MiddleEasy recently and had some interesting things to say about Zuffa’s stranglehold on the sport or on black fighters, depending on how you interpret his racially-infused rhetoric.

(Life: It’s more about the journey than whether you actually beat Travis Pastrana in arm wrestling. Pic: Zimbio)

Ah, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. At this point, we honestly don’t know if we should applaud the guy for his honesty or criticize him for continuing to waste everybody’s time. After conducting a lengthy interview with the former UFC light heavyweight champion recently wherein it becomes painfully apparent that the guy just can’t bring himself to be terribly dedicated to fighting anymore, maybe Five Knuckles says it best. As the MMA website quips in the very first line of its resulting story about Jackson: “You can call Quinton “Rampage” Jackson a lot of things, but dedicated isn’t necessarily one of them.”

Dude, ouch. Then again, that seems like a pretty apt description anymore. Heading into his upcoming bout with Matt Hamill at UFC 130, Rampage claims he’s training hard, but says he hasn’t bothered to chase down any film on Hamill and even admits he “doesn’t know a whole lot” about the guy. Really? You don’t know a whole lot about Matt Hamill? Interesting. Anyway, a bit later on Jackson flat out admits he’s just biding his time until he can find another movie role that will compensate him as much or more than his current UFC contract.

(How many muppets must die for Jason Miller to dress in the manner to which he’s become accustomed? Pic: ESPN)

Truly spoken like a dude who’s used to being asked to leave. Some pretty classic quotes out on Tuesday from fighter, television host and all-purpose awesome dude Jason “Mayhem” Miller re: recent reports that Strikeforce literally couldn’t find him a fight during the last year of his contract because he’d become persona non grata at both Showtime and parent network CBS. Turns out, though he knew he was in hot water after his participation in the April, 2010 Nashville brawl, nobody at any of the above corporate entities bothered to inform Mayhem that he was no longer welcome on the two television stations and – therefore – damaged goods for Strikeforce. Instead, they just put him on the shelf to rot.

“I asked, and guess what? Nobody would tell me,” Miller told MMA Fighting. “This is a political environment. Nobody’s going to tell you. They’re just going to be cowards about it. That’s the way of the world. Nobody’s going to tell the crazy ultimate fighter guy to his face, ‘Hey, screw you.’ They’re not going to do that.”

(“Let’s see here: High kick, low kick, body kick, side check kick … yep, I think I’ve got them all scouted.” Pic: LasVegasSun)

Some three days later, I’m still not sure if it makes it better or worse that Randy Couture’s MMA career ended via insane, never-before-seen crane kick knockout. On one hand, it was certainly sad to see the legend’s body slump lifelessly to the canvas after the UFC’s resident Karate Kid blasted him in the face just a minute into the second round of their bout in Toronto. On the other hand, maybe the kick really just saved us nine more minutes of watching Couture take potshots to the face at the hands of notorious counterpuncher Lyoto Machida. It had taken just a few moments after all to realize this bout wasn’t going to go Couture’s way. All 47 of his hard-earned years were apparent as we watched “The Natural” hopelessly chase Machida around the Octagon like a dog trying to hunt down its own tail for the full extent of the first round. Granted, he didn’t look Chuck Liddell-bad or anything, but the performance was enough to confirm that it’s high time for Couture to walk away – and this time to stay gone.

It got us thinking. When you’re in the game for 14 years, compile a 19-11 career record, essentially shepherd a sport from its dark ages into the white hot light of mainstream acceptance – when you are arguably the most important athlete ever to compete in your chosen field – there are going to be a few ups and downs. In light of that and by way of career retrospective for a guy who absolutely deserves one, after the jump we give you our picks for the five greatest and five worst moments in the MMA career of Randy Couture, presented here in chronological order …

(Our thoughts exactly, Diego.)

This would appear to put to rest not only Royce Gracie’s aspirations to rematch Matt Hughes at UFC: Rio, but also an immediate bout for Diego Sanchez against any of the numerous dudes he’s been beefing with on Twitter: The horse’s mouth itself – UFC.com – confirmed on Thursday that Hughes and Sanchez will face-off at an event to be named later, likely in the fall. So that’s weird.

We might’ve thought Sanchez deserved better, after squeaking by Martin Kampmann via relentless disregard for his own face at the latest UFC on Versus show. Meanwhile, Hughes – who is 37 – has recently grumbled about retirement and appeared to indicate he’d only like to fight fellow old guys who he might actually be able to beat from here on out. This appears to be an odd little piece of matchmaking for both guys.

(Video courtesy of YouTube/UFC)

For all of you who thought Chuck Liddell’s new role of vice president of business development with the UFC was a paper position with the promotion, think again.

It turns out “The Iceman” does a hell of a lot more in a day than Jager shots and beer bongs at afterparties with Clay Guida and Chris Leben.

(Jake, you be Strikeforce. Jason, you be the UFC. Now, show us how the next few months will go …)

It’s been three days since Jason “Mayhem” Miller’s sudden jump to the UFC and we still haven’t heard anything substantive on the topic from Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker or anyone else in the lame duck MMA company. A week ago Coker went on a popular MMA “radio” show and danced around the issue of Miller’s future in Strikeforce. He said the promotion was talking to Mayhem’s management about a fight this summer. No mention of the fact Miller was twisting in the breeze without a contract. No mention that the UFC might stick its beak in. Used to be, it felt like a waste of time to ask Coker questions because it was hard to get a straight answer out of the guy. Now it feels like it’s a waste of time because he may no longer even know what’s going on inside his own company.

For all his talk about his ongoing commitment to “growing Strikeforce and making it work,” it’s pretty clear that Coker (and maybe Strikeforce itself) has become the metaphorical equivalent of a WWE referee. He’s just a dude standing the middle of the ring in an official-looking outfit, desperately pleading for order while the battle rages heedlessly around him. No one is listening. No one is even pretending he has any power anymore. That’s sad, because Coker seems like one of the sport’s legitimate good guys, but the quiet loss of Miller last week is maybe the most compelling evidence yet that it’s only a matter of time before that phone call from Vegas comes in, informing the Strikeforce staff that the charade is over.

(“That’s a great question, Fabricio. Actually, Chuck and I have found that through careful investment research it’s possible to locate dependable mutual funds that can average as much as 12 percent annual growth over the long term.”)

Look, we gotta believe there are a limited number of fake jobs that Zuffa, LLC can possibly make up for aging former fighters as the company’s way of saying, “Thanks for getting punched in the head for so many years so Dana could buy a new Ferrari.” Chuck already has one, Matt Hughes obviously wants one and now MMA grandpa Randy Couture is making noise about wanting one too. Not for nothing, but if we were Liddell we might be getting a little nervous right now. I mean, if you could choose to have Couture as your phony Vice President of Business Development instead of THIS GUY, you’d do it in a heartbeat, right? Office politics can be a bitch that way.

(“This guy knows how to eat.”)

Frank Mir thinks Alistair Overeem will suffer a similar fate as Mirko Cro Cop if and when he finally fights for the UFC.

Either Mir doesn’t know anything about Overeem or he’s trying to needle his way into a fight with the heavyweight Strikeforce, DREAM and K-1 champion  when he transitions to the Octagon. Whatever his intentions are, it’s likely the only thing Mir will succeed in doing is pissing off “The Reem.”

Here’s what he had to say in a recent interview he did with MMA30′s Dave Farra:

“With all the guys with the wrestling ability I dont think Overeem will do as well as a lot of the fans would like him to do. Obviously the guy’s from from K-1 and I can’t say enough about his stand-up. He’s a great fighter and he has a pretty wicked guillotine — at least he did at light heavyweight he [did],” mir explained. “I haven’t really seen him establish it since he put the weight on. He has some submissions off his back and he moves around, but he’s been fighting in boxing rings and stuff, but going to fight in the cage, which he’s he’s had fights in cages, but you get someone like a Velasquez or Carwin or Brock, they’re going to change levels and push you against a cage and rip you down. So I think Overeem is going to have to deal with the cage now. When youre a striker, it’s an issue.”

(“What can I say? Beef jerky and flattops don’t pay for themselves.”)

As the rest of us scramble to get our taxes done in the hopes of getting back a nominal return, the world’s highest paid athletes laugh at us from their million-dollar penthouse apartments as they light thousand-dollar cigars with hundred dollar bills as their accountants write checks to Uncle Sam on their behalf to cover what they owe for the year.

Sadly, what the top ball throwers, dribblers, catchers, hitters and kickers pay out in yearly taxes equals more than many of us will make in a single year as long as we live. According to ESPN The Magazine, former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar is a member of that elite club as well.

(Vid: YouTube/DEMusicGroup)

Alright, we take back all those jokes we made about people who think the world will end in 2012. The apocalypse is clearly upon us, as it has just come to our attention that Arianny Celeste apparently fancies herself some kind of singer now. Just let that news sink in for a moment before reading on … We knew she dabbled, but surely these new apparently professional aspirations can only mean the end of western civilization as we know it, right? I mean there are bad ideas, and then there is the fucking Titanic. There is the Hindenburg. There is leading your army into Russia in the dead of winter. Allowing this attractive, halfway famous girl who has no doubt always considered herself pretty good at karaoke to think she can try her hand at making actual “music” ranks right up there with the worst of them.

Nonetheless, there’s our beloved AC starring in the above video, introducing a “sneak peek” of her “debut single” titled “Fight to Love Me” (Get it? Because she’s a UFC Octagon girl …) which she promises will be out soon with the help of something called the DE Music Group. At first, we thought it must be a joke. The lyrics here are (naturally) cartoonishly bad, the “beat” sounds like somebody made it on a hacked version of some Russian production software from the 80s and if you don’t squint a little bit and lean away from the computer every time she tries to hit a high note, well, you don’t have your speakers turned up loud enough.

(Belcher, seen here prior to getting that giant picture of Carl Perkins tattooed on his left arm. Pic: TigerMuayThai.com)

If Alan Belcher manages to return from the detached retina that nearly ended his career last year and can recapture anything close to the 4-1 form he showed during his five most recent fights in the Octagon, it’ll be one of 2011’s true feel good stories. Belcher has always struck us as one of the sport’s more likable characters, so when he tells Sherdog this week that he’s interested in returning to the UFC as soon as September, that’s great news. Only thing is, we wish Belcher would show just a touch more originality in deciding who he wants to fight in his comeback bout. Pretty much the usual suspects here:

“(Michael) Bisping is an asshole who disrespects the sport and his opponent,” Belcher tells the Dog. “A fight between me and Michael Bisping is something everybody wants except for Michael Bisping. It would be amazing to sign that fight and have him come to my backyard. He always gets to fight in Britain and other places, but it’d be good to see him come down to Louisiana. I’d love for that to be my comeback fight.”

Yep. Bisping. The ol’ standby. And in case you’re wondering, Belcher wouldn’t turn down a fight with Wanderlei Silva, either, though he sounds a little more reasonable about Silva’s standing in the division than some of the other dudes who’ve called out “The Axe Murderer” recently …

(Vid: Playboy.com)

Just a couple of days before the semifinalists in our ’2011 Hottest Women in MMA Grand Prix’ are revealed and we thought you could use a little scouting video. What you’ll find above is a subtle little film from the artistes over at Playboy where Octagon girl (and tournament two-seed) Brittney Palmer dresses up like a slutty Power Ranger and plays video games in the most sexually-charged way possible against some lady named Jo Garcia. We’re led to believe Ms Garcia is some variety of Playmate, but whatevs. When we saw it, we thought of you, Nation. Need convincing that this is something you should invest just under two and a half minutes in? “I’m so on top of you right now,” Garcia says to B-Palm at one point. Watch the vid, then come back on Thursday to find out who stays in the running for the big gold belt, the medal, the trophies, the oversized check and the wreathy crown.

(“I survived the Full Tilt Poker bust and all I got was this crappy jacket.” Too soon? Pic: WSOP.com)

The federal indictments lobbed at three top poker websites late last week – including noted fight sponsor Full Tilt Poker – continue to cause a troubling ripple effect in the MMA world, new reports indicate. You may have already seen the stories over the weekend about how much the sudden absence of such poker site dough may or may not adversely affect the bottom line of individual fighters, but notable sports business reporter Darren Rovell (who works a lot on ESPN) now says the charges against Full Tilt also mean the loss of an important upcoming deal for the UFC.

“The UFC had a huge new sponsorship deal on the table with Full Tilt that will now go out the window with the feds bust,” Rovell tweeted on Monday afternoon. This came on the heels of a story from MMA Junkie quoting agent Ken Pavia saying the poker shutdown “will severely impact fighters’ sponsor revenue, which traditionally matched their show pay for our televised clients.”

So yeah, any time big sponsors drop out (or get indicted) and their money gets taken out of the pockets of fighters and the coffers of the only important company left in the industry, we have to do the Dennis Hopper voice again: Bad things, man. For those of you who may have actually gone outside or done things with friends/family over the weekend, a short recap of the story and some reflection on what it might mean for MMA are after the jump.

(“Tell us again how you chased down that robber and held him until the cops came. That was awesome.”)

An undisclosed injury he is currently rehabbing coupled with a desire to get bigger, better, stronger and faster the next time he steps into the Octagon has prompted UFC light heavyweight prospect Phil Davis to take a brief hiatus from fighting until late 2011.

“Mr. Wonderful” told MMAJunkie recently that besides the nagging injury he is nursing, the other reason why he is stepping away from competing for the time being is to take a look at his last performance — a win over Antonio Rogerio Nogueira last month at UFC Fight Night: Nogueira vs. Davis — and figure out how he could have performed better.

“I really want to make some huge gains inside the gym before I step back in. I’m ready to take one step back,” Davis said. “I’ve got three steps ahead of me. I’ve got one step back, then two forward. That might sound like the cha-cha. But pow – there it is.”

Way to make us all look like underachievers, Phil.

(Assunção is confident that he’ll be a force at 145. Photo courtesy of Eric Langley Photography)

Four years ago Junior Assunção walked out of the UFC Octagon following a disappointing loss to an up-and-comer by the name of Nate Diaz. Soon afterwards he received the dreaded phone call that every fighter hopes will never come from UFC matchmaker Joe Silva telling them to string together a handful of wins in the minor-league circuit and wait to be called back up to the big show.

6-1 in his last seven fights since losing to Diaz, Assunção (11-4) has not lost in three years. Although he says he is willing to fight anywhere the opportunity exists and reveals that he is planning a drop down to his more natural weight of 145 for his next bout,  the current Xtreme Fighting Championships lightweight champion admits he is eagerly and patiently waiting for his UFC callback.

“I’m not specifically looking to go back to the UFC, but I think there would be better competition for me in the there because of the athletes they have. I was fighting at 155 and with the merger of the WEC with the UFC there were a lot of lightweights went to the UFC and it became very crowded,” he says. “My plan is to go down to 145 and I think when I do, I should get a call to fight for them anytime now.”

(Video courtesy of YouTube/bjfromarattlesnake)

Brock Lesnar sat down recently with HDNet’s Mike Straka for the latest episode of Fighting Words and as always, the former UFC heavyweight champ had a lot to say.

We won’t spoil the rare experience of hearing Brock speak candidly and honestly about his life by revealing all of the topics he covered, but we will say that Gus Johnson’s make-up artist made Brock and Straka look remarkably like  Zac Effron and Justin Bieber.

(“I kill a communist for fun, but for a green card, I gonna carve him up real nice.” Pic: Underhooks.com)

It took a while for Dana White and the always capable Sergio Non to really get down to business during the UFC boss’ Wednesday interview with USA Today. Both guys spent a lot of time making the obligatory small talk about UFC 129, Silva vs. Okami and which weight class Frankie Edgar should be fighting in before the actual questions came out of the quiver. Once they began in earnest, White characteristically did not shy away from giving us The Full Dana on any number of topics.

Among them, DW expresses his belief that the UFC didn’t really have any competition in the MMA marketplace, even before the acquisition of Strikeforce. Now, we’re not totally sure how that jives with his claims last month that the UFC is not a monopoly, but whatevs. Moving on … Non also becomes (as far as we know) the first “mainstream” reporter to personally ask White about his company’s denial of media credentials to several high-profile MMA reporters during last weekend’s Strikeforce event. White responds by saying those people he’s banned are “dirty, dirty, dirty” and they’ll never be credentialed until somebody pries the UFC from his cold, dead hands. Throughout it all White lists back and forth between sounding totally likable (which kind of kills us to admit, but it’s true) and sounding a little like Tony Montana from Scarface.

If we had to pick one quote to serve as a microcosm for the whole interview – which we present here admittedly totally out of context – it would be this one: “Listen, I own the fucking thing,” Dana says. “At some point, you’ve got to get over it, you know what I mean?”

(Video courtesy of RuTube/IronWorld)

During a recent interview with the Russian sports news website MixFight.ru, M-1 Global president and the manager of Fedor Emelianenko, Vadim Finkelstein spoke a bit more about his thoughts on the recent acquisition of Strikeforce by Forza LLC, an offshoot of the UFC’s parent company Zuffa LLC. According to the man often referred to by Dana White as one of the “crazy Russian,” he is one of a growing number of people who aren’t buying the UFC president’s claims that in spite of the purchase, things will be business as usual for both promotions.

“The news of the acquisition of Strikeforce by Zuffa caught me so off guard that I initially did not believe it when I got the call from our partners telling us about it, but the next day the deal was reported on both of their official websites. What are my impressions? First of all, I do not believe that Strikeforce will somehow maintains its independence from the UFC and the organizations will continue to work as they did before. I do not believe that they will fight for the fighters’ best interests. I think that the fate of Strikeforce is quite predictable and will be a repeat the fate of other organizations that the UFC purchased.”

(Will watch.)

In spite of the fact that both former PRIDE champions are from completely different weight classes, it looks like a proposed bout between Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Dan Henderson and former pound-for-pound king Fedor Emelianenko has been agreed to in principle by both fighters.

According to a report by MMAFighting that cites Henderson’s manager Aaron Crecy as well as “a source with knowledge of the situation” and an unnamed rep from M-1 Global, Hendo and “The Last Emperor” have both said they would accept the fight if offered.

(My God, the muckraking! Pic: Strikeforce)

After being denied media access to cover last weekend’s Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Daley for CBS Sports (and apparently buying a ticket and going anyway), longtime reporter Loretta Hunt conducted a video chat with fellow scribe Jason Probst on Monday to discuss the ongoing banishment of many of the sport’s best-known journalists from events controlled by the UFC. We missed it, but since Zuffa, LLC’s brazen efforts to marginalize media it doesn’t deem friendly enough to its own interests is perhaps the biggest story consistently ignored by “credentialed” MMA sites (for obvious reasons, right?), we figure some of it needs repeating.

For starters, Hunt claims the honchos at CBS Sports are not impressed that Zuffa continues to conduct media relationships like a 13-year-old girl deciding who can ride the pony at her birthday party. It appears that heavy-hitters like CBS are used to a certain amount of professionalism from the entities they cover and the UFC obviously sorely lacks in that department. Zuffa has been such a pain in the ass that Hunt says CBS might just chuck it the fuck-it bucket and stop covering MMA entirely. So, that seems counterproductive. Her quotes – with props to Fight Opinion for the original transcriptions — and some of our own musings are after the jump …

(“I’m sorry, Chael’s not here right now. I’m his protector personality, Buck the beer-swilling Vietnam vet. Pic: ProMMANow)

Admit it, you missed this crazy son of a bitch. Fresh from his sentencing in federal court in Oregon last week and a few days further removed from what sounded like a contentious initial meeting with the Nevada State Athletic Commission, Chael Sonnen made his first extended public appearance in recent memory on Monday on the MMA Hour over at MMA Fighting. Sonnen’s nearly 40-minute discussion with Ariel Helwani centered mostly on his continued efforts to reapply for a license to fight in Las Vegas, but also touched on many things UFC.

Listing back and forth between his two dominant personalities — sober, straight-talking manly-man and over-the-top middleweight contender — Sonnen admitted his main focus hasn’t been on fighting these last few months, but said he hopes to return to the Octagon sooner than later. The more human side of Sonnen admitted he still needs to “clear the air” with NSAC before moving forward with his athletic career, while his batshit crazy side couldn’t resist simultaneously tossing a few verbal barbs at most of the rest of the UFC roster. It’s not a mystery which quotes we’ll hit you with first after the jump …

(At least he’s done his research. Pic: ESPN)

Uh-oh, we bet somebody is going to get their Twitter in a bunch over this: Former Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal spoke with Five Knuckles over the weekend, breaking down the current Jon Jones-Rashad Evans beef with the kind of simple analogy any pimp could understand. Lawal said that in going back on his original oath never to fight a friend and training partner, Jones displayed the personality traits of a common street prostitute and now “Bones” – ahem – should be treated like one.

“I think it broadsided (Evans), because they both made an agreement (not to fight) and all of a sudden someone reneges,” Lawal said. “I would never fight Daniel (Cormier) definitely, and he would never fight me. Then all of a sudden if he went behind my back and said, ‘I’ll fight Mo on TV’ … that’s a ho move and a ho move deserves an ass whipping. I know none of my training partners that are my brothers would ever pull a ho move like that. If I say I ain’t going to fight my brother, I ain’t going to fight my brother.”

(Video courtesy of YouTube/MMAWeekly)

- The 5 Most Obnoxious Child Stars of All Time (TheRugged)

- Why Miss New Jersey hates me (RangerUp)

- Paul Daley’s manager says win or lose Semtex will stay with Strikeforce for at least 5 more fights (LowKick)

- TUF Times: The 10 Most Bizarre Moments from the Ultimate Fighter (BleacherReport.com/MMA)

- BJ Penn explains shoulder injury that forced him out of UFC 132 (MMAMania)

- Jeff Buckley biopic in the works (ScreenJunkies)

- THIS is how you announce a basketball game (TuVez)

- Daley open to UFC return but he isn’t going to seek out White (CageWriter)

-The ultimate bachelor party guide (MadeMan)

- Bjorn Rebney explains how MTV2 will counter-program the UFC’s counter-programming (FightOpinion)

- Jacob Tucker rocks the NCAA dunk competition (TheScoresReport)

- How to write a Nickelback song (HolyTaco)

(“Attn journalists: Instead of writing that Fedor ‘lost’ we’d appreciate it if you would use the phrase Fedor ‘almost won.’ Thank you, that is all.” Pic: All Elbows)

Since we figure our readers don’t spend a ton of time poking around the “fine print” section at the bottom of UFC.com, we assume very few of you noticed recently when Zuffa, LLC quietly began imposing its “Professional Journalism Policies” on Strikeforce. All told, the policies (which you can read right here, if you really want) are almost 1,500 words of dense legalese that spell out what it takes to be deemed worthy of a Zuffa (or in this case “Forza, LLC,”) press credential and the rules writers and photogs will abide by in order to stay in the company’s good graces. Basically, it’s two full pages that boil down to one big “Or else!” for MMA journalists. While this may be Business As Usual at UFC events, it charts a bold new direction for how Strikeforce will deal with the media moving forward.

We won’t bore you with many of the details, because it’s all pretty standard: No shooting video of the fights, no cheering on press row, etc., etc.. The policies themselves aren’t much different from the ones imposed on journalists by other major sporting events. The difference here is that the people making the rules have historically been fairly heavy-handed in their dealings with the media. The UFC certainly hasn’t been afraid to hand out indefinite bans to some of MMA’s best known and most “professional” journalists, many times for seemingly very petty reasons. This latest development also means that a few major MMA outlets that were formerly credentialed by Strikeforce (including some of the sport’s most veteran journalists) likely won’t be welcome anymore. Any way you slice it, that’s scary news.

(All this talk of finances is really harshing Urijah’s mellow. Pic: CageToday)

Props to our BFFs over at Bloody Elbow for pointing out an odd little singularity in the early UFC 132 betting lines this morning. After bantamweight champ Dominick Cruz and challenger Urijah Faber opened at matching -120 odds, early money appeared to push Faber to as much as a -160 favorite before Cruz stormed back to flip-flop the line. As is it stood in the a.m. on Monday, Cruz was now a -160 favorite, while Faber was a +120 dog, exactly the opposite of where they’d been less than 24 hours earlier.

But what does it all mean, you ask? Well, one of two things: Either the knee-jerk, hair-trigger gamblers blew their wad on Faber only to have opportunists go heavy on Cruz as soon as he became an underdog … or the chimpanzees who get paid to do data entry at these gambling sites screwed it up to begin with. Either way, we know you’re dying to hear more …