(Note to Anthony: ‘Super Hulk’ isn’t a real weight-division.)

Anthony “Rumble” Johnson has gone from being awesome and stringing together some great knockout wins in the UFC, to washing out because of his inability to make weight. He missed weight three times in the UFC, most epically in his last bout against Vitor Belfort, and now it appears he’s done it again. MMA Fighting’s Mike Chiappetta has the details:

“Another fight, another weight issue for Anthony Johnson. A Friday night bout that will mark his first since his UFC release has been reset at a 195-pound catch weight despite numerous previous announcements it would be contested at 185.

The Titan Fighting 22 bout was originally advertised as a middleweight bout, but on Thursday’s edition of Bloody Elbow Radio, promoter Joe Kelly said that Johnson and opponent Dave Branch had signed catch weight contracts instead. Johnson weighed in at 194.2 while Branch was 189.2.

(This face describes the situation better than any words truly can.) 

We guess when you are able to knockout a guy in the most devastating fashion possible in front of millions of people, you can pretty much call him whatever you want to afterward. If you don’t believe us, just ask Chuck Liddell, or for that matter, UFC middleweight kingpin Anderson Silva. After front kicking Vitor Belfort into hyper-sleep in the first round of their highly anticipated grudge match at UFC  126 and subsequently trouncing Yushin Okami at UFC 134, “The Spider” spent most of 2011 rehabbing his injured shoulder and judging nude body-painting contests like the boss that he truly is. When word got out that he would in fact be rematching world-renowned shit talker Chael Sonnen at UFC 148, the war of words began once again. And per usual, 99.9% of it came from the challenger.

But don’t let the completely falsified percentages fool you, the champ can talk trash with the best of them. Just check out the clip below, in which Anderson offers Wanderlei Silva a little bit of advice on “The Axe Murderer’s” opposing coach/upcoming opponent, Vitor Belfort, after Wanderlei brings it up. Apparently unaware that he still has a microphone on, Silva makes a mistake of Frank Drebian proportions, calling the Phenom “a coward” before realizing what he has done.

Let the speculation over UFC 147′s location end.

After a United Nations convention in Rio forced the UFC to change the original venue, the UFC announced that UFC 147 will still take place on June 23 in Brazil. Specifically, Estádio Jornalista Felipe Drumond – commonly refered to as the “Mineirinho” Arena – in the city of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais will house the event.

Mineirinho Arena is the largest indoor arena in Brazil, capable of holding 25,000 people at full capacity.

Needless to say, the UFC is pretty excited about booking the venue. In a press release sent out by the UFC, UFC Managing Director of International Development Marshall Zelaznik issued the following statement: “It is great for our fans and for the UFC to be able to stage events in new parts of Brazil. The UFC is exploding everywhere in the country and Minas Gerais, being the third biggest state in the country, seemed like the perfect place for this.”

UFC 147 will mark the first time that the promotion held an event in Brazil outside of Rio de Janeiro since UFC Brazil was held in Sao Paulo on October 16, 1998.

(God damn…Randy Couture is looking ROUGH these days.) 

It’s kind of a shame that we’ve barely managed to touch upon the aftermath of what was a fantastic UFC on FUEL event this past weekend, but simply put, UFC 145 has so much more on the line in terms of hype, hatred, and championship gold that the Swedish card can’t help but be placed on the back burner. The light heavyweight championship bout pitting Jon Jones against Rashad Evans has torn fans, friends, and even training camps apart before our very eyes, and we are just a business week away from finally being treated to its conclusion.

And among those divided by this match-up are the very fighters who once ruled the 205 lb division with an iron fist. Everyone from Chuck Liddell to Vitor Belfort to even Frank Shamrock (who was king of the division back in its “middleweight” days) recently weighed-in on the fight, and needless to say, they have it a lot closer than the bookies do at this point.

Let’s start with the division’s very first champion, Frank Shamrock, who was finally able to speak without unknowingly blinding his audience with the illuminating power of his braces:

This fight has a tremendous story behind it, with it having grown out of a friendship that went sour back when these two were teammates. The drama that’s fueling this is incredible. Fans can expect a fight that, stylistically, will be extremely challenging for Jones to overcome, and he’ll have fits with Rashad’s wrestling if he’s able to put Jon on his back. But ultimately, I see Jones being able to inflict more damage and walk away with the belt still in hand. This will be a fight that will not end as easily and devastatingly as Jones’s others have, but rather one of those moments in his career where he’ll have to pull himself up and battle until the final bell. In the end, this fight will help Jon become a better fighter and a better champion, and will endear himself to fans for years to come.

Join us after the jump to hear what the rest of the light heavyweight elite have to say about Bones/Suga.

(Wandy may not know English that well, but in his native tongue the guy is a regular George Carlin.) 

There probably weren’t many of us who managed to catch the 11:30 p.m. stream of The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil‘s premiere episode last night, but needless to say, it was chock-full of exciting finishes and memorable one-liners from coaches Wanderlei Silva and Vitor Belfort, the best of which we’ve managed to snag a screenshot of above. Featuring a mix of 32 middleweights and featherweights vying for a spot in the illustrious, adobe constructed house, TUF: Brazil is looking like it could possibly surpass TUF 15 in terms of pure excitement, even without the help of widow’s peak and butt chin jokes. Follow us after the jump for a GIF break down of all the finishes from last night, courtesy of IronForgesIron.

SPOILER ALERT

(Rony Mariano def. Dileno Lopez via TKO) 

(WTF???!!!) 

Great news for all you subtitle fanatics out there. It looks like this season’s second series of The Ultimate Fighter is going to be broadcast for free starting this Sunday, compliments of TUF.tv. Airing on Sunday nights on Brazilian network Globo TV, the show will be streamed on the website starting at 11:30 p.m. ET/8:30 p.m. PT. Featuring fellow Brazilian sluggers and long time rivals Wanderlei Silva and Vitor Belfort as its coaches, TUF: Brazil has, at the risk of sounding cliche, captured the hearts of the nation, uniting them on a level that a shared hatred of Chael Sonnen could never attain.

The first episode kicks off this Sunday, and will feature eight elimination matches to whittle the thirty-two current contestants down to the sixteen which will enter the house. Being that the season takes place entirely in Brazil, we can expect the ring girls to be incredibly voluptuousness and rocking nothing but body paint for the show’s entirety. Let’s hope Vitor Belfort’s wife takes over in Arianny’s absence. Then again, being that we are in Brazil, we will also likely be treated to more than one tale of childhood poverty and/or City of God-style gang violence. Yin and Yang.

Check out a video preview of TUF: Brazil after the jump. 

(Tom couldn’t handle constantly being asked if the guy he was with was the dude that f*cked Kimbo)

As fans and pundits of the sport, sometimes we forget that the fighters we love and hate to watch in the ring and cage are normal human beings like we are. They have bills to pay, mouths to feed and wives and girlfriends that *most* of them go home to every night.

We’ve been introduced to many of the W.A.Gs of fighters by UFC countdown shows, porno movies, arrest reports and through their own contributions to the sport as managers and fighters in their own right. Regardless of what they do, they support their men through the good and the bad and keep the home front running smoothly while their husbands and boyfriends are away for training camps or competing.

They don’t get a lot of mention by us media types, so we figured we would pay them tribute by posting a gallery of some of the lesser-known ladies behind the well-known fighters in the sport.

“This is a historic moment,” remarked Wanderlei Silva in broken English when attempting to describe the groundbreaking, upcoming season of The Ultimate Fighter set to take place entirely in Brazil. And indeed, it is pretty amazing to see how far the reality show, and therefore the UFC, has come in the past few years; UFC 144 really sent this notion home. A sport once considered a passing trend by its critics has now grown to the point that it can simultaneously broadcast two different reality shows from two different countries, folks, so let’s join in on the celebration.

Set to air on March 25th, The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil has already made huge waves in the Mecca of mixed martial arts, receiving overwhelming support from the country as documented in the above video. Set to coach opposite Vitor Belfort, “The Axe Murderer” recently made one of several appearances to plug the upcoming show, and was greeted with open arms and cries of “When are you going to kill Chael Sonnen?” by the legions of fans lined up around the block. Man, those dudes carry a grudge. Never a man of many words, Silva could only reply, “SOON.”

As we know, TUF Brazil will feature featherweight and middleweight classes doing battle (unfortunately, not against one another) over the course of a twelve episode season, with the rematch between Silva and Belfort to transpire on a separate PPV card, likely in June. Being that this season will feature up and coming Brazilian talent, we would imagine MMA fans will be paying especially close attention, because we are likely looking at future champions in their respective divisions.

Join us after the jump for some more TUF video hype.

(If anyone can explain what is going on in this photo, we’ll give you Carmen Valentina’s digits.) 

After Edson Barboza’s spinning heel kick KO over Terry Etim gave birth to the phrase “falling tree” knockout here on CP, we got to thinking, what other classifications of devastation existed in the MMA highlight-o-sphere? Debates got heated, egos got crushed, and limbs got mangled, but we were eventually able to agree that the next category of KO’s in need of appreciation was that of the “lawn chair.”

What is a “lawn chair” knockout, you ask? Well, it’s that special kind of knockout, perhaps the complete opposite of a “falling tree,” in which the victim’s legs give out from underneath them almost instantaneously after the lethal blow is delivered, often forcing their body to collapse into itself like that of a common lawn chair. And to add insult to injury, the poor son of a bitch often receives an unnecessary strike courtesy of his own knee on the way down. Here are nine of the finest examples, in no particular order.

Chuck Liddell v. Guy Mezger

Ricardo Lamas v. Bendy Casimir

Check out seven more beautiful examples of this phenomena after the jump.

It was on this day three years ago that Affliction held its second and final MMA event, “Day of Reckoning” in Anaheim California. It’s not that the event did poorly at the box office or that it didn’t feature great fights, because the show took in $1.5 million and with names like Fedor Emelianenko, Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Vitor Belfort, Matt Lindland, and Josh Barnett, the line-up rivals any UFC card today. The problem was that the owners of the company tried to pay fighters whatever their asking price because they were friends with most of them, having sponsored them for years.

Case in point, when you are paying Tim Sylvia $800,000 to get KO’ed by Fedor (who only netted $300,000 for the feat), you may need a new business model.

The event, whose main event was broadcast as a pay-per-view with the undercard shown on HDNet,  featured some exciting fights and some dramatic finishes by Emelianenko, Belfort, Barnett and Nogueira.

Behold: a shining example of “kick face“. (Photo: UFC.com)

Brazilian fans are credited with being the most raucous audience in the world, and last night’s fighters gave them plenty to cheer about. Six of the nine bouts ended via knock out or submission*, with five of those stoppages coming in the first round.

Chokes, knees, and even a spinning wheel kick punctuated last night’s fights (*as did a controversial referee stoppage). Pop on in for a motion picture tribute to UFC 142.

As always, praise be to Zombie Prophet.

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The People’s Champion, showing Chael Sonnen how it’s done. Props: @CopperHeartCT

With the UFC’s quick return to Rio de Janeiro, the promotion had high expectations to live up to. Their last visit saw a nearly perfect performance from one of the sport’s most dominant champions, a local favorite earning a quick finish, and (most) Brazilian fighters outmatching their foreign opponents on their ways to victory. It was going to be difficult to entertain the local fans the same way that UFC 134 did, yet the UFC’s return to Brazil netted nearly identical results.

Heading into his title defense against Chad Mendes last night, critics were starting to say that Jose Aldo was beginning to coast his way through fights. That the fight finisher fans grew to love in the WEC had been replaced by a fighter content to go through the motions en route to a decision victory. In front of his home country, Aldo made an impressive statement by finishing “Money” Mendes in the first round.

Mendes displayed improved striking, but that means little when facing the lethal limbs of Jose Aldo. To win this fight–or even stay competitive–Mendes needed to put the champion on his back, yet time and time again his best efforts were thwarted. Though Aldo blatantly grabbed the fence to prevent one takedown, a follow-up attempt from the same position seconds later barely took his feet off the ground. Had he been deducted one point- or ten- it’s hard to imagine the fight going any other way. The brilliant takedown defense and impeccable timing he showed throughout the bout were on full display in the closing seconds of round one. Aldo’s transition to the fight ending knee was nothing short of perfection, something only a dominant striker of his caliber could dream of pulling off.

“I’m not even kidding you, man! It must have been four feet of linguiça. And ‘Humble’ ate the whole thing, just now backstage!” (Photo: UFC.com)

It’s 1 AM in Rio De Janeiro and and the locals have turned out in droves to cheer on their countrymen and wish death upon foreigners. It may not be very sporting of them, but we’ve pretty much thrown professionalism out the window this weekend.

Is Mendes the right Alpha Male to topple Aldo in his own backyard? Does Belfort have enough power to put away one of the UFC’s top heavyweights? And will Palhares’s overwhelming desire to tear limbs apart overcome his instinct to stop fighting in the middle of a bout?

Come join me, Chris Colemon, inside for the answers to these questions and more.

(Video courtesy of YouTube.com/UFC)

Dana White’s latest vlog walks us through the behind the scenes drama at yesterday’s weigh-ins. Before the action unfolds we get to tag along with the multimillionaire fight baron as he soars over the slums of Rio in a private helicopter. Poetry.

Things get interesting when Vitor Belfort checks in at the arena. Watching “The Phenom” gnaw away on a towel of crushed ice like a starved animal as he learns that “Rumble” is nowhere in the vicinity of 185lbs makes Johnson’s massive failure all the more unforgivable. Vitor had the option of stopping his cut and fighting at a catchweight, but ultimately chose the path of the professional and made the contracted weight. That 20% of Johnson’s purse probably didn’t hurt his decision.

Join us back here this evening as we kick off our Liveblog with the prelims on FX!

Totally Looks Like:  Sean Kingston

By now, you’ve probably heard the big news of the day:  Anthony “Hey Yo, Is That My Tummy Rumblin’?” Johnson missed weight today in historic fashion, tipping the scales at 197 pounds.  According to some research that I absolutely did not just do, twelve pounds is the most that anyone has ever blown weight anywhere ever, and you can feel free to correct me in the comments.  Vitor Belfort has agreed to fight a catchweight at 197, but has asked that Johnson weigh-in again tomorrow at no more than 205.

Now, maybe I’m not shocked by this — but damn brotato, how do you miss — how do you go UP a weight class because you have a nightmare cut at 170 and the boss has said you belong at 185, then proceed to bulk up like you got a call from Vince McMahon?  

Serious question: is Anthony Johnson dyslexic with numbers or something?  Just checking.

UFC 142 goes down this Saturday from the HSBC Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and though it doesn’t feature quite as epic a lineup as the UFC’s return to Brazil at UFC 134, the fact that the card has still maintained its two marquee match-ups is something to brag about, if only due to how cursed a card this has been. So if you, like Siyar Bahadurzada, Paulo Thiago, Stanislav Nedkov, and Fabio Maldanado, find yourself watching the action from the sidelines on Saturday night and suddenly in need of some extra dough, then we are here to help. Check out the betting lines below, courtesy of BestFightOdds, and join us after the jump for some sound betting advice.

Main Card
Erick Silva (-525) vs. Carlo Prater (+415)
Edson Barboza (-270) vs. Terry Etim (+230)
Rousimar Palhares (-525) vs. Mike Massenzio (+415)
Anthony Johnson (-110) vs. Vitor Belfort (-110)
Jose Aldo (-240) vs. Chad Mendes (+200)

Preliminary Card
Antonio Carvalho (-225) vs. Felipe Arantes (+175)
Mike Pyle (-460) vs. Ricardo Funch (+340)
Yuri Alcantara (-195) vs. Michihiro Omigawa (+160)
Sam Stout (EV) vs. Thiago Tavares (-140)
Gabriel Gonzaga (-120) vs. Edinaldo Oliveira (-110)

(Man, Rampage is looking ROUGH these days.) 

A fighter’s lifestyle is all about two things: discipline and sacrifice, especially when it comes to the food one eats. Those cookies ‘n cream Oreo fudge brownies your grandma used to make? Now a distant memory. That chili cheese Frito pie you used to eat right out of the bag? A thing of the past. And don’t even get us started on that fast food lasagna you and your buddies got drunk and made last weekend. But fret not, Potato Nation, for newly re-signed UFC bantamweight Miguel Torres is here to show you how to make a meal that will satisfy your inner beast without making you look like Paul Daley at the weigh-ins.

Today’s dish, “Pork Spare Ribs with Tomatillo Chile Sauce.”

We gotta say, if Miguel feels the need to quote Workaholics again in the near future,  he could easily grab a spot on the next season of Celebrity Cook Off. Join us after the jump to learn how to make Vitor Belfort and Mike Dolce’s infamous “East Coast Breakfast Toast.”

(Video courtesy of Sapo/IFI)

If you missed the premiere of the UFC 142 countdown show yesterday, not to worry brohams. We got you covered.

In perhaps the most interesting segment on the show, we get to know undefeated Team Alpha Male featherweight Chad Mendes, who is set to challenge Jose Aldo on Saturday. “Money” has a decent shot at taking the belt from Aldo. Mendes’ doppelganger Urijah Faber has nothing but good things to say about his teammate and points out that he can roll with anybody and submit BJJ black belts and that “no one can match his wrestling.”

Fight journals are an interesting batch of film. More often than not, they are a simple collection of offhand moments in a fighter’s life, usually preempting/hyping an upcoming fight. They are of varying interest levels, but usually reside somewhere between “been there, done that” and “would rather watch new Meisha Tate interview.” However, every now again, we are treated to a stylized, slickly edited piece of film that, regardless of it’s content, is able to pique our interest. We’ve seen it before with the fantastic web series The Reem, and today we’ve managed to stumble over another exceptional fight journal, that of Anthony Johnson, who maybe be looking at a future title shot if he gets past Vitor Belfort at UFC 142, which goes down in less than a week in Rio De Janerio, Brazil.

(Video via YouTube.com/UFC)

Just five months after their last visit to the HSBC Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the UFC returns with another card headlined by native heroes. In UFC 142‘s main event, featherweight champion Jose Aldo — who has now won ten straight fights in the WEC/UFC — looks to make another belt defense against undefeated Team Alpha Male wrestling specialist Chad “Money” Mendes, who will be hoping to put Aldo on his back as much as possible and score some revenge for Urijah Faber’s leg.

In the co-main event, middleweight contender Vitor Belfort returns from his latest injury layoff to welcome Anthony Johnson to the middleweight division, in a matchup that contains too much explosive athleticism for its own damn good.

All 11 fights on the “Aldo vs. Mendes” card feature at least one Brazilian, with Rousimar Palhares, Edson Barboza, and Gabriel Gonzaga making return appearances. The full UFC 142 lineup is after the jump…

(Let’s hope the rematch lasts a little longer.)

During the UFC 142 press conference this morning, the UFC announced that long time rivals Wanderlei Silva and Vitor Belfort have been chosen as opposing coaches for the first international season of The Ultimate Fighter, which will be filmed on location in Brazil and entirely in Portugese, or in Mike Goldberg’s case, Japanese. The debut for TUF Brazil is set for March 25th as of this moment, with the finale being held sometime in June at a location TBD.

(Rumble poses next to a normal-sized human being. Photo via KnoxxGear.)

By Ryan Ventura

For a long time, many fans have felt that Anthony Johnson was too big to be playing around in the welterweight jungle. But now they get their wish and he is making the jump to the middleweight division to face ‘The Phenom’ Vitor Belfort at UFC 142, January 14th in Rio. “I still want to fight at 170,” said Johnson “but I’m excited about making the jump to 185 and we’ll see what happens after this fight is over.”

In a way, this opportunity to fight the legendary Vitor Belfort is coming full circle for Anthony Johnson. The two first met after Anthony’s very first professional Mixed Martial Arts bout back in 2006. “I knocked out my opponent in one minute and nine seconds. Vitor happened to be in the crowd, Shogun Rua was too. After the fight, Vitor gave me props and shook my hand. I never thought I’d be fighting a man who I shook hands with many years ago. I’m a fan of Vitor Belfort and always will be. It’s going to be fun fighting him.”

Continue reading this interview on Lowkick.Blitzcorner.com

ProMMANow caught up with Chael Sonnen over the weekend and they asked the number one UFC middleweight contender if he thinks the rumored bout with Anderson Silva will happen soon. As usual, Chael didn’t hold back especially when talking about Silva’s seeming unwillingness to fight him again and the recent callout he got from Vitor Belfort.

“Listen, I’m gonna go fight whether it’s him or it’s someone else, I’m not gonna hold back. I fight them all. I am the middleweight champion and I take on all comers and he’s an impostor. The clear distinction between the tru champion and that bum is that. I’ll fight ‘em all. I don’t care what their name is, what their record is…big fight, little fight, this fight, that fight…I will fight. Period. Vitor Belfort calls me out, that’s no problem, Vitor,” Sonnen stated. “I will stomp you just as sure as I’ll do this interview today. You mean nothing to me, okay? You wanna fight me? Let’s fight. Got that, Vitor? You challenged me. I accept your challenge, stupid. Now what are you gonna do? Nothing, are you? You just said it ‘cuz you knew my plate was full. Wrong. I will stomp you.”

(Yeah, this is probably for the best.)

It’s been a long time coming. The UFC confirmed today that disturbingly large welterweight contender Anthony Johnson will make the jump to 185 pounds and meet Vitor Belfort at UFC 142 (January 14th, somewhere in Brazil), in support of the Jose Aldo vs. Chad Mendes featherweight title match.

Johnson is riding a two-fight win streak, including a unanimous decision victory over Dan Hardy and a first-round TKO of Charlie Brenneman last month. Due to his habit of packing on mass outside of training camps — which resulted in him blowing weight by six pounds before his 2009 fight against Yoshiyuki Yoshida — speculation about Rumble’s size has hounded him for most of his UFC career. Competing at a more natural weight could be the best thing for his career. Just ask Alistair Overeem, if he ever gets a break between killing people.

(“Your face still has my footprint on it, bro.”)

According to the Brazilian website GLOBO, UFC middleweight champ Anderson Silva and former number one contender Vitor Belfort will be the coaches on the Brazilian version of The Ultimate Fighter, which begins filming in South American country in March 2012.

UFC officials, however told MMAJunkie this afternoon that the report is erroneous, but take the denial with a grain of salt. Remember the company has been guarded in the past when it comes to revealing TUF coaches prior to approximately the month before shooting begins for logistical reasons. The other reason why they could be denying the report, if it is in fact true, is that Silva is likely to face Chael Sonnen in February and it would come off as though they are expecting “The Spider” to win if they were to announce him as a coach, especially if it’s likely that he will defend his title against Belfort at the conclusion of the season. Smoke and mirrors.

Personally, I’d like them to bring in Uncle Chael to coach opposite Anderson. Hell, I’d watch the whole season without subtitles and on mute just to see Anderson’s facial expressions whenever Chael addresses him. It probably won’t happen since 3/4 of the Brazilian MMA fan base don’t know what playing the heel is, which is probably tied into the absence of the Internet in the country and because they often mistake buses for horses.

(Ah, 2007. A very fine year for gogoplatas. / Photo via Sherdog)

By Ben Goldstein

Over the last two decades, MMA has evolved so consistently that fighters are still finding new and unexpected ways to destroy their opponents — while causing fans to spit their beers in shock. We decided to take a lil’ spin through MMA history and identify the single most awe-inspiring technique from each year since the sport’s modern inception. We expect you to disagree with us; there’s a comments section just for that purpose. And away we go…

1993: Royce Gracie’s Rear-Naked Choke
vs. Ken Shamrock @ UFC 1, 11/12/93

(Fight starts at the 3:54 mark)

You have to remember that in the early ’90s, a well-placed roundhouse kick to the head was considered the pinnacle of martial arts. What Royce Gracie introduced to fight fans in his early UFC run was something much more practical, less flashy, and a little bit scary. Gracie’s submission of Ken Shamrock — and the similar hold he used to stop Gerard Gordeau in the finals — proved that skill beat size, and pajamas beat man-panties.

1994: Dan Severn’s Suplexes
vs. Anthony Macias @ UFC 4, 12/16/94

During today’s UFC 140 press conference in Toronto, Dana White was asked about a potential superfight between UFC light heavyweight champ Jon Jones and middleweight kingpin Anderson Silva, “once Jones goes through Machida and Evans” and the UFC president revealed that one of the variables that stands in the way of the bout happening is a likely second meeting between “The Spider” and Chael Sonnen.

“[Jones] just whispered, ‘You can’t look past these guys.’ He’s got two tough fights ahead of him and then Anderson’s gonna continue to fight. He’ll probably end up fighting Chael Sonnen [next]. They’ve got a lot of tough guys in front of them.”

(Damn. Mandy Moore is looking *rough*. / UFC 135 crowd gif via caposa)

- What’s Next for UFC 135′s Winners and Losers? (NBC Sports MMA)

- Exclusive: Paul Daley Discusses Beef With BAMMA and His Desire to Return to the UFC (BleacherReport.com/MMA)

- Here’s That Strange and Awkward Moment From Last Weekend’s Strikeforce Challengers (MiddleEasy)

- EliteXC’s Gary Shaw Tried To Sign Fedor Emelianenko, But Wouldn’t Meet M-1 Global’s Demands (MMA Convert)

- Chuck Liddell Talks Retirement, FOX Deal and ‘Hawaii Five-O’ Cameo (MMA Fighting)

- Save the Day: MMAMania Interview Exclusive With Demetrious Johnson (MMA Mania)

- ‘UFC 135: Jones vs. Rampage’ Exclusive Photo Gallery (TheFightNerd)

- Jeff Monson Asks Pat Miletich, “How Can You Not Consider America a Terror Organization?” (FightOpinion)

- Charlie Brenneman: I Have Everything I’ve Ever Wanted Within My Grasp [Exclusive] (LowKick)

- Vitor Belfort Interested in December Dance Against Winner of Sonnen/Stann (Five Ounces of Pain)

- Dominick Cruz Lives Cheap, Enjoys Cruising in a Honda Civic (5th Round)

- UFC 135: Payout Perspective (MMA Payout)

(Video courtesy of YouTube/UFC)

The UFC uploaded an interview with Wanderlei Silva today in which the former PRIDE middleweight champion discussed his upcoming UFC 139 bout with former Strikeforce middleweight champ Cung Le.

The consummate crowd favorite says that he actually took some time to decide whether or not he’d have enough time to prepare for the short notice bout as a fill in for Le’s original opponent, Vitor Belfort, who bowed out of the event due to injury.

“I was just chilling. I was at home with my son. These days I’ve been teaching classes at my gym. I got a text asking if I wanted to fight at UFC 139. I was in shock. But a good shock. I was planning on fighting again, but I didn’t think it would be so fast. I was preparing to go back in February. I wasn’t sure right away,” he reveals. “I was thinking if I needed more than eight weeks, but I was already conditioned from [my fight with Chris Leben in July]. I took a break from training, since I had no fight scheduled, but now I’m already training good and hard. I was very happy. It was a great surprise.”

(As it turns out, Belfort-brand bottled water mostly consists of hydrochloric acid. Good to know. Photo via LasVegasSun)

Due to an undisclosed injury, UFC middleweight Vitor Belfort will not be showing off his “powerful trunks” against Cung Le at UFC 139 (November 19th, San Jose). Dana White broke the news via Twitter, adding that Le’s new opponent will be another Brazilian legend — none other than Wanderlei Silva.

Silva vs. Le will serve as the co-main event of UFC 139, which will be headlined by the PRIDE-era fantasy match between Dan Henderson and Mauricio Rua. Silva is coming off his 27-second knockout loss to Chris Leben at UFC 132, while Le will be making his Octagan debut 17 months after his rematch victory over Scott Smith.