UFC 88

(Oh, Chuck! Not in the cake, man!)

Over at the UG some users have straight-up crazy Photoshop skillz, kid. Fortunately, they've put them to good use in light of the Rashad Evans-Chuck Liddell fight at UFC 88. Some of them are sloppy, some are downright offensive, and others are surprisingly well-done and imaginative. The one you see above, done by SkeetersMMA, is really on a whole other level. Work like this deserves recognition. Consider this a tip of the old CP cap, Skeeters.

A few honorable mentions are after the jump.

(Props to "Justinmacd" on the UG.)

When Rashad Evans was shown twisting his nipples directly before his UFC 88 fight with Chuck Liddell, we wondered if the Greg Jackson camp knew something we didn't; after all, Evans's teammate Georges St. Pierre did the same thing before his title defense against Jon Fitch last month. Turns out it was just a simple goof on GSP. As Evans explained to TAGG Radio:

"Georges St. Pierre was the first do it, and it's just sort of an inside joke...Georges said it was supposed to be good luck or something, so I said, 'Cool, alright,'" Evans said, laughing.

Good luck, huh? Never heard that one before. Can't wait to try it out at the roulette table.

Evans also talked about the Bill Gates mugshot t-shirt that he wore during his cage-entrance, which bore no apparent sponsors, and which some assumed was viral marketing on the part of Microsoft. If Gates paid Evans to wear it, Sugar wasn't letting on:

"[Gates] was arrested in Albuquerque, N.M. He started off Microsoft in the basement of the Bank One Building. That's right next to the (Team Jackson) gym."

That's the only association right now, but the team is hopeful Gates could become more involved with Team Jackson someday.

"Maybe one day he'll be part of my crew," Evans joked.

Meanwhile, in an interview with MMA Weekly, Evans credited another Jackson teammate, Keith Jardine, for helping him with his strategy for the Chuck fight:

“Keith said ‘you’re gonna get his timing, and there’s a point when you’re going to see em’ coming,’” Evans said. “‘When you see it coming, get off first — don’t sit there and wait.’ And that’s what I did. As soon as he had me against the fence, you can always tell when he’s coming, so as soon as I see him make that face, I just tried to bust off first.”

(Friendship. It's a bitch.)

Matt Hamill may not have fought his greatest fight against Rich Franklin at UFC 88, but he went two rounds and change before succumbing to some brutal body kicks. That's not the outcome you want if you're Hamill, but there's no shame in that, right? Not so, says Hamill's trainer, Duff Holmes (if in fact that is his real name). He blasted Hamill's performance in an interview with Fightline.com, suggesting that Hamill didn't have his mind right going into the fight and questioning his "fighting spirit," among other things:

"I practically begged Matt to take Rich down," said a clearly frustrated Holmes. "I was screaming at him to stop fighting Rich's fight and fight his fight. I can't explain it. He just had this blank look on his face. I don't know where he was, but the Matt Hamill that I know and trained for the past 11 weeks was not in that octagon on Saturday."

[...]

"Reports that Matt wasn't able to take Rich down are completely false. Matt didn't shoot once the whole fight. He didn't try. Matt Hamill is one of the most physically gifted athletes in the UFC. He has double leg takedown that's like he's shot out of a cannon. The guy is an animal; unfortunately that's not the Matt Hamill that showed up on Saturday. He didn't work the game plan."

[...]

"I can't explain it," said Holmes. "The only person that knows why he didn't come out to fight is him. I told him after the fight that his performance was uncharacteristic and that he really needed to do some soul searching to see if this is really what he wants to do. He had absolutely no fighting spirit, no killer instinct. He looked like a shell of himself and was just out there to get through it and that is very disconcerting."

(Couldn't have happened to a nicer person. Photo courtesy of UFC.com.)

Saturday's UFC 88 card took in $2.6 million in ticket revenue, making it the second-highest-grossing event ever held at Atlanta's Philips Arena, next to a Barbara Streisand concert in 2006. The fighters at "Breakthrough" pulled in $1,510,000 in disclosed payouts, with a third of that going to knockout recipient Chuck Liddell. The numbers are below. Unless otherwise noted, each winning fighter's salary represents a doubling of his base pay.

Chuck Liddell: $500,000
Dan Henderson: $250,000 (win bonus was $150,000)
Rashad Evans: $180,000 (including $60,000 Knockout of the Night bonus)
Jason MacDonald: $104,000 (including $60,000 Submission of the Night bonus)
Rich Franklin: $100,000
Kurt Pellegrino: $84,000 (including $60,000 Fight of the Night bonus)
Thiago Tavares: $73,000 (including $60,000 Fight of the Night bonus)
Nate Marquardt: $56,000
Dong Hyun Kim: $46,000
Ryo Chonan: $30,000
Jason Lambert: $17,000
Tim Boetsch: $16,000
Martin Kampmann: $15,000
Matt Hamill: $10,000
Roan Carneiro: $9,000
Matt Brown: $8,000
Rousimar Palhares: $7,000
Michael Patt: $5,000

Underpaid: Not that the dude's going broke, but it's surprising that Rich Franklin's base salary is only $50,000; Rashad Evans makes more than he does (which makes sense now, I suppose). It's also too bad that someone as talented as Rousimar Palhares couldn't negotiate better terms when he joined the UFC.

Overpaid: I'd let Evans knock me the eff out for half of what Chuck got for his little two-round appearance. Seriously. Get in touch with my people, Rashad.

While Fowlkes was dutifully liveblogging UFC 88, I was at New York's 40/40 Club for a viewing party hosted by Matt Serra and his training buddies George Sotiropoulos and Pete "Drago" Sell. Between tense games of eight-ball, the Serra-Longo crew hung out with journalists and answered questions. At one point, I got my Canon PowerShot up in the Terror's face and asked him about his health and his upcoming match with Matt Hughes; the video is above.

Major respect to MMAFacts.com — and their tireless efforts to get MMA regulated in New York State — for putting the party together, and to MMA Mania's Jesse Holland for keeping me company at the bar during the fights. After the jump, a few pictures from the event...