I'm not too sure about that.

Look at Anderson Silva. He beats Chris Leben once and gets a title shot. Once he wins the title, they throw everybody and the kitchen sink at him and he mows them down. Lutter, Marquard, Franklin again, Henderson. And it's not like any of those fights were close, he finished them all.

Look at Dan Henderson, he comes in to the UFC and his first two fights are both for titles.

Look at Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira. Heavyweight champion...which I'm not too sure how I feel about that.

At look at former light heavyweight champion Rampage Jackson. His stoppage against Chuck Lidell was an early stoppage at best. He clipped him, he was down and you could make a very good case that he recovered as the fight was stopped. That was his second fight in the UFC.

That really leaves George St. Pierre and BJ Penn as the two pure UFC title holders in recent memory. Well, Forrest now but we'll see how long he holds it.

It seems to me like Joe Silva (the UFC matchmaker) gave a lot of PRIDE fighters title shots really early in their UFC careers.

Anyways, yeah, I think the Griffin v. Jackson fight could have been scored either way. It's always my belief that in order to win the belt by decision you have to really dominate a fight (see Coutre vs. Sylvia for the definition of a dominating fight). I don't really think Forrest did that. I scored it 10-9 Jackson, 10-9 Griffin, 29-28 Jackson the rest of the fight. That's 47-46 in my book but I'm also an armchair MMA judge. I think the judges looked at the fact that Forrest was the busier fighter both on the feet and on the ground. Submission attempts count for a lot in the judges eyes. The triangle that he had locked up was close to ending the fight. I don't think Forrest took advantage of the mount which is why I don't give him a 10-8 second round. He landed some short elbows but for being in the mount for at least two minutes, he never really hurt Rampage.

I think Rampage got robbed a little bit, but that's what happens when you leave a fight in the judges hands. We all know that.

Though I'd say one of the reasons for them doing this was that before Silva became the man Franklin was dominating the MW division; no one could touch him. What we've seen now with Anderson is exactly what happened when Franklin was champ.



Yeah but you musn't forget that he held two titles simultaneously in one of the world's biggest MMA orgs. Couple that with aforementioned lack of challenge for the new champ and there's no big surprise that Hendo got handed a title shot against Silva. Also the whole "unifying the championships" crap was great marketing so it made sense to throw Hendo up against Rampage.



I feel great about it. Like I've said before: Big Now was Fedor before Fedor showed up. From his debut until his first meeting with Fedor he went undefeated completely dominating every single fighter he faced; for god's sake he even submitted Bob Sapp!

People often whine about the third Herring fight so I'll throw in my two cents here again.
Herring landed ONE GOOD HIT in the entire fight and did nothing with it for fear of Nog catching him (a very real possibility if we check Nog's track-record). The rest of the fight was, in short, Nog dominating and controlling Herring.

Also, let's face it, Tim Sylvia is bad for business. The guy doesn't really have too many fans and with CroCop gone and Kongo still too green the only acceptable candidate for a title fight should be the guy who was, at one time, seen as the best heavyweight in the world and is still seen as one of, if not the, best grapplers in MMA. Big Nog did exactly what I expected him to do in the fight and got the title well deservedly; it's not like he got it from some bogus decision. He finished Sylvia in the most clear-cut way possible: by submission.



I've checked that fight many times and that stoppage was well justified; Liddell was far from recovered on the ground. His jaw was slacking, his eyes were glazed over and his hands were at his sides (at one point even going limp). Rampage did exactly what all the old Pride fans knew he would do, and that was basically why he got the fight; maybe the people at Zuffa wanted a new Iceman, maybe they wanted Liddell to avenge his loss or maybe they just wanted the storyline of "They've met before in a 'close' fight" (and I'm not kidding, that's basically how it was marketed). All I know for sure is that Rampage has got Liddell's number and is a horrible match-up for ye olde Iceman.



Most of these fighters however, as I mentioned above, were huge names in Pride so it would only make sense to do that. If we're talking weird shots given I'd give my vote to Gonzaga; he was FAR from ready to fight for the title yet still got the shot. This probably has something to do with the UFCs compulsory title-fight at every PPV.

I won't comment on the Griffin/Rampage fight as I haven't seen it yet but I will say this: The judges in the UFC have been rather iffy lately. People started scrutnizing them after Bisping/Hammill (and for good reason) and they sure as shit haven't been marketing Rampage AT ALL. Meh, I didn't really have any stock in this fight anyways; I'm just waiting for them to give Machida his long-due shot (HAH, yeah right, like that will ever happen) and for them to revise their rules because, frankly, they suck pretty hard.

Yeah, my points were just counter points to the "Dana doesn't like Pride guys having belts" argument. If that were the case, none of these guys would have been current, or former UFC champs. I think Dana and the UFC want the best, most exciting champions holding the belts. Just look what happened to Sylvia. He has a good record in the UFC. He loses to Big Nog, then gets cut. Why? He's a boring fighter. He held the belt for a long time and whenever he was headlining an event, I never watched his fights. I ordered the PPV but when the main event came up, I turned it off. All he did was jab, jab, run, jab, jab, run.

You'd think if the UFC wanted UFC guys to have the belt, they would have kept him in the mix. I'm pretty sure that Timmy could have won a couple of fights against some tin cans and gotten a rematch. But again, he's boring as hell to watch.

The only reason Griffin is champion is because he beat Shogun. Well, and Rampage but anyways. Had Shogun won that fight he would have been the one fighting Rampage for the belt. Nobody except Forrest went in to the Shogun fight thinking he was going to win. Shogun v. Griffin was almost a warm up fight for Shogun before fighting for the belt.

So I think that saying Dana doesn't want PRIDE to have belts isn't true. I think Dana wants the best and most exciting fighters to have belts. There are a lot of guys in the UFC you could make arguments for that they earned a title shot before the PRIDE guys came in.

And FYI - Chuck did get KTFO in my eyes. I was just saying you could make an argument against it.

Also FYI - I love Machida's style. People say it's boring, but I love watching him fight. Every time I see him fight, I am always thinking the other guy is saying to himself "WTF!??!?!!?"

I agree with the "leave it in the judges hands comment".

But really, you don't think Dana would rather have HIS boys hold the belts? I don't know if I buy that. How many years has it been that people have been talking up Pride and UFC down? People still do it today. Fedor is the best HW. Fedor can topple Sylvia, Fedor can beat Coture. Wandy could destroy Chuck. Quinton owns Chuck. Who in the UFC can beat Crocop? So UFC eventually buy Pride so we can make these dream matches happen. You don't think theres any disdain left from all those years of shit talk? Dana wants HIS boys to win. Franklin, one of Dana's Boys. Hughes, one of Dana's Boys. Anyone to ever win or come from the hit cable television show The Ultimate Fighter, automatically Dana's Boys. It makes his product look better and even though Zuffa owns Pride now and is in essence no more, having UFC guys beat ANY Pride guy is showing that their product was always the superior product. He gave Pride guys title shots quick because for one, they deserve it. Pride guys that came into the UFC due to the merge were automatically ranked high if not at the top. Just because they're new to the UFC, doesn't mean they should go through the ranks. They've proven themselves that they are at the top albeit in another organization.

C'mon do you think Dana White would rather Quinton hold a UFC belt than Chuck Liddell? Of course not. Do you think Dana would rather Anderson Silva hold the belt than Rich Franklin? Nope.(But this can't be helped cause Anderson is better than anyone in that weight class) Do you think that Dana would want Tim Sylvia, who reigned at the top of the UFC HW division be put away with ease by Fedor or Big Nog or any HW from Pride? Of course not. It makes his company look bad if all this happens. Crocop losing twice, Wandy losing to Chuck, Forrest beating Quinton, anytime a Pride guy comes to the UFC and loses. All of this makes Dana smile inside and I don't care what anyone says otherwise cause I just can't buy it.

Whatever though, Pride will soon become an afterthought and no one will care anymore cause everyone will be UFC at that point. It will be sort of like arguing whether ABA players were better than NBA players. What does it matter now? It doesn't.

Everyone go and support "Dream".

For the record I love Forrest and am not too upset that he won. Congrats to the man.

My apologies man. I should've spoilered my comments. Next time remind me so I won't do such an idiotic thing again. I'd hate to ruin the outcome for anyone.

QFT; Prime example of this was Sylvia/Vera. Mah Gawd that fight was boring!



This is very true though a big problem in that fight was Shogun's lack of preparation and his underestimating of Griffin. Say what you want about Griffin but the kid's got more heart than most fighters outside of Japan today.



Yeah, but that's like making an argument that Bisping beat Hammil.

Machida kicks ass and his track record proves it. No one in the LHW division has been able to touch him and he's never in danger during his fights. I really can't see how people find him boring... is it because they know he's going to win?

For all you Rampage fans out there, he was arrested today on felony hit and run and felony evade today. Arrested at gunpoint.

http://mmamania.com/2008/07/15/quinton-rampage-jackson-arrested-on-felony-hit-and-run-charges/

You know, I think the hardest part of the whole story for me to stomach was the fact that he has his image plastered all over his truck. Seriously.

Anyways, it's a great chance for the UFC to reach a new demographic - inmates.

Edit: Oh yeah, and reckless driving.

Why Rampage, why?

Well, I guess with a nickname like that we should've seen it coming... especially when he's had the brilliant idea to plaster his mug all over the car

Seriously. You could pretty much put this story at the top of the world of MMA craziest stories list. By far. The Sean Shirk/Hermes Franca thing, The Randy Couture thing. The Tito Ortiz thing. Aw man, this is gonna end up on shit like Nancy Grace and The O'Riley Factor. It's gonna be all about how fighters are nothing but thugs, human cock-fighting, blah blah blah. I don't want to have to deal with that all over again. It's finally moved on from that old tired topic to how MMA is going to dethrone boxing. What's really bad is we don't even know why he took off yet.

Oh well, it's pretty cool that he at least got to have the belt for a minute. It's also pretty cool he was able to defend it against "Dangerous" Dan Henderson, Dan "Hollywood" Henderson, or whatever his nickname is. Still, it must feel like going from the penthouse to the outhouse pretty quick.

What the fuck was he thinking?

Anyways, I'm just counting down till Affliction.

Don't forget that one of the presidential candidates started this whole "human-cockfighting" back in the day...

We'll see what happens next with Rampage; maybe a fight against Machida?

More like a trip to the psychiatric ward. Literally.

http://mmamania.com/2008/07/17/report-quinton-rampage-jackson-arrested-again/

Man, this just keeps getting weirder and weirder by the minute. I would say by the day, but he's not giving it that long.

The Last Emperor, victorious. No one in the UFC can touch him.

Darth Fedor:

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/se ... lvia_sport

I have never heard of TKO by eyepoke. UFC is a joke.

Two things were proven last night. One, Fedro still has it. Two, Anderson Silva is just crazy good. Sorry if this is a spoiler for anyone, but tough, because UFC was for free.

Fedor is a bad ass.

It's true.

Not only that...

Where are the Wanderlei Silva fights, they finally got him to sign a contract, so give him some fights. And where has Arlovski been?

Uhhh..Silva just destroyed Keith Jardine in 36 seconds(highlight reel knockout) and The Pitbull signed with Affliction, just destroyed Ben Rothwell looking like his old self again, and is next in line to take on Fedor...who happened to choke out Big Tim in just 36 seconds(highlight reel submission). Damn that's eerie...

This just made me laugh so hard. I can't get the image out of my head of Slampage driving around in a monster truck, just bugging out.