Hey Brewer

MMA became a huge sport a few years back when it started to get more PPV buys than both boxing and wrestling. Everyone knows the big names of the UFC, Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture, Rampage Jackson and Tito Ortiz. Spike TV has a popular reality show following up and coming competitors on The Ultimate Fighter. Kimbo Slice, the internet sensation, has brought a whole new group of fans into the MMA world and has enough clout to convince CBS that EliteXC can succeed on network television.

With all of these things taking place it was only a matter of time before “the nerds” started to apply their skills to MMA. I don’t use the word nerds disparagingly, rather I’m referring to people who are looking for new ways to make MMA even more popular and more interesting.

What was Chuck's WHIP in 2007?

Recently I noticed some MMA fantasy leagues popping up and on my last trip to Vegas (for a UFC event) I couldn’t help but notice the amount of money that people were gambling on these fights.

Why do I bring all of this up? Because today I came across this site:

Fight Metric

The guys who run this site have made significant strides in figuring out how to analyze MMA fights. This is extremely difficult because of the differing styles between fighters and the number of different ways in which a fight can be finished.

I’m not sure how long the site has been around, there is obviously still some work to be done but I definitely think it is a great start. Keep an eye on this, pretty soon we’ll know as much about MMA fighters before their fights as we do about pitchers before their big starts.

On last week’s EliteXC Strikeforce event, there was a surprise appearance midway through the show (reminiscent of a WWE event) by Kimbo Slice. Goldberg interviewed him in the middle of the ring and it turns out that he will be fighting on May 31st.

The crazy part about this fight is that it will be airing on CBS! That has to piss off Dana White and the UFC team. The UFC has been around for over 10 years and they’ve never received this kind of exposure from a major network. EliteXC hasn’t even been around for 2 years and they’ve only put on a total of 15 events. Now they have a deal with Showtime to put out a ShoXC event monthly and the rumor is that CBS will be airing a EliteXC special every other month on Saturday.

Kimbo’s opponent is unnamed as of yet but there are rumors swirling about. The 2 fighters I have heard mentioned as opponents are Ron Waterman and James Thompson. As of today, the rumor mill is abuzz with an inside source claiming that the matchup will be Kimbo v Thompson.

Here is Kimbo on Elite XC making his announcement:

The recently aired EliteXC Strikeforce featured some great undercard matches and what was on its way to becoming a great match between Frank Shamrock and Cung Le until Shamrock fractured his ulna.

The first fight that was aired though, Villasenor v Jensen, gave us the best KO of the night by far. Below is the video, I apologize for the poor quality:

My usual weekend routine consists of watching HDNet Fights that I recorded during the week. There tend to be some decent matches, an occasional great knockout and some humorous moments involving out of shape individuals running out of gas three punches into a fight. Today was different though, I was excited about watching Gregor Gracie fight again, having seen him a few weeks ago on a similar event. His opponent was 30 year old Doug Gordon, a decent, run of the mill fighter.

Gracie was easily winning the first 2 rounds and going into the third he just needed to protect himself and not make any big mistakes to earn his 3rd pro victory. Gordon had other thoughts though, this knockout is just vicious, make sure to stay tuned for the 1st replay!

(Sorry for the average quality, but I recorded this off my TV since I could not find it online)

I can’t believe Andrei Arlovski is still making the money he does, especially when he’s fighting on the under card. Probably the biggest under card payday I’ve seen in a while (or ever for that matter). UFC is clearly trying to rehabilitate him into the fan favorite he was, before he decided to start losing all his fights. Regardless, here are all the salaries from UFC 82.

I will totally bite you

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Not that big a deal in itself. BUT, check out this recent quote from “The Bad Girl of Pop” as she discusses her feelings on former boyfriend Chuck Liddell.

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Yeah, this is a couple days late, but in possibly one of the most anticipated UFC matchups we have seen in a while, Anderson Silva defeated Dan Henderson by submission in what was a clinical display of striking and BJJ. First, even though Henderson was a little older (37) than Silva (32), he looked good early on with an unorthodox ground game were he was using his hand to close the mouth of Silva and smother his face. Silva clearly looked uncomfortable with this ruthless tactic that I have not seen since a 4th grade wrestling match with my younger brother on the living room floor.

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OK so I know I have been on a Kimbo kick lately but I have gotten some feedback from people saying that Kimbo is the real deal. While I tend to disagree, I thought it might be interesting to post some possible matchups for him. Dana White take note, this is what the fans want to see!

VS.

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While we all knew our MMA friend Kimbo Slice got his start on the streets, many of you may not have been aware that when we say “streets”, we mean that in the most literal sense. As an orphan, Kimbo hustled panhandled ruthlessly to generate the necessary funds to pay for his Bas Ruten training. I was able to dig up this photo, taken circa 1994, to show where our hero came from. It’s not too hard to see why he is enjoying his time in the limelight and why he is now reaping the financial awards of hard work and sticktuitiveness (totally not a word).

HEY! BREWER!

OK this past weekend Kimbo Slice faced Tank Abbott in a highly anticipated idiotic match up between 2 skilled Mixed Martial Artists street thugs.

While this takes me back to the early days of UFC where you saw sophisticated fighting disciplines like “Street Fighting”, “Hard puncher dude” and “Ass beater supreme”, etc. I must admit that the prospect of watching these two guys (Kimbo & Tank) punch each other 3 or 4 times fell pretty low on my “to do” list.

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