You may have noticed things have slowed to the point of stopping here at Blood, Booze and Bruises. It’s going to stay that way for the time being because I’ve started contributing on a new fight blog called The Rumble. It’s a partnership between The Sporting News and No Mas under The Sporting News banner. Go ahead, ask your dad about The Sporting News, he used to subscribe.

The blog covers the worlds of boxing and mixed martial arts and I’ll be one of the guys writing about MMA. It’ll be just like here, but I’ll be doing it more often.

It’s pretty much the greatest and most violent sports blog ever written. I’ve been told I’m working with a very talented crew over there. The one thing everyone has in common is a love of combat sports. That means there will be no pointless boxing vs. MMA arguments. They’re both special in their own way.

So in review, you can now read my MMA scribblings at The Rumble. I’ll be posting under my actual name at The Rumble so prepare for a culture shock. Oh, and fear not, old school CRM fans – I’ll still be putting in work at TBL. Until next time – Mahalo.

This video is from his 2002 Pride debut against Alex Stiebling. Be entertained…

This is easily my favorite Michael Jackson song. Not that I like Michael Jackson. Its just that this song was used during the Seinfeld clip show. Other than that, I would have no reason to care about this song. Just like I’ll always love Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now because of its inclusion in Shaun of the Dead. And More Than a Feeling after the Air Band episode of Scrubs. What was I talking about?

Oh yeah, this is the kind of thing that would push Anderson to the next level of popularity in the US. Well, that and speaking English.

Anderson is one of the top 3 pound-for-pound fighters in the world – if not #1. He should be marketed as such. He needs to be made into a cross-over multimedia star. Maybe the UFC can get him on True Blood as some sort of Brazilian vampire. Or the next Twilight movie. Something with vampires. We get Anderson Silva associated with vampires and the sky is the limit. Until then, we’ll just have to settle for old videos and more ass-kickings.

[h/t: Bloody Elbow]

A couple weeks ago this was looking like a tremendous card. There were going to be something like 7 championship bouts. Then some people got hurt, some people had a bad trip and others decided they didn’t have enough time to flush drugs out of their system. Now we’re left with the titular title fight and some leftovers.

Where once we had a championship fight of Joe Riggs vs. Nick Diaz we now have Jay Hieron (17-4) vs. Jesse Taylor (13-3). Hieron is one of the Affliction castoffs. He’s on a 5-fight win streak and last fought at Affliction: Day of Reckoning in January. Taylor on the other hand has already fought 6 times this year including twice last month. He’s probably fighting right now. Taylor was one of the best fighters on TUF 7 and he’s been on a tear since getting kicked off the show and then dropped from the UFC. (Remember, those were 2 different occurrences.) I’d like to see JT-Money continue his streak because he’s a fun guy to watch. He’s a danger to himself and everyone around him, but from the safe viewing from my couch, he’s great.

The last fight added to the main card was Mike Kyle (12-6-1) vs. Fabricio Werdum (11-4-1). Originally, this was supposed to be a title fight between Werdum and Heavyweight Champ Alistair Overeem. The champ had to pull out though. That’s -2 championship fights if you’re keeping count.  Kyle went 2-1 in the UFC with a win over James Irvin a few years back. He’s won 3 straight after a rough stretch that saw 3 L’s and a D. Werdum is fresh out of the UFC. Werdum went 2-2 in the big show with wins over Brandon Vera (controversial stoppage) and Gabe Gonzaga. He lost to Andrei Arlovski and Junior dos Santos. I’m guessing Werdum pummels Kyle.

Hey, finally, a title fight! Oh, its an interim title? Who cares!? There’s going to be a big shiny belt on somebody’s waist at the end of the Mistuhiro Ishida (18-5-1) vs. Gilbert Melendez (15-2) fight.  Melendez has held the Strikeforce Lightweight Title and now the Interim Lightweight Title. (As the poster above shows, it was originally supposed to be a title unification bout.) He also once held the WEC LW belt. Ishida is fighting for the fake belt despite the fact that he’s coming off a loss. (What a challenger!) Though to be fair, he did win his last fight under the Strikeforce banner last year. Also, he beat Melendez back in 2007. I’m going to guess Melendez gets his revenge Saturday. He has fought for many belts (both real and make-believe) before so the harsh lights of Showtime shouldn’t bother him.

In the Light Heavyweight division, we get an actual championship fight. Gegard Mousasi (28-2-1) vs. Renato “Babalu” Sobral (35-8) was originally scheduled for Affliction: Trilogy, but that didn’t happen so Strikeforce scooped up the bout. Babalu won the Strikeforce LHW belt back in late 2008 and hasn’t defended it since. Babalu has gone undefeated since he was tossed from the UFC for holding onto a choke for too long. Like I said then, he needs to win and win a lot to get back to the UFC. With the new war, he could become one of Strikeforce’s tent poles. To do that he’ll have to beat the young, but experienced, Mousasi. He’s won 12 straight fights including 6 in 2008. His last 5 fights have come in DREAM. He already has his next fight scheduled for October against Sokoju. This will be Mousasi’s first fight on American soil. I’m guessing Babalu, one of the top 205-lbers in the world, give the younger Mousasi his first setback in 3 years.

Finally, we have the main event. The first female 145 pound title fight in Strikeforce’s history. It features the face of Women’s MMA and a truly scary woman. Gina Carano (7-0) vs. Cris “Cyborg” Santos (7-1) will be the first Women’s fight to headline a major show. Cyborg is favored in Vegas, but Carano is favored in the hearts of the fans. (The male fans at least.) The main concern for Carano might be ring rust. She hasn’t fought since EliteXC went under while Cyborg most recently earned a TKO in April. The most interesting part of the fight could be the weigh in. Both ladies have a history of not making weight. And not just missing weight. I’m talking around 5 pounds over. This could be the inaugural Welterweight Women’s title by Saturday night. My question – If only one woman makes weight, does she get the belt?

This will also be the first time either fighter could go longer than 15 minutes. (Cyborg once, Carano none times) Most women’s fights are 3, 3-minute rounds. This will be 5, 5 minute rounds. Who knows what happens if this thing gets to a 4th round. A double-pass out is possible. I’ll be rooting for Gina Carano as I always root for good looking people, but I think Cyborg wins the first ever women’s title.

Torres was a tremendous champion and I can’t wait for him to get back to the top. He’s a tremendous fighter. If you’ll recall, last Friday at The Big Lead I correctly predicted that one of the top fighters in the world would lose that weekend. Boy was I right.

From what I remember Sunday, the entire card was decent. Someone said it was even better than UFC 101. I wonder if Forrest stood still long enough to watch?

Anyway, starting tomorrow I’ll be looking at the Strikeforce card and all the problems they’ve had. I think at one point Gina Carano was supposed to fight one of the Shamrocks. Crazy stuff.

WEC replay starts at 8pm.

The headliners will be the title unification bout between Brock Lesnar and Frank Mir and the (spoiler alert!) highlight knockout of Mike Bisping by Dan Henderson. The 5-round bad-hammy take-down clinic of Thiago Alves by Georges St. Pierre will not be shown due to time constraints and potential boredom to casual fans.

Here’s the rest of the free replay:

Middleweights
Alan Belcher vs. Yoshihiro Akiyama
Light Heavyweights
Stephan Bonnar vs. Mark Coleman
Lightweights
Shannon Gurgerty vs. Matt Grice
Light Heavyweights
Jon Jones vs. Jake O’Brien

I’ll have to DVR this because I want to see how Stephan Bonnar lost to Mark Coleman. I imagine during the replay I’ll be chanting, “Dusty old bones, full of green dust.” I’m also glad that the public will get to see Jon Jones. (Who!?)

Chuck Liddell makes a cameo in a new Funny or Die video called “The Ballad of G.I. Joe.” The Iceman has really been showing his acting chops lately. First with Mandy Moore’s latest video and now as Gung Ho. As you can see, the similarities are striking.

Of course, Chuck isn’t knew to Hollywood. Who could forget his incredible performance as “himself” in Bachelor Party Vegas?

Or as himself in Entourage? (Part 1 and 2) It’s nice to see Liddell finally breaking the mold and showing some range.

[h/t: clown via the MLJ Batphone]

That’s not suspicious or anything. I guess he learned his lesson from Josh Barnett. It’s kind of a selfless act if you think about it. Whenever the California State Athletic Commission says somebody’s dirty, a shitload of people lose their jobs. Taylor will be fighting Jay Heiron who replaced Joe Riggs. Riggs had to withdraw because he had an adverse reaction to a drug. Ironic!? (Not really.)

Apparently CSAC didn’t give Diaz enough time to flush the marijuana out of his system. What a freaking joke.

Jesse Taylor is 13-3 as a profesisonal. Since he lost to CB Dollaway at the Silva-Irvin Fight Night, he’s won 7 fights. That’s 7 fights since July 19, 2008. He fought and won twice last month in a span of 9 days.

This will be Taylor’s return to the spotlight. (Unless you count his DREAM debut a few weeks back.) Now he’s fighting at the 2nd biggest promotion in America. Maybe he’ll celebrate his comeback by kicking out the window of a limo. I hear that’s what the cool kids do. That and smoke weed and skip drug tests. That’s the new hot fiyah.

[via MMAjunkie]

[h/t: @harlingtoxad]

There were many moments that you’d never seen before at a UFC event. Things that either made me laugh or raise an eyebrow. Most of the raised eyebrows came at the expense of Forrest Griffin. I’ve put together some screen caps to help illustrate what I’m talking about.

The pre-fight-hype package ends with Forrest saying “I can guarantee I’m not going to lose.” Famous last words.

The lights go dim, and the familiar sounds of the Dropkick Murphy’s start. All is normal. Then we see Forrest, running from his locker room. He’s obviously ready to go. As he jogs through the crowd, one of the security guys brushes past him and Forrest seems… surprised.

Then some fans start to touch him and he seems confused. Who are these people? It’s been 10 seconds and he already doesn’t seem himself. He seems more distracted than confident.

When he got down to the Harley Davidson Gets Naked Square the cageside official told him to hug all his corner guys like they toold every fighter all night. Told he could hug his friends, Forrest said no and they had an awkward moment.

There will be no bro-hugs for the Griffin corner tonight. The official asks again to see everyone hug and Forrest again says, “No thanks.” He obviously just wants to get this over with.

He then has his gloves checked. Every other fighter you saw on Saturday night had their gloves check and then the guy from the commission initialed the tape. He didn’t do this for Forrest.

Griffin then got in the cage and went to the wrong corner.

Forrest is nothing but nervous kinetic energy at this point. He doesn’t really seem to have his bearings. It doesn’t matter. He’s in his corner, safe for the last time. Cue DMX.

If Forrest is kinetic, Anderson Silva is potential energy. He’s doing his little Silva-shimmy and just looking generally cool as a cucumber. He shimmies and preens. He looks far off and focused as he always does. He spends most of his walk-in time looking around the Wachovia Center. Presumably wondering where the championship banners are.

He’s also wearing socks, shoes and a sweatshirt around his waist.

Anderson does take the time to hug and kiss each of his loved ones.

It’s like team Silva is dropping Anderson off at the airport while Forrest was trying to catch a cab in New York City.

Anderson makes faces as he gets frisked for possible weaponry and gets Vaseline’d up. Then he crawls into the octagon.

He does his usual dance around the cage and settles into his corner. Then we get to see the tale of the tape. As you can see, Griffin is huge and Silva is tiny. At least that’s what we’ve been hearing all night.

Forrest is an inch taller and has shorter arms. They also both weighed in at 205 the day before. Forrest reportedly gets up to near 220. I’ve heard that Anderson’s walk-around weight is somewhere in the 225 range. I’m guessing Silva put on a solid 5-10 pounds. The size difference as you’ll see in the staredown is negligable.

Forrest is introduced. He’s still doing everything he can to get psyched. Pounding his chest, jumping up and down and screaming. He’s exaggerating every action. Notice how all the screen caps of Forrest are blurry.

Then there’s Anderson. When he gets booed, he starts making faces as if to say, “yikes!” Except, ya know, in Portuguese.

I crack up every time I see this part.

Let’s go.

Look at that size. It’s like Jeff Monson and Tim Syvlia. They head back to their corners for Forrest to continue bouncing nervously while Anderson does his usual standing patiently waiting to destroy whatever presents itself.

As the action starts, Forrest throws a head kick which misses and that’s the closest we come to a strike in the first minute. The Anderson catches a kick and pushes Forrest. Everyone has a James Irvin flashback.

Then Anderson gets aggressive. The passive champion pushes forward.

By the 2:40 mark, Mike Goldberg notes that Forrest is already looking at the clock. Less than 3 minutes into the fight.

They exchanged a couple shots at close range that did nothing to Silva. At this point he starts to yell at Forrest. Griffin is clueless. He shrugs as if to say “What do you want me to do?” Anderson starts to get right in front of Forrest and drops his hands to his side. He’s challenging Forrest to hit him.

Forrest does not comply. As FightMetric points out, Forrest landed 1 of 35 strikes.

Anderson knocks him down for a second time. This time he offers to help him up. The showing up of Forrest Griffin is in full effect.

Anderson continues to let Forrest swing. At the 1:50 mark, Forrest again looks at the clock. Not long after, he’s on the canvas via a fadeaway jab. He celebrates by doing this. (Via UFC.com)

Then to cap off Forrest’s weird night, he immediately jogs back to the lockerroom.

I’ve never seen anything like this. Rumors immediately started flying. He broke his jaw. He was running to get medical attention. Even that he lost partial hearing. (What?)

At one point during the aftermath, you hear a fan yell “Forrest, what the fuck!?” Indeed. Joe Rogan rightfully called it one of the most embarassing knockouts we’ve ever seen.

After the replay, Anderson jumps on the cage to encourage his fans to cheer. After all, isn’t this exactly what everyone wanted? Forrest joked that the UFC wanted a big slow guy to chase Anderson around. Everyone thought this fight would be great because Forrest would push the pace and encourage Silva to do something spectacular. And it happened.

The question that really sums up the night is, “Forrest, what the fuck!?” Griffin said prefight that Anderson Silva makes good guys look bad. And did he ever. Forrest looked slow and couldn’t land anything. Everything about the night for the former Light Heavyweight champion seemed off. Did he realize that he was basically a sacrifial lion? A gladiator that was supposed to lose? Come home on your shield, or not at all. Forrest did neither.

Rumors around the internet is that Forrest is taking this loss really hard. He ran out of the octagon looking hurt and embarassed. Was there something wrong with him? Did he take a shot to the head warming up on Saturday? Was he out with Ryan Howard the night before the fight? Or was he simply too wound up to put on a good performance? And yes, all of that is summed up with, “Forrest, what the fuck!?”