MMA News

Justin Golightly - February 9, 2018

Everyone is familiar with the fable about the Tortoise and the Hare. The moral of the story was slow and steady wins the race. It ended up working out for Max Holloway. We all had our hands up in the air wondering when he would get his shot after taking out every contender imaginable. Now, the undefeated Brian Ortega is finally one single step closer to the featherweight title after an insane 13-fight win streak. However, Frankie Edgar is one giant step he’ll have to get over at UFC 222. Not only that, it’s on short notice. Ortega isn’t worried though, for him, it’s just like any other fight. “I’ve been in so many street fights. It doesn’t matter that I’m taking a fight on a month’s notice. I’ve taken many fights on two seconds’ notice. I was out of town, they asked if I want the fight [back at UFC New Orleans with Thiago Tavares in 2015] and I said, ‘Yep.’ I started running right there in the parking lot. It’s not a big deal. It’s like a street fight. If someone puts ’em up, you’ve gotta put ’em up. This is the fight for me [with Frankie Edgar]. Once I took it, I took a second to appreciate the hard work. I’m here. My face is on the poster, the fight’s going down. I’ve never seen this happening like this, so considering that, I’ve already won. Now when I fight Frankie and beat him, I’ll prove everything I need to all the fight fans.”

bjpenndotcom - February 9, 2018

Unable to catch tomorrow night’s UFC 221 event in Perth, Australia? BJPenn.com has you covered with all the UFC 221 Live Results. Tune in to “Play By Play Radio” for up to the second results. Play By Play Radio” will be hosted by 2X UFC Hall of Fame Champion BJ Penn.

Justin Golightly - February 9, 2018

Every step in Yoel Romero’s career has led to this. After a war with Robert Whittaker ended in a decision that halted Romero’s eight-fight win streak, fate seemed to favor the former Olympian. The title switches and changes have been almost as dizzying as the flying knees which Romero launches at unsuspecting opponents. Yet, here he is again fighting for an interim middleweight belt. Luke Rockhold and coaches have said the only thing that would lead to their defeat is a ‘lucky strike’, but it seems like luck is on the side of Yoel Romero. “First of all [in response that Luke Rockhold saying he’s better then me in every aspect of the fight], the Philistines said Goliath had to kill David because he was a great warrior and David was just an average man. Who won that fight? I feel like the Son of God and I believe it’s a blessing for me to feel this way. I respect this [opinion that Rockhold can out grapple me] but the whole world has the right to talk, but it’s God that’s got to shed the light so, I’m going to shed the light in those dark places that Luke talks about it. I will be the light that God gives me in that moment. I feel blessed [to be in an interim title fight]. The strength of my work, the amount of work that I put in, the amount of work my team has put it in, the support that I have for my family, this is what drives me.”

Justin Golightly - February 9, 2018

Most fighters hope their style gets labeled as something that resembles a killer like Jon Jones or strikes comparisons to the legend Anderson Silva, but not ‘Style Bender’ Israel Adesanya. While he may fit the body type and skill set, he’d rather you not disrespect them — or him for that matter — by constructing mental Venn diagrams of him and them. Going into his UFC debut tomorrow, he wants to showcase something completely new. He wants to showcase himself. “Don’t insult [Jon Jones, Anderson Silva or Michael ‘Venom’ Page] or me by comparing us. I know what they’re trying to do, I know what they’re trying to say, but we’re different people. I watched Anderson Silva at UFC 90. I think it was my first pay-per-view I watched of him. Before that I watched some DVDs, but then UFC 90 I watched him live fight Patrick Cote. He used — probably in the first round — 10 different styles and then in the second round used telekinesis to dismantle [Cote’s] knee. I was like, who’s this skinny black guy?”

Justin Golightly - February 9, 2018

As the middleweight division spins effortlessly back into chaos again, two men will try to set it back on its axis tomorrow. Luke Rockhold will fight Yoel Romero at the main event of UFC 221 for an interim middleweight title, created in response to newly-awarded undisputed champ Robert Whittaker’s triple threat health bomb. Romero and Rockhold have been on a collision course for years and now they finally get to scrap. He thinks he’s better everywhere and his coaches believe him too. It’s hard to say [who is the worse match-up for Luke Rockhold] because they both have different strengths. Yoel [Romero] is very explosive, great wrestling, but [Robert] Whittaker is good everywhere and a very dangerous striker. They’re both different, but the thing is with Luke, Luke’s good everywhere. So Luke can finish those guys in every department, where they can’t. They can’t finish Luke everywhere, they can’t finish Luke on the ground, they can’t do this with Luke. Luke can do that to anybody.”

Drake Riggs - February 8, 2018

“I think i’m one or two fights away [from a title shot]. I think [Valentina] Shevchenko will fight for the title next and I would like to fight her for the title. So however many I need to have between now and then, that’s what i’m working towards 100%.

Drake Riggs - February 8, 2018

It was announced yesterday that UFC 222 had been saved. Initially what was supposed to be Max Holloway attempting to make his second featherweight title defense against Frankie Edgar turned into…well, another featherweight title fight actually but instead with the other champ! Cris Cyborg will now be headlining the event as she defends against the Invicta FC bantamweight champion, Yana Kunitskaya. As for Edgar, he will remain on the card and take on the quickly rising contender, Brian Ortega in the co-main event. While some are happy that the event was saved at all, that doesn’t mean everyone liked what it was saved with. And among those include former Strikeforce and UFC 135-pound champ, Miesha Tate who had this to say about the change on MMA on SiriusXM:

Drake Riggs - February 8, 2018

When you bring up the discussion of best female flyweight fighters in the world today, very few if any will say that Invicta FC champion, Jennifer Maia isn’t #1. The Curitiba, Brazil native, Maia has defended her title twice and is currently on a six-fight winning streak that includes wins over Vanessa Porto, Agnieszka Niedzwiedz, and Roxanne Modaferri. Around the time that the UFC was ready to crown their inaugural 125-pound champion after a season of The Ultimate Fighter, Maia was ready to defend her title the week after. As one might imagine, Maia should have been a part of the tournament to decide the UFC’s first flyweight champion. Instead, Maia turned down the offer to participate on the show and as she told MMAFighting, it was for a pretty understandable reason:

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

All of the UFC fights are basically just a countdown to Daniel Cormier’s epic encounter against UFC heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic. The same title shot that Fabricio Werdum has been clawing back to. You have to have a college degree in MMA match to figure out this one, it’s more than just any light heavyweight moving up to fight a bigger opponent. The former champ himself knows full well what it’s like to be in the cage with Miocic, who took the title away from him back at UFC 198. Despite having nothing but respect for Cormier and his skills, he thinks Stipe Miocic will walk away with the strap still on his waist. “I want to see this fight [between Daniel Cormier and Stipe Miocic], too. Of course I want to go first, but for the business UFC, for fans this is much better. I understand this part, too. For sure I was sad before, but after talking to Dana White, I understand for the company, business is much better. I hope I’m the next one after my fight.”

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

After Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson got on The MMA Hour and said he wanted a fourth — yes, fourth — fight with PRIDE and UFC veteran Wanderlei Silva, we had no idea what to think. However, all that really matters is what Bellator and Silva himself thinks. He caught wind of the offer and is all for the quadrilogy with Quinton Jackson, that is only if it takes place in the Brazilian’s hometown of Curitiba. ”I will [talk to Bellator president Scott Coker about the fight], but I want to do this rematch with ‘Rampage’ [Quinton Jackson] at Arena da Baixada, in Curitiba [Brazil]. I’ll put this as a condition, to be in my hometown. Then it would be worth the effort. Money alone isn’t worth it, it has to be something more, and that would be fighting in front of my friends in Curitiba. I’m kind of big, too, with 229 pounds. I’m training a bit stronger.”

Jason Kindschy - February 8, 2018

BJPENN Radio returns tonight at 8PM ET/5PM PT! 8:15PM ET- Our guest for the evening is “Bullet” Valentina Shevchenko. Following what can only be described as one of the most dominant wins in recent MMA history over Priscila Cachoeria this past weekend, Valentina has been the hottest topic in the combat sports headlines. With this impressive and authoritative victory, Shevchenko claimed the No. 1 spot in the women’s flyweight rankings and struck fear into the hearts of everyone in the division. Now eyeing gold in her new weight class, we’ll recap her incredible performance and discuss the looming title fight against current champ, Nicco Montano. Valentina will also share her thoughts on the backlash against referee Mario Yamasaki for not stopping the fight earlier, what she has planned for the remainder of 2018, and the likelihood that she battles Amanda Nunes once again before the end of the year. All that and much more with “Bullet!”

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

Demetrious Johnson versus TJ Dillashaw. The UFC flyweight champion fighting the UFC bantamweight champion in an ultra high level MMA double title fight. It’s a match-up that everyone has been clamoring for, but still some people aren’t in favor of it. Although, it’s easy to see why Dominick Cruz isn’t keen on the idea. If you count the WEC bantamweight title which the UFC absorbed, Cruz was the bantamweight king from 2010 until he was stripped due to injuries in 2014. A title he nearly immediately got back upon his return from Dillashaw himself. The very same title he wants back. “I think [the bantamweight championship] should be my next fight, but they play weird games where they want to give TJ Dillashaw an easier fight because he doesn’t want to fight somebody hard right after he won the title. He wants an easy fight. So, he wants to fight somebody that he knows he can keep the belt a little longer before he knows he gets a really hard fight, whereas I went TJ Dillashaw, Urijah Faber, Cody Garbrandt and then I lose the belt. Let’s go TJ. I beat you. Don’t you want to get that back? Stop going down and looking for little baby boys at 125. Silly Dilly, that’s what I call him.”

Tom Taylor - February 8, 2018

Referee Mario Yamasaki might the most unpopular man in MMA right now. The MMA community brought out the torches and pitchforks after he let Valentina Shevchenko brutalize the grossly outmatched Priscila Cachoeira for far longer than necessary last Saturday, and the backlash hasn’t stopped since. Of all the people to criticize Yamasaki, none did so with more ferocity than UFC President Dana White, who went so far as to promise we’ll never see the referee again.

Tom Taylor - February 8, 2018

Last month, in the main event of UFC 220, the hype train of Francis Ngannou came to an abrupt halt at the hands of UFC heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic. For five rounds, the champ out-fought the challenger, exposing major deficits in his wrestling and his cardio in the process. Speaking on a recent episode of his podcast, UFC color commentator Joe Rogan (one of the biggest drivers of Ngannou’s hype train before UFC 220) discussed the outcome of the UFC 220 main event.

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

Matt Brown comes back soon against Carlos Condit at UFC Glendale in April, which is a fight we’ll all praising the MMA gods for bestowing upon us. However, it’s not his opponent that he’s trashing publicly like some other fighters, he’s continuing a beef he has with Dana White’s Tuesday Night Contender Series commentator Snoop Dogg. Matt Brown is still heated for the wild Instagram video Snoop posted insulting Conor McGregor after his boxing loss to Floyd Mayweather. Brown went as far to say if he caught him on the street, he’d catch these hands fashizzle. “Snoop Dogg, that piece of sh-t. I’ll call him out. He called out Conor [McGregor]. Remember, he called him a b-tch? That’s not cool, man. I don’t care [if he was f-cked up]. He put it out in public. He could have apologized, deleted it, whatever. If I go to the UFC PI [Performance Institute] I might just punch him. If I see him there. I’m cool with that. I’m just saying. That really offends me, man.”

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

Mark Hunt is making his return to the Octagon after going through a series of tests to make sure it was safe for him to be fighting, but Hunt thinks this is all just hypocritical based on his former opponents and what Dana White has just said about Brock Lesnar. Last night, White seemed all about Lesnar returning to the UFC and as you can imagine, that didn’t sit well with Super Samoan. “[Brock Lesnar] shouldn’t be fighting. He’s just a cheater. There should be a show for steroid users like him and you can’t tell me any different. He didn’t deserve to be there. He took the short cuts. It just goes to show [the UFC’s] credibility when they say a guy like Brock Lesnar is coming back. So, it’s all about money and you don’t really care about the fighters at all? Some of you said to me, “Oh Mark, you gotta go and do your tests because we’re worried about you.’ You’re lying? Yeah, I thought so.” 

Justin Golightly - February 8, 2018

While Dana White is talking about still making a rematch between TJ Dillashaw and Cody Garbrandt, Dillashaw’s trainer Duane Ludwig is still pushing for the Demetrious Johnson superfight. It makes sense considering Johnson himself has said they’re in negotiations for co-main event of UFC 226 with Stipe Miocic and Daniel Cormier. As with most things, it’s probably both fighters wanting the money they deserve that is stalling things, but Ludwig says that no matter what the obstacles, this fight needs to happen for the future of MMA. “[TJ Dillashaw]’s a ninja. That’s why he’s the champion and that’s why he’s going to fight Demetrious [Johnson]. Demetrious, where you at buddy? C’mon, Demetrious. Let’s make this happen. Whether I’m TJ’s trainer, or friend, or instructor, or Sensei or not, right? For me, just as a martial art enthusiast, I want to see that fight happen to see who truly is the best mixed martial artist.”

Tom Taylor - February 8, 2018

Last weekend, in the co-main event of the UFC’s return to Belem, Brazil’s Priscila Cachoeira was brutalized by the far more experienced Valentina Shevchenko en route to a second-round submission loss. In the wake of this brutal fight, there has been widespread criticism of referee Mario Yamasaki. In the eyes of many fans and pundits, the referee should have stopped the fight much earlier. UFC President Dana White was particularly critical of Yamasaki post-fight. Priscilla Cachoeira, you showed so much heart and toughness in that fight. I’m honored to have you fight in the UFC. Unfortunately the ref is there to protect you and Mario DID NOT do that. This isn’t his first disgusting performance in the octagon. Another unfortunate thing is that i can’t do anything about I️t only the Brazilian commission can and i am hoping after this scary, incompetent showing he hopefully will never set foot in that Octagon again. Strikes landed was 230-3.