Lei Tong

Considering I just lost one of my few regular clients and am still spending money at an exponential rate... no.

Don't get me wrong, Hironaka's good. He's easily Top 15, and possibly on the same level as the previously aforementioned guys... but BJ is a P4P caliber fighter with much better stand-up and good takedown defense. Well, at least he doesn't have Aoki's guard.

BJ Penn vs. Kuniyoshi Hironaka at UFN 7. Wow... Hironaka got fucked for a debut match.

Brandon Vera vs. Frank Mir has been anounced. I'm really suprised, as it looks like the UFC has officially given up on Mir, and expect to use his name to give Vera a recognizable win. Though its only probablity of being competitive would be if Mir came in-shape (fat chance... har), I'm actually pretty excited by the prospect of Vera still getting a name win now that Buentello is gone and Monson is fighting for a title.

I actually wasn't being sarcastic earlier, but Buentello is an AKA guy, Tank is a "living legend," and both have reps for knocking guys out or getting obliterated themselves. It'll probably be better received than Overeem/Belfort.

Strikeforce has its ear on the ground when it comes to knowing what your average MMA fan wants.

Double post.

I don't think Sakuraba has actually ever won with a kimura from the bottom. Babalu did fuck up Zaza Grom with one, though.

See, I don't give a shit about this tournament. So this is all fucking hilarious to me. Besides, as MMA gets bigger, does anyone honestly expect not to see more of this? It happens in pretty much every sport once the athletes start gaining leverage, and assuming MMA can near some measure of overall success, expect to see fighters giving promoters and/or fans the finger for any number of reasons. BIGGER THAN BOXING!!!111

MMA fans are all about seeing fighters getting paid, until it adversly affects a match-up they want to see. lawl

Americana/top wristlock/keylock

Monson's an average cuddler, hence I picked him to beat the likes of Anthony Perrosh & BLH, but not a secretly-sweet-cuddler like Vera.

I pick winners on who I think is the best cuddler.

From the sound of it, Sak was getting absolutely mauled and not defending himself (grounds for a stoppage), purposely flopped out of the ring (again, grounds enough for a stoppage), still got his head bounced off the mat (blah blah stoppage), and then was saved as the ref took his time restarting them.

GSP has trained a good deal with Renzo in the past, who also taught Serra, who in turn taught Sell, so I imagine they've run into each other at some point. My black horse pick for the WW final is Jackson, based on being arguably the best striker in the weight class and... well, Lytle being the only other true WW (IE- not including Serra & Thomas) there worth a crap. Also, GSP sweeping with those comparative line-ups still wouldn't trump Tito, who managed to make some hilariously bad picks and still dominated the series against Shamrock. Even with bad training, there's no way I would've picked Kendall over Kalib, or Noah & Haynes over Jesse.

Considering it also has Serra & Sell... yeah, probably.

Now you're just being Canadian.

Assuming those are teams in LotC's sig, whoever picked the blue boys should be shot.

You mean... Sak was protected? Get out of town. Oh, and cage> ring.

I'd still make Silva a favorite, but to act like Okami wouldn't be a threat to Silva (especially if Anderson fough ton short notice) is recockulous. Also, I did pick Takase to sub Silva back when.

Considering Okami's main strength (his lanky-framed G&P) would be hard for Silva to nullify sans upkicks, Okami would stand a very good chance of beating Silva.

Check for his recent SHOOTO preview by Jordan Breen.

-4000 Street Cred pts. If you're saying that articulate, well-informed articles are bad for the pond of mediocrity that is MMA journalism, than I say -4000 Street Cred pts to YOU, sir.

MSIA is actually more of a BK'er, though he's started writing articles for Sherdog.