Hawkius Maximus

Being insane can only help Miller in Japan. The problem is, it's questionable if DREAM is in any position to make stars right now. Apparently, Miller REALLY wants to face Sakuraba in the next round of the MW GP. I could see Sakuraba taking that fight.

Two Takedowns > Two Knockdowns. The judging tonight has just established that.

I can never learn that one. I have no idea why. I get corrected on "their" and "they're" all the time. And it NEVER sticks. Almost on a daily basis. I have a learning disability I think.

He won't. But it'll draw. It's an easily sellable main event.

That article is horribly biased. Almost to a laughable level. He complains about fighters not being built up, but it was HDNET that did not air the official videos. What we got were *not* DREAM videos. For whatever reason, HDNET made the choice to ignore all official videos and make their own for Miller and someone else that I can't remember. Why they did this? No idea. And I've heard people hyping about mismatches...There weren't many on this card. There were two you could qualify for that. Melvin's opponent (who is now 4-4...but we've seen with the DONGER that, that record doesn't mean much), and Mayhem's opponent in Shibata. Nakamura's opponent was a former silver judo medalist who nearly beat Aoki and Ishida. That is *not* a can. Just like how Donger was never a can because he was always competitive. A can is someone who comes in and just loses without a fight...Like Yamamoto. Great can there. And I bet my ass in the live Japan broadcast they played up Mayhem's style of "Pro-Wrestling" against the former pro-wrestler. Sadly, we did not get that. Almost all the complaints of this show on the article stem from the HDNET side. DREAM Has no control over what HDNET decides to do with the feed. And all I can say about the ramp is...That's a complaint? I mean...really? DREAM can't afford huge rampways, I mean, fuck, their running the Saitama Super Arena every month. Their BLEEDING MONEY. How can they afford a huge ramp?!

Absolutely fantastic show last night...Only marred by HD Net's horrible production. Although, Bas appearing to be either falling asleep or drunk off his ass was fantastically entertaining. If it's possible right now for DREAM to make stars, then they did last night with Mayhem, Alvarez, and Hansen. Just great work in those fights...Mayhem made his absolute mauling of Shibata entertaining, while Alvarez and Hansen was one of the best fights in some time. Uno looked fantastic in his fight with Ishida...but after Hansen/Alvarez the fan's weren't super into it. They were too burnt out from the last fight.

If UFC has the balls to play up the steroid thing, this show could be massive. But since that'd paint Sherk in a negative light, they haven't touched on it at all as far as I know outside of small references.

Personally, I don't really buy the line that the first few seasons of TUF had the best fighters...Overall, yeah, the first season had the most fighters who became anyone...but if you think about it, the last two TUF's in particular have produced two guys who are already ready to walk into title contention. Nate Diaz and Mac Danzig are far stronger overall then anyone we got in those early days. Guys like Leben, Koscheck, Forrest, all had time pass before they were in contention. Rashad Evans still is kind of in the ether of contendership. However, Nate & Mac have already shown off skills and in Nate's case, have a big enough win streak that they could be plunked in contention without a missed beat. Coincidentally, their two of the few guys from each of those seasons that had any developed personality on the show.

You can be the most god-awful fighter and still have personality. It just so happens that most of the people have the personality of a wet sock.

The problem with TUF, is that this is what...the...seventh season? Something like that...May be eighth. It's never really changed. Sure, they got rid of challenges, and made it into a tournament, but it's still been the same format since the first one really. People are just tired of it. There's no real POINT to TUF anymore with UFC running so many shows in the last few years, the rise of Elite, and whatever else is out there. It doesn't serve a purpose anymore. If you are really good, you'll end up in UFC either way. So what's the point of TUF? No one cares about it anymore, and they have done a really poor job over the last few seasons giving fighters defined identities...Only one from the last season that really had a personality was Mac Danzig, and that was because he was the only fighter at his level in the competition. I know jack about anyone in this house, outside of May and Brown. Brown's really angry, May's a douche. That's all I know. TUF needs the guy who's directing the countdown shows now to do it. Make me *care* about these fighters. You have a weekly one hour block, it shouldn't be that hard. The reason the first TUF worked so well, is because people cared about the fighters. Leben was a dick, but Koscheck and Southworth were BIGGER dicks, so you wanted to see Leben kill them...You also had stuff like Diego out in the rain trying to catch lightning bolts, Forrest being a complete smartass, and so on. If none of the guys in the house right now have a personality conductive to showing them on TV...then they shouldn't *be* on TV. If we get more "You don't fuck with a man's dip" then this season will be a success. Matt Brown at least gets points for promising to kill May, and then proceeding to do so.

I think most people are taking you up on that statement.

No, I think they expected Leben to be released from his sentence, so he'd have a chance to train and all that. Just in case Silva had a match prepared. This show is freaking cursed though.

She found out about Wellness~!

It's a slippery slope UFC's on. They claim to want the "best fighters" and yet they cut or allow good talented fighters, or prospects to leave, or allow others to remain in the FA world. They claim to want "exciting fighters" yet their trying to establish Machida as a contender and have Sherk main eventing. The best way to view UFC, is WWE without works. Dana's just gonna do whateverthefuck he wants to do, regardless if it contradicts what he's previously said or not. His world, and we just are allowed to view it. And in Dana's world, Sean Sherk is Dana's friend. He's not going to be going anywhere anytime soon.

They won't cut Sherk. Main reason is he's friends with Dana. Dana plays favorites. He'd never cut one of his fighter buddies.

and Tito would be probably right. The Machida fight is intended to either drag Tito to a boring fight, or to have him beaten. If Tito wins, he most likely will not be interviewed or given a mic without them on the "cut" button. That's just kind of how UFC operates, but they usually don't show it on screen. I honestly keep forgetting this show is this month. I've always hated UFC's presentation because until they get to the countdown show and can make me care about these fighters as people, it's just another show. They just treat it as another show, in the "I don't like my opponent! I'm gonna punch him!" kind of way. The last countdown was fantastic at making me feel somewhat invested in the people. Hopefully they do as good of a job this time when it comes up. I also still hate the fact that Sherk fails a drug test and gets a title shot first fight back. No one else has gotten that benefit. Buuut I can just hope that BJ Penn kills him a roided man.

I think the problem basically boiled down to the fact that when Hansen was slated to lose the title...He called Baba and asked if he *could* lose it. To Hansen, it didn't really mean squat what the AWA wanted. If Baba told him he could, he would have lost it. If he told him he couldn't, he wouldn't. Baba wanted to have Hansen defend the title in Japan still, so Hansen said okay and jacked the belt and hopped on a plane. Hansen had absolutely no loyalty to AWA at all. Plus, from what I've always heard Verne Gagne was a really stubborn guy. So having his champion walk out with his title probably didn't sit well with him at all.

The story I've always heard is Stan Hansen was intensely loyal to Giant Baba. Almost to the level you'd have to be to take a bullet for them. He'd be fine with working in the US *as long* as it did not affect his All Japan bookings. AWA worked around it, so he worked for them. However, he basically stole the AWA title for Baba. Baba wanted him to wrestle for AJPW as AWA champion, but Hansen was slated to lose the title...Hansen proceeded to refuse to job, and then went to Japan with the championship. When AWA threatened legal action, Hansen then apparently ran over the championship with his truck and mailed it back. I believe WCW worked around Hansen in AJPW as well...but he had no issues with bailing on them to remain in Japan as well. So that's pretty much the reason. Hansen was beloved in Japan, and had a loyalty to AJPW that you don't see very often. And since WWF and WCW pretty much demanded exclusivity, that's why he never ended up there... There's also the fact that Hansen was incredibly stiff due to having vision problems. I can't imagine many wrestlers in WWF back then being able to take Hansen on, even when he was being careful. Even when Hansen was trying to take care of someone (like with the series with Luger) sometimes...shit just happened.

Semmy Schilt showed that you don't have to hit someone in the face to KO a fighter. Mark Hunt thought he could eat anything Schilt could throw. He did *not* see that spinning back kick coming at all. If you want to talk the ability to just take a shitkicking and keep coming, then Nogueira has to be really high on that list. He got knocked down in the fights with Sylvia and Herring, but didn't get finished and just kept coming. Let alone all the abuse he ate from Fedor. The man just will not stay down.

I was playing Free Mode with a friend last night, and we armed ourselves to the teeth, and found a hospital...Where we proceeded to kill everyone in it, and make it our final stand. First time, my friend made it up to six stars wanted, and we held out for a period of time...I couldn't find a good place to get cover, so I went down to a couple shots to the head. My friend amassed a six star rating, and picked the cops off as they came. My friend lasted a bit longer, but without a second gunner got overwhelmed due to the sheer numbers being thrown at us. He also found out that if you shoot the RPG's right into the moving doors, you'll take out anything outside and inside in that radius. Flaming bodyparts would almost literally rain down from the sky. At one point there was a flaming corpse on the ground, a SWAT member came in, touched the corpse and went up in a fireball, and we just watched him scream in pain until he died. We rearmed ourselves and went back there for a second round...This time, he had his old spot behind a wall, and I found out I could use the reception desk for cover. He of course made sure to blow every patient up with grenades before the stand off began, and got reported for "possible terrorist activity" at the Hospital. This time went much smoother for us at first, because I had good cover and his spot proved to be good...However, he made a HUMAN ERROR (Like in all good action movies, one person messes up and puts the mission at risk~!) when he went to the sliding doors for a weapon or something, and got shotgunned from a cop right outside...He respawned a few times and helped me, but lost his huge inventory of weapons forcing him to use the pistol to good success. I remained behind the desk using the AK-47 and Sub Machine Gun to good success...I amassed the six stars this time, but I finally ran out of ammo, and with us both using pistols they eventually broke our defenses and took us out at the same time. That may have been one of the most fun and action packed moments I've ever had.

Free Mode is AWESOME...Provided you have friends who just want to organize shit. Everytime I've played with people other then that, they just run around shooting each other and doing stupid shit. There's nothing that rivals you and your friends standing a showdown with the cops. RPG's, AK 47's, all kinds of shit just blasting away at them. Not to mention the high speed getaways where you all have to work in tandem. The mission Hangmans Noose is awesome...we've beaten it twice, and tried on Medium and Hard, but even on Easy it's difficult. Fun as hell though.

From what I know of the CBS/Elite XC deal, is that CBS bought into the company in some form. They have a vested interest in seeing it pay off, which is why they've been running ALOT of ad's during their main programing. During Big Brother by the end, you were pretty much sure to see one Elite XC ad per episode. Survivor as well of late, so I figure that extends to pretty much every major show they have. I don't think one bad rating will seal the deal for Elite. What will do it, is if they fail to increase or get any further with the deal. If Elite pops a low 2.0 for their first show, but the second one dips to a 1.4? Then they could be in trouble. However, if it goes UP to a higher 2.0 or more? They should be fine. If I had to guess, I'd say Elite will be in the 2 range for their debut. Hardcore's should tune it (Because there's really no reason not to unless you hate anything non UFC), and they SHOULD attract the casuals given how much their putting into it. It's gonna be a test to see how big of a name Kimbo Slice really is, because this show is almost entirely being sold around him. There's not much else on this show, although Lawler/Smith should be fun.

Bas Rutten's Men's Room is AWESOME. It's like they took all of Bas's instructional videos on how to fight on the streets and notched it up ten times.

So we're not doing spoiler tags for DREAM since it's airing in the US soon? If not, I SHALL GIVE THOUGHTS. If someone wants me to use tags, I will. Missed the first two fights...Aoki beating JZ was a surprise. DONGER IS UNSTOPPABLE~! 4-4 now, on a four fight win streak. The PRIDE theory of throwing fighters in against gods = Clearly working with Donger. Galesic impressed the fuck out of me with his ground skills...Isn't he the guy that Takimoto submitted rather easily once the fight hit the ground? He showed off some skillz here. Ronaldo Jacare was ssssssssssccaaaaary. Poor Ian Murphy. He was just completely overmatched. I don't know who Ian Murphy is...but I wonder who he pissed off to get that fight. Tamura vs Funaki I actually missed most of it. I did see the finish...Tamura finished him with hammer blows. Don't see that all that often. I dunno what the fuck Kang was thinking leaving his head out there like that...Maybe he didn't think Mousasi had good submissions. If so, he was WRONG. Sakuraba/Nakahara was surprisingly good. Sakuraba clearly thought he'd entertain the fans with standing...but then quickly realized that was a BAD IDEA. Sakuraba couldn't get him down, but once he did and got side mount, he eventually got one of the sickest subs I've ever seen. It was like a Rear Naked Neck Crank...It looked like he was going to *KILL HIM*. Overall good show...It being on at 1 AM here on Tuesday was no fun though. Out of the people left in the MW GP, I'm backing Sakuraba, DONGER or Jacare.

We could argue semantics all day over Tanahashi's popularity. But this I had to point out. How is Tanahashi sloppy? He's considered the top wrestler in ALL OF JAPAN right now, by just about every expert out there. Because he can get a fantastic match out of anyone at seemingly anytime. He carried Goto to one of the greatest matches all last year, and his matches with Nagata & Nakamura were either equal, or more him then his opponent. All his CC matches got rave reviews, all his NJ Cup matches got rave reviews, and he's getting more and more favorable reactions due to his in-ring work. Have you see the Tanahashi/Nakamura Korakuen Hall match? Tanahashi does the bulk of the work, and carries the storyline of the match. Watch that and tell me only women wanted him to win, because that entire building was rocking for Tanahashi. I just think you see some pretty boy wrestler, and he doesn't fit what you expect to see. Fact is, Tanahashi has a higher workrate then almost anyone in the world, he's improved by leaps and bounds, he's developed a cocky heel persona, and he is *THE GUY* of the industry now.