I don't know if anyone is watching it, but this season's The Next Ultimate Fighter has been on for a few weeks now. It's all heavyweights this time (coaches are Rashad Evans and Rampage, who were supposed to fight at the end of the season, but Rampage has retired to make the A-Team movie). If you haven't heard, Kimbo is on the show this season.

Say what you want about the guy and his loss to that chump with pink hair, I still find it hard to dislike him. He really seems like he's trying to become a quality fighter and is trying to better himself. Even though Dana White talked shit about him and dared him to join the show, he did it, where most men would have had a chip on their shoulder and would have been too proud to work with White.

So the show has been on for 2 weeks now. The first 2 weeks, Rampage got to pick the fights. Both times, his boys got clowned (although the 2nd fight was much closer than the first bloodbath). The third fight was picked by Rashad, and he wasn't fucking around. He went right after Kimbo and paired him up against Roy "Big Country" Nelson. Nelson is no pushover. He has held a belt before in one of the lesser fight leagues (the IFL). He's also big. And fat. But he's a quality fighter.

I am really looking forward to the fight. I am curious to see if Kimbo can last more than 3 weeks on the show, since he's the poster-boy and is on all of the commercials. Dana White has already gone on record to say that even if Kimbo doesn't win the show, he will be in the UFC. Does this mean that he will win the show? Or does this mean that White knows that Kimbo is a ratings superstar (the ratings for the season premier DOUBLED the previous season) and he'd be a fool not to sign him to a deal? I guess we'll see.

The fight is next Wednesday (Sep 30) on Spike TV.

Ps: Here's Big Country:


And here's Kimbo, in case you are living in a box:

Yeah, I'm definitely looking forward to finding out how Kimbo does. Tried to cheat and find a leak on the internet, but there's too many rumors to know the truth. I'll just have to wait like everyone else.

1st fight was indeed brutal. Loser got his dome cut straight to the skull.

2nd fight was PATHETIC. They were both gassed mid first round, it was so sad. Personally I thought Wes won with his takedowns even though James had the kicks going for him. But really I'd rather neither one of the fuckers had won.

Definitely rooting for Kimbo in this fight, but Roy's fat ass ain't know joke. Don't let the belly fool ya.

I agree, both of the dudes in the 2nd fight were a joke. I expected James to beat homeboy's ass, the way he talked, but he was as gassed as the big fella. It was awful. Either guy could have won that fight if they could have just been willing to go all out for 15 seconds (which is all it would have taken for the ref to stop the fight).

I thought Wes won too but it really was very close. Neither one had that killer instinct when their opponent was hurt. I thought that James was the first pick by Rashad too. It he was, I really question how long that guy will be in the show. His endurance was horrible. Of course this is coming from a guy who's ass he could kick in a millisecond. =)

Goes without being said for most of us of course.

I've seen many defend the fighters by saying they're training while fighting these and aren't given time to rest up for the fight. That may be true, but I don't recall a previous T.U.F. match where the fighters were so gassed, so early.

Yeah, I thought Rashad's dude for the second fight was going to be a lot stronger than he was but aside from some good leg kicks, I didn't see a lot that impressed me. If neither fighter had of gased, I think Wes would have won. The first fight was a bit of a joke.

As for the next episode, I'd love to see Kimbo win but I can't help but think he's a significant underdog; if nothing else, I hope it's a good fight.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

This shit is tonight, yay!

And Kimbo goes down again...

/yawn

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"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats." -Henry Louis Mencken
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VEGETARIAN -Noun (vej-i-tair-ee-uhn): Ancient tribal slang for the village idiot who can't hunt, fish or ride.

Very boring fight. In Kimbo's defense, there wasn't a whole lot he could do when Big Country was sitting on his arms patting him on the head. I have a feeling he'll be back. Damn, I wanted him to kick ass.

Me too. Just too much belly. Kimbo probably comes back though, he's confirmed he's training for a December fight. Could be the TUF Finale, could be the pay-per-view.

Havent watched Ultimate Fighter in a while. Watched this one and all I saw was a fat guy smothering a dude with his belly and poking him on the head. Weak.

I hold out hope for a come back.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

If by "fat guy smothering a dude with his belly" you mean used superior ground ability to TWICE easily pass guard, and crucifix the guy then that's an accurate assessment. He was milking his TV time.

From a non-regular viewer who doesnt really care about guards or whatever it was a big fat guy smothering the other dude with his belly and patting him on the head.

I'm sure there was a lot of subtle stuff I missed, but it was really dull to watch and I flicked it off and probably won't bother watching again. I used to be into ufc years back but it just started getting dull, dunno why.

Roy took a number of decent hits that shook him enough to be overly aggressive in his take downs, if Kimbo had of had better skills, he probably would've made Roy pay dearly.

_________________
Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

Lotwell: I thought UFC was much more entertaining (and crazy) when they didn't have weight classes.

On that count, I agree. That said, Roy can shoot well, but he chose to stand up for too long and bang it out. I'm impressed with Kimbo's drive to learn, and hope he sticks to it.

There are times when MMA fights simply aren't as exciting or technical as we'd like.

Just gonna be that way sometimes. No need to pretend it was something it wasn't.