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Sonnen/Silva talk after their fight

Clay Guida talks UFC 117 and his fight against Rafael Dos Anjos with Heavy.com.

“I’m gonna bring my style which is crazy, ugly, drooling on myself, burpin’, spittin, you name it.” – Clay Guida

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by Tim Priester

After watching the “free” UFC fights on Versus last night I thought it to be important that I fill you all in on my rating system for good fights. I use the six pack rating system. If I watch the fights and manage to drink just one beer before I open my mouth and start trash talking how I can beat this guy, then this particular fight was not as good as it could be and gets the ultra low rating of 1. See, the best any UFC fight can get is 6 on my scale, pretty simple, and I hope we are all following along. A six pack rating means that it looked like every fighter was more prepared and dangerous looking than the fighter previously, the fighters put on a good fight even if it was a 10 second knockout or 15 minutes of ground and pound. There are special factors that could single-handedly change my thoughts about a fight night; for instance I gave the last Anderson Silva fight 2 beers because of his two rounds of him trying out for “Dancing with the Stars.” When big name belt holders do that it doesn’t matter how many good fights there were previously in the fan’s mind the only thing remembered was his playing around. There are other special circumstances that could change my rating quickly and you will see as I analyze this fight.

Overall the fights were good, especially for being free. In this tough economy any little bit helps and I love when you can see UFC for free, so that helped their rating. Another thing that helped the overall fight rating was Jon “Bones” Jones not disappointing in his climb to become a champ.

Another boost to the rating was the knockout of Griffin by Gomi, which this writer/fan is not calling foul on the ref stoppage…did you see how wobble Griffin was when he did stand up? Gomi needed this after his last lost and all the hype about him.

A definite ratings helper was that tumor growing off of Howard’s eye. If the doctor doesn’t stop that there was no telling if Ellenberger would have done the same to the other eye or left Howard with permanent damage.

Now let’s look at those details that caused a drop in my rating of this event. First and foremost, a real lack of some home town cooking. Call me a homer for Chicago but I love this place, deep-dish, Vienna hot dogs…I love it so much I don’t hate Oprah! But I didn’t see too many fighters from the Chicagoland area and that is not right. So in an effort stay tuned to the end of this I will help you get your Chicago’s MMA fix.

Another ratings drop was the lack of a big name fight…I get that it was for free but if you want to dig into that NFL, MLB on NBA revenue dollar you need to put forth the big names, and this is not a knock against the fighter who fought but come on! The other nagging thing from the fight was the split decision, the fighting equivalent of kissing your cousin. You got a kiss…but! I hating seeing it left in the judges’ hands. And the last comment that really hurt the score was Jones’ “Stay classy San Diego!” Loved the Anchorman with Ferrell just felt like Jones thought of that on Friday and was so proud of himself.

So, my overall rating was three beers. Could have had some big names show up, especially from the city of the Chi. No cheesy one liners from fighters please. But the real reason it gets three beers was because of price tag.

Now like I promised if you want some local talent being displayed throughout August, we have Clay “The Carpenter” Guida at UFC 117, XFO’s “Outdoor War 6” up in Island lake on the August 14th, and August 18th Bart Palaszewski is fighting for WEC on Versus, tune in and cheer on the Chicago talent!

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Princess, huh? Surely James Toney can run better smack than that. At least he has been — until now.

by Tim Priester

So my buddy says to me prior to the Lesnar/Carwin fight that he thinks Carwin was going to win and he had a 12 pack on it. Not one to shy away from a bet especially one dealing with beer, unless it was that bet of jumping off my house and using the trampoline to try and clear my neighbor’s house…dude, it was a two story with an 80’s antennae! But back to this bet. He was telling me stories of Carwin’s magnificent first round defeats and how not one lasted more than four minutes. How Carwin, who by the way looks huge, at 6’4 and 265 was evenly matched against the bigger looking Lesnar. He felt Lesnar hadn’t really been tested, how could he in so few MMA fights. And he felt confident; enough to make it that fancy beer.

I took the bet. I thought that other than Mir and Gonzaga, Carwin hadn’t really been tested, and that although Lesnar was returning from a devastating injury that kept him from the ring, Carwin had a year in between victories himself. Lesnar also beat Mir (he may have lost to Mir early on in his career but that was when Lesnar was fresh to the ring), Couture (yes, that legend) and I wouldn’t hold his going to a decision on the Herring fight against him, after all he wasn’t rushing in to lose again like he did against Mir.

So the fight started and man was I confident in my boy Lesnar. That was good for about 10 seconds and then came Carwin’s famous first round. That was brutal. An unbelievable fury that would have killed any normal man, but Brock managed to keep his bearings and held off the blasts as part of his game plan. I thought for a moment, “There goes my free beer!”

Thankfully that moment lasted for about 10 seconds of the second round. Lesnar did what he has done since college, used his size to control the flow of the match, and about half way through the second round he submitted Carwin via the arm triangle.

Now the questions would have to be asked, Did Lesnar show that he was fully recovered from his injury and ready to retain the heavy-weight belt? Was this Carwin’s only chance to take on a less than 100% Lesnar and become champ? Who will face Lesnar next? Frankly I don’t have an answer yet, just drinking in my victory!

Tim Priester is a local MMA fan and a new contributor to Chicago’s MMA.

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Chris “Lights Out” Lytle (The Ultimate Fighter Season 4) will be at The Olympian Centre for a one day MMA and Jiu Jitsu workshop.  He’s coming off a win at UFC 116 where he Matt Brown with an armbar.  This will be a three(3) hour workshop.  Lytle is one of the most exciting fighters in the Octagon who brings professional boxing experience(13-1-1 record) and a solid ground game to the fight.   It will take place August 7 and goes from 11:00 am to 2:00 pm.

Price is $50 per person but there is a discounted price, $35, to the first 25 people that register at TOC and pay up front. To reserve your spot contact The Olympian Centre.