MMA News

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

At this past Saturday’s Bellator ‘Dynamite’ event the light heavyweight champion Liam McGeary successfully defended his belt, submitting MMA vet Tito Ortiz with an inverted triangle. The fight started out with Ortiz getting an early takedown and it looked like it was going to be a classic Tito fight, full of ground and pound and top control. However, McGeary had different plans.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

Here’s a side of Fedor we don’t normally see. Usually it’s just a stoic face looking emotionless and calm no matter what’s going on around him. Is it just me, or does Fedor seem more lively in his return to MMA? He’s smiling more, he’s doing interviews in english and making jokes and now we see him sparring in the gym and messing around with his partner.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

Man, it seems like this just keeps happening more frequently now. Obviously, the most notable is the injury suffered by former UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva, from when he fought Chris Weidman the second time. More recently, we saw an M-1 Global fighter suffer a very similar injury and now, we have another one.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

Sometimes press conferences can get pretty weird. Let’s be honest for the most part they’re pretty boring. A group of people sitting up on a stage, answering questions and talking about whatever they’re supposed to be talking about. So, when things like Conor McGregor taking over the ‘GO BIG’ press conference happen, it spices things up a bit. But during this boxing press, to promote a fight between Wladimir Klitschko and Tyson Fury, things went from spiced up to just plain weird, real quick.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

Stud Show Radio (formerly Team Alpha Male Radio) is a biweekly MMA podcast that airs Tuesday and Thursday right here on BJPENN.COM. The show features hosts Justin Buchholz and Chris Carlino aka Sir Studboy talking to callers and guests about all the latest stories in MMA and beyond.  Guests from Team Alpha Male appear on the show regularly, including UFC champion T.J. Dillashaw, Urijah Faber, Joseph Benavidez, Chad Mendes and many, many more.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

There are fans and then there are super fans. You know, the kind that would instantly spend $2,500 on a Louis Vuitton bag just so he could get a signature from Manny Paquiao on it. Yup, that’s what one extremely excited fan in Tokyo did when he spotted the boxer walking through the store. Pacquiao obliged and added his signature. The funny thing? There’s a good chance with the addition of the signature the bag is now probably worth less. I guess unless another super Pacquio fan was in search of a signed designer bag.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

Last Monday UFC fighter Nick Diaz was handed a five year suspension and a fine of $165,000. The suspension came from the Nevada State Athletic Commission who cited past offenses and what they saw as a lack of respect for the commission as their reasons for giving such a lengthy and controversial suspension. In the last week we’ve seen an overwhelming amount of support for Diaz, from fighters to fans. There was a White House petition started, which caught on like wildfire and is on track to reach it’s 100K signature goal, and we also had fighters announcing that they would no longer be fighting in Nevada to show their support. Things blew up.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

This past Saturday the combat sports world watched as kickboxing and MMA collided at Bellator ‘Dynamite.’ On the MMA side of things we were treated to an old school one-night tournament featuring the best light heavyweights the promotion had to offer. In the opening fights, Phil Davis took out former champ Emanuel Newton and ‘King Mo’ defeated Linton Vassell.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

Sometimes fighters are exhausted and do their best during post fight interviews to make sense and answer the questions that are being thrown at them. Those post-fight cage interviews sometimes deliver some of the best entertainment of the night. From Ben Rothwell’s creepy laugh, to basically all of Rampage Jackson’s interviews, we always seem to get at least one memorable one for every event.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

This is something you don’t ever want to see happen to anyone. We all saw it go down with former UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva when he fought Chris Weidman the second time. He threw a leg kick, Wiedman checked it and bam, Silva’s leg was snapped and he was on the mat screaming out in pain. Unfortunately, a very similar situation happened recently at an M-1 Global event.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

World Series of Fighting returned last weekend with “WSOF 23: Gaethje vs. Palomino II” in Phoenix, Arizona! Justin Gaethje headlined the card with another successful WSOF Lightweight Championship defense against Luis Palomino. Palmoino was brutally knocked out and is just one of the many fighters who will be forced to sit on the sidelines due to damage sustained during their fights. Check out the full list of suspensions below:

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

One of the most amazing parts about being a fan of a sport so young is the ability to watch it grow before your eyes. It wasn’t long ago that the Ultimate Fighting Championship was banned in the majority of the country, and now they are partnered with one of the biggest broadcasting companies in the world in FOX. World Warriors Fighting Championship helped France take a major step in accepting MMA as a sport in their country when they help their “Cage Encounters 4” event in Paris, France on September 19, 2015. It was the first MMA event under unified rules to take place in France in a cage.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

Bellator has been known to host some questionable fights in their history. Kimbo Slice went toe-to-toe with Ken Shamrock earlier this year in the headliner of Bellator 138 ahead of featherweight champion Patricio Freire. Most believe that there is no place for fights like that in MMA, but as long as there are no title implications it isn’t doing anybody harm. Former UFC champion Frank Shamrock was about to come out of retirement for one of those fights, however, as he was originally supposed to be the one to face Tito Ortiz at “DYNMAITE”. Instead, Ortiz chose to aim for gold by fighting Liam Mcgeary. Now, Shamrock only has two names he would come out of retirement for: Dana White and Donald Trump.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

World Series of Fighting and Bellator both ran major events this weekend and two Renzo Gracie fighters brought some gold back to the gym with them! Liam Mcgeary stepped into the Bellator cage on Saturday evening to defend his light heavyweight championship against the legendary Tito Ortiz. Ortiz was looking to secure gold for the first time since his dominant run in the octagon with the UFC and was well on his way of doing that when he blasted the champion with shots on the ground. Ortiz left himself susceptible to strikes when the tried to implement his ground and pound gameplan and walked into an inverted triangle choke! The jiu-jitsu paid off for Mcgeary as it put another “W” in his record.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

“Phoenix Jones” is as close to a real life super-hero as people will see in the world of mixed martial arts. While some fighters are heroes in the sense of charitable work, “Phoenix Jones” actually patrols the streets at night and fights crime. Ben Fodor is used to dawning the gear to transform into his alter-ego “Phoenix Jones”, but he was wearing civilian clothes on Saturday night when he stopped a murder. Just a day after picking up his first victory in World Series of Fighting, Fodor tweeted out that he had stopped a murder in Seatlle at 2:30 in the morning.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

Fans can expect some of the biggest names in mixed martial arts to make their way to Japan to see the return of Fedor Emelianenko live, but this potential spectator came out of left field. Former PRIDE FC President Nabuyuki Sakakibara announced the signing on “The Last Emperor” at Bellator’s “DYNAMITE” event on Saturday and confirmed he would be fighting in a new Japanese based promotion. While an opponent has yet to be named, it is official the fight will take place on New Year’s Eve on December 31, 2015. Emelianenko’s deal with the new promotion is expected to last only two fights, then the Russian’s future is up in the air after that.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

For the second event in a row, World Series of Fighting had to deal out a severe punishment for unsportsmanlike actions. At “WSOF 22: Palhares vs. Shields”, the company was forced to strip their welterweight champion Rousimar Palhares of his title after he held on to ANOTHER submission long after the referee asked him to let go, as well as repeatedly eye gouging Jake Shields throughout the fight. At “WSOF 23”, Vagab Vagabov struck Brian Grinnell several times after the bell. Vagabov had Grinnell pinned up against the decagon fencing and was teeing off shot after shot, which forced the referee to step in and stop the action. It was very obvious the referee was stopping the fight, but Vagabov decided to land a couple extra shots for good measure with an aggravated look on his face.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

World Series of Fighting took over the world of mixed martial arts last Friday with another exciting card in the form of “WSOF 23: Gaethje vs. Palomino 2”. Gaethje once again proved he was the most dominant champion in the promotion by sending Palomino down to the mat with a brutal combination, followed up by several shots that forced the referee to stop the fight. “I feel like I’m on top of the world. I gotta be honest with you,” Gaethje told MMA Fighting. “I don’t remember much of the fight, just like every fight I’ve been in.