Shinya Aoki is the lightweight champion of Dream, Japan's biggest mixed martial arts promotion, and in his last fight he beat Mizuto Hirota, then the champion of Sengoku, Japan's No. 2 promotion. He's firmly established himself as the best in Japan.
But a month before his fight with Strikeforce lightweight champion Gilbert Melendez, Aoki said that adding the Strikeforce lightweight belt would mean something particularly important to him, not just for personal pride, but for national pride.
The North American MMA scene may be the healthiest it's ever been, what with the UFC, WEC, Strikeforce and Bellator all aggressively looking to expand. What makes this current climate so interesting is that each organization offers something a little different than others.
Just as interesting is the MMA video game landscape, which until last year was pretty non-existent. However, after the success of UFC 2009: Undisputed, THQ is set to release the 2010 version of the highly successful game in May.
A few months later, EA Sports will deliver it's first-ever video game, featuring some of the best fighters from Strikeforce and DREAM (and Randy Couture). Both companies put out new teasers of their respective games this week, which can be found below
Pat Curran, the cousin of former WEC contender Jeff Curran, has signed on to become the eighth and final name in the upcoming Bellator season two lightweight tournament.
The 22-year-old Pat comes from a wrestling background and began fighting MMA two years ago. His career has been guided by Jeff, who also helped land him on an episode of TapouT on Versus in 2008 (video above).
Tito Ortiz returned home Tuesday after hospital treatment for a bout with flu, the fighter updated on his Twitter page.
"Nice to be home. They put six bags of fluid in me. I'm better now. I lost 15 pounds. I thought I had swine flu but I didn't. Just a really bad flu," Ortiz wrote.
Ortiz's illness contributed in recent days to a lot of discussion whether he would be fighting opposing coach Chuck Liddell following the airing of all the taped The Ultimate Fighter 11 episodes.
During the March 6 WEC bout between Miguel Torres and Joseph Benavidez, an elbow from Benavidez opened an enormous cut on Torres' forehead.
Moments later, Benavidez got Torres to tap with a guillotine choke, and Torres was left covered in blood. Torres had to have a surgical procedure to repair the wound, and he posted this video of that procedure. It's obviously not something that people who get squeamish about medical procedures want to watch, but it's worth watching if you want to get an idea of just how much damage that elbow from Benavidez inflicted.
The addition of Roger Huerta to the Bellator lightweight division has given the upstart organization a nice boost as it prepares for the start of its second season on April 8.
But what about Huerta's relationship with his former employer, the UFC? Huerta really made a name for himself fighting inside the Octagon eight times over the course of three years and even became the first and only MMA fighter to land on the cover of Sports Illustrated while a member of the UFC roster. In other words, the UFC has been a big part of his fighting life.
When Dan Henderson chose to sign with Strikeforce instead of the UFC, he said he wanted to personally break the news to Dana White, but on Tuesday's edition of SiriusXM Fight Club, 'El Matador' said that his UFC run ended quietly.
"I've cleaned out one side of the weight class, [Alves has] cleaned out the other. I beat him, it's kind of like putting all those wins in my back pocket, too," Fitch says in the upcoming Countdown to UFC 111 show. "If I could stop Thiago Alves I did something twice that GSP couldn't do in five rounds."
It's not often that a fighter looks back and is thankful for a drug suspension, but James Irvin's positive drug test in 2008 forced him to overcome a painkiller addiction, the UFC fighter tells The Canadian Press.
"I needed to get caught," Irvin said in the interview with Neil Davidson. "I needed to get in trouble for it and wake me up and get off of those things."
"The Outlaw" isn't so counterculture that he can't bathe in the love of the fans. In fact, Dan Hardy revels in being the center of attention, which isn't an altogether unusual trait among men who fight in a cage for a living.
Just last weekend, Hardy walked into a Long Island, N.Y., bar to watch the Manny Pacquiao-Joshua Clottey boxing event when he came face-to-face with a UFC poster, adorned with his own Mohawked mug.
"It's just awesome," he said. "It's fantastic. I just love the spotlight. I'm a bit big-headed like that, I guess."
With a short burst of MMA action upcoming around the world in the next two weeks, it seems like a good time to take a look at some of the questions surrounding the fighters and events that are soon to take place.
Michael David Smith and I take a look at who's under pressure to win, what's the biggest fight in upcoming weeks, whether Dan Hardy has a realistic chance to beat Georges St. Pierree and more.
Wednesday night's episode of UFC Primetime: St. Pierre vs. Hardy goes a bit beyond just the UFC 111 match-up of Georges St. Pierre and Dan Hardy and gets into the fighters' camps and training partners. The big story is Hardy training with Matt Serra, the last man to beat St. Pierre, but I was also interested in something one of St. Pierre's training partners, Nate Marquardt, said.
Analyzing the Hardy-St. Pierre match-up, Marquardt said the talent gap between the two is so great that at some point in the fight, Hardy is going to get mentally discouraged because he's being so thoroughly dominated physically.
First, Strikeforce CEO Scott Cokersaid he would not consider signingJose Canseco. Soon after, reports of a meeting with Canseco surfaced (he denied them). Next, Canseco produced a picture of him at dinner with Coker. Now, Coker's saying Canseco is back in play.
I think we all know where this is going.
While Coker apparently told MMAJunkie.com that he wasn't actively pursuing Canseco, he left the door open to the possibility. The gradual changing of his stance surely means the thought is in his mind. It is one that needs to be flushed with a quickness.
Heading into his UFC 111 welterweight title showdown, champion Georges St. Pierre finds himself in a similar position as he was in April 2007, an overwhelming favorite.
On that day, however, St. Pierre became the victim of MMA's Buster Douglas moment, as he was knocked out by huge underdog Matt Serra. So with British challenger Dan Hardy facing mountainous odds (St. Pierre's as much as an 8:1 favorite) in their upcoming March 27 bout, perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise that Hardy has recruited Serra into his camp.
Hardy arrived early to the east coast to settle in and begin final preparations for their Newark, N.J. bout, and in the days since, has been training with Serra. But the champ says it's not a cause for concern.
UFC lightweight fighter Rafaello Oliveira was so distraught after finding out that his Affliction: Trilogy fight against Takanori Gomi was canceled a week before the pay-per-view that he considered retiring from MMA.
Oliveira, who was only 27 years old at the time, had competed in 10 pro MMA fights prior to the proposed Gomi fight in August 2009, but a win over "The Fireball Kid" would have undoubtedly been the biggest of his career.
by Michael David Smith
Shinya Aoki is the lightweight champion of Dream, Japan's biggest mixed martial arts promotion, and in his last fight he beat Mizuto Hirota, then the champion of Sengoku, Japan's No. 2 promotion. He's firmly established himself as the best in Japan.
The North American MMA scene may be the healthiest it's ever been, what with the UFC, WEC, Strikeforce and Bellator all aggressively looking to expand. What makes this current climate so interesting is that each organization offers something a little different than others.
During the March 6 WEC bout between 
The addition of 
It's not often that a fighter looks back and is thankful for a drug suspension, but 
"The Outlaw" isn't so counterculture that he can't bathe in the love of the fans. In fact, 
With a short burst of MMA action upcoming around the world in the next two weeks, it seems like a good time to take a look at some of the questions surrounding the fighters and events that are soon to take place. 
First, Strikeforce CEO 
Heading into his 
MMA Fighting will have Twitter updates of Tuesday's 
UFC lightweight fighter 
