Spilled Bag of Fights: Junk Sling!

It was a tough night for Tito Ortiz. The self-proclaimed “People’s Champion” wasn’t able to keep his Cinderella Man story going against Rashad Evans and Dennis Hallman’s twig and berries upstaged him. We’ll get to the Hallman “Junk-in-a-sling” look in a little bit. For now, let’s keep it on Tito and Rashad. I was rooting for Tito for the first time ever. I had to respect the man for pulling off what I and a lot of other people thought was impossible when it was do or die time in his fight with Ryan Bader. Now I have nothing against Rashad but the story line of a guy going from begging to keep his job to title contention in the course of a month would’ve been kinda awesome. Love Tito or hate him, you gotta admit that’s some good narrative. Tito’s hands looked impressive in his fight with Ryan Bader so I thought maybe the iron chin attached to that massive cranium might give him a shot of KOing Rashad – especially if Rashad backed straight up like he did against Lyoto Machida. Of course this was a long shot. And while Tito put on an impressive show, Rashad, not showing an ounce of cage rust, was on his game and, let’s face it, his game is better and more well-rounded than Tito’s. What’s next for Tito? I dunno. He needs a win or his victory over Bader will be seen as a lucky fluke – fair or not. But for now, I think Tito’s earned himself some time off. Besides, that knee looked like it hurt like a muhfuh.

(Original photo courtesy of Zuffa, LLC.; alterations by Spilled Bag of Ice)

Vitor Belfort looked amazing in his fight with Rich Franklin. He looked like the Vitor of old. Then after a long lay-off, Anderson Silva and Steven Seagal decided to play a mean prank on Vitor and kick him in the face Daniel LaRusso-style and put the brakes on his plans of taking the belt. Well, it turns out that hiccup aside; Vitor was in his old form again against Yoshihiro “Sexyama” Akiyama. Vitor did the classic hurricane of fists and no amount of sexy was going to stop the inevitable loss of consciousness. That makes three loses in a row for Sexyama. “Three strikes and you’re out” has to be balanced with three “Fight of the Night” awards out of four fights. Well, that and the sexiness. Yeah, Belfort looked great but let’s hope Sexyama doesn’t get cut.

Hey, Dennis Hallman, what’s with the micro-Speedo junk sling? What, didja lose a bet?! Oh, you did? I thought it was pretty funny. Yeah, uncomfortable, wince-inducing funny but funny all the same. Kinda like Chris Pontius’ “Partyboy” character on Jackass. Looks like Dana thought it was just wince-inducing and not so much funny. Maybe it was the fact that boxer Bernard Hopkins was there and B-Hop had recently come around from his position that men rolling around with other men was, I guess, kinda gay.

(Original photo courtesy of Tracy Lee and Yahoo! Sports; alterations by Spilled Bag of Ice)

“No I swear, Bernard, MMA is a manly and respectable sport.”

CUT TO: A guy in a tiny blue Speedo rolling around on the ground with a guy with his chest hair shaved into an arrow pointing towards his face.  Hilarity ensues. Awesome. Shit like that should happen more often. That’s why I love Charles “Krazy Horse / Kid Kaos” Bennett. As long as the fighters are fighting to the best of their abilities and it’s not getting in the way of that, I’m all for shenanigans and showmanship. When everyone in MMA starts acting like GSP, I’m out! Anyway, way to go Brian Ebersole, you kooky weirdo. Keep going with yo bad self. Also, Ebersole told Joe Rogan that he wanted to be on Fear Factor. Well, he faced Hallman’s junk and the scabies that he seemed to have on his arm fearlessly… I say, sign him up! I’ll watch.

Incidentally, I got all my pics from the UFC website – except the one of Hallman. Why? There isn’t a single photo of that fight up in the UFC 133 gallery. Really? I mean you’d think Ebersole came out with a swastika shaved into his chest and Hallman’s speedos read “baby rape” instead of “training mask”. Get a grip, guys! It’s just a dude’s tackle box in a baby blue sling, it’s not 9/11.

Rory MacDonald, holy shit. I’d make a joke about his acne but it’s too easy and quite frankly, I’m kinda scared of him. I mean, he tossed Nate Diaz around like a sack of potatoes and we all know that Nate ain’t no bitch, and then Saturday night, he made Mike Pyle look like a scrub rather than a dude with some thirty-odd fights. Is this kid the next GSP? Sure. In fact put him up against GSP after Nick Diaz takes the belt from him. Oh Snap! I feel the Canadians seething with anger. Simmer down, Canadians! I just praised your boy Rory, didn’t I? Stop being so nationalistic.  I know… you’re all like “Us? What about all those USA chants at fights, eh? You hoser!” and all I can say is, I agree that shit is mad lame. Now go have some Tim Horton’s and simmer down, eh. Anyway, the point is Rory is bringin’ some next-level shit to the game.

(Original photo courtesy of Zuffa, LLC.; alterations by Spilled Bag of Ice)

Matt Hamill got Sweded by Alexander Gustafsson and then Hamill retired. I’m not hating on Matt Hamill. I like him and his story is inspirational and awesome but… I can’t help but think that a movie of that story is gonna be sappy, maudlin and very movie-of-the-week. I haven’t seen it but it’s really hard to do those inspirational type stories without coming off as saccharine. Have any of you guys seen it? Good thing he retired after the movie. “Yeah, I’m just not really into this anymore” wouldn’t make a very dramatic ending. Just sayin’.

Overall, I think UFC 133 was pretty solid. I also got to catch a couple of the Tachi Palace Fights 10 on Friday Night. They were kinda streaming on Sherdog but then again, kinda not. I had to watch some of the fights in the archive since  the stream shit the bed so often during the live stream. Anyway, I wanna give props to Ulysses “Useless” Gomez for his perfectly executed Rear Naked Choke victory against Drew Bittner. I also wanna congratulate Ian “Uncle Creepy” McCall for taking the flyweight championship from Darrell Montague via third-round RNC. McCall has been on a tear since dropping down to flyweight and has to be at the top of the list when the UFC adds a flyweight division. “Uncle Creepy” himself will be our guest on MMA Gospel Radio this Wednesday night at 5:30P/ 8:30E along with Diamond MMA CEO Craig Diamond. So tune in for that shit. It’ll be awesome.

(Original photo courtesy of Zuffa, LLC.; alterations by Spilled Bag of Ice)