Couture makes short work of boxer Toney... So much for Toney's promise to make a showing!

BOSTON – As almost everyone expected, mixed martial arts legend Randy Couture dominated and then defeated boxer James Toney at UFC 118, causing the heavyweight boxing champion to tap out with an arm triangle that choked Toney in 3:19 of the first round.

The fight at the TD Garden was billed as a battle between mixed martial arts and boxing, rival sports that compete for customers, media attention and bragging rights, even if the result proved little.

Couture, a one-time All-American college wrestler and a well-rounded MMA legend, scored an immediate takedown on Toney by tackling him around the ankles around 30 seconds into the scheduled three-round fight. The move neutralized the boxer’s advantage in punching power.

Couture (20-10) then mounted Toney for some ground-and-pound and eventually was able to choke the mostly defenseless Toney.

“I’m a huge fan of boxing, a lot of credit to James for being the first boxer to step in here,” Couture said.

The result was greeted well by the pro-Couture crowd, who chanted “UFC, UFC” as the MMA legend pummeled Toney, who could mount little defense from his back. The fight was completely lopsided. Toney managed to land little if any offense.

“He just got me,” said Toney (0-1). “He’s a great fighter.”

Toney is the current IBA heavyweight champion, his 11th boxing belt in five different weight divisions in putting together a 72-6-3 record, highlighted by 44 knockouts. At 42 years old, though, Toney has lost a significant amount of the skill and punching power that earned him the nickname “Lights Out.”

There were questions about his fitness level and commitment. His physique lacked definition and his stomach hung slightly over his shorts. He weighed a career-high 237 pounds in a sport where fighters are often in incredible physical condition.

Matchups between high-level boxers and legitimate MMA fighters have been rare. It’s been mostly agreed that the advantage is based on what rules are employed. In a boxing match, the boxer would win. Inside the cage – where boxing, wrestling, jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai, karate and just about anything else you can think up is allowed – the more well-rounded MMA fighter should dominate.

Couture showed conventional wisdom was right.

Still, Toney counts as one of the most accomplished boxer to ever attempt to step into the UFC’s Octagon. The pro-MMA crowd booed Toney and roared their approval for “The Natural” Couture, a UFC Hall of Famer.

Toney’s major punching power, aided by the lighter four-ounce gloves of the UFC (boxing is usually 10 ounces) gave him a puncher’s chance and made the fight intriguing.

Toney agreed to give mixed martial arts a chance because the current state of the boxing business is devoid of big paying bouts – “I can’t get no fights,” he said in the run-up to the UFC card.

He arrived on the scene expressing respect for MMA but delivered a tidal wave of trash talk in an effort to sell the fight. He claimed he’d been well-schooled in MMA during an eight-month training run, and that his punching power was sure to knock Couture silly.

It turns out he never threw, let alone landed, a serious punch. Couture left the Octagon without a single mark on his body after a relatively easy night’s work.

Toney, note to self; "I might want to stick with boxing as this MMA fighting is a lot tougher than I thought it was!"

Nice Win Randy Couture!!!

and remember.... You Can't Win, Until You STEP IN.

Strikeforce: Houston results The King Dethroned

Strikeforce Houston was one of the better cards that Strikeforce has offered the fans. The main event and co-main event were both title fights that on paper were sure to be very exciting fights. The main event was for the Light Heavyweight Championship with Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal defending his championship against challenger and number one contender Rafael Cavalcante.

Prior to the fight Lawal had stated in numerous interviews that he considered himself an underdog and indicated that Cavalcante was an excellent striker with a black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

The crowd was pumped when these two final made it to the cage. With Big John McCarthy shouting out “let’s get it on” the two fighters came out ready to do battle. Lawal came out with an early flurry but Cavanlcante seemed to be unfazed. Both fighters continued to appear to be feeling each other out. Lawal worked his way inside and was able to get one of his power slams but was not able to keep the fight on the ground, as Cavalcante was able to immediately stand up.

The first round went back and forth and no fighter doing any significant damage. At the start of the second round, Lawal looked to be a changed fighter. He looked to be more aggressive and really took the fight to Cavalcante. Lawal was able to take Cavalcante to the mat but again he was not able to keep the fight on the ground. Lawal did dominate the second round and appeared to be taking control of the fight.

When the bell rang to start the third round, Lawal came out and attempted to continue where he left off in the second round. Cavalcante, on the other hand, had a different idea. Cavalcante hurt Lawal with a knee that took Lawal’s legs away from him. He did not fall to the canvas but he was definitely rocked. As Lawal shot in for another take down he was again met with a knee and punches that hurt him bad.

Lawal was relentless in working for the take down and did not give up. As Lawal was working for double under hooks, Cavalcante continued to rain down hammer fists to the side of Lawal’s head. This proved to be more than Lawal could handle and Big John McCarthy stopped the fight.

Cavalcante shocked the world with his TKO stoppage over Lawal. After the fight, Lawal stated that this loss will only make him stronger. He stated that a true champion learns from defeat and he will go back to camp, make some adjustments and earn his title back. For now though, Lawal will be left with the taste of defeat in his mouth and wondering why tonight was not his night.

and remember.... You Can't Win, Until You STEP IN.

Strikeforce CEO says Sarah Kaufman has earned right to fight on major Showtime card

Sarah Kaufman (12-0 MMA, 4-0 SF) asked, and she shall receive.

Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker recently told MMAjunkie.com that the women's 135-pound champion will fight on a major Showtime-televised event in the near future.

"I think she's earned her right to fight in the big show," Coker said.

Kaufman blogged this past month about her frustration at being placed repeatedly on the promotion's prospects-based Challengers series instead of the more visible primetime events. After knocking Roxanne Modafferi (15-6 MMA, 0-2 SF) out cold in her first title at Strikeforce Challengers 9, Kaufman vented further.

"Get me on main cards on Showtime, guys," she said in her post-fight interview. "I think I deserve it. Put me on there."

Coker said he didn't fault Kaufman for using the spotlight to give herself a boost.

"She was probably feeling a little bit frustrated, and wanted to move up to the bigger show,' he said. "I think she could have come to us and talked about it, but she wanted to get her message (across), and she took it to the media. But hey, look what happened. It worked out for her.

"It's a fighter out there trying to improve their position and their life, and I think it worked out real well."

Strikeforce this Friday holds a four-woman tournament that will crown a future contender to the women's 135-pound title, and Strikeforce officials previously announced that Marloes Coenen will drop down from 145 pounds to challenge for the title next.

A native of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, Kaufman has dominated her Strikeforce competition, though the Modaferri win was her first stoppage victory. Kaufman previously bested Miesha Tate, Shayna Baszler and Takayo Hashi by unanimous decision.

As of now, Kaufman is un-booked, but Coker promised she'll get her due when Strikeforce schedules her next bout.

"She will definitely be on one of the bigger shows," Coker said. "Of course, I can't tell you if it's going to be the main event or the co-main event because that will because that will be determined by who's fighting on the card as a whole. But I think she's earned her right to fight on the bigger show, just like Cristiane 'Cyborg' (Santos) did."

Santos, the current women's 145-pound champion, has terrorized her division with four consecutive wins by stoppage due to strikes. All of her contests have been broadcast on on the main cards of Strikeforce's marquee events on Showtime.

Coker said he'd love to see the two champions face off, though he doesn't view it as a requirement.

"If [Kaufman] ever wanted to move up to fight Cristiane, we would love that," he said.

(Pictured: Sarah Kaufman and Roxanne Modafferi)

Shout out to: MMAJUNKIE

And remember..... You Can't Win, Until You STEP IN..

UFC 117 Aftermath: Anderson Silva Earns an Extra $120K for Getting His Ass Handed to Him for 23 Minutes

Whatever “demon effigy” Anderson Silva and Ed Soares really do worship, he certainly turned out to be the better God on Saturday night. If nothing else, Silva’s prayers were answered at UFC 117 when his Hail Mary triangle choke somehow found the mark around Chael Sonnen’s neck with a minute, 50 seconds left in a fight the challenger had dominated for four complete rounds. Sonnen kind of tapped, referee Josh Rosenthal kind of stopped the fight and Silva kind of proved he is still the best 185-pound fighter in the world. So much for the vengeful Christian God that Republican wrestlers from Oregon prance and dance in front of, we guess.

There will no doubt be more than a couple breathless accounts of Silva’s “miraculous comeback” in the MMA media during the next few days, but let’s make no mistake here: Anderson Silva’s greatness was not on display Saturday night. In fact, if the UFC’s so-called “performance-based bonuses” are actually in any way based on performance, Big DW should take that $120,000 he evenly split between the two main eventers for “Fight of the Night” and give about $90,000 of it to Sonnen. Because really, only one guy had the “fight of the night” at UFC 117. The other guy just sort of got lucky.

Instead, it was Silva who walked away from last night’s presser with $120K in total bonus money after his Doug Flutie moment also netted him the “Submission of the Night” award. The champ shared that honor with Matt Hughes, who prior to the end of the main event seemed to have the prize for the night’s most surprising sub locked up for himself. How Silva managed to have just about every hole in his game thoroughly revealed and exploited and still walk away with not one, but two bonus checks, we’ll never know. Chalk it up to another part of his “legendary” night, we suppose.

Yesterday, we published what seemed at the time like an overly optimistic hypothesis that Sonnen had a chance to beat Silva if he could fight a perfect fight. Honestly, we didn’t think for a second the guy would come so close to actually doing it. But there was Sonnen last night, not just beating Silva, but downright outclassing the man many regard as the world’s top pound-for-pound fighter for 20-plus minutes. In the process, Sonnen inspired some pretty uncomfortable feelings deep down in our brains’ hearts: We actually felt good for the guy, excited for him and when it was over we felt a great deal of empathy for him. As of about 7 p.m. last night, we wouldn’t have thought any of that possible.

The reason Sonnen’s performance was so stirring was not just because he appeared to be doing exactly what he said he was going to do in the fight – “dump Silva on his prissy ass and beat a hole in his face” – but also because it was a kind of bout we’ve never seen Silva in before. In the past, the middleweight champ has been criticized for being unmotivated, for being ill prepared and for showing a concerted lack of urgency in the cage. That’s not at all what happened at UFC 117. At UFC 117, Sonnen and Silva both showed up and tried their hardest and guess what? For nearly the entire fight, Sonnen was the better man.

In the end though, the Oregon wrestler did as the Oregon wrestler usually does. He got tapped out. Taking people down and letting them catch him in subs is basically the story of Chael Sonnen’s career. Eight of his 11 total losses have now come by some form of arm bar or choke. We’d say that’s a fair enough sample size to conclusively prove that Sonnen has a submission problem. Shoring that up might be something he’ll want to check out.

It also would not be totally accurate to say Sonnen “backed up” much of his prefight trash talk with his performance, since most of his promotional blather had nothing to do with fighting or with reality. No, the true greatness of Sonnen’s domination of Silva was that for those 23 minutes he managed to divorce himself from the Bobby “The Brain” Heenan character he’d been playing for the past few months and, just, fight. He fought his ass off. He fought the fight of his life which, when it was all over, wasn’t quite good enough to steal the UFC middleweight title.

We’d love to sit here and tell you that our lasting memory of Sonnen will be of the shockingly contrite and humble guy we saw in the cage and at the press conference following the loss. The guy who said he was “devastated” and heartbroken over the defeat. Unfortunately, we know that’s not the case. Give Sonnen a day or two to turn this one over in his mind and he’ll probably decide he never tapped out. He could decide that his loss was the result of a vast conspiracy against him. Hell, he might even decide that wasn’t even him in the cage at UFC 117.

Whatever happens, we sincerely hope we can all refrain from spazzing out about how great Anderson Silva’s “comeback” was last night. We hope we can give Sonnen the credit (and some of the disdain because, seriously dude, another triangle?) he deserves. If we can’t, well, maybe Chael Sonnen was right about us all along. Maybe we really are just a bunch of Anderson Silva marks.

and remember....You Can't Win, Until You STEP IN.

Title Shot for UFC 117 Winner.....

There are many fights that have gone overlooked for UFC 117 because of all Chael Sonnen’s talk about his fight with Anderson Silva. There are many fights that should not get overlooked, but fight fans especially do not want to over look the fight between Roy “Big Country” Nelson and Junior Dos Santos.

Dana White has announced that the winner of this fight will get a title shot against the winner of the Brock Lesnar vs Cain Velasquez bout schedule for UFC 121. Nelson won the Ultimate Fighter Season 10 with a knockout victory over Brendan Schaub. After the Ultimate Fighter Finale, Nelson defeated Stefan Struve via knockout 39 seconds into round number one at UFC Fight Night 21. The victory over Struve earned Nelson a shot at Dos Santos and possible a title shot.

Dos Santos debuted at UFC 90 and made an immediate impact with a first round knockout over, then top contender Fabricio Werdum. Dos Santos continued his winning ways with a TKO victory over Stefan Struve at UFC 95. Dos Santos next earned his biggest and most significant victory when he completely dominated Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic into a verbal submission at UFC 113. Dos Santos most recently earned victories over Gilbert Yvel and Gabriel Gonzaga setting up the show down with Nelson.

This looks to be a very interesting fight as the two match up very well against each other. Both fighters have knockout power in both hands and both fighters own black belts in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. On paper, this fight looks good where ever it goes. If they decide to stand and bang the fight fans should see some fireworks and if the fight goes to the ground then fight fans will be able to see some of the world’s best heavyweight Jui Jitsu practitioners go to war.

Either way this fight has the potential to offer fans a knockout of the night, a submission of the night and fight of the night. If you are going overlook a fight this weekend make sure that you do not overlook Nelson vs. Dos Santos as this fight is sure to be one of the best.

and remember......You Can't Win, Until You .Step In