(ShoXC weigh-ins become an impromptu beach party. Photo courtesy of Combat Lifestyle.)
Last night’s ShoXC card from Fresno, Calif. had its share of interesting bouts, but the big news coming out of the Pro Elite camp is that the company has canceled another show, this time in the form of one its smaller confederates across the pond. Contenders 11, scheduled to take place in the UK today, has been called off. Five Ounces of Pain also reports that Cage Rage — another Pro Elite organization — has suffered a rash of layoffs and is down to only three employees. Somehow during all of this, the Pro Elite stock price jumped from $2.50 to $8.00 a share on Friday, even amid reports that they were canceling their September 20 event. As they say on the internet, WTF!?!
Something is going on with Pro Elite, no doubt, but what? Could it be that Pro Elite executives have discovered oil underneath the grounds where their offices lie, and now they’re going to quit putting on MMA shows altogether and move their families to big mansions in Beverly Hills, complete with indoor plumbing and cement ponds? There is very little evidence for this hypothesis at the moment, but we’re going to go ahead and say yes, this is precisely what is happening. You heard it here first.
As for last night’s show, yeah, well, here you go:
Jared Hamman def. Po’ai Suganuma via TKO (strikes) at 2:34 of round 1
Fabricio Camoes def. Sammy Morgan via submission (rear naked choke) at 0:47 of round 1
Cyrille Dibate def. Jaime Fletcher via unanimous decision
Rosi Sexton def. Debi Purcell via split decision
Ray Lizama def. Keith Berry via TKO (strikes) at 2:15 of round 2
Katrina Alendale def. Melanie La’Croix via unanimous decision
Roberto Vargas def. Ralph Lopez via split decision
Jesse Brock def. Josh Rave via unanimous decision
Lucas Gumaza def. Kenny Johnson via split decision
David “Tarzan” Douglas def. William Jacobson via TKO (corner stoppage) at 1:12 of round 1
Saturday’s special ShoXC event on Showtime from the Table Mountain Casino in Friant, Calif., was one of many events put on recently by EliteXC. And just like all the others, this one did not disappoint.
Here are results from the action in case you missed the show:
Jared Hamman vs. Paoi Suganuma:
Suganuma landed a huge overhand right early that stunned Hamman. He followed that up immediately with a gorgeous flying knee. Hamman went down, and the ref jumped in and stopped the fight right away.
The knee looked devastating in real time, but after watching the replays Hamman did not appear to be knocked out at all. He got right up afterwards, but the ref had already stopped it.
It was a questionable stoppage for sure. It’s a shame the last two ShoXC events have ended in controversy. We’re possibly looking at a rematch between these two sometime in the near future.
Here’s Suganuma when asked about a rematch:
“Nobody likes to win by controversial decision, and everyone loves a rematch. So I’m down.”
And Hamman:
“I was completely fine. I’m not hurt. I’m fine. I’m good. I’m just going to go back to training. What am I supposed to do? I lost and that’s just the way it is. Can’t make excuses. Yeah I want a rematch if he wants to give me one”
I’d certainly tune-in to see. In other action:
Fabricio Camoes vs. Joe Camacho:
Camoes took an early takedown and worked the top position for a minute or so, then turned up the aggression.
He was relentless with punches and elbows. He bombarded Camacho until the ref stopped the fight at exactly half way through the first round. Very impressive win for Camoes.
That’s five wins in a row now for him and that also snaps Joe Camacho’s six- fight win streak.
Good stuff.
Shayna Baszler vs. Keiko Tamei:
Baszler won with a neck crank in the first round — she dominated the enitre fight. That would win submission of the night on any card.
Neck cranks are awesome.
Givanildo “The Arm Collector” Santana vs. Matt “Luke Duke” Lucas:
The fight was going pretty slow for most of the first round until Lucas dropped Santana with a big left hand around the one minute mark. He went in for the kill, but forgot he was fighting “The Arm Collector.”
He left a small window for Santana, and thats all the armbar specialist needed. Lucas tapped with 12 seconds left in the first round.
Santana is now 11-0 with 10 wins by armbar. That’s pretty crazy.
Doug Evans vs. Bao Quach:
Quach — a last minute replacement for Wilson Reis — won this fight 55 seconds into the first round with technical knockout.
He showed some quality takedown defense and eventually lured Evans into a big right hand.
Quach is going to be a big player in the EliteXC 145-pound division. He’s got big time power and a lot of talent.
That’s seven wins in a row now for the Hawaiian.
Here are the results from the undercard action:
Melanie LaCroix defeats Melissa Vasquez by technical knockout at 2:58 of round one
Brent Cooper defeats Jaime Iracheta by technical knockout at 1:30 of round one
Roberto Vargas defeats Telly Sanders with a shoulder lock at 1:53 of round three
Luke Riddering defeats Yasser Pezzat by technical knockout at 2:53 of round one
Lucas Gamaza defeated Devin Howard via unanimous decision
Tony “Kryptonite’’ Lopez defeated Terrell Dees via knockout in round two
It was an explosive night of fights for sure. The main event was definitely controversial, but all five main card fights ending in the first round made for some exciting action.
Next up for EliteXC is the CBS network debut on May 31 featuring Kimbo Slice. That will be followed up two weeks later with a Showtime event featuring two title fights — KJ Noons vs. Yves Edwards and Jake Shields vs. Drew Fickett.
Cyborg, Shields, and Mean Mr. Munchies may be M.I.A., but tomorrow night’s EliteXC/Strikeforce show still has some very compelling match-ups going for it, including a main event that will pit the fan-hyped Cung Le against the self-hyped Frank Shamrock in a middleweight championship bout. You can catch the action on Showtime starting at 9 p.m. ET/PT. Here’s what the televised lineup looks like…
Shamrock vs. Le (for Strikeforce middleweight title)
Frank (24-8-1) has talked his usual trash about how he’s going to spank the relatively inexperienced Le (5-0), but trust us, it’s only for promotional purposes; Shamrock isn’t dumb enough to actually believe he’ll be cruising through an easy one tomorrow, and unlike his brother Ken, he’s not dumb enough to stand and trade with a superior striker. Le has the most devastating kicks in MMA right now, and he ended his last fight — against Sam Morgan last November — via the ultra-rare body-kick KO. But like other fighters who come from a kickboxing background, Le’s long-range kicks often leave him open for single-leg takedowns, and Shamrock could capitalize. He’ll certainly be looking to take the fight to the ground when the moment is right and finish Le by submission, and we think Shammy will succeed in the second or third round. If they really wanted to make this one interesting, the loser would have to accept eternal banishment from San Jose.
Drew Fickett vs. Jae Suk Lim (welterweights)
A.k.a., “The Battle of the Guys Who Were Supposed to Be Fighting Other Guys.” Rage in the Cage/UFC vet Drew Fickett (32-5) has choked out fighters like Josh Koscheck, Kurt Pellegrino, and Carlo Prater, and has generally faced much tougher competition than “The Korean Icepick” (9-3), who spent most of his career in Spirit MC. We’re loving Lim’s nickname, but it’s not going to help him much against the far-more-experienced Arizona native. Both men hadn’t been preparing to face each other, so it’s a bit of a wash, but judging from how Fickett’s done against guys with Lim’s skill level, we’d say a first-round submission victory is nearly inevitable.
Frank Shamrock’s battle with Cung Le is on Saturday, so expect to see a lot of Frank around the web this week promoting the hell out of the thing. Already, there’s several Frank-related stories/vids out there today. Here’s a few to check out:
15 Rounds has an interview posted where Shamrock talks yet again about fighters controlling their own brand and promoting their own events. He goes into a lot of detail about the different models and how the MMA model could improve — depending on how you look at it. He also dishes about a possible upcoming duel with Tito Ortiz. It looks like something is in the works and the two fighters’ companies would co-promote it and hire out for someone to actually run the show. We’ll see if a rematch shapes up soon.
Oh yeah. And the little subject of Kimbo Slice comes up. Frank’s not a fan.
Q: What do you think of the fact that Kimbo Slice is being pushed as the biggest star fighting on the show?
FS: Kimbo has a weird aura about him. Personally, I think it’s a step back to where we were ten years ago which is the big, tough scary guy fighting, but he’s very, very popular with the young generation. His story is very interesting and appealing to people, but I also think they will quickly grow tired of it because it is kind of that gimmick story. The problem with Kimbo is the more he learns – the worse he’s going to get. He’s going to lose that raw, crazy, angry power that he is using to beat people.
Q: Do you think that Kimbo is a bad role model for kids considering how he made himself popular - through backyard fights? Could there potentially be a problem with the younger generation trying to copy Kimbo in order to get noticed?
FS: 100%. I think he is the absolute worst role model we could have for our events. This is coming from someone who has been here since the beginning. Having Kimbo as a representative as a face for the first big event on CBS is a step back.
Q: If you saw your own kids watching Kimbo Slice fights on the Internet, would you let them watch it?
FS: I don’t know. That’s a tough one. I’d probably let them watch it, but then I’d make them go to the martial arts class that night. It’s like I wouldn’t stop my son from watching car racing, but I wouldn’t let my son go race. But I would let him go to a racing school and learn about it.
Denny took the fight to the mat early, where the fight stayed for almost the entire first round. Malaipet escaped being submitted and was able to get to his feet. Denny then attempted to get things to the ground again when the Muay Thai kickboxer committed the disqualifying elbows. Denny was unable to recover after being given time to shake off the blows. The official call was DQ at 4:51 of the first. Malaipet dropped to 3-2 in MMA after a successful kickboxing career and Denny’s record went to 26-16.
Post fight quotes from the press release:
“I’m sorry because I came here to fight, but this is MMA and you have to follow the rules,” said Denny, who could not continue
after he was nailed by three blatant elbows to the back of the head. “I may have been dazed but I wasn’t knocked out. One thing I could not do, however, was move my neck.”
“I definitely want to fight him again,” Malaipet said. “If he wants to do it at 150 pounds, I’ll fight him any time, any place. This wasn’t my type of fight. But there was no way I was ever going to tap out.”
In other action, Conor Heun went to 7-2 when he earned a unanimous decision — one that didn’t sit well with the crowd — over Marlon Mathias. While it was a back-and-forth battle, the judges still scored it 30-27 on each card. Mathias clearly hurt Heun more and landed the most blows — Heun had a gash above his left eye and possibly has a broken jaw. Mathias expressed his disappointment afterwards with the decision, stating he knows he won at least two rounds.
(‘Pet and the Wildman, L.A.’s wackiest drive-time talk radio team. Image courtesy of MMAWeekly.)
If you’re feeling bloodlustful this evening, we suggest setting the DVR for Showtime at 11 p.m. ET/PT, when the ShoXC Elite Challenger Series kicks off from the Chumash Casino Resort in Santa Ynez, CA. Headlining the event is explosive former Muay Thai world champion Malaipet Sitprapom (3-1 MMA), who faces King of the Cage vet Thomas “Wildman” Denny (25-16). Also on the main card is undefeated bantamweight Chris Cariaso, as well as 205′er Aaron Rosa, who took his first career loss in his last ShoXC appearance in October against Jared Hamman. The weigh-in results are below. It looks like a few guys went over, but hey, it’s ShoXC, so whatever.
Televised Card
Malaipet Sitprapom (154.75 lbs.) vs. Thomas Denny (160 lbs.)
Marlon Mathias (159.5 lbs.) vs. Conor Heun (159.5 lbs.)
Aaron Rosa (203.25 lbs.) vs. Jaime Fletcher (205 lbs.)
Shane Del Rosario (231 lbs.) vs. Analu Brash (256.5 lbs.)
Mark Oshiro (138.75 lbs.) vs. Chris Cariaso (139.5 lbs.)
Preliminary Card
Brandon Tarn (250.5 lbs.) vs. Jason Williams (257.25 lbs.)
Devin Howard (172.5 lbs.) vs. Mark Kempthorne (170.75 lbs.)
Vince Guzman (161 lbs.) vs. Lyle Beerbohm (160.75 lbs.)
Kenny Johnson (170 lbs.) vs. Michael Penafiel (168.25 lbs.)
Steve Gable (169.75 lbs.) vs. Eric Jones (168.5 lbs.)
Alright, so that may be a bit of a stretch. But Variety reports that Showtime subscriptions jumped 11% in the fourth quarter of 2007; parent company CBS Corp.’s profit fell 19% in the same period. We’d imagine that many of those new subscribers were people who signed up just to see Kimbo Slice destroy Bo Cantrell at EliteXC: Renegade. It sure as hell wasn’t for The Tudors.
In other dollar-related news…
— “Strikeforce at the Dome”took in more money than any other combat-sport event ever held in Washington state. 7,089 disappointed fans packed the Tacoma Dome and gave up $300,000 of their money, which they immediately regretted.
— Rich Franklin has put the Hummer H2 he was given for being a coach on the second season of The Ultimate Fighterup for auction on eBay. The starting bid is 80 grand, and you can “Buy It Now” for $125,000. The auction ends on March 2nd, and 10% of the proceeds will go to the Keep it in the Ring Foundation, which channels youthful aggression through after-school sports and martial arts programs. We hope Franklin is more successful at this eBay thing than Ricco Rodriguez, who eventually settled for $250, a dozen Krispy Kremes, and a pack of smokes.
It’s Friday, and past 5 p.m. (hint, hint), so you might be interested in watching Kimbo Slice try to sing a Kelly Clarkson song in this new Showtime promo. And if not, hey, no worries.
