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WALKER: Weekend review - Rampage Jackson, Bellator 60, TUF: Live, and booking reactions
Mar 11, 2012 - 10:45:08 PM WALKER: Weekend review - Rampage Jackson, Bellator 60, TUF: Live, and booking reactions

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By: Brad Walker, MMATorch Contributor

There's been a lot going on this week in the world of mixed martial arts, and this is going to become a new weekly piece I will write up on Sundays. It will be my take on things that have gone on over the week in MMA with some personal thoughts tucked inside. This week, we have seen quite a bit going on, including the start of The Ultimate Fighter Live on FX, and the twitter tirade of Rampage Jackson. I forgot to mention some booking that I consider questionable by the UFC, but I'll get into that shortly; here's Walkers Weekend Review:

Rampage Jackson

Quinton "Rampage" Jackson has become quite a personality since he began his career in MMA, but now he just seems to be a PR crisis in the making. For a guy who came in and won the UFC Light Heavyweight title in his second UFC fight, and then in his third fight unified the UFC and Pride belts, he has become one of the hardest fighters to watch inside the cage. He started off hot in the UFC, knocking out both Marvin Eastman and Chuck Liddell, and then took home a decision win over Dan Henderson in a great fight; then things started to go downward. Since losing to Forrest Griffin, he has posted a mediocre 4-4 record in the Octagon, and spent most of that time complaining about irrelevant things. If you're getting paid a disclosed $250,000 per fight, while posting only a .500 record, what exactly is there to complain about?

Jackson recently stated on Twitter that he hoped to get his release from the UFC to go and fight elsewhere, so obviously the money isn't a factor to Rampage - either that or he just likes to whine. UFC has pampered him since his arrival, and with the recent admission of using TRT in preparation for his fight with Ryan Bader, I can't imagine there's a lot of open doors for him if he does leave. In my 12 for 2012 column I did predict he would leave Zuffa to fight in an overseas promotion such as DREAM, but this has just turned into a snooze fest of a formerly dominant fighter whining about everything that doesn't go his way. I think Jackson knows he's no longer the fighter he was, and wants to be able to fight, and destroy low level fighters rather than lose to respectable ones, which I will dub "pulling a Fedor." Honestly, I don't really have a lot of interest in seeing him fight the guys who the UFC has right now, so perhaps another organization is better suited to his needs, and I hope he is able to find himself a happy place in the world of MMA.

Bellator 60

This past Friday night many of us tuned in to watch the kickoff of Bellator season six, with the featherweight semi-finals and a title fight between Pat Curran and Joe Warren. There were some decent fights, but some were much less than entertaining – and quite the reminder of how few top tier fighters that Bellator employs. I loved the main event, as Pat Curran put on an absolute striking clinic and destroyed Joe Warren in three rounds, but I don't think the stoppage was done in time – Warren was clearly out on his feet for at least 15 seconds prior to the stoppage. In events like this we really need to take a step back and ask ourselves "should this ref really be giving him a chance to do something?" Or for that matter "What the hell is this guy going to do when he's unconscious?" After the fight you could visibly see Warren being helped out of the cage by his team, which is never a good sight, and can probably be very squarely placed on the shoulders of the referee.

That was pretty much my only big highlight of the Bellator show, and of course being a member of Team Curran I was a little biased going into the fight, but then again the odds were heavily in Pat's favor. The other fight I was hoping to catch on television was the Sean McCorkle fight, which aired on Spike.com after the main event - and was another piece of evidence that McCorkle does not belong inside of the UFC. Fighting at super heavyweight has never been a way to get into Zuffa, and McCorkle beating up overmatched opponents isn't going to get him anywhere near the radar. Other fighters did look good on the night,; Mike Corey got absolutely rocked by Ronnie Mann and recovered to take the win, but the previously undefeated Jeremy Spoon looked very overwhelmed facing off with Daniel Straus. I look forward to the rematch between Santos and Prindle next week, and I highly doubt it will once again end in a high velocity nut-shot.

The Ultimate Fighter Live

First of all let me get this off my chest: I DVR'd TUF to watch Bellator live, yes I know in the realm of MMA that may be a cardinal sin, but a team mate fighting for a belt isn't something to miss. The first impression I got of this season was that we won't be hearing a lot of smack talking between Faber and Cruz, as they seemed rather friendly on the microphone, which was actually off putting. We saw a lot of talented strikers step in and take home decisive wins, as well as some very ugly fights that made me want to drink a glass of warm milk and go to sleep. A few of the potential fighters didn't seem to have the desperation in them for the one round fight and just fell victim to their own inability to push the pace, while others went out and put it all on the line.

All in all the live format of the fights was pretty cool, and hearing all the censored audio let me know how much Dana White likes to use the phrase "holy s***" – and boy did he do it frequently.
On the other side of the coin, in the days leading up to Friday's premiere, there was a lot of talk about Dakota Cochrane and his gay porn career prior to the show. A number of MMA outlets decided to pick up the story about how he had performed in numerous gay porn titles, and immediately labeled him the first ‘openly gay Ultimate fighter.' Personally, I disagree with how that was gone about by most of them, as he clearly stated as soon as he was given a chance that he did it for money, and was in fact a straight man – who even disclosed the past work to the UFC prior to being selected. So much emphasis was put on this kid because of the possibility of him being homosexual that it makes me wonder, what is going to happen when there actually is an openly gay fighter in the top end of the talent pool? Is he going to be glamorized for being gay, or is he going to be labeled "the gay fighter"? I don't know for certain, but what I do know is that none of us should care if a fighter inside of the cage prefers an alternative lifestyle, as long as he gets inside of the cage and gives 100% for the fans.

UFC's Booking

There have been some fights booked this week that I have to question the validity of, simply because I disagree with how they were put together. Firstly, let me say this: Frankie Edgar granting people rematches after draws or close fights should not automatically mean he is going to get one in return. He lost his title, and if they have a rematch and he wins it back, guess what – Ben Henderson is going to ask for one too, and the other guys in line are going to continue to get screwed. It honestly bothers me that this merry go round of rematches managed to continue now that Edgar lost the belt, as I was truly hoping to see a rematch between Henderson and Anthony Pettis now that Bendo has the belt. Sure, Edgar did enough in the fight to warrant one, but let's stop this feeling of entitlement and let him fight the winner of Diaz-Miller before we say "hey, you know what, you lost, so let's do that again and expect a different result!" I have a natural distaste for rematches being booked right away after the original fight, because the person who is being granted a rematch doesn't have to do a single thing to earn another shot at the belt.

There were two more fights recently announced that made me scratch my head and wonder who was throwing darts at the wall to make these matchups. First up is Mike Russow vs. Fabricio Werdum. As soon as I heard this fight announced I broke into a belly laugh, because it's pretty much the same as Werdum's last fight - chubby guy with a good chin (Russow) vs. guy who's going to win (Werdum). I know and acknowledge that Mike Russow is on a winning streak, but he would be better suited to face Werdum's last opponent than Fabricio himself; Nelson vs. Russow makes a lot more sense to me than tossing him in there with a top 10 heavyweight. The other fight I don't understand in the least bit is Antonio "Bigfoot" Silva vs. Roy Nelson - could they have picked a worse matchup? It's like asking me to fall asleep for 13 minutes after these two gas out in the first two. I would have put Silva in there with a guy like Cheick Kongo or Mark Hunt who is at least going to have the ability and reach to score a knockout before it turns into a slow motion war against sleep.

Now on the flipside of things I would like to give some credit where it's due in the booking process; Cain Velasquez vs. Frank Mir is the perfect title eliminator fight. The only way we can make this fight look any better on paper is to have John Hancock write it all in calligraphy. I expect this fight to be a war to see whose game plan will get executed, with Mir wanting to take it down and Velasquez looking for a knockout. I really truly hope that Frank Mir doesn't do what he so often does and decide that he's going to box with a better striker, because it just doesn't work out. It will be an excellent fight and I think that we will see the new number one contender and the (possibly new) champion put on a war when the dust settles. Personally, I would love to see Velasquez vs. Overeem, but Mir vs. Overeem looks great too, so does Dos Santos vs. Mir, and we've all already seen Dos Santos vs. Velasquez.

Thank you all for reading my thoughts of the week, and make sure to follow me on twitter - @BradMMATorch

Be sure to let me know what you all think.