Page 572 - Top MMA News and Mixed Martial Arts Headlines

Back in March after a successful UFC event there, Dana White vowed UFC would return to Columbus, Ohio for a UFC event every year. Apparently "every year" won't include 2010-Dana confirmed Thursday that UFC won't return next year. The main reason seems to be expansion and desire to visit new cities. UFC has run 3 Columbus events over the last 3 years.

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And he wants fans to remember that. He recently told a Las Vegas newspaper that in MMA "you cannot have the future without the old guys like me that did it first". And he referenced Michael Jordan in regards to there being no Kobe Bryant and LeBron in the NBA without MJ to compare himself to the young stars of MMA today.

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Martin "The Hitman" Kampmann was originally scheduled to face Mike "Quick" Swick at UFC 103 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. An injury forced Swick out of the bout and hard hitting British fighter Paul Daley stepped in to replace the American Kickboxing Academy fighter. "I was preparing for Swick. I was looking forward to fighting Swick, but now Paul Daley steps up. He was supposed to fight too on the same night. I was happy they could switch it up and get me an opponent to fight."

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Strikeforce CEO Scott Coker Thursday confirmed to MMAWeekly.com that his middleweight champion, Cung Le, has booked another major motion picture role and will relinquish his belt. Jake Shields and Jason “Mayhem” Miller will now vie for the undisputed title under the eye of CBS when the two meet at the promotion’s network debut Nov. 7 at location to be announced early next week. A report on ESPN.com says the Sears Center Arena in Chicago is under intense consideration, citing sources close to the situation. The telecast will air live from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET. Coker was unaware whether the broadcast would be tape delayed to other parts of the country.

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More than 48 hours prior to fight time UFC 103 was already setting records in Texas. “We’re very happy with ticket sales,” said UFC president Dana White. “It’s the number one sporting gross we’ve ever had and only second behind the Rolling Stones in 2005 (for gross ticket sales for any event),” said American Airlines Center general manager Dave Brown at the UFC 103 pre-fight press conference.

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Michael David Smith talks to Scott Coker and gets more scoop on the November 7 Fedor Emelianenko vs Brett Rogers card on CBS: Can you tell me any of the undercard fights? I can tell you some of the fighters. You'll see Gegard Mousasi, Jake Shields, Mayhem Miller and Cris Cyborg. It'll be a solid card, with the No. 1 heavyweight in the world and a great undercard.

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Former Elite XC welterweight champion Jake Shields and former ICON Sport middleweight champion Jason Miller will settle their score at Strikeforce: “Fedor vs. Rogers” in front of a national television audience on CBS this Nov. 7, according to a recent Twitter post from “Mayhem.” Here’s the snip: “Ok bitches who said I was ducking — I duck NO ONE. Fighting Sheilds on November 7th. Official BOOM!" The former “Bully Beatdown” buddies have recently been squabbling back-and-forth, claiming that the other won’t accept the fight. Perhaps that’s because there was no fight to accept — Strikeforce officials denied that the fight was even in the works.

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DALLAS – UFC light heavyweight superstar Quinton "Rampage" Jackson's decision to forego a December bout with Rashad Evans has resulted in a series of headaches for UFC brass. Rescheduling main events and shuffling fight locations may seem troubling enough, but today White admitted he was forced to scrap plans for a potential third event in November based on Jackson's decision to take a role as B.A. Baracus in a feature film version of "The A-Team." "Thanks to [expletive] B.A. Baracus, I couldn't [expletive] pull it off," White said. "B.A. [expletive] me. The collateral damage that was done by him doing this thing was unbelievable."

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DALLAS – While UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva has insisted he's currently ready to fight on a moment's notice, UFC president Dana White told a different story at today's UFC 103 pre-fight press conference. White said "The Spider" is set to have bone spurs removed from his elbow, and while the procedure is routine, Silva will still need time to recover. "Contrary to whatever the hell [Silva] is saying, he's not 200 percent healthy," White said. "He's having some bone spurs removed from his elbow, which is a simple little procedure that happens, but you've got to have recovery time."

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With the show seemingly on its deathbed in recent years, the UFC and Spike TV's reality series "The Ultimate Fighter" recently debuted its 10th season on Wednesday and scored the biggest ratings in series and Spike TV history. According to Spike TV, "TUF 10," which features an eclectic mix of MMA and NFL veterans (most notably, former EliteXC headliner Kevin "Kimbo Slice" Ferguson), debuted with a whopping 4.1 million viewers. The series' previous high was 2.8 million viewers, who tuned in for the "TUF 3" premiere in 2006.

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Don't tell Tyson Griffin's teammates at Xtreme Couture gym that he'll be fighting on the same card as them, they'll likely cringe at the thought. After all, Griffin has managed to five Fight of the Night honors in eight performances in the UFC while also picking up a Submission of the Night honor in his UFC debut at UFC 63. As Thomas Gerbasi states in his sitdown with Griffin heading into UFC 103, teammate Martin Kampmann was a little upset that Griffin would once again share a card with him much like the UFN 18 card in which Kampmann won a hard fought victory over former WEC champion Carlos Condit, but Griffin won Fight of the Night honors instead.

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"Fedor Emelianenko and Brett Rogers will face off in a heavyweight main event for Strikeforce on Nov. 7 on CBS. A venue for the event is still to be announced. Strikeforce announced the event on Thursday. The CBS Corporation owns premium pay channel Showtime, which has a multi-year broadcast deal with Strikeforce. The bout will be the first of three for Emelianenko, the world’s top-ranked heavyweight, with the promotion and will mark his first bout in a cage." I was expecting it to be earlier than this. Also, the only interesting thing about the fight will be seeing Fedor in a cage.

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Former UFC middleweight titleholder Rich "Ace" Franklin headlines UFC 103 against former UFC light heavyweight champion Vitor Belfort. The two will complete at a catch weight of 195 pounds; for Franklin it will be back-to-back fights at what I've coined the heavy middleweight division. What does a win at 195 do for a fighter in the middleweight or light heavyweight division? "That's a good question," Franklin told MMAWeekly.com. "I look at myself online sometimes and I see that I don't really have a good ranking at 205. I don't really have a good ranking at 185 anymore. I think a lot of people don't know where to put me in those weight classes, and I realize that these catch weight fights are kind of doing that to me.

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As a freshman in high school, Casey Olson was small, but determined. "I was 100 pounds soaking wet," Olson told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com), "but I made varsity (wrestling)." Olson's father, who went through a rough patch when Olson was in elementary school, had stabilized his life and had coached his son. Heading into his sophomore year, Olson wanted to improve, so his father did some extra drilling at the house, with the couch pushed aside in the living room.

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And The Bully noticed. In post-fight comments on his victory over Roger Huerta, Gray Maynard noted he heard Huerta's shoulder pop a couple times during the fight, but Huerta was able to avoid being submitted.

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Providing an update on his health after a seizure forced him off UFN 19 right before his fight, Phillipe Nover says he's feeling better but can't really explain what caused his seizure. He said everything came out normal in tests except his blood sugar being high, which might've been from eating so much after the weigh-ins. But he also said he'll be back.

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Fedor Emelianenko is getting set to make his Strikeforce debut in the next month or so, and faces a formidable opponent in the undefeated Brett Rogers. Rogers has racked up wins over the likes of Jon Murphy, Ralph Kelly, and most recently, former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei Arlovski. Fedor recently noted to Inside MMA that Rogers presents a difficult challenge for him. "Brett Rogers is in very strong physical shape," Fedor noted. "He has a great knockout punch and is very big and very dangerous." Despite the fight being announced a month ago, an exact date for the bout has yet to be announced. Fedor admitted that he wasn't sure when the fight would take place, saying it will "take place sometime in October or November, the exact date is still being identified." Fedor also stated that this will be his last fight this year, and he will probably not fight again until February of 2010. Fedor was asked if MMA fans should forget about a fight between him and Brock Lesnar from ever happening, to which "The Last Emperor" replied, "definitely not." "I think that this fight will definitely take place sometime," he continued. "I hope that finally we'll find some common language with the UFC and we'll come to an agreement." Stay tuned to FightLine.com for an announcement on a date and venue for the Fedor - Rogers fight.

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Although Texas does not require drug testing for combat sports such as MMA, UFC has requested that random drug testing be conducted this weekend at UFC 103. There was no drug testing at UFC's last Texas event, UFC 69, which appeared to result from a misunderstanding between UFC and the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation.

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As the 37-year-old Frank Trigg approaches his UFC return on Saturday against Josh Koscheck, the two-time UFC title challenger could very well be looking at the start of his final run fighting at the elite level. "I'm in the game to get titles, I'm in the game to get victories," Trigg told FanHouse. "I'm in the game to battle my way up to the top." In this exclusive interview with FanHouse, Trigg talks returning to the UFC and welterweight division against Koscheck at UFC 103 in Dallas, Texas.

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OKLAHOMA CITY – Former WEC welterweight champ Carlos Condit (23-5 MMA, 1-1 UFC) appeared nearly unstoppable during his five-fight WEC run. But after fighting at Wednesday night's "UFC Fight Night 19: Diaz vs. Guillard" to a split-decision result for the second time in two UFC appearances, Condit knows there's still work to be done before he can replicate his WEC success in the sport's biggest promotion.

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