Strikeforce has signed Cristiane "Cyborg" Santos to face Hitomi "Girlfight Monster" Akano- No seriously, her nickname is "Girlfight Monster", to face each other in their upcoming April 11 card. The bout will be the regular 3/3 held at 145#. Akano is a Bodog vet and trains at Abi Abe Combat Club in Tokyo; she is a submission specialist with 10 of her 14 wins coming via arm bar.
The Brazilian commented on the fight, "I know Hitomi Akano is the best Japanese female fighter today, but I am prepared for any situation and will always be looking for the knock out." Watch out "Girlfight", Cyborg makes most men look like wimps.
Tell me that's not scary!
And, she's only 23... wow the Brazilian sun is brutal.
Sengoku has announce the featherweight Grand Prix pairings.
Hatsu Hioki v Chris Manuel
Hideki Kadowaki v Nam Phan
Marlon Sandro v Matt Jaggers
L.C Davis v Michihiro Omigawa
Masanori Kanehara v Jong Man Kim
Seiya Kawahara v Nick Denis
Tetsuya Yamada v Ronnie Mann
Also on the card in non-tournement bouts will be Muhammed Lawal v Ryo Kawamura at light heavyweight & James "Cauli-ear" Thompson v Jim York battling at heavy weight.
The Grand Prix will be held at the Yoyogi National Gym in Tokyo and aired in the US on HDNET.
RUMOR MILL
UFC 98 will see Yushin Okami (top MW challenger) face Dan Miller.
Paul Taylor has -rumored- to have agreed to fight German native Peter Sobotta at UFC 99. The 22-year-old Sobotta trains out of Unlimited Combat System Geislingen (Balingen, GER) and has a record of 8-1-0.
It is also rumored that Stefan Struve will be facing Bosnian Denis Stojnic. It seems the UFC wants to pad the card with regional guys for their first mainland European event. Struve, Sobotta and Stojnic are all from countries in close proximity to Germany. The UFC may also announce a bout for light weight Dennis Siver. Both he and Sobotta appeared at the press conference announcing the organization's 99th event.
The T.U.F. 9 finale may be Diego Sanchez's next test. He is rumored to face seasoned light weight Clay Guida at the June 20th event. The forums are already a buzz with whether this will be a LW legacy fight or capture a 2009 lay-and-pray fight of the year prize. Sanchez looked decent at his 155 debut against Stevenson last month. "The Nightmare" has good wrestling, but Clay has excellent ground game with everything to gain and nothing to lose.
MINCED WORDS
Yesterday's USA Today(3/4/2009) interview with Dana White had him basically guaranteeing Jackson a title shot -even if he loses-, dangling Groves future with the UFC and sparring words with Jardine. Regarding Kendall Grove, T.U.F. 3 winner, Dana had this to say, "If Kendall loses this fight, It could be the first-ever T.U.F. winner that's no longer with the UFC." That, of course is excluding "The Comeback" winner Travis Lutter. I'm sure he meant guys who never competed in the UFC before T.U.F.
Keith Jardine has recently stated (see prior post) that if he were to get a title shot he would turn it down because of his friendship with belt-holder Rashad Evans. White wasn't so happy about the Montana natives choice, "I disagree with that, and I have to their face many times. This isn't basketball or football. You're not part of a team. Do you want to be the champ? If Rashad's got the belt, what are you going to do- sit your whole career out and wait for Rashad to retire? Their careers are going to cross paths. And when they do, they're going to have to fight." Not necessarily. Maybe Jardine is okay with second-best, as long as his good buddy has the belt. I mean, Rich Franklin doesn't seem to have a problem with it.
And now, the much anticipated M-1 explanation/reaction/refusing of all guilt statement regarding "Baby Fedor" Kirill Sidelnikov's positive steroid test. M-1's reasoning behind the positive result is "a nose spray commonly used in Russia". In their statement M-1 (Fedor and Kirill's managers) detailed that "...in preparation for his Affliction debut... Kirill spent some time training outside of the Imperial Team family in St. Petersburg. Kirill indicated that during that time away he began to experience complications from a broken nose that he had recently sustained. ...Kirill followed the advice of a coach not affiliated with M-1 [of course!] who gave him a nose spray commonly used in Russia to help treat some of his symptoms. It is M-1's belief that the nose spray is what contained the Stanozolol."
But, incase you don't buy that they go on with this: "For those that are skeptical of this explanation, we believe Kirill's account is true based in large part to his physique. If he had been using large amounts of Stanozol[ol] on a regular basis, we believe that the frame of his upper body would have contained leaner muscle that had more definition." That's right, he couldn't have been taking steroids "on a regular basis" because he's FAT. I get it now. There aren't steroids that just make you a big piece of meat.
But of course, if you still think he's guilty, they'll just own up to it and blame it on him. "While we do not believe the use of a nose spray provided Kirill with an unfair competitive advantage, we are obviously very disappointed in his lapse of judgment. Even though it was only a common nose spray that he used to treat an injury, an athlete must take full responsibility for what he puts into his system at all times."
And finally, just to get your oh-he's-just-a-baby sympathies up they will conclude with, "While we are not citing youth as an excuse, we feel we need to offer the public an explanation and we attribute the mistake in part to the fact that Kirill is just 20-years of age." But at least he still has somewhere to turn, "In spite of our disappointment, Kirill remains a part of the M-1 family and as such, he can continue to count on our support through this turbulent period. While we do not endorse his actions, we stand by him."
I'm sorry, but when I was 20 years old [hem, last year] I knew the difference between steroids and Zicam.
I'll leave you with this Demian Maia video.. just because it's cool.
Sorry, this was a long one.
Missed something? Questions? Comments? E-mail me: samantha.lynn.johnson@gmail.com
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