Larry Brown Sports

Rashad Evans had no problems with Phil Davis in his light heavyweight fight on FOX Saturday, winning the five-round match by unanimous decision (though it didn’t go quite the way Evans had predicted). Evans’ win sets up a title shot against Jon Jones at UFC 145 on April 21st in Atlanta. Jones said during Saturday’s post-fight show that he was pumped for the fight.

“I feel so alive when I know who I’m fighting next and I have a new mission, and I have a new purpose,” he said. “I’m so excited about fighting Rashad. I can’t wait to get past this chapter in my career. I’ve been calling him the antagonist in my career because of all the hype and all the drama. So I’m a happy man. I’m excited to retain my title on April 21st.

“I try to look at it as no fight is a big fight, and not to fight people’s names, but people’s bodies, but I think I’m a little more emotionally attached to this fight, and it’s going to drive me to train harder than I’ve ever imagined.”

Th Jones-Evans fight was supposed to happen twice, but each fighter had to pull out with an injury. First it was Jones pulling out with a hand injury, then it was Rashad who had thumb injury postponing their December matchup. There is plenty of bad blood between the guys, so it should be a good one. I’m hoping Evans knocks Jones down a few pegs.

On Sunday, a hacker called Josh the God hacked the UFC’s website to protest Dana White’s support of SOPA — the congressional act aimed at stopping online piracy. On Tuesday, the hacker took matters a step further by releasing the UFC boss’ personal information.

In an interview posted on MMA Fighting Tuesday evening, White said “The Internet is a place where cowards live.” He challenged hackers to try messing with the website again, saying he wasn’t scared of the internet. Josh the God responded by releasing White’s information, including his phone number, address, and social security number.

The act got White’s attention, and he began sending tweets to the hacking group Anonymous.

“I love the Internet. It helped us grow our biz. Stealing is stealing! And hacking into people’s shit*** is terrorism. … same guys on the net bitching about fighter pay are the ones who are stealing from them. That are our partners on PPV! and yes cowards hide on the Internet! At least I’m man enough to say all my s*** in public and not hide behind a screen name!!”

Here’s the truth of the matter. As White says, the bill may have the right intentions, but it’s going about things in the wrong way. If White recognizes what’s wrong with the bill, and what about it has angered the public, he wouldn’t support it. He’s a smart man and I think he sees that. He should work on something that protects his copyright content in much less extreme terms, otherwise he’s going to receive extreme backlash.

Fist pound to Bloody Elbow

The UFC’s website was hacked on Sunday and its front page yielded the image seen above. The site was presumably hacked for supporting SOPA — the stop online piracy act. A group of hackers called Anonymous has attacked several sites in response to file sharing site megaupload.com being shut down. They hacked CBS.com and several Brazilian sites.

The UFC has supported SOPA and goes to great lengths to ensure their content is not pirated on the web. Clearly the government has pissed off a large group of powerful web people who are now responding.

Fist pound to The Big Lead for pointing the hack job.

Gina Carano is an MMA fighter and the star of the new action movie Haywire. She appeared on Conan to promote the flick and ended up in a discussion about how fighting is like sex.

“If you think about it, [sex] is a very real interaction between two human beings,” she explained. “It’s an energy, like you have an energy, and I have an energy, and it’s an energy that nobody else is going to share.”

Alright, I’m kind of with you on that, Gina.

Carano also says she got into MMA because of an ex-boyfriend who went to a gym to start changing his life. Five months later, she began fighting too. Oh yeah, and how can we leave out that the person at the gym said she was fat? I wonder what he would say now.

Fist pound to Guyism

Ronda Rousey is quickly becoming as legendary for her trash talking as she is for her brutalizing arm bars.

The female MMA fighter responded to a Cris Cyborg Santos tweet on Monday with one of the best burns of the year.

“You don’t just have a dick, you are a dick for posting that picture of Gina, you cheater,” Rousey wrote to Santos over Twitter.

What was the picture that prompted the harsh response? Santos posted a doctored picture of Gina Carano, whom the Brazilian badly beat in 2009.

Santos deleted the picture, but Cagewriter shared it with us:

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Miesha Tate will defend her Strikeforce Bantamweight title on March 3rd against Ronda Rousey. Tate is 12-2 and has been competing professionally since 2007. Rousey is 4-0 and only had her first professional fight last March. Based on their experience and career accomplishments, Tate doesn’t think Rousey deserves a title shot.

“Honestly, I just don’t think that she was next in line,” Tate told Showtime’s Heidi Androl during the Strikeforce: Rockhold vs. Jardine show Saturday. “I think she’s done great so far. She’s had a really impressive career, but I think she’s still new.

“She’s only a year into her career. I’m about six. [Sarah] Kaufman’s about six. Kaufman’s 14-1, I’m 12-2. We’re kind of veterans of the sport.

“She kind of talked herself into a title fight. I’m going to be very excited to send her to where I think she belongs, and that is the back of the line.”

The gauntlet has been officially thrown. Tate’s friction with Rousey is nothing new; the debate between the began late November when Rousey called for the match because it’s a marketable “hot chick” fight. Tate later expressed a similar sentiment, saying that Rousey needs to beat some top 10 women before she gets a title shot. But Tate does understand why, from a business perspective, Strikeforce wants the fight.

I understand where Tate feels it’s unfair, but I have to side with Rousey. Rousey is a damn good fighter, she’s a damn good marketer, and I want to see if she can back up her talk and beat Tate. The interest she’s generated in the fight has been great for the sport.

Gee, what gave it away? The 20″ biceps? The six-pack abs? The Adam’s apple? Oh I get it, it was the hair on her knuckles and chest that tipped everyone off.

Yes, Cyborg Santos tested positive for stanozolol metabolites following a Dec. 17 title defense at Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Masvidal. She’s been suspended a year, fined $2,500, and her win over Hiroko Yamanaka has been overturned to a no-contest.

Her positive test takes away one of the main attractions in women’s MMA and almost kills the top division. About the only thing fans have to look forward to is Ronda Rousey against Miesha Tate in March, which should be exciting.

But now that Cyborg’s been popped for roids, about the only thing I’m wondering is when they’re going to find her twig and gigs. Where does she hide big old mister knish when she’s fighting?

The last we heard of B.J. Penn came after his October loss to Nick Diaz at UFC 137. Penn was beaten badly in the fight and said afterwards that he was probably retiring. Now that he’s had some time off, he seems to have changed his mind.

Penn uncharacteristically called out Nick Diaz over Twitter Thursday.

“Look how much bigger you are in this pic..” he tweeted at Diaz (picture seen above). “I thought you were gonna scrap from the beginning homie? What was that coward fence holding strategy to tire out the smaller man? Street fighter my ass! I made you fight like glass jaw @jonfitchdotnet poser! I’ll be ready for that weak bs next time we fight!”

Penn’s Twitter account is also linked to the people that run his website, but they confirmed the tweet came from B.J.

“BJ wrote it and he was fired up and not just an off-beat bad day type of fired up, it’s that old fire that we haven’t seen in a while and it appears to be back,” they say.

It’s not too much of a surprise to hear he has the fire again. No fighter is happy about his career prospects after getting his face smashed. But we’ve learned that after you give them some time to recover, they often reverse their decision to retire.

Glove touch to Bloody Elbow

Alistair Overeem beat Brock Lesnar by first-round TKO in their UFC 141 fight in Las Vegas Friday night, leading to Brock’s announcement that he was retiring.

The fight went about the way I expected, and it ended exactly how Overeem predicted: with a hard leg kick to the liver. Lesnar was hesitant to shoot on Overeem and take to the fight to the ground where he’d have the advantage. The hesitation allowed Overeem to go to work with his striking and stand-up game.

Brock had no defense for Alistair’s Muay Thai knees and hard leg kicks which led to the stoppage. It was a kick straight to the liver that did all the damage, and Brock told Dana White after the fight that he thought he had a few broken ribs.

Lesnar has now lost two fights in a row since his fast rise to UFC Heavyweight Champion. He became UFC champ in just his fourth professional fight — an incredible feat. At 34 years old and recovering from intestinal surgery because of diverticulitis, Lesnar announced he was retiring from MMA. It’s likely he’ll make at least a few appearances in the WWE like he suggested in October.

Overeem will now face heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos in what should be another exciting fight.

Nate Diaz and Donald Cerrone refused to touch gloves prior to their UFC 141 fight in Las Vegas, and the hate between the two continued well after the bout began. Prior to the start of the third round, Diaz flipped Cerrone the double bird.

We told you it was on when Diaz knocked Cerrone’s cowboy hat off at their press conference. Their fight did not disappoint — it went the distance and Diaz won by unanimous decision.

Uncensored version of the picture below:

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