Warriors in the (North) East (WMMA2) - Page 3

PilotMan · 01-13-2010, 01:35 PM

NOVEMBER 2010

Another month in the books, and another successful one at that. The company posted a loss of 42k last month, which is less than most of the past 6 months. Our gate revenues seem to be holding steady right now, while our merchandise sales are taking off. Revenue from merchandise very nearly tripled from last month. At the same time, our expenses have also been on the rise. Marketing costs have nearly quadrupled in the last month. The other expense that has seen a rise is our general admin and overhead. I have been on a bit of a hiring spree and handed our over 20k in bonuses last month. That is a high since we started last year. I just can’t pass up the chance to get some of these fighters signed.

We have made great leaps over the past year, and have officially moved up and out of the regional standing. Our shows are gaining national attention, and our fighters are too. We are at 10% popularity now, and we have added some regional popularity now in Canada and Mexico. This jump has been the prime reason for us getting a new TV show and PPV deal. After WVR’s last show we have climbed to the #4 promotion jumping over WVR who had a weak show. I know that we have some weak shows coming up, and I also know, that we can expect to plateau for a little while. Strikeforce, WEC and UFC are the only promotions ahead of us in the World, and in the US. WVR is still the top promotion in Japan, with DREAM, and Shooto next.

Reaching this pinnacle also allows me, according to my own stipulation, to start to sign guys to exclusive deals. That fact alone makes this series of latest signings very important.

Last month we looked at the lightweights, and this month we look at the welterweights. Lyman Good won the title, and sits on top of the pile.

Cage Warriors Welterweight Rankings

1. Lyman Good (13-0) Cage Warriors Champion, #3 in the World
2. Jesse Taylor (16-5)
3. Gary Wright (11-0)
4. Brock Larson (29-3)
5. Pat Miletich (32-7-2) The old man is back and fighting here now.
6. Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0)
7. Jason Norwood (9-2) Lost to Good in the first title fight.
8. Ryan Ford (12-3) Scheduled to get the next title fight against Good.
9. Jason High (12-2)
10. Yosmany Cabezas (10-3)

This is a pretty stocked weight class and is getting stronger by the month. I can see almost all of those guys going around and around for some time.

PilotMan · 01-13-2010, 01:38 PM

Marius Zaromiskis (15-3) retained his DREAM welterweight title with a win over Ryo Chonan (18-12). Also on the DREAM card, Cage Warrior, Raphael Davis (10-1) handed Mario Miranda (13-1) his first career loss with a first round TKO.

Sean Sherk (33-5-1) has officially retired. His last fight was a loss to Gray Maynard last year.

UFC 108 ran a day before our next show. The main event saw Josh Koscheck (16-4) defeat Matt Serra (10-8). Martin Kampmann (16-3) picked up the win in the co-main against Karo Parisyan (18-6). Other winners on the night were Yushin Okami (25-5), Shane Carwin (12-1), and Kenny Florian (13-4). After the fight it is widely reported that Matt Serra will be leaving the UFC in the near future. Rumors are that the company is unhappy with his performance.

PilotMan · 01-13-2010, 01:44 PM

Cage Warriors 21: Herman v. Bush, and our first PPV show, airs live from New Jersey. Our show features two title fights. The first fight is set to begin.

A pair of welterweights are first off tonight. Jesse Juarez (12-6, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Norman Paraisy (5-3, Boxing/Wrestling). Both fighters are coming off of losses. Paraisy used a good ground game to keep Juarez on the defensive. Paraisy worked to mount in the second round, and after taking a lot of damage, Paraisy grabbed an armbar and got the submission. Good fight.

Two lightweights are next Koetsu Okazaki (7-1-1, Freestyle) makes his debut by taking on Scott McAfee (8-1, BJJ). Okazaki makes short work with a good takedown, and good grappling. McAfee gave up his back and Okazaki forced him to tap in the second round. He didn’t seemed fazed at all. Good fight.

Christian Uflacker (3-1, BJJ) takes on Thomas Longacre (5-1, Kick Boxing/Muay Thai) in the lightweight division. Both fighters won their last fight. Uflacker made no bones about it, he meant to take this to the ground, and he did, scoring no less than 6 takedowns. The problem was, that Longacre was able to escape back to standing from almost every single one. Longacre almost knocked him out with a big kick, but couldn’t take advantage, and the last round was combo of good strikes and takedown escapes. Longacre pulled out the narrow decision. Decent fight.

The next fight is between featherweights Bao Quach (16-10-1, BJJ) and Darren Uyenoyama (7-4, JJ/Wrestling). Both fighters have proved tough fighters but haven’t made themselves into contenders yet. An active and entertaining fight between them. Whether it was standing or grappling both men moved to try submissions and strikes, takedowns, and takedown defense. It was a close fight but Quach was the better man today. Decent fight.

Our last prelim fight is in the middleweight division, between top contender Tom Watson (10-3, Boxing) and Fabio Nascimento (10-5, BJJ). Watson barely won in his debut, and Nascimento hasn’t been on the tear since his win in Brazil over Renzo Gracie. Watson shocked the world with a takedown attempt and almost lost it, when it was Fabio who was in control. Watson suffered in the first round, and in the second his strategy changed. Watson was sharp with his punches, landed a serious combo, and sent the Brazilian flying back. Watson wins with a TKO in the second round, Good fight.

A pair of light heavyweights start off the main show. David Heath (12-5, Wrestling) takes on Ryan Jimmo (13-2, Karate). Heath makes his debut against the tough Jimmo. Just as predicted, Heath wanted to get this to the ground, but paid the price multiple times with good striking from Jimmo. In fact, Jimmo almost knocked Heath out twice, and defended well when he was on his back in the second round. Heath tired out, and Jimmo stayed safe with clean strikes and good defense. Jimmo spoils the debut of Heath. Decent fight.

Featherweights, Jose Aldo (15-2, BJJ) is set to make his Cage Warriors debut against Joe Soto (10-1, Wrestling). Aldo is among the best in the world in his weight class, while Soto, is coming off of his title defeat. Heckofa fight! Aldo looked like he wanted nothing to do with Soto up close, and he used some great strikes to keep him off. He couldn’t keep it that way though, and Soto took him down quickly once he got a hold of him. Soto bullied Aldo early in the second, and got a takedown from the clinch. Soto moved quickly to an Americana and Aldo was powerless to stop it. Fantastic fight, as Joe Soto pulls off the huge upset.

The first of the title fights is about to begin. Trevor Prangley (22-6, Wrestling) takes on Jared Hess (11-1-1, Freestyle) for the Cage Warriors middleweight title. What do you expect from a pair of grapplers. Both men expended a lot of energy early on, while neither did much damage. Hess’ age and skill was good early on, but as both men tired it looked like Prangley would steal it with his tactics. The last round was ugly, but Hess just managed to do enough to win 48-47 on all three cards. Jared Hess is the first Cage Warriors Middleweight Champion! Poor fight.

The next fight is for the Cage Warriors Heavyweight Title! Justin Wren (10-1, Wrestling, 285) is set to take on Brandon Cash (7-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 265). This fight is all about striking. Cash looked good early on, and Wren didn’t seem to want to get close either. Towards the end of the first round, Cash knocked Wren down with a straight right, Cash wasted no time, and moved to unload more damage. Wren had no hope as Cash blasted him again, and the ref jumped in with one second before the end of the round. Brandon Cash is the first Cage Warriors Heavyweight Champion. Great fight.

We finish with our main event between Dave Herman (18-3, Wrestling, 265) and George Bush (7-1, Wrestling, 255). How can we top the title fight? Herman is huge next to the older fighter. He has a full 4 inches and 6 inches of reach advantage. Bush went for an early takedown, but Herman pulled him into a close grapple. Herman picked up Bush and slammed him down. Bush defended well early on, but Herman was able to move to side control, and fired off more powerful shots. Finally, doing enough damage to force the stoppage. Great fight.

We had 971 in attendance for our show and over 22,000 buys on our first PPV. Too bad the show was rated as being Awful.

Fight of the Night goes to Bao Quach and Darren Uyenoyama
Knockout of the Night goes to Brandon Cash
Submission of the Night goes to Joe Soto

Yeah, it wasn’t all that hot for our first PPV show, but that was to be expected. I know that Herman and Bush had no business being the main event. Jared Hess and Brandon Cash come away with titles, and neither was expected to win. The Soto/Aldo fight was huge, just huge, and vaults Joe Soto into a new level of fighter. Ryan Jimmo and Tom Watson both saw their stock rise, and a few for wins for Longacre and he could be back into the top contenders, but lightweight is very tight.

PilotMan · 01-15-2010, 06:51 AM

Our first episode of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV is now scheduled to air on The Fight Network the last week of December in New Jersey. I needed to announce the show this far out just to be able to secure the two fights that I really needed on that card. Suffice to say that Cage Warriors will finish the year with a title holder in every weight class.

At a Shooto show in Japan, Dean Amasinger (6-2) made his debut in a title fight against A Sol Kwan (7-5), winning the welterweight title with a third round TKO. Cage Warrior, Issei Tamura (8-0) stayed undefeated with a win over unheralded Tenkei Oda (7-8-2).

We are undergoing some huge roster shuffling. We have been adding some higher profile fighters the last few weeks, and they will be fighting early next year. Also we are going to start to see some of the fighters who just didn’t cut it leave. Our roster is starting to get a bit bloated, but we still need to rely on our huge roster to keep running quality shows, while we don’t have lots of guys under exclusive deals.

The great(?) Fedor was on the card fighting in the main event for Strikeforce. But, he was beaten in three rounds in his rematch with Brett Rogers. Chase Beebe (15-6) won in the co-main. Also winning on the card was Robbie Lawler (19-5), Hatsu Hioki (25-4-2), Dan Cormier (3-1). Former CW fighters Terry Martin, and Shonie Carter fought in the prelims. Martin won, while Carter was beaten.

UFC ran a card opposite Strikeforce. This card was better with GSP (22-2) defending his 170lb title against Mike Pierce (10-2) with a submission late in the 5th. In the co-main event Ed Herman (16-8) defeats Michael Bisping (17-4). Other winners Aleksander Emilianenko (17-3) beat Roy Nelson with a KO at :50, of round 1. Big Nog (34-6-1) beat Frank Mir (14-4), and Matt Hughes (43-8) won again.

Maximum Fighting Championships Dean Lister (13-6) defended his Middleweight title against Jason Day (19-9). Other winners on the card were Jess Liaudin (15-11), Ryan Machan (10-4), Ariel Sexton (8-2) and Antonio Mendes (17-5).

A couple of our fighters are leaving the us. First is Crafton Wallace. Wallace lost his debut fight and had his second fight scheduled for two weeks from now. Wallace was supposed to fight the second week of December, but with him leaving there is no reason for him to fight. So Kala Hose (7-4) will take his place fighting Reggie Orr (9-9-1). The second is Rudy Bears (10-5) who lost his two CW fights, but the first was a headlining show against undefeated Gary Wright, in a close split decision. Neither fighter will be missed all that much.

PilotMan · 01-15-2010, 07:07 AM

Ben Henderson and Donald Cerrone are on tap for Cage Warriors 22. Also tonight, I have added two low profile prelim fights to the card. I needed to get some of these other guys some fights to see if they can break apart from the pack.

The first fight on the card in between two welterweights. Jesse Sanders (20-7, Boxing/Wrestling) and Scott Norton (6-3, Submission Wrestling). Both fighters are still looking for their first wins here in CW. Sanders dominated the fight with a quick takedown, work to mount and finish before the round ended. Great fight.

Lightweights Carlos Quinton (6-2, Muay Thai) and Jose Morales (4-2, Wrestling) are up next in the bonus prelim. Quinlon was supposed to have the better stand up but Morales landed the better punches, while Quinlon controlled all the action on the ground. Quinlon finally breaks his losing streak, and Morales has now lost 3 in a row. Average fight.

Jae Hee Chun (2-1, Muay Thai) and fellow featherweight Taiki Tsuchiya (5-2, Shooto) are set to go next. Taiki has a 7-inch reach advantage over the smaller Chun. Chun again struggled while Taiki scored a couple of takedowns and Chun showed that his ground game is weak. Taiki got his back and forced Chun to submit. Good fight.

Middleweight Bryan Baker (11-3, Judo/Wrestling) and Jeremy Horn (82-20-5, Freestyle JJ) are hoping that they can get another win and start a long winning streak. Not an exciting fight. Lots of grappling and leaning up against the cage. Horn and Baker traded positions and Horn scored two takedowns to Baker’s one. But it was Baker that did the more effective work, and who pulled out the narrow victory. Average fight.

Light Heavyweights Travis Wiuff (59-14, Wrestling) and James Lee (13-5, Wrestling) are the next pairing. Neither fighter has been good, both have been boring and believe it or not, Wiuff is only 32 with all those fights. Wiuff used solid striking to control round one, and in the second round, he took Lee down and pounded away, worked to mount, and finished it in fine fashion. Good fight.

Alex Trevino (7-2, Boxing/Wrestling) and Andrew Buckland (10-7, Boxing/Wrestling) are set against one another at welterweight. A close fight between these evenly matched fighters. Buckland’s takedowns and strikes were good enough to overcome Trevino. Average fight.

Hae Joon Yang (3-0, Wrestling, 285) takes on fellow heavyweight Mike Hayes (6-1, Freestyle, 255). Yang is so big, he scored one quick takedown, and Hayes couldn’t control the bigger man from underneath. Yang worked to mount and used his ground and pound to force the fight stoppage. Great fight.

A featherweight fight is next between Buck Bisbey (10-1, Hybrid) who is making his debut in CW. He is taking on Hideo Tokoro (23-18-1, Boxing/Wrestling). Tokoro proved to be too much for the debuing Bisbey. He was really in no trouble, but still made a game fight of it. Decent fight.

Two light heavyweight contenders are next on the show. Jake O’Brien (13-4, Wrestling) is going up against Victor Valimaki (18-6, Karate). An exhausting grappling fight in the first round. Both men pushed and reversed each other over and over. Valimaki looked tired at the end of the round. In round two he definitely was tired. O’Brien knocked him down, and despite some good ground work by Valimaki, O’Brien landed some heavy blows and eventually forced the stoppage. Good fight.

Welterweights Drew Fickett (37-13, Wrestling) and Hiromitsu Miura (10-7, Judo) are next up. Miura was all over Fickett. He kept the fight standing, he landed clean punches. He knocked Fickett down with a brutal shot, but it was in the 3rd where Fickett finally got Miura down, worked to mount and secured an armbar as time ran down that settled the fight. Miura had the win, but it was Fickett that ultimately prevailed. Great fight.

The co-main event is between Alberto Crane (15-3, BJJ) and Ran Weathers (15-5, Boxing/Wrestling). Both lightweights have been on a winning streak and both are just outside the top contenders. Crane wanted to get this fight to the mat, and he succeeded in the first round, but Weathers survived and in the second found his range. Weathers caught Crane following a jab when he was coming forward, and hammered him into the middle of next week. Great knockout. Good fight.

The main event is our big one between Ben Henderson (11-2, Wrestling/Taekwondo) and Donald Cerrone (11-2, Wrestling/Kick Boxing). This is the second time these two have squared off, but the first for our company. Cerrone wanted to put his mark on this fight, and to make up for the first loss against Henderson. He did all that in the first, by having better strikes and doing more damage. Round two was the same and he built up a nice lead to cruise with, but that’s not exactly how it ended. Instead, a desperate Henderson clocked the Cowboy, and sent him to the mat. Henderson followed up quickly locking in an armbar and getting the rapid submission win in dramatic come from behind action. Good fight.

We had a crowd of 718 on hand for the fight and it was rated as very poor. We did another 21.5k buys on PPV.

Fight of the Night was Drew Fickett and Hiromitsu Miura
Knockout of the Night was Ran Weathers
Submission of the Night was Taiki Tsuchiya

I have to say I am more than disappointed in the result of the show. I figured we would do better than that. However, our fighters continue to improve, and gain in popularity, and these shows are going to be part of our growing pains over the next year or longer. Ran Weathers win over Crane was a surprise and really moved him up the list. With as thick as the lightweight division is though, it will take a couple more wins to get to the top. Hideki Tokoro did great. A tough and entertaining fighter. Yang goes to 4-0, a big, young, green heavyweight that will take some more time to develop. James Lee is all but done in Cage Warriors.

PilotMan · 01-15-2010, 07:15 AM

Another letter from the athletic commission was on my desk this morning. This is the 3rd suspension that we have had this year. This time, it’s for Bryan Baker (12-3). Baker had pulled together a nice win streak of late and was working his way up the division. Not a contender at this point, he is only 25, and will have time to get his career back on the right path. He also works for Maximum Fighting Championships, who will also be missing his services.

Cage Warriors 24 marks the end of the calender year. We will have run 24 shows, 2 per month, and have completed a full year fight schedule. Our last show is a good one, and features the most popular fighter in Cage Warriors taking on a new face to the company. Daniel Puder, who is just on the outside looking in a title shot will go in the cage with Assuerio Silva. Silva is a former PRIDE and UFC figher who had been fighting in Pancrase and held the Heavyweight King of Pancrase Title. Silva has abandon that title for his chance to return to the US, his first fight since 2007, when he lost to Cheick Kongo. The other big name debuting on the card is that of UFC legend Pat Miletich. Miletich had been retired but only recently got back into the cage for Shark Fights. He won 3 fights for them and is now here in Jersey, taking a step back toward his former glory. His opponent will be the toughest that he has faced since his return. Jason High has been on a tear, quickly moving up the welterweight ranks. His last win, a submission over seasoned vet Chris Wilson, moved him on to the contenders list, where he he is ultimately looking for a shot at Lyman Good. Here is a look at the full card.

Code:

Cage Warriors 24: Puder v. Silva

Daneil Puder (9-0) v. Assuerio Silva (16-8) HW
Pat Miletich (32-7-2) v. Jason High (12-2) WW
Benji Radach (20-7) v. Chris Price (16-2) MW
Kevin Casey (4-2) v. Andy Reese (9-4) HW
Cole Province (8-1) v. Brandon Foxworth (17-6) FW

----Prelims----

David Baron (16-5) v. Kyle Bradley (13-7) LW
Xavier Lucas (10-1-1) v. Bryan Travers (12-2) WW
Rex Richards (7-3) v. Mark Burch (10-3) HW
Rawdon Lee (2-1) v. Jeremy Williams (5-1-1) LHW
Andy Kappas (3-2) v. Kim My (2-1) WW
Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-3) v. Russ Miura (5-3) FW
Ikuo Usuda (6-3) v. Sergio Gomez (8-4) LW

Andy Reese, Xavier Lucas, and Rex Richards are all new to the Cage Warriors roster. Rawdon Lee was in the original LHW title tournament but an injury took him out. He is just now making his Cage Warriors debut. The Radach/Price fight should be very good, it will be a test of that gaudy record of Price’s. Radach is no pushover.

PilotMan · 01-20-2010, 07:48 PM

The Cage Warriors Featherweight Champ was in action in Japan, fighting for tiny Cage Force. He won his fight via decision in a poor fight. Din Thomas pushes his record to 28-8. It’s too bad that he did that, we could have been looking at a fight with Cub Swanson on TV for the last week of the year if he wouldn’t have. Thomas isn’t likely to fight now until April.

In other action in Japan, WVR ran a show with the main event between Jorge Santiago (23-9) and Joe Doerksen (43-15). Santiago won via first round submission. Lightweight Cage Warrior Kwang Hee Lee (8-3) was also on the card and picked up a win via 3rd round TKO.

The Shark Fights featherweight title changed hands last night as Jason Georgiana (9-5) beat Joe Pearson (31-14-1) by first round submission to win the title.

WEC announced a show where the headliner would be a battle between Cub Swanson and Jens Pulver. The next day they cancelled the show.

UFC 115 was last night from Miami, Florida. The main event saw Rampage Jackson (32-8) knock out Tito Ortiz (16-7-1) early in the second round. The co-main saw Little Nog (17-4) grab a win over Matyushenko (23-6). Other winners on the card were Tyson Griffin (15-3), Marcus Davis (17-5), and George Sotiropoulos (11-2).

WEC WrekCage was on last night, and the main event saw Wagnney Fabiano (15-3) knock out LC Davis (15-3), but it was a poor fight. Other winners on the card were Ed Radcliff (10-1), Fredson Paixao (11-4), and Ricardo Lamas (8-2).

PilotMan · 01-20-2010, 07:51 PM

Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV has it’s first episode on The Fight Network scheduled for the last Saturday of the year. Like I said earlier. We are going to finish the year with a title holder in each division. I finished the bookings for the show, it features 8 total fights, with two title fights. I have high hopes for our show, and hope that it’s a strong outlet for our talent, and give us a broader audience with which to reach.

The main event will be for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight title, and is between Marcus Sursa and Jimi Manuwa. It’s fitting that Manuwa get to fight for the title since he was the first fighter that signed for Cage Warriors. The co-main is a battle for the lightweight title, and is between two very experienced, veteran fighters. Jeff Curran will take on Rich Clementi for that title. Raphael Davis will standby to face the winner of the light heavyweight title, and the lightweight challenger will be Karen Darabedyan. Here is the full card for our TV show.

Code:

Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV

Marcus Sursa (8-4) v. Jimi Manuwa (6-0) for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight Title
Jeff Curran (32-12-1)  v. Rich Clementi (35-15-1) for the Cage Warriors Lightweight Title
Christian M’Pumbu (14-2-1) v. Phil Davis (6-0) LHW
Yves Edwards (37-16-1) v. Chris Wilson (15-8) WW

----Prelims----

Bobby Stack (8-2) v. Carlos Quinton (7-2) LW
Dan Hornbuckle (21-3) v. JJ Ambrose (11-3) WW
Dong Yi Yang (8-2) v. Josh Curran (3-2) HW
Jason Black (23-6-1) v. Keita Nakamura (16-7-2) LW

All American wrestler and rising MMA star Phil Davis takes on European fighter Christian M’Pumbu, who makes his US debut. Our show opener should be good between two established fighters in Yves Edwards and Chris Wilson.

PilotMan · 01-20-2010, 07:54 PM

DECEMBER 2010

The end of 2010 finance meeting went well. It had to, our growth and expansion has been fantastic, and despite the fact that we lost money for most of the year, we turned a profit at the end of the year, mostly in part to the PPV deal that we signed with Shaw PPV.

Our P&L looked good as we made a profit of 113k, that erases almost all of the losses of the last 3 months. We look forward to more good months ahead. Our PPV revenue was over 183k, and that alone was where our profit came from. Our ticket sales were actually down to the lowest levels in the last quarter. Sponsorship has increased while our merchandise sales are off slightly.

Our fight prize money expense has risen again to an all time high of over 85k. We did run some longer cards, so it shouldn’t come as any surprise that it happened. Our production costs tripled this month, while marketing dropped with our drop in popularity. We handed our 25k in signing bonuses, a new high, but again, I think we brought in some high quality guys who are going to put butts in the seats, or good fighters who haven’t been given a shot to fight in the US.

We finished last month having advanced to a national level of popularity, but two successive shows have put us back down to 81.3% in the US. I have a feeling that we are going to be teetering on this point for a while. We have 3 show to finish the year, I think they are good shows, and I am curious to see how our TV exposure affects our popularity. We are currently the #6 promotion in the world having fallen behind MFC and WVR. We are still #4 in the US.

Last month we looked at welterweights, so this month we look at the middleweight division. Multiple new hirings have added fighters to this list that have yet to debut with CW.

Cage Warrior Middleweight Rankings

1. Tom Watson (11-3) - UK based fighter still gaining pop in US.
2. Jared Hess (12-1-1) - Cage Warriors Middleweight Champion
3. Siyar Bahadurzada (19-4-1) - Based in Japan, Siyar comes to the US
4. Fabio Silva (17-5) - Likely to get first crack at Hess.
5. Joe Riggs (32-11) - Big name former UFC and Strikeforce fighter is new to CW
6. Trevor Prangley (22-7) - Lost to Hess in title fight.
7. Jacob O’Connell (6-0) - Green but rising
8. Benji Radach (20-7) - Won in his CW debut
9. Nate Moore (9-2) - Rising star
10. Gerald Harris (14-4) - Drops a long way after his loss to the departed Martin.

PilotMan · 01-24-2010, 07:47 PM

Bellator 21 was last night and the main event was a battle of light heavyweights. Poai Suganuma (12-3) beat Ian Freeman (19-10-1), and on the same card, Cage Warrior Eric Reynolds (15-5) was TKOed in the 2nd round by KJ Noons (10-3).

Over in Poland, Ibragim Magomedov (24-6-1) retained his KSW Heavyweight title with a win over Tadas Rinkevicius (17-6).

In Japan, Takyua Wada (20-8-10) retained his Welterweight King of Pancrase title with an unexciting win over Asaki Honda (5-4-1). The fight was buried on the card.

At DREAM’s last card Riki Fukuda (18-5) won over Zelg Galesic (11-7) in the main event. On the same card, Ryan Ford (12-4) who is due for a title shot against Lyman Good was defeated Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6), when Hironaka submitted him in the first round. Incidentally, Hironaka has also recently signed with Cage Warriors and will join the organization when he leaves Japanese based Cage Force. Although this fight was at welterweight, Hironaka is the Cage Force Lightweight champion. And will be fighting at lightweight for Cage Warriors.

PilotMan · 01-24-2010, 07:55 PM

Cage Warriors 23 is the first show that we have run outside of New Jersey. This time, we take our show straight into the teeth of the lion with a show in Las Vegas, Nevada. Our main event tonight is between Brock Larson and Gary Wright. Both Larson and Wright are at the top of the welterweight division, and this battle should be epic. Larson has a big experience advantage, and both fighters have been on a winning streak. Also fighting is a solid matchup between Antonio McKee and Zac George. In total 12 fights on the card.

Our opening fight of the night is a striker/grappler fight between Joe Heiland (6-2, Striker) and Kyle Pimentel (7-2, BJJ). These fighters are in the welterweight division. After some tentative striking, Pimental shot and got a takedown. Heiland was helpless as Pimental unleased a ground and pound that stopped the fight. Great fight.

Next up is a pair of lightweights in Charles Diaz (4-1, JJ) and Matt Grice (10-3, Wrestling) are going to fight in the cage. Two grapplers choose to spend 15 minutes striking. Diaz was the only one who even shot, and he managed 2 takedowns, but both were at the end of the round and no damage was done. Diaz was rocked hard by Grice in the second round, but managed to survive the fight. In fact, he won a unanimous decision over the more experienced Grice. Decent fight.

Welterweights Jean-Francois Bedard (1-2, Kick Boxing) and Jin-Kyu Lee (2-1, Striker) will battle it out next. Neither fighter has really started to establish himself here. Bedard started with a big kick, but walks right into a mean hook, knocking him completely out. Lee finishes it quickly. Great fight.

Besiki Gereneva (6-1, Sambo) takes on Bobby Rehman (7-2, Muay Thai) in the light heavyweight division. Rehman scored some great punches early on stunning Genereva and a couple more knocked him down. He survived the ground and pound, but Rehman transitioned to an arm triangle and Genereva didn’t survive that. Great fight.

Middleweights Kala Hose (7-4, Striker) looks for his first win against Reggie Orr (9-9-1, Boxing/Wrestling). Apparently Orr looked at some fight footage of Hose, and saw that he sucks on his back. Orr took him down, controlled him, pounded on him, and left him defenseless. The ref stopped the fight shortly thereafter. Great fight.

A pair of big heavyweights get in the cage next. Rodrigo Munduruca (8-0, Muay Thai/BJJ, 285) will put his perfect record on the line against Neil Cooke (6-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 290). Big boys indeed. Cooke has 4 inches of height, but it is Munduruca who has the reach advantage. Cooke just plain destroyed Munduruca. He took him down, pounded the crap out of him, dropped some elbows, took his back, pounded on him again, and finished him with a rear naked choke. Good grief. Great fight.

The last prelim fight is between debuting contender Renan Barao (20-1, BJJ) as he takes on tough customer Matt Fiordirosa (12-3, Wrestling). Firodirosa has a 5 inch reach advantage, and is a proven hard to beat fighter. This fight is in the featherweight division. Fiordirosa was stunned early as Barao took him down early on in the first and controlled him through the round. But the other rounds were weak as Fiordirosa could only manage to push Barao up against the cage and hold him there, without really doing anything else. I guess that wins fights, because it was enough. Barao suffers his second loss. Average fight.

The main card starts with two lightweights. Ville Manninen (6-1, Grappler) will take on Joe Durate (6-2, Muay Thai). An exciting first round saw Duarte take Manninen down, then get caught in a triangle choke, pick up Manninen and slam him down hard, then pound the rest of the round. Manninen survived the round, and took the second with good work, but in the third it was Duarte that owned the fight. Taking down Manninen and controlling the round, but not really doing any damage. Duarte won the fight, it was decent.

The next fight is between light heavyweights Jeremiah Billington (12-2, Wrestling) and Ralek Gracie (3-1, BJJ). Both Billington and and Gracie are looking to rebound from losses in their last fights. Gracie looks like a Gracie here. His ground game was strong, and even though he was pushed around in the second round, he made Billington pay for a mistake by getting a guillotine and locking it in and finishing it in the second round. Great fight.

Lightweight Antonio McKee (23-4-2, Vale Tudo) makes his way to the cage. He will take on Zac George (19-3, Wrestling). George is 13 years younger than McKee and has a 4-inch reach advantage. Round one wasn’t all that, but George won it in boring fashion. George took McKee down fast, but McKee defended well. A scramble for position resulted in George getting an ankle lock on McKee, and sinking it in fast. McKee didn’t stand a chance. Good fight. Zac George on the rise with a good win over McKee.

The middleweight division is the home for the co-main event. Jacob O’Connell (6-0, BJJ) will take on Nate Moore (9-2, Wrestling). Both men are working their way up the division, and looking good. Who will come out on top? The fight started off slow with both men grappling and doing nothing more. Moore does more in round two, and in round 3 hit’s a barrage of clean strikes that forces the ref to stop the fight. O’Connell, suffers the first loss of his career. Average fight.

Our main event is next. Brock Larson (29-3, Submission Wrestling) looks to stop the winning streak of Gary Wright (11-0, Wrestling). Larson is slightly taller, and has a slight edge in reach. Both men are undefeated in Cage Warriors. Brock Larson didn’t waste any time in this fight. He was aggressive and took Wright down early on, and nearly finished the fight in round one, working to mount. Round two went pretty much the same. Larson took him down early. Wright didn’t know where he was coming from, and Larson locked an Americana on him and that was the end of the fight. Larson hasn’t even been tested here in Cage Warriors. Wright suffers his first loss of his career. Great fight.

We had 928 fans on hand in Las Vegas, and an additional 29,298 buys on PPV. That’s a good viewership jump from two weeks ago. Our show received an excellent rating.

Fight of the Night goes to Joe Duarte and Ville Manninen
Knockout of the Night goes to Jin-Kyu Lee
Submission of the Night goes to Zac George

Brock Larson, Nate Moore, Zac George, Ralek Gracie, are all putting themselves into a position where they are a fight or two away from a title shot. Some of these guys probably should get one right away, but you know how these things go sometimes. On the flip side, Matt Grice and Jean Francois Bedard, have nothing to give our organization and their relationship with this company will need to be reassessed.

PilotMan · 01-24-2010, 07:57 PM

On the same night as Cage Warriors 23, Purecombat also ran a show. Mostly fighters that wouldn’t stand a prayer on our roster. Brett Cooper (10-4), a former IFL and Affliction fighter retained his welterweight title with a win over Jason Pierce (10-2).

Kings of the Cage also ran a show and the only thing worthwhile on their card was a fighter by the name of Alan Omer (16-2) who won his 3rd KOTC fight. Omer’s agent will be getting a call from us. He has potential at the early age of 22.

PilotMan · 01-27-2010, 09:51 PM

Cage Warriors will kick off the new year with Cage Warriors 25. The show will be at our home in New Jersey. The main event will again feature two new fighters to Cage Warriors, but not new to the world of MMA. Our exciting main event is between former WEC Bantamweight fighter Takeya Mizugaki, who is stepping up to lightweight, and former WEC lightweight contender James Krause. Krause will tower over Mizugaki by 5 inches. Mizugaki is also the Cage Force Bantamweight champion. A big step up in weight for Mizugaki, and a chance for Krause to prove himself in our tight lightweight division. The co-main is a welterweight battle between rising stars Magomed Shikshabekov and Rich Anderson. Here is the entire card rundown.

Code:

Takeya Mizugaki (13-5-2) v. James Krause (13-1) LW
Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0) v. Rich Anderson (4-0) WW
Jim Miller (17-2) v. Per Eklund (18-4-1) LW
Brendan Schaub (6-1) v. Yoshiro Nakao (10-3) HW
Isao Hirose (8-1) v. Yahir Reyes (16-7) FW

----Prelims----

Kirill Sidelnikov (6-3) v. Neil Joslin (6-0) HW
Cristobal Verissimo (4-0) v. Dragan Tesanovic (6-1) MW
Noah Thomas (14-7) v. Ryan Stonitsch (9-2) WW
Jason Brilz (17-2-1) v. Seth Petruzelli (11-6) LHW
Karn Grigoryan (6-1-1) v. Lolohea Mahe (5-3) LHW

So on the main card, we also see the debut of European fighter Per Eklund. Eklund isn’t very well known here, but he brings a wealth of talent to CW. In the prelims we see another debut, this one by former UFC fighter Jason Brilz. He will have to make something of himself against Petruzelli. It shouldn’t be too hard, Petruzelli hasn’t done anything with his time here. We also get to see some of the younger talent like Verissimo, Joslin, and Sidelnikov.

PilotMan · 01-27-2010, 09:55 PM

In Japan, John Alessio (28-14) defeated Yoon Young Kim (13-6) to win the WVR Welterweight Title.

Lightweight fighter Eric Reynolds (15-5) will be leaving us. He has signed an exclusive deal with Bellator. Good luck to him. He was 1-1 with CW, and wasn’t in the picture to contend for a title any time soon. Especially given the recent signings that we have had.

In Japan, Rambaa Somdet (8-3) successfully defended his flyweight title with a with a win over Homare Kuboyama (7-9-1). On the same card, Cage Warrior Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2) was defeated in the first round.

Elsewhere in the US, Jefferson Silva (5-2) defeated Marcus Jones (5-3) to retain his X-1 Heavyweight title.

DREAM have cancelled a TV show that was scheduled and the reason was a lack of available fighters. Their TV contract with Tokyo Broadcasting has been cancelled.

Down under, CFC Middleweight Champ, Hector Lombard (24-2-1) made his 7th defense of his title with a win over Dylan Andrews (9-3).

In Strikeforce, Jay Hieron (18-5) lost his welterweight title to Tyron Woodley (7-1) when he was TKOed in the first round. In co-headliner Jacare Souza (12-3) won easily over Scott Smith (14-7). Chris Cyborg (8-2) won her rematch with Gina Carrano (8-3) with a TKO in the 3rd. Also winning on the card was Fabricio Werdum (16-4-1), Sokoudjou (9-6). Cage Warrior Spencer Herns (3-1) won on the undercard.

PilotMan · 01-27-2010, 10:01 PM

Man, it has been an incredibly busy week. We have been in negotiations with multiple fighters, and have managed to sign most of them. Our roster is reaching the bloated point, but over the next year, some of those guys will start to be weeded out, as we decide who is the best to keep moving forward over the long run.

It is fight night here in New Jersey, and we are not only going head to head against Maximum Fighting Championships in Canada, but also against the UFC, who is running a card on the same night. The UFC show is headlined with a fight between Wanderlei Silva and Vitor Belfort. Rashad Evans, Gray Maynard and Takanori Gomi are also on the card. Kimbo Slice is headlining the MFC card. Our card is highlighted by Daniel Puder, our super-popular heavyweight who will take on Assuerio Silva in his CW debut. Pat Miletich, Benji Radach, and Jason High are also on our card.

We start off with a lightweight battle between Ikuo Usuda (6-3, Wrestling) and Sergio Gomez (8-4, Striker). Neither fighter has had a great year, a win to finish is what they are looking for. The first of the stand up v. ground fighter fights results in a win for the grappler. Usuda wasted no time in taking Gomez down, and used strikes from the ground. Gomez gave up his back, but it was the strikes of Usuda that finished the fight. Good fight.

Featherweights Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-3, Kick Boxing) and Russ Miura (5-3, BJJ) are next in the grappler/striker wars. Hwang didn’t have anything to offer standing, and spent the first and second rounds defending from his back. Miura tried submission after submission but Hwang was up to the task. Eventually Miura, from the mount, secured an armbar that Hwang couldn’t defend. Good fight.

Andy Kappas (3-2, Submission Fighting) will take on Kim My (2-1, Wrestling). These two welterweights figure to be spending some time locked up on the cage. Hopefully someone knows how to finish. But no, neither fighter knew how to finsh. Instead what we were treated to was a couple takedowns, and an exciting third round where reversals sub attempts, and escapes abounded. Kappas edged out a narrow victory. Great fight.

Rawdon Lee (2-1, Boxing/Wrestling) makes his debut at 205 against Jeremy Williams (5-1-1, Boxing). Williams comes in a big underdog. Meh. A pretty boring fight to be honest. Lee showed good grappling skill, and took Williams down at will, but couldn’t’ do much beyond that. Lee ran out of gas, and Williams took the 3rd round, even though he spent most of it on his back. Lee gets the win. Average fight.

Heavyweight Rex Richards (7-3, Wrestling, 290) makes his Cage Warriors debut against Mark Burch (10-3, Brawler, 285). Richard made short work of Burch, taking him down almost immediately and peppering him with some monstrous elbows until the fight was stopped. Good fight.

A couple of welterweights are the next to enter the cage. Xavier Lucas (10-1-1, Boxing) makes his Cage Warriors debut taking on Bryan Travers (12-2, Wrestling. So far, grapplers have won all of the match-ups. Travers got Lucas to the mat in the first, but he was soundly beaten the rest of the fight. Lucas showed good strikes, and a reasonable defense on the ground. Lucas finished the fight in the 3rd with a brutal flurry, that put Travers out on his feet. Great fight.

We finish the undercard in the lightweight division, with a battle between 37-year old David Baron (16-5, JJ) taking on 28-year old Kyle Bradley (13-7, Boxing). A back and forth battle that saw Baron lay on Bradley in the first round, Bradley knock the crap out of Baron, and Baron take it all in round two. Baron stay safe and get a late takedown to steal the round. Baron wins a very tight split decision. Decent fight.

On to the main show. Cole Province (8-1, Wrestling) takes his All-American wrestling skills against submission artist Brandon Foxworth (17-6, Submission Fighting). In this fight, there was one fighter, and one punching bag. Province landed multiple huge punches in the first, and in the second, after a takedown, took Foxworth’s back, and easily pounded him out. Great fight.

Kevin Casey (4-2, BJJ) takes on debuting Reese Andy (9-4, Wrestling) in the Light heavyweight division. What can I say here? Neither fighter looked like a superstar out there. Neither fighter was really hurt at all, and it was only the better takdown defense of Andy and his better ground game that won the fight. Average fight.

In the middleweight division, Benji Radach (20-7, Facesmashing Fu) will take on Chris Price (16-2, Boxing/Wrestling). An entertaining fight between these two fighters. Radach dominated round one, with a good ground and pound. Price controlled round two, by getting Radach to the ground and controlling him, but not doing too much damage. Price won the fight in the third round, he took Radach down, but still didn’t do too much offensively. But it was enough. Decent fight. Big win for Price.

42-year old Pat Miletich (32-7-2, Freestyle JJ) maked his Cage Warriors debut against Jason High (12-2, Wrestling). This is a battle between highly ranked welterweights. Miletich looked good early on, being elusive, and working for a submission early on in round one. As the fight moved on though, conditioning looked to be a factor, and High slowly started to take over. Late in round 2, High caught Miletich with a strong punch knocking him down. With Miletich stunned, High chased him in and locked a kimura on him for the win. Good fight.

Our final fight is in the heavyweight division, and is between Daniel Puder (9-0, Wrestling 255) and Assuerio Silva (16-8, Muay Thai/BJJ, 257). A striking battle in round one that spilled over into round two. Puder caught Silva with a vicious shot, and quickly followed up forcing the stoppage in round 2. Average fight.

We had 976 for the show and 31k in PPV buys. The show was rated as being fantastc.

Fight of the Night goes to Jason High and Pat Miletich
Knockout of the Night goes to Daniel Puder
Submission of the Night goes to Russ Miura

Daniel Puder continues to decimate all-comers here. He will get a title shot, it’s only a matter of time. His popularity has gotten so high, that I am wondering how I am ever going to afford to keep him. Pat Miletich makes a good debut, but he isn’t fooling anyone. He is a long way away from contending for a title shot. Chris Price passed a tough test in Benji Radach. That was a good win for him. All of our debuting fighters looked good out there. Timing is just the most important thing. We did record numbers considering that we were going against the UFC and MFC.

PilotMan · 01-31-2010, 12:04 PM

At UFC 116, Wanderlei (34-11-1) scored a 26 second TKO of Vitor (20-10) in the main event. For some reason the UFC heavyweight title was between Todd Duffee (8-0) and Gabe Gonzaga (13-5). It was Duffee that won the fight to win his first title. Other winners on the card were Rashad Evans (15-1-1), Gray Maynard (11-0), and Nate Marquard (30-10-2).

ON the MFC card, Kimbo Slice (5-3) lost to Antoine Hayes (8-6). Other winners were Soa Palelei (11-3), Travis Galbraith (19-7), Ryan Heck (9-2), and Jon Madsen (6-0).

Tough week, but three of our fighters are getting pink slips this week. The first is Brandon Foxworth (17-7). Foxworth went 1-3 in Cage Warriors and his only win was a submission that came out of nowhere in a fight that he was losing. His good record was all for show apparently. Hopefully he gets some work with one of the lower promotions and does well. The second fighter to be released is Jean Francois Bedard (1-3). Bedard went 0-3 in his fights with us, and although his fights were entertaining, he isn’t going anywhere, and won’t draw anyone to us…ever. The last fighter is Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-4), the kick boxer from South Korea, went 0-3 in CW. He was submitted in 2 of his 3 losses. Like Bedard, he isn’t going anywhere for us.

In Texas, Emyr Bussade (13-5) won the Shark Fights weltweweight title with a win over Anthony Waldburger (13-6).

Over in the UK, Robbie Oliver (18-8-1) retained his UC UK featherweight title with a 5-round decision over Michal Hamrsmid (15-9).

PilotMan · 01-31-2010, 12:10 PM

We bring you to the first Cage Warriors TV special, Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV! This is the first TV special, and we have some really killer fights in store. Our two remaining vacant titles are on the line tonight, as well as the debut of European light heavyweight Christian M’Pumbu, as he takes on 4-time All-American Wrestler Phil Davis. Rounding out our televised portion of the card are MMA vets, Yves Edwards and Chris Wilson in a striker/grappler showdown. Let’s get right to the undercard.

The first fight of the night is in the lightweight division, between two fighters who are trying to gain some momentum. Jason Black (23-6-1, Wrestling) will take on Keita Nakamura (16-7-2, Wrestling). Both men wanted it to the ground so that is where it ended up going. Black took Nakamura down in round one, and spent it defending against sub attempts, and couldn’t improve his position. Nakamura got the takedown in round two, and he managed to get to full mount, where he was able to finish the fight with strikes. Good fight.

The next prelim fight is at heavyweight between Dong Yi Yang (8-2, Wrestling, 240) and Josh Curran (3-2, Brawler, 285). Yang gives up 45 pounds but he has a 4-inch reach advantage. After a couple of circles, Curran comes in and misses with a punch, and Yang catches him with a nasty hook that sent Curran down and out in quick fashion. Great fight.

Welterweights Dan Hornbuckle (21-3, Muay Thai/BJJ) and JJ Ambrose (11-3, BJJ) are the next fighters to enter the cage. Hornbuckle is coming off of his loss to Brock Larson. Ambrose dictated the flow of the fight and took Hornbuckle down in round one, but neither could mount any offense. A lot of missed knockout punches, but no damage done. In a surprise Ambrose steals the fight from the favorite Hornbuckle. Poor fight.

The last prelim before the main show stars is at lightweight. Bobby Stack (8-2, Wrestling/Muay Thai) takes on Carlos Quinlon (7-2, Muay Thai). For 12 minutes Quinlon dominated Stack with better technical punches, better defense and good cage control. Then Stack got a takedown. He quickly passed to side and full mount. Quinlon was helpless on his back, and Stack did enough damage to force the stoppage with only 13 second remaining in the fight. Fantastic fight.

The main show begins with Bas Rutten and Bill Goldberg cage side for out broadcast.

Yves Edwards (37-16-1, Thugjitsu) comes out for his fight with Chris Wilson (15-8, Kick Boxing) in the welterweight division. Chris Wilson quickly closed the distance, and took the grappler down. Pressed against the cage Edwards was helpless as Wilson transitioned from side control and took Edwards’ back. Wilson went for an armbar but Edwards fought it off, then Wilson just started throwing bombs and elbows. The ref had to jump in with just 2 second remaining in round 1. Good fight.

All the way from Paris, France, Christian M’Pumbu (14-2-1, Muay Thai/BJJ) makes his Cage Warriors debut against All-American wrestler Phil Davis (6-0, Wrestling) in the light heavyweight division. Davis worked quickly taking down the JJ fighter, and smoothly overpowering him on the ground. By the 2:30 mark of round 1, Davis had mounted the Frenchman, and landed punch after punch forcing the stoppage of the fight. Fantastic fight.

The first of our title fight is next. Jeff Curran (32-12-1, BJJ) steps into the cage to take on Rich Clementi (35-15-1, Boxing/Wrestling) for the Cage Warriors Lightweight title. Whoever wins this fight, will need to defend against Karen Darabedyan, and a host of fantastic lightweight fighters. Well it wasn’t Rocky that’s for sure. Some pretty good action early on, but both fighters tired by round 3. Curran scored multiple takedowns, but Clementi was able to escape or reverse most of them. The ref had to break them up a couple of times for inaction. Curran was the aggressor for most of it, and his grappling skills against the cage were good despite being the smaller man. In the end, Jeff Curran came away with a unanimous decision and becomes the first Cage Warriors lightweight champion! Decent fight.

The last fight of the night is for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight title. Marcus Sursa (8-4, Wrestling) takes on Jimi Manuwa (6-0, BJJ) with the victor having to defend against Raphael Davis. Sursa upset Ralek Gracie to get to this point. This fight was a little better than the previous one. Both fighters went back and forth each taking turns with the advantage, and each time Jimi Manuwa came out just a bit better. The first three rounds came and went with Manuwa edging out each round. Both fighters looked good at the start of round 4, in between rounds you could hear Sursa’s corner tell him to get it to the mat. Sursa listened and shot in for the takedown, but Manuwa nailed him with a straight right that put Sursa out. Jimi Manuwa becomes the first Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight champion. Good fight.

We had a gate of 551 for the show in New Jersey and the show was rated as being excellent.

Fight of the Night belongs to Bobby Stack and Carlos Quinlon
Knockout of the Night belongs to Jimi Manuwa
Submission of the Night belongs to nobody, we didn’t have one.

A great show and a great start to our MMA run on TV. Curran was the underdog in his fight with Clementi. Phil Davis is a monster in training, and Yves Edwards may be on the precipice of taking the big slide down. That was a pretty rough fight against Wilson. Jason Black is about done except for our contractual obligations. We had 439,000 viewers across the three countries for our show. The big man will be happy with those numbers.

PilotMan · 01-31-2010, 12:14 PM

JANUARY 2011

Our first full year of cards, and boy, what a year it was. We started and finished (sort of) tournaments in each weight class, and crowned champions in each. We started the year as a total unknown and finished it as a major MMA organization, and one of the few with a TV and PPV contract. We now look to this year.

December was the most expensive and most profitable month on record. Cage Warriors posted a profit of over 150k for the month alone. Our biggest revenue increases were at the PPV level where additional buys brought additional moneys. Ticket sales were up slightly, and we did receive some money for the TV broadcast on The Fight Network, but those gains were offset by higher production, a drastic increase in marketing costs, admin overhead, and of course fighter prize money. All of that is to be expected with our corporate growth. After the great last two months that we had, another couple of months at this level, and we will be back to our starting point of 5 mil in cash.

Our roster is up to 230 fighters now. That breaks down to an average of just under 40 per weight class. I thought that we would be able to go higher, but what we are going to see this year is an under-utilization of fighters and contracts begin to expire. That or we look to acquire another promotion that we can send some of our younger guys to. We have more than enough fighters to continue the scheduling pace that I have set. And the fight matchups are innumerable. That kind of flexibility will only serve us in the future.

With the wild success of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV we finished the year as the #3 promotion worldwide, and the #1 promotion other than a Zuffa owned company. That is bound to drop though, we only have one fighter who can carry the company at that level. We are rated 24.7%, which is a low level national popularity. We also are rated as a mid-level regional in Canada, and have minor popularity in Mexico and the UK.

The UFC is still the world’s MMA leader, with the WEC a distant second. Cage Warriors is 3rd, and Strikeforce is #4. Five is Maximum Fighting followed by the two Japanese promotions, WVR and DREAM. Bellator has rebounded to #8, UC UK is #9 and Shooto has climbed to #10.

This month we take a look at the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight division. Here are the top 10.

1. Jimi Manuwa (7-0) - Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight Champion
2. Raphael Davis (10-1) - First in line for the title shot
3. Ralek Gracie (4-1) - Still green, but in the title hunt
4. Marcus Sursa (8-5) - Lost in the title final
5. Shane Primm (7-1) - Former Bellator fighter makes his debut this month
6. Jake O’Brien (14-4)
7. Phil Davis (7-0) - Stud in the making
8. Stipe Bekavac (15-3) - Croat fighter will make his US debut soon.
9. Ryan Jimmo (14-2)
10. Reese Andy (10-4)

Light Heavyweight certainly isn’t as packed as some of our other weight classes. Jimi Manuwa and Phil Davis are our most popular fighters but that can be attributed to their TV debut’s last month. I just don’t see too many fighters in this division who are capable of slowing Davis down in the future. Still, a lot of the guys here are young and developing, and Manuwa will have his hands full with another Davis, hopefully this year sometime.

PilotMan · 02-05-2010, 02:12 PM

YEARLY AWARD RUNDOWN

The fighter of the year was Masakazu Imanari (20-6-1). Imanari is currently the DEEP Bantamweight champ, but all of his fights over the last year were fighting for WVR. He went 4-0, and is currently the #1 ranked bantamweight in the world. Personally, I felt that Fabio Silva had a better year.

Cage Warriors had two fighters win awards. The first was rookie of the year. That was won by Hae Joon Yang. Yang is only 4-0, but won 3 decisive fights to put himself on the path to stardom. The next winner was Rise of the Year. That was Issei Tamura (8-0). The featherweight won 4 fights this year. Three of them were in Cage Warriors and the last was in Japan for Shooto. Tamura is currently ranked #3 in CW, and #4 in Shooto.

The show of the year was UFC 105. Rampage was awarded the knockout of the year for his win over Tito. Ryan Bader’s submission win over Lyoto Machida was the submission of the year. And main event of the year was Brock Lesnar v. Shane Carwin.

PilotMan · 02-05-2010, 02:13 PM

Strikeforce on CBS was on last night. I watched. Being in the business you have to. Great main event. Josh Thompson (19-2) retained his lightweight title with a second round KO over Victor Ribero (21-5). With that win Thompson defended his title for the 3rd time. Other winners on the card were Frank Shamrock (24-11-2), Cole Escovedo (16-5), and Zoila Frausto (6-0) who retained her women’s title with a win.

PilotMan · 02-05-2010, 02:20 PM

Cage Warriors 25 is going head to head against Kings of the Cage tonight. I know that our show is better, but I also know that our show won’t live up to expectation either. I am just hoping for the best out of this show. Our main event between Mizugaki and Krause will hopefully live up to it’s billing, while the co-main between rising stars Shikshabekov and Anderson will be good too. Actually, we have some great fights from the undercard on up to the main show. Brenden Schaub, Jim Miller taking on a debuting Per Eklund too. Let’s get right to the action.

We start off with action from the light heavyweight division. Karn Grigoryan (6-1-1, Freestyle) takes on Lolohea Mahe (5-3, Brawler). Both men have been on the losing side recently. Mahe is useless. Even in a striking battle he sucks. He wound up on his back here, and Grigoryan dismantled him with strikes until the fight was stopped at the end of the second. Decent fight.

Next into the cage is the CW debut of former UFC fighter Jason Brilz (17-2-1, Wrestling). His opponent for this light heavyweight battle is Seth Petruzelli (11-6, Brawler). Brilz should be able to win this one easily. And he does, Brilz quickly closed the distance and knocked Petruzelli down with a hard uppercut. Brilz quickly dove in and landed some bombs, knocking Petruzelli completely out. Great fight, good debut for Brilz.

Welterweights are next into the cage. Noah Thomas (14-7, Wrestling) takes on Ryan Stonitsch (9-2, Muay Thai). Stonitsch used pinpoint strikes to both do damage and keep Thomas from taking him down. Thomas’ only answer was to keep trying for that takedown. Stonitsch caught him with a big head kick while he was coming in, and Thomas went down hard. Stonitsch didn’t even bother to follow up. Great fight.

Cristobal Verissimo (4-0, Kick Boxing) is the first to enter the cage. His opponent will be Dragan Tesanovic (6-1, Submission Wrestling). Tesanovic has the better resume, Verissimo is only 19. A very entertaining first round gave way to a terribly boring fight. A lot of grappling seemed to play right into Tesanovic’s strategy, as he controlled a lot of the action against the cage. Verissimo really had no way to overcome Tesanovic, who won via decision. Poor fight.

Our last prelim fight is a battle of young heavyweights. Kirill Sidelnikov (6-3, Sambo, 242) takes on Neil Joslin (6-0, Freestyle Wrestling, 273). A lot of action considering both are big men. Joslin took the last 2 rounds behind some good grappling, and good cage control. Sidelnkov was in big trouble in the second, but he survived to see the third, but was out of gas. Decent fight.

The main show starts off with a battle of featherweight fighters. Isao Hirose (8-1, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Yahir Reyes (16-7, Boxing/Wrestling). Reyes is 7 inches taller and has a 7-inch reach advantage going in. Reyes’ size certainly played to his advantage here. Most of the fight was fought on the ground with Hirose spending quite a bit of it on his back. Reyes at one point was caught in a triangle but picked up Hirose and slammed him down to regain contol. That was the story of the fight. Reyes won a close decision. Average fight.

Heavyweight fighters Brenden Schaub (6-1, Boxing/BJJ, 260) and Yoshihiro Nakao (10-3, Wrestling, 240) are set to tangle. Schaub took Nakao down right away at the start of the fight. Nakao took a big shot, and Schaub transitioned to mount fast. A few more punches and it was all over. Nakao didn’t stand a chance. Fantastic fight.

A battle in the lightweight division next. Jim Miller (17-2, Wrestling) is giving away 4 inches as he takes on Sweedish fighter Per Eklund (18-4-1, Freestyle) in his Cage Warriors debut. Miller took this fight to the ground right away. Like the previous fight this one looked like it was going to be over quickly, and it was. Eklund hooked a guillotine on Miller after he made a mistake and choked him out. That fast. Fanstastic fight.

The co-main is next. Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0, Sambo) takes on Rich Anderson (4-0, Submission Wrestling). One fighter will suffer his first loss of his career. There was some discussion earlier that Anderson didn’t have a good camp. That he was sidelined by illness. Shikshabekov got a takedown, and passed to side control where he worked an Americana armlock to secure the win in just over 2 minutes. Fantastic fight.

Our main event between Takeya Mizugaki (13-5-2, Muay Thai/Shooto) and Jerry Krause (13-1, Wrestling) is next. Both fighters are getting their first taste of the main event at Cage Warriors. Krause towers 5-inches over Mizugaki. Krause went for the takedown, but found himself on the mat having given up side control. Mizugaki used his knees and elbows on the mat to soften Krause up, before finishing the fight with more elbows and some hard strikes. The ref didn’t waste any time in stopping it. Great fight.

We had a crowd of 1,142 on hand and had a PPV buyrate of just over 28k. The show was rated as being poor.

Fight of the Night goes to Yahir Reyes and Isao Hirose
Knockout of the Night goes to Ryan Stonistch
Submission of the Night goes to Per Eklund

The fights went pretty much as expected. Eklund’s win over Miller was unexpected. I was surprised by the number of early finishes that we had, some good KO’s and generally good fights. Jason Brilz makes a good debut, while Petruzelli, Thomas, and Mahe look like they are about done.

PilotMan · 02-08-2010, 11:47 PM

Kings of the Cage ran their show against ours. Their Main Event saw Manny Rodriguez (4-1) win the KOTC Heavyweight title for the second time in his career. He beat Gan McGee (14-5). The lightweight title was also on the line. Rafael Dos Anjos (13-4) beat Poppies Martinez (17-6) to win the title.

Cage Warriors 27 has been booked. Again considering our popularity, the show won’t help us out that much. But it is still an exciting card. Lyman Good (13-0) will defend his Cage Warriors Welterweight title in the main event against mandatory challenger Ryan Ford (12-4). Ford hasn’t fought for us in over a year, having spent all of last year in Japan. He was 1-2 while he was there. Not exactly good lead in for our fight. But, he gets the first shot anyway. The co-main is a heavyweight battle that pits two potential contenders. Blagoi Ivanov (4-1) takes on Rex Richards (8-3). Richards is going to come into the fight with at least 25 pounds on Ivanov. Our card also has the debut of Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1) a jiu-jitsu fighter who previously held the KOTC featherweight title. His opponent will be Henrique Bilcalho (12-3). Bilcalho’s a tough fighter who will certainly test the meddle of the former champ. Here is the rest of the card

Cage Warriors 27: Good v. Ford

Code:

Lyman Good (13-0) v. Ryan Ford (12-4) CW Welterweight Title Fight
Blagoi Ivanov (4-1) v. Rex Richards (8-3) HW
Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1) v. Henrique Bilcalho (12-3) FW
Andre Gusmao (8-1) v. Danny Valimaki (5-1) LHW
Gerald Harris (14-4) v. David Loiseau (18-12) MW

----Prelims---

Jason Norwood (9-2) v. Sidney Silva (9-3) WW
Marcin Held (6-1) v. Ricardo Tirlone (9-3) LW
Bill Boland (6-1) v. Kwang Hee Lee (8-3) LW
Bryan Humes (6-3) v. Don Frye (20-12-1) HW Frye’s retirement fight
Jeremy Williams (5-2-1) v. Mark Lajhner (6-1) LHW
Peter Dominguez (1-3) v. Sadhu Bott (4-1) FW
Dan Cramer (3-2) v. Nick Klein (3-2) MW

This card also has the return fights for Marcin Held and Jason Norwood, after their last losses. Don Frye retires after he gets killed by Bryan Humes. Humes needs an easy fight to get back to his winning ways. David Loiseau makes his debut. He hasn’t had a very good run of late. The former UFC, MFC and EliteXC fighter hasn’t won in over 5 years. I don’t expect him to win here either, but at least we can take advantage of his popularity for the next three fights or so.

PilotMan · 02-08-2010, 11:50 PM

Over in Japan Andrews Nakahara (6-2) won the DREAM middleweight title with a 3rd round TKO over Kazushi Sakubura (28-13-1). At the same show, Cage Warrior, Darren Uyenoyama (8-5) won a fight to break his losing streak.

WEC 54 featured Mike Brown (24-4) defending his WEC featherweight title by handing the a loss to Mackens Semerzeier (8-1). In the co-main, Cage Warrior, Cub Swanson (17-2) won over Chad Mendes (4-2). Other winners included Yves Jabouin (16-6) who beat Jens Pulver (22-16-1). Pulver has lost 8 in a row and 10 of his last 11. His last win was over 2.5 years ago, over Cub Swanson. Shane Roller (8-3) and Dominck Cruz (17-2) were also winners.

At an X-1 show in California, Darrill Schoonover (13-0) remained undefeated with a win over Analu Brash (2-3).

Kaz Fujita (15-10) has retired from the world of MMA. Fujita finished his storied career working for WVR, and losing his last four fights.

In the Great White North, MFC heavyweight champion Steve Bosse (9-1) defended his title against Ralph Kelly (6-10). Other winners on the card were Bobby Lashley (6-1), and Thales Leites (17-3).

PilotMan · 02-08-2010, 11:56 PM

Ten fights on the Card for Cage Warriors 26, and our first show in California. The main event of the night will be between Dave Herman and Eddie Sanchez. A classic striker/grappler battle. Our show also features the debut of former UFC fighter Tamden McCrory. Three former Bellator fighters also debut on the card. They are Ross Pearson, Toby Imada, and Shane Primm. The fighters for the first fight are getting ready to enter the cage.

From the featherweight division, Roberto Vargas (8-3, BJJ) will have his hands full as he takes on Taiki Tsuchiya (6-2, Shooto). Vargas has been favored in early discussions. A solid, entertaining fight. Tsuchiya did not allow himself to be takendown, and looked to be in better condition than Vargas. Taiki shocked Vargas by taking him down in the third, then moving into position and took Vargas’ back where he locked in a rear naked choke, for the win. Good fight.

Next up, lightweights. Anthony Njokuani (11-4, Muay Thai) takes on the much smaller Mark Oshiro (11-4, Freestyle). Njokuani towers above Oshiro as he stands at six feet, and he has a nine inch reach advantage. This fight was all standup, and you would have thought that would have benefited Nkokuani, but it was the Oshiro who won the fight with clean boxing, and better defense. A disappointing outcome for the heavily favored Njokuani. Average fight.

Big Brad Imes (14-7, Wrestling, 285) enters the cage. He takes on George Bush (7-2, Wrestling, 255). Both fighters have are coming off of losses. Imes stands 6 inches taller than Bush, and has 30 pounds on him. Bush rocked Imes with some big shots in round one, knocking him down once, and staggering him, but he couldn’t finish him. Imes kept trying to take the fight to the ground and succeeded in the second. Bush was out of his element there, and Imes managed to pound out the victory. Fantastic fight.

Two more lightweights are next to enter. Our debut of Shannon Gugerty (12-3, BJJ/Muay Thai) as he takes on Japanese fighter Katsunori Kikuno (14-3-2, Judo/Karate). Gurgerty gutted this one out. He scored 5 takedowns, and maintained the dominant position for most of the fight, but Kikuno was slippery enough to stay away, and avoid taking damage. Kikuno did little to get the win. Decent fight.

The last prelim fight is in the middleweight division. Six foot, six inch Kendall Grove (11-7, Muay Thai/BJJ) makes his Cage Warriors debut against Louis Taylor (5-2, Striker). Grove was the favored fighter coming in. It was thought that he was to big and too skilled. Well, we found out that Taylor has a pretty good takedown defense, and his strikes were clean and accurate. Grove jumped guard in the third round, and Taylor was good enough to keep control then, and move to side control to do some damage. Taylor sneaks out the good win in a good fight.

The main show begins with young welterweights. Ben Holscher (7-1, Wrestling) enters to take on Joe Scarola (5-1-1, BJJ). Holscher was thought to be the better all around fighter in this fight, but that’s not what I saw in the cage. Scarola landed better punches, got better takedowns, and had more sub attempts. Average fight.

Light Heavyweights Shane Primm (7-1, Boxing/BJJ) and Valentino Petrescu (8-1, Vale Tudo) are next on the main show. Primm comes in with the much bigger reputation. A pretty sad fight. Primm won rounds one and two, and then cruised. Neither fighter was close to finishing the fight, and Primm won a close decision. Poor fight.

Lightweight journeyman Toby Imada (24-14, Judo) is set to take on Ross Pearson (12-3, Boxing/Wrestling) in the debut for both fighters. Toby Imada handily won rounds one and two with a judo toss, and better striking. Pearson came roaring back in round 3, knocking Imada down with a big punch. Imada hung in there and made it to the end of the round, where he won the unanimous decision. Decent fight.

Welterweights Tamdan McCrory (14-3, Wrestling/Muay Thai) and Yosmanny Cabezas (10-3, Judo) are making their debut’s here in Cage Warriors. McCrory is a heavy favorite. McCrory took Cabezas down right away, and moved to side control quickly. Some big punches forced the stoppage. Fantastic fight.

The main event is next. From the heavyweight division, Dave Herman (19-3, Wrestling) takes on Eddie Sanchez (10-4, Striker). Herman landed a couple of sharp punches, and then pulled Sanchez close. He locked on a Muay Thai clinch and drove a knee into the forehead of Sanchez and knocked him completely out. Fantastic fight.

We had a gate of 1,021 for our show and a total of 26k PPV buys. Our show was rated as Poor.

Fight of the Night was Brad Imes and George Bush
Knockout of the Night goes to Dave Herman
Submission of the Night goes to Taiki Tsuchiya

Alright, so it was a crummy show, but honestly, at least it had some good fights. Dave Herman wins another main event. Brad Imes continues his win then lose, then win streak. Anthony Njokuani has been a disappointment so far.

PilotMan · 02-13-2010, 08:45 PM

Pancrase has signed KSW Heavyweight champion Ibragim Magomedov (24-6) to a contract. This will be Magomedov’s first return to Japan since his loss to Cro-Cop in 2005. Magomedov is clearly the cream of the crop in Pancrase’s heavyweight division.

Elsewhere in Japan, at a WVR show, Satoshi Ishii (4-2) beat Mu Bae Choi (10-5) to win the WVR Heavyweight title. Also on the card, Fabio Silva (18-5) win again Moise Rimbon (15-11-3) with a first round submission. Silva hasn’t lost or been out of the first round in 17 months. That’s 7 wins in a row. Title shot?

In Texas, Shark Fights 20 went off without a hitch. Vinicius Magalhaes (7-4) defended his SF Light Heavyweight title with a win over Kyle Bracey (5-2).

Over in England, Roman Shipp (3-2), who came to Cage Warriors undefeated, but hasn’t fared so well, got back to his winning ways with a 2nd round TKO.

Back in Japan at Pancrase’s latest show, MMA stalwart Yuki Kondo (52-24-6) retained his middleweight title with a win over Rikuhei Fiji (8-4).

UFC 118: Penn v. Sanchez ran yesterday. This was the first time that these two have squared off, and it was Sanchez (25-2) pulling off a 4th round submission over Penn, to win the UFC Lightweight title. BJ Penn (16-6-1) after holding the lightweight title for 3 years and defending it 4 times. Anderson Silva (26-5) won in his return to the cage after losing his title to Denis Kang. Other winners on the card were Mark Bocek (7-2), Alexandre Ribero (5-0), and Sergei Kharitonov (18-4).

PilotMan · 02-13-2010, 08:49 PM

FEBRUARY 2011

As I head downtown to the monthly leadership meeting, I can’t help but think that things are finally heading in the right direction, and that we are doing the right things to position our company where it needs to be to be the best MMA organization around.

Our accountants start the meeting and are pleased to announce the best fiscal month in company history. Last month CW Inc. posted a profit of 166k, almost a 10% bump from last month. PPV revenue declined slightly, but gate totals and an increase in sponsorship money helped. Since we didn’t run a TV show, our expenses were also much less. We have continued to sign new fighters and I had to spend some time explaining why.

First off, a lot of the guys that we have under contract were signed to long term deals, and we have an obligation to them, regardless of how they perform, at least until their guaranteed number of fights is up. Obviously, as contracts start to come due, the middle of this year, we will see fighters start to leave the company. As we have expanded so rapidly, and out popularity has grown so much, we need to continue to bring in better fighters to keep being able to put on quality shows.

We are only down 167k from the original 5 million dollar investment. Once we are profitable and above that mark, expect the pocketbooks to open up a little more so that we are able to sign some even bigger names, as well as retain the ones that we have made bigger.

Speaking of popularity, Cage Warriors currently stands as the #5 promotion in the world. We are just behind Maximum, and Stikeforce, and of course the UFC, and WEC. The top promotion in Japan is World Victory Road, with DREAM and Shooto next. Bellator and UC UK round out the top 10. We are currently the #4 promotion in the US, #5 in Canada, #7 in Mexico, and #7 in the UK. We are growing, and our TV exposure overseas will serve us well in the future.

This month we are taking a look at the top fighters in the heavyweight division. Remember our heavyweight division goes all the way up to 290lbs.

Code:

1.  John Madsen (6-0) Yet to debut, he has been fighting in Canada.
2.  Daniel Puder (10-0) The most popular fighter in CW, #8 HW in World
3.  Brandon Cash (8-1) Cage Warriors Heavyweight Champion
4.  Darrill Schoonover (13-0) Has a guaranteed title shot.
5.  Brenden Schaub (7-1) 
6.  Blagoi Ivanov (4-1)
7.  Justin Wren (10-2) 
8.  Hae Joon Yang (4-0) 2010 MMA Rookie of the Year
9.  Neil Cooke (7-1)
10.  Dave Herman (20-3) Slowly making his way to the top.

Our heavyweight division has a lot of very young fighters. I expect great things from them down the road, but the big names just are not here. There is a strong chance that Puder will have one more fight, possibly with Madsen or Herman with the winner getting a title shot after Schoonover and Cash go at it a few months down the road.

PilotMan · 02-13-2010, 08:51 PM

February is going to be a busy month, with 2 PPV’s and a TV show airing there will be plenty of Cage Warriors action to be had. The first fight will be Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV from New Jersey. The main event will be two featherweight contenders, Abel Cullum and Issei Tamura. Clearly Cullum is the more experienced, and has been on the big stage longer, but Tamura is the rising star, and was the 2010 MMA Rise of the Year winner. This will be his biggest test. The co-feature will be between Light Heavyweights Jake O’Brien and Travis Wiuff. Also fighting will be former Kings of the Cage Lightweight champion Cameron Dollar as he makes his CW debut. Here is the entire television card.

Code:

Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV

Abel Cullum (19-2) v. Issei Tamura (8-0) FW
Jake O’Brien (14-4) v. Travis Wiuff (60-14) LHW
Alberto Crane (15-4) v.  Donald Cerrone (11-3) LW
Cameron Dollar (5-2) v. Zach Micklewright (8-1) LW

----Prelims----

Justin Wren (10-2) v. Rodrigo Monduruca (8-1) HW
Martin Stapleton (6-2) v. Scott McAfee (8-2) LW
Alexander Trevino (7-3) v. Jesse Sanders (21-7) WW
Brian McLaughlin (7-1) v.  Christian Uflacker (3-2) LW
Michael Pastou (5-1) v. Derrick Gumble (6-1) WW
Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2) v. Stephen Ledbetter (8-6) LW

PilotMan · 02-16-2010, 02:39 PM

One week after our TV show our next PPV will air from Las Vegas, Nevada. The main event will be a big lightweight battle between two of our top contenders, Richie Whitson, and Ben Henderson. Outside of the main event there will be 6, count ‘em 6 fighters debuting on the main show. And I know I said he wouldn’t be back, but Dave Menne makes his return to Cage Warriors as he fights on the undercard. Here is the full slate of fights.

Code:

Cage Warriors 28:  Whitson v. Henderson

Richie Whitson (10-0) v. Ben Henderson (12-2) LW
Javier Vasquez (16-4) v. John Hosman (20-5-1) FW
Marcus Hicks (11-3) v. Drew Fickett (38-13) WW
Stipe Bekavac (15-3) v. Tony Lopez (16-4) LHW
Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6) v. Paul Sass (10-1) LW

----Prelims----

Mark Burch (10-4) v. Ricco Rodriguez (37-13) HW
Jeremy Horn (82-21-5) v. Tony Ballout (4-1) MW
Dong Yi Yang (9-2) v. Neil Wain (6-2) HW
Dave Menne (43-17-2) v. Justin Davis (10-8) WW
Cristobal Verissimo (4-1) v. Koa Ramos (4-2) MW
Demico Rogers (4-3) v.  Lolohea Mahe (5-4) LHW
Jae Hee Chun (2-2) v. Joe Morales (4-3) FW

Wow! A lot of new guys here. Vasquez, Hosman, and Hicks all come from the WEC, while Bekavac comes over from UC UK, and Lopez from KOTC where he once held the Heavyweight title there. Hironaka is the former Cage Force (Japan) lightweight champion, and he still works for DREAM. The undercard is underwhelming. Hopefully some of the guys can get started winning.

PilotMan · 02-16-2010, 02:44 PM

Kings of the Cage Middleweight Champion, and former Cage Warrior, Crafton Wallace (19-4-1) defended his title with a 25-minute fight over Floyd Sword (11-4).

I went to the latest Strikeforce show last night. Their show was live from New Jersey, and the main event was a battle between King Mo (8-0) and Babalu Sorbal (36-11) for the Light heavyweight title. King Mo ended the fight in the 4th round with a KO. Other winners on the card were Charlie Valencia (12-6), Gilbert Melendez (18-3), Kazuo Misaki (25-9-2), and Nick Diaz (21-8). It was a good show, and was attended by over 1500 people.

DREAM ran an opposing card in Japan. Kid Yamamoto (21-2) won over Hiroyuki Takaya (12-9-1) with a first round submission. American Joe Warren (6-3) won in the co-main over Yoshiro Maeda (28-9-2).

Bellator debuted their highest profile fighter, Heath Herring (29-16) in the main event. He won easily with a first round submission over Jeff Monson (34-9). In the co-main, Cage Warrior, Wilson Reis (11-3) won with a first round submission over Jimmie Rivera (5-3). Another Cage Warrior was also a winner on the same card. Jesse Juarez (13-7) won by first round TKO. Juarez is undefeated in Bellator, but winless in Cage Warriors. Omar De la Cruz (8-2) is also a Cage Warrior, but hasn’t had a fight with us. He also won on the card in a close fight with Virgil Lozano (8-3-1).

PilotMan · 02-16-2010, 02:54 PM

We have brought Cage Warriors to Florida, right in the backyard of Bellator. Our show is also being broadcast via PPV to the rest of the US, and Canada. The show features the first defense of Lyman Good’s welterweight title. Good comes in a big favorite over Ryan Ford. Especially since Ford didn’t fare well the last half of last year. Ford is a talented all-around fighter, who will be tested by the workhorse, Good.

Cage Warriors 27: Good v. Ford

The show opens with a pair of inexperienced middleweight fighters. Dan Cramer (3-2, BJJ) and Nick Klein (3-2, BJJ) are ready to go. You know, two guys with similar strengths like these two sometimes ends up with the worst. Neither could put their JJ to use, so we ended up with a crappy striking fest. An awful fight sees Dan Cramer eeek out a win.

The next fight is in the featherweight division. Peter Dominguez (1-3, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Sadhu Bott (4-1, BJJ). Both fighters are looking to change their fortunes. Bott has a 5-inch height, and 6-inch reach advantage. This was a strange fight. Bott scored a takedown early on, but couldn’t do anything with it, then kept trying, but it was Dominguez who was able to stuff him. Dominguez didn’t offer much until the third, when Bott was tired. He took advantage and stole a narrow decision. Average fight.

The next fight features two light heavyweights. Jeremy Williams (5-2-1, Boxing) takes on Mark Lajhner (6-1, Judo). Both men are very similar physically, and are looking to turn it around. Williams used good takedown defense, and solid striking early on to set the pace. Lajhner came back and had Williams in trouble in the second when he drug him to the ground in a guillotine choke. Williams escaped but it looked like Lajhner wore himself out. In the third, he was a sitting duck, as Williams picked him apart with clean shots, and a big hook. Lajhner survived, but he lost the fight. Decent fight.

The Don Frye (20-12-1 Wrestling, 230) retirement fight is next as he takes on Bryan Humes (6-3, Boxing/Wrestling, 285). Humes didn’t keep us wondering. He took Frye down fast and worked him to an arm triangle fast. Frye had no real answer and only lasted 90 seconds. Great fight.

Young fighters in the lightweight division are next up. Bill Boland (6-1, Wrestling) takes on South Korean Kwang Hee Lee (8-3, Kick Boxing). An exciting fight! Boland and Lee mixed it up early, with Boland pressing often. Lee managed to stay on his feet and his crisp strikes and a knockdown took the first round. A slow kick saw Boland succeed in taking Lee to the ground. Boland looked at ease as he transitioned across Lee’s body and locked up an arm, and secured the Americana. Lee was helpless and tapped. Excellent fight.

19-year old Marcin Held (6-1, BJJ) enters the cage to take on Ricardo Tirlone (9-3, BJJ). Held is still stinging from his first professional loss to Rich Clementi. This is the way grapplers should fight. Held scored an early takedown, but fell into a guillotine. He then picked up Tirlone, and slammed him down breaking the hold. That’s the way this fight went. Held was able to get takedowns, and sweep Tirlone when he got the takedown. There were quite a few reversals throughout, and it was Held who managed to pick up the hard earned win. Decent fight.

Our last prelim fight is at welterweight. Jason Norwood (9-2, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Sidney Silva (9-3, BJJ). This marks Norwood’s return to the cage after his loss to Lyman Good. In what was to be a close affair, Norwood looked unbeatable. He attacked quickly, taking Silva down and working to mount right away. An armbar finished it. Great fight.

Our main show starts with newcomer David Loiseau (18-12, Vale Tudo) coming in to take on Gerald Harris (14-4, Wrestling). Harris is making his return to the cage after a long layoff following his elimination from the middleweight tournament. No holding these guys back! Harris shoots right away, but is tagged by a nasty shot, and moves back on wobbly legs. Loiseau comes in and throws a kick, but Harris catches it, and takes him down. Harris, in half guard, gets a kimura on and forces the tap. Lots of action for 1:47 worth of fighting. Great fight.

Light Heavyweight Andre Gusmao (8-1, BJJ) takes on Danny Valimaki (5-1, Wrestling) in the next fight on the card. Gusmao has been total destruction so far in CW. Wow, from the good to the bad. Gusmao got the takedown, but just laid there. Valimaki was clueless, and couldn’t do anything. Lots of uninspired action. Gusmao gets the win but the fight was awful.

Featherwight Jiu-Jitsu specialist Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1, JJ) makes his CW debut against tough customer Henrique Bilcalho (12-3, BJJ/Muay Thai). Let’s hope for a better fight here. And it is! Bilcalho controlled the action early on, and held Evangelista against the cage and peppered him with short punches, elbows and knees. He was controlling the action, but the ref didn’t think it was enough and moved them apart. Evangelista took advantage and got a fast takedown. Bilcalho defended well but was mounted with a minute to go Evangelista took advantage and locked in an armbar for the win. Excellent fight.

The co-main in the heavyweight division is next. Ranked Blagoi Ivanov (4-1, Sambo, 265) looks to legitimize his ranking with a win over Rex Richards (8-3, Wrestling, 290). Richards got a fast win in his debut, and has a big size advantage here. Richards made an impact….literally. Early on in round 1, Richards got Ivanov up and slammed him down. Richards then used some incredible ground and pound to end it early in a decisive win. Decent fight.

Our main event is next! Five rounds of action in the welterweight division. Lyman Good (13-0 Kick Boxing) puts his title and undefeated record on the line against Ryan Ford (12-4, Boxing/Wrestling). Hopefully it lives up to it’s expectations. Ryan Ford starts off great. He gets a takedown early in round one, and keeps Good on the defensive. The second round goes the same, but Ford starts to tire. Good takes round 3 with clean strikes but not much else. In round 4, Lyman Good puts Ford down with a big shot. Ford defends himself but Good has side control. Good suddenly takes Ford’s back and launches a brutal ground and pound. He doesn’t let up until the ref pulls him away. Good retains in a good fight.

We had a gate of 894 and 25k PPV buys. The show was rated as being very poor.

Fight of the Night goes to Bill Boland and Kwang Hee Lee
Knockout of the Night goes to Rex Richards
Submission of the Night goes to Bill Boland

I know the show was rated poorly, but it had a great main event. Lyman Good is now free to defend against the cream of the crop and he will be challenged right away. Ford is good, but his cardio let him down. Rex Richards has made an real impact. Ivanov was just beaten badly. There were some other really positive results in there too. I am glad to see Don Frye retire, he wasn’t going to be around for long anyway. Of course, we had some terrible fights. And that is something that I need to work on and remember as I make these fights.

PilotMan · 02-21-2010, 05:48 PM

The next day Cage Warriors is proud to announce the card for Cage Warriors 29. The show is scheduled to take place in San Francisco, California. The main card will feature Cage Warriors debut’s by 4 fighters. The main event of the card will be a welterweight battle between Jesse Taylor and Shamar Bailey. Bailey had been a rising star with Strikeforce, and now fights exclusively for Cage Warriors. Both men are on winning streaks and both are primed at the top of the contenders list behind Lyman Good. The co-main for the show features a middleweight battle between Tom Watson, the top-ranked boxing-mma star from England. His opponent will be former UFC fighter and UFC contender Ryan Jensen. Jensen’s jiu-jitsu skills will pose a serious test to Watson, but a win for Watson could put him solidly in line for a potential title shot. Also on the card is a battle between former Bellator fighter Diego Saraiva and WEC vet Richard Crunkilton. Here is the full card for the show.

Code:

Cage Warriors 29:  Taylor v. Bailey 

Jesse Taylor (16-5) v. Shamar Bailey (13-1) WW
Tom Watson (11-3) v. Ryan Jensen (17-5) MW
Brendan Schaub (7-1) v. Hae Joon Yang (4-0) HW
Wesley Johnson (6-1) v. Jim Miller (17-3) LW
Diego Saraiva (15-9-1) v. Rich Crunkilton (18-4) LW

----Prelims----

Henry Martinez (5-1) v. Cole Province (9-1) FW
Danillo Villefort (11-3) v. Hiromitsu Miura (10-8) WW
Orvil Palmer (5-1) v. Neil Cooke (7-1) HW
David Heath (12-6) v. Christian M’Pumbu (14-3-1) LHW
Spencer Herns (3-1) v. Dan Cramer (4-2) MW
Jussier da Silva (4-1) v. Shoji Maruyama (7-7-1) FW
Besiki Gerenava (6-2) v. Priscus Fogagnolo (4-2) LHW

PilotMan · 02-21-2010, 05:52 PM

Fury FC in Brazil also put on a card the same night as us. Rafael Natal (14-2) won the middleweight title with a KO over Antonio Schembri (6-6).

In Japan, DEEP 57 was run. The main event featured a title defense at in the featherweight division. Current holder, Daiki Hata (14-6-3) defended his title with a win over Zach Makovsky (8-4).

At Cage Force 23, also in Japan, Isao Terada (8-7-4) retained his bantamweight title with a win over Daisuke Endo (5-4).

On the same night, PURECOMBAT ran a show with Doug Marshall (12-3) retaining his middleweight title with a win over Zach Trammel (7-3-1). We are contacting Marshall’s agent to discuss a contract with Cage Warriors.

Wilson Reis (11-3) has decided to sign an exclusive deal with Bellator. He will be locked up by them for less than a year and a half. I like Reis, and hate to see him go. I have a feeling that 16 months from now, we will be much bigger than he is.

UFC 118: Kang v. Hendersonwas live last night from Ohio. Kang (35-11-4) is the current middleweight champion and he defended his title with a 2nd round TKO over Dan Henderson (26-8). Shane Carwin (13-1) stopped Cro Cop (26-9-2) inside of a minute in the co-feature. Other winners on the card were Melvin Guillard (25-8-2), Rich Franklin (26-7), and Yoshihiro Akiyama (15-2) who beat Renzo Gracie (14-9-1). Gracie is now 0-2 since his return to the UFC. The UFC has already come out and stated that they will not be renewing his contract.

Funny thing, Omar De la Cruz (8-2) who we signed some time ago, but for one reason or another hasn’t fought for us yet, has decided to turn his notice in and sign an exclusive deal with Bellator. It’s a similar deal to what Reis signed. He didn’t make an impact for us, so I am not that sad to see him go. I just think that like Reis, he has some potential.

At a Shooto show in Japan. Shooto Bantamweight Champion Masakatsu Ueda (13-0-2) defended his title with a submission win over Marcos Galvano (8-5-1).

WEC was in Ohio with a big PPV show that featured the bantamweight champion Brian Bowles (11-1) defending his title against Rani Yahya (18-4). Yahya took Bowles the distance and won via decision to gain the title. Yahya is undefeated in the WEC. Other winners on the card were Ox Wheeler (12-2), Uriah Faber (26-2) (who handed Diego Nunes (15-1) his first professional loss), Karen Darabedyan (12-1), and Mike Budnik (9-4).

PilotMan · 02-21-2010, 05:58 PM

Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV’s second episode is tonight, and airing in the US, Canada, and the UK. The main card is only 4 fights, but the rest of the card is still loaded. The main event is between Issei Tamura and Abel Cullum. Tamura will have his hands full with the more experienced fighter and this will be his chance to prove himself to us here, that he is worthy of a possible title shot.

The first fight of the evening is in the lightweight division. Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2, Shooto) takes his gaudy record against (8-6, Boxing/Wrestling) in what amounts to a loser out fight. Ledbetter is shorter, but has a 5-inch reach advantage. Nishino is 2-0 in CW, while Ledbetter hasn’t fared so well. Nishino shot early, and didn’t get the takedown, but got Ledbetter against the cage. From there, he used some unorthodox style and took Ledbetter’s back. Ledbetter when down face first in confusion, and Nishino quickly locked a rear naked choke to finish the fight. Great fight.

A pair of welterweights enter the cage. Michael Pastou (5-1, Freestyle) takes on Derrick Gumble (6-1, MMA-influenced JJ). Gumble is the bigger fighter. Pastou goes for and gets an early takedown, then uses a solid ground and pound attack to finish the fight in the first round. Great fight.

Lightweight, hometown boy, Brian McLaughlin (7-1, BJJ) takes the cage first in his fight against Christian Uflacker (3-2, BJJ). Wow, that might be the worst fight ever in the history of MMA. Uflacker took McLaughlin down 3 times, the ref stood them up 3 times and absolutely nothing happened in between. It was awful. Uflacker wins by default.

Another welterweight battle. Alex Trevino (7-3, Boxing/Wrestling) enters to take on Jesse Sanders (21-7, Boxing/Wrestling). Trevino used good boxing skills to set up his ground and pound, and dominated the first two rounds before finishing it in the 3rd with the exact same tactics. Sanders was completely overmatched. Good fight.

Another lightweight battle is next. Martin Stapleton (6-2, Boxing/Wrestling) comes from England to face Scott McAfee (8-2, BJJ) who hails from Alaska. There was quite a bit of action in this one. Stapleton controlled the action in round one, by bullying McAfee around the cage, and taking the fight to him. The second round saw a takedown from McAfee reversed by Stapleton but then when he tried to stand up, the Jiu-Jitsu specialist seized his arm, and locked a tight armbar on from guard to finish the fight. Fantastic fight.

The final prelim fight takes place in the heavyweight division. Previously undefeated fighter Rodrigo Munduruca (8-1, Muay Thai/BJJ, 285) takes on Justin Wren (10-2, Wrestling, 285). Wren was defeated his last time out by Brandon Cash in his shot at the Cage Warriors Heavyweight title. Wren has to be the favorite here. Both men moved close and grappled to start the fight. Wren pushed Munduruca against the cage, and floored him with a sharp hook. With Munduruca on the mat, Wren was able to secure an arm, and force Munduruca to tap out just over 2 minutes into round 1. Fantastic fight.

The televised portion of the show features a lead in by Bas Rutten and Bill Goldberg discussing the main event. From there, the move to the next fight.

Former UFC fighter and KOTC lightweight champion Cameron Dollar (5-2, Wrestling) makes his cage warrior debut against former WEC fighter Zach Micklewright (8-1, Wrestling). Micklewright is also making his debut, he trains under Pat Miletich. Dollar pressed the fight early on using his skills to take Micklewright down. Micklewright however, was able to reverse with some good JJ, and finished the first round with side control. The second round started in similar fashion except it was Micklewright who pushed Dollar against the cage. Dollar reversed but made a mistake and Micklewright was able to lock a standing choke. He drug Dollar down, and choked him out. Decent fight.

The second fight on the card features two more lightweights. Alberto Crane (15-4, BJJ) comes into the cage to take on Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone (11-3, Wrestling/Kick Boxing). Both fighters are considered highly rated, but not quite championship material yet. Both are coming off of losses. Cerrone has a 3-inch height advantage, but an incredible 10-inch reach advantage. Can Crane get inside that reach, especially against a kick boxer who knows how to use his feet? The first round was quiet with both fighters fighting from the outside. Round two saw Crane really go after Cerrone, and try and fail over and over to get it to the mat. Ceronne landed a short hook that put Crane on his seat, but recovered quickly, and at some kicks to the legs. The third saw good stand up from Cerrone with using his jab and countering well. Crane clearly wasn’t totally recovered as another hard shot put him down. Cerrone chased in this time and finished the fight with an armbar on the dazed fighter. Great fight.

We have a light heavyweight fight for the show next. Jake O’Brien (14-4, Wrestling) takes on Travis Wiuff (60-14, Wrestling). Both men are just outside the top contenders, and hoping that a win can get them that much closer to a fight with Jimi Manuwa. The fans loved this fight. Wiuff took the fight to the mat and controlled O’Brien throughout the first round. O’Brien answered in round two by taking Wiuff down, and then mounting him and throwing a barrage of punches to force a stoppage on the vet fighter. Fantastic fight.

Our main event is up next. Featherweights Abel Cullum (19-2, Freestyle) and (8-0, Shooto) take the cage for the last fight of the night. With only 2 losses between them this looks to be an exciting fight. This will clearly be Tamura’s toughest fight of his career, but for Cullum he generally fights at flyweight, and this is 2 weight classes above that. And that as they say folks is that. The fighters were very tentative at range and Culllum was the first to close, shooting and getting an easy early takedown. Cullum tried to pass, but Tamura defended well, and used a kimura to reverse and take side control. Tamura continued his hard work, and Cullum gave up his back. Tamura then quickly secured a rear naked choke to win the fight. The big underdog Tamura, pulls out another big win. Great fight.

We had a crowd of 404 in New Jersey for the show. The show was rated as excellent.

Fight of the Night goes to Donald Cerrone and Alberto Crane.
Knockout of the Night goes to Jake O’Brien.
Submission of the Night goes to Hidenori Nishino.

Tamura’s win was a huge upset. I fully expected Cullum to win that fight. O’Brien hasn’t lost since his opening loss to Ralek Gracie. Cerrone rebounds from his loss to Ben Henderson nicely, while we see the likely end of the line for Stephen Ledbetter, and perhaps a couple of others. The show is rated very good, and that will keep us in the national spotlight for a little while longer. I am still hoping that we can make legit stars our of some of these guys, instead of poaching the better talent. Of course, poaching is always fun.

PilotMan · 02-27-2010, 06:43 AM

Stephen Ledbetter (8-7) was cut loose last night. He was a huge disappointment and never managed to put any good fights together.

Down under, the CFC lightweight title changed hands as Tristan Yunker (16-9) defeated Bernardo Magalhaes (7-2). Also on the card was Cage Warrior Kevin Croke (5-2). Croke’s only two losses have been in Cage Warriors, and again he won here to stay undefeated in CFC.

PilotMan · 02-27-2010, 06:51 AM

One week after the second episode of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV, our next PPV is scheduled to run. The show marks our return to Nevada, and features a main event battle between Richie Whitson and Ben Henderson. A highly anticipated fight that some are saying should be for the title. Well we all know that the title is currently around the waist of Jeff Curran, and that he is supposed to make his first defense against Karen Darabedyan. Darabedyan is still planning on taking a few months off after his WEC appearance, and the likelyhood of a fight with Curran is slipping. However, like we will see tomorrow, title bookings can change.

Our show is set to begin with a fight in the featherweight division. Jae Hee Chun (2-2, Muay Thai) is against Joe Morales (4-3, Wrestling). Morales, a natural lightweight has dropped weight classes and is 6 inches taller, and has a 5 inch reach advantage. This fight started fast with Chun being knocked down by a hard punch, and then surviving the onslaught that followed. Morales dominated the first round. The second round started better for Chun who used his legs more, but it was the hard punching of Morales that hurt Chun again. In the third, Chun moved better, and landed the better of the shots on the outside. Morales pulled off the 2 rounds to 1 win even though it could be said that he should have been able to finish the fight. Decent fight.

Up next is a light heavyweight battle between Demico Rogers (4-3, BJJ) who is dropping from heavyweight to face Lolohea Mahe (5-4, Brawler). Rogers comes in as the taller fighter, but it is Mahe who has the reach advantage. You knew that Rogers was going to try and get this to the ground and that when he did it would be over. Rogers wasted no time in trying but it took a little while before he could get the big Hawaiian down. But when he did that is exactly what happened. Rogers pounds out Mahe for the win in a good fight.

Next up is a middleweight battle between Cristobal Verissimo (4-1, Kick Boxing) and Koa Ramos (4-2, Hybrid fighting). Cristobal came out very aggressively and took Ramos down, slipped to mount and brutally finished the fight with some very strong punches. He must be out to make a point after his last fight resulted in his first pro loss. Great fight.

Dave Menne (43-17-2, Freestyle) makes his Cage Warriors return, just over one year after being suspended for illegal drugs. He returns to fight Justin Davis (10-8, Boxing/Wrestling). I’m pulling for Davis, as I am still holding that grudge. The first round was all strikes…missed strikes. Both men were very tentative. Davis landed the better of the weak blows. The fight ended in the second when Davis pinned Menne against the cage and nailed him with a wicked uppercut that floored Menne. Davis didn’t let up until he was forcibly pulled off. Get that man a bonus! Good fight.

Big heavyweights enter the cage for the next fight. Dong Yi Yang (9-2, Wrestling, 240) hopes to come out on top in his fight with Neil Wain (6-2, Brawler, 285). Korea v. England here. Both men are a few fights away from being anything in the heavyweight division. You gotta give it to Yang. He was floored not once, not twice, but three….count ‘em three times in the first round. Each time he was able to get back to his feet, and he lived to see the next round. He was knocked down again after a failed takedown in the second, but again, he got back to his feet. Wain ran out of gas in the third, but still easily won the fight. Decent fight.

Moving on, middleweight vet Jeremy Horn (82-21-5, Freestyle) takes on Tony Ballout (4-1, Shoot fighting) in what amounts to the biggest fight disparity ever here in Cage Warriors. Horn showed his skills in the cage may be in decline but his brain still knows where to go. Horn took Ballout down and had him in trouble in the first, but Ballout survived. Horn took the second round in similar fashion before he ran out of gas in the third. Ballout took it the distance but lost in a poor fight.

The last of the prelim fights sees Mark Burch (10-4, Brawler, 285) take on Ricco Rodriguez (37-13, BJJ/Wrestling, 262). Wow, where was this Rodriguez in these other fights? He took Burch down fast, and quickly mounted him before pounding him out in just under 2 minutes of the first round. Great fight.

The main show starts with the first fight, in the lightweight division, being between Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6, BJJ) and Paul Sass (10-1, Muay Thai/BJJ). Hironaka is making his Cage Warriors debut. Fight of the night so far. Hironaka tried to take this to the mat from the start of the fight, but Sass defended well and used some clinical strikes to keep him away. Sass was taken down in the second, but was able to reverse, and after some neat grappling both men escaped back to their feet. With Sass seeming to take both rounds Hironaka secured an early takedown in round three. He dominated most of the round and looked dangerous throughout. Sass managed to reverse, and survive the round. Now, we know that judging can be off sometimes. But two judges saw it 29-28 for Sass, while the third saw it 30-27 for Hironaka! WTF! Luckily it didn’t affect the outcome of the fight, but wow. Good fight.

Stipe Bekavac (15-3, Kick Boxing) makes his debut against Tony Lopez (16-4, Kick Boxing). Both men are making debuts here in Cage Warriors. Lopez has 5-inches in height and 5-inches in reach. A pretty solid stand up fight that saw Bekavac come out in just about every exchange. Bekavac took every round, as neither fighter was hurt. Average fight.

Welterweights are in the cage next on the main show. Marcus Hicks (11-3, Wrestling) enters the cage to face Drew Fickett (38-13, Wrestling). Hicks is 4 years older, but Fickett is vastly more experienced. Hicks came forward without fear, like he usually does. He wrestled with Fickett and pushed him against the cage. Fickett took Hicks to the ground in a headlock, but couldn’t finish him with the guillotine. Hicks tries some ground and pound, but left his arm in a little too long and Fickett transitioned to an armbar that he used to finish the fight. Great fight.

The co-main is between two former WEC fighters who are already in a higher profile fight. Javier Vasquez (16-4, BJJ) takes on John Hosman (20-5-1, Wrestling) in the featherweight division. Vasquez came in fast and hard. Both men crashed hard against the cage with Hosman on his butt, and Vasquez on top of him. Vasquez began working for the guillotine right away, but Hosman defended, at least at first. It was only a matter of time. Hosman couldn’t move Vasquez at all and began to panic a bit when Vasquez finally sunk in the finishing maneuver. Fantastic fight.

The main event is the last fight on the card. Lightweights Richie Whitson (10-0, Boxing) will put his impeccable record on the line against he toughest test of his young career. Ben Henderson (12-2, Wrestling/Tae Kwon Do) has already seen some great fights in his young career, and looked to be on a title path in the WEC before coming to Cage Warriors. Both men are just about equal physically. Whitson is currently the #3 lightweight in the world. It is said that the best fighters are the best because they never take any damage and lie in wait for the right moment to strike. Both men looked for plenty of opportunities but the other’s defense was better. Henderson used his great wrestling skills to keep Whitson against the cage for most of the first round, and used it again in the second. Henderson started to look tired in the third, and Whitson looked more desperate. Henderson got caught in a guillotine and taken down with it, and for a moment it looked like Whitson would finish it, but Henderson somehow managed to hold on until the end. Henderson puts another notch in his belt, and Whitson takes his first MMA loss. The crowd liked the end , but were unhappy for most of the rest of the fight. Poor fight.

We had a crowd of 1,195 on hand, with just over 35k PPV buys. The show was rated as being average.

Fight of the Night goes to Kuniyoshi Hironaka and Paul Sass
Knockout of the Night goes to Ricco Rodriguez
Submission of the Night goes to Drew Fickett

Some fighters clearly improved their stock her. Bekavac, who was previously unknown gets a nice win on the main card. Paul Sass did very well against a Japanese Champion. Drew Fickett needed a win to get back toward title contention. Javier Vasquez made quick work, and looks like he could be a real challenge for anyone in that division. Some others hope to just turn their boat around, and others may be out of work.

PilotMan · 02-27-2010, 06:55 AM

The final booking has been completed for Cage Warriors 30. The show will be our debut in Ohio. The main event will the first title defense for our heavyweight champion Brandon Cash. Cash was supposed to make his first title defense against Darril Schoonover. There have been too many scheduling conflicts so he will make his first defense against Dave Herman. Not Puder, but Herman. I know, but look, we don’t have Cash on an exclusive deal yet, so we have to use him or lose him. He has to make this fight, and right now Herman is the best guy for him to fight. The co-main is going to be an entertaining battle between between two welterweight title hopefuls. Jason High takes on Tamden McCrory. This show will debut two more new signees to Cage Warriors. The first is Shooto Middleweight Champion Siyar Bahadurzada. The the other is Joe Riggs. Here is a rundown of the entire card.

Code:

Cage Warriors 30: Cash v. Herman

Cage Warriors Heavyweight Title Fight
Brandon Cash (8-1) v. Dave Herman (20-3) HW 
Jason High (13-2) v. Tamden McCrory (15-3) WW
Takeya Mizugaki (14-5-2) v. Per Eklund (19-4-1) LW
Siyar Bahadaurzada (19-4-1) v. Chris Price (17-2) MW
Joe Riggs (32-11) v. Fabio Nascimento (10-6) MW

----Prelims----

Antonio McKee (23-5-2) v. Dave Jansen (14-2) LW
Bao Quach (17-10-1) v. Hideo Tokoro (24-18-2) FW
Jeremiah Billington (12-3) v. Victor Valimaki (18-7) LHW
Damien Stelly (10-3) v. Pat Berry (6-3) LHW
Dan Evensen (13-5) v. Lavar Johnson (12-3) HW
Andrew Buckland (11-7) v. Kyle Pimentel (8-2) WW
Micah Miller (13-7) v. Sergio Gomez (8-5) FW

Koa Ramos (4-3) hasn’t won in three fights in CW, and has been let go. Ramos was a middleweight.

PilotMan · 03-07-2010, 03:12 PM

MARCH 2011

As I head to the downtown office for my monthly finance meeting I am feeling good. Gone are the questions about me. Am I the right guy? Am I leading us down a path of prosperity? Why are you doing this, that or that other thing? Gone, all gone. I am still here, we have grown more rapidly than any other promotion, and now, we have reached a critical part of our history.

There are smiles all around the conference room table. From the big D, to the secretaries, and the accountants. Our lawyers are happy too. You see, Cage Warriors is now considered a profitable company. I know we have been making money for 4 months now, but you see, we are now above the point of the initial 5 mil dollar investment. And on top of that, we never dipped below 4 mil in cash, and now we sit with a small surplus, and the strong likelihood that we will keep that going for some time. What this major hurdle means for me directly, is that Big D, has given me the go ahead to look at signing some bigger name guys. Guys that we will continue to build around as we try and make our way to a major MMA player. This cash surplus has proven that all the gambles were good.

Last month we had a 15% increase in gate receipts and a 25% increase over 2 months ago. Sponsorship money is slowly growing but is still minimal. Merch sales and PPV revenues are largely unchanged over the last 2 months.

The TV show did cost us. Our worker costs were at an all time high, a 9% increase over Dec, when we ran our last TV show. We are still seeing a slow and steady increase in production costs. That is to be expected. We handed out the fewest bonus money to new fighters this month as well. That has the potential to explode, but it’s my job to try and keep it in check.

Cage Warriors is currently the #4 promotion in the world, behind the UFC, WEC, and Strikeforce. MFC, and WVR are very close behind. While DREAM and a resurgent Bellator fall closely behind them. CW is the #4 promotion in the US, #5 in Canada (where Kings of the Cage are actually higher than we are), #7 in Mexico, and #3 in the UK. That is the extent of our global reach at this time.

It’s time to revisit the Cage Warriors featherweight division. Many new faces have arrived since our last update 6 months ago. But here is the rundown of the top 10 fighters in the division.

Cage Warriors Featherweight Rankings

1. Issei Tamura (9-0) 2010 MMA Rise of the Year, # 6 Featherweight in the World
2. Din Thomas (28-8) CW Featherweight Champion, #9 Featherweight in the World
3. Dominck Cruz (17-2) Leaves WEC, moves up in weight
4. Marlon Sandro (20-1) Leaves Strikeforce, former Featherweight King of Pancrase
5. Joe Soto (11-1) Bellator Featherweight Champion
6. Cub Swanson (17-2) Earned a title shot, most popular Featherweight in CW
7. Javier Vasquez (17-4)
8. Jose Aldo (15-3)
9. Jorge Evangelista (12-3-1) Former KOTC Featherweight Champion
10. Yves Jabouin (16-6) Just signed from the WEC

Featherweight is seriously stacked. It’s hard not to find a legitimate title contender in that group. Outside of the UFC, I would say we have the best featherweights in the world. Of course, we have been fortunate to pick some beauties from the WEC. Now if we could only get Faber, hmm.

PilotMan · 03-07-2010, 03:15 PM

Light heavyweight fighter Lolohea Mahe (5-5) has been let go. He went 1-3 in Cage Warriors, and fought some pretty bad fights. His only win was against Seth Petruzelli.

WEC has cancelled WEC 56, citing scheduling as the reason.

Bellator 23 ran their latest card. I don’t know who would go and see it, but the main event saw Jorge Ortiz (19-6-1) beat former “Contender” fighter Rubin Williams (0-4) with a first round submission. Also on the card, fighting in a prelim fight, Cage Warrior, Norman Paraisy (7-3) won in a unanimous decision.

DREAM 27 ran last night from Japan. The main event was a lightweight title fight between Eddie Alvarez (21-4) and Joachim Hansen (22-8-1). Someway, somehow, Alvarez submitted Hansen in 29 seconds to win the title. Hansen is now the former 2-time DREAM champion, and Alvarez is now a title holder here, as well as in Bellator.

Alright, so I did see what Faber wanted to sign. And it was a bit higher than I think I would be allowed to sign. Basically bidding started at 50k per fight, not including bonuses. I can’t compete with that kind of dough yet.

Ahh, now here is some good MMA booking. Stikeforce ran a show with the main event being the defense of the prestigious heavyweight title. Current champion Shane Del Rosario (11-1), who you will remember bested Roger Gracie for the title, was scheduled to defend his title against that MMA legend…..wait for it….36 year old…..Gary Frazier! This was only Frazier’s second professional fight. Apparently his good showing in his TKO loss to Daniel Cormier 18 months ago turned some heads. Oh, brother. Del Rosario won via 3rd round TKO. Also on the card, Jacare Souza (13-3) won. Cage Warrior Thomas Longacre (7-1) won. Gegard Mousasi (29-3-1) also won. Shonie Carter got his 50th career win.

WVR apparently followed Strikeforce’s lead when they decided that a good headliner would be an MMA debut of Matt Mitrione (1-0) fighting another WVR debuting fighter in Lonnie Holly (6-1). Needless to say, it didn’t go over very well with the fans.

PilotMan · 03-07-2010, 03:21 PM

It’s a busy Saturday in March. Our show is in California, while X-1 and Shooto are also running shows today. Clearly, ours will be the best. The main event for Cage Warriors 29 will be a welterweight showdown between Jesse Taylor and debuting Shamar Bailey. Tom Watson, the boxer from England, gets his first exposure on the main card, taking on former UFC fighter Ryan Jensen. A great lightweight battle between Wesley Johnson and Jim Miller will take place as well. Johnson has overpowered other fighters with his wrestling, but Miller will be the a tough test for him. Let’s get right to the action!

First up is a battle in the light heavyweight division. Besiki Gerenava (6-2, Sambo) will take on Priscus Fogagnolo (4-2, Submission Wrestling) in the battle of the damn near unpronounceable names fight. Gerenava used better grappling skills to get Fogagnolo to the ground in rounds one and two. Fogagnolo was in real trouble in the first, but the round ended just in time, and it looked like Generava gave all that he had to give. Fogagnolo came back in the third, but couldn’t make up for the first two rounds. Average fight.

The second fight of the night is between featherweights Jussier da Silva (4-1, BJJ) and Shoji Maruyama (7-7-1, Muay Thai). Da Silva will need to get this to the ground to win. Jussier tried takedown after takedown, but never could get Shoji to the ground. He gave away the first round, but rounds two and three were very close. Shoji landed some crisp punches, but no damage was done. In the end, Shoji won on two of the three cards, in a very close, and somewhat controversial decision. Decent fight.

Middleweights are next. The crowd erupts for hometown boy, Spencer Herns (3-1, Wrestling) as he takes on Dan Cramer (4-2, BJJ). Both men tried to get to the ground early, but neither was successful. The result was that both guys settled for the stand up war, and it was very close. Herns just came out on top in a decision. Average fight.

David Heath (12-6, Wrestling) enters the cage for his light heavyweight battle against Christian M’Pumbu (14-3-1, Muay Thai./BJJ). For 12 minutes David Heath looked good. He stopped Christian’s takedowns, and took the Frenchman down, and bullied him while standing. No real damage was done, and it appeared that Christian was a one trick pony. He kept looking for the guillotine at the cost of all other offense. Heath was comfortably ahead, and took Christian down and was in guard in the third. Again, Christian went for the guillotine from guard, and this time Heath couldn’t escape. Decent fight.

Heavyweights are next. Orvil Palmer (5-1, Wrestling, 266) enters to take on Neil Cooke (7-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 290). Cooke looked comfortable and relaxed as he used strong kicks and good grappling in this one. Cooke took Palmer down in the second, and the big man, passed to side control and unleashed a nasty ground and pound to force the stoppage. Decent fight.

Danillo Villefort (11-3, BJJ) is ready to take on Hiromitsu Miura (10-8, Judo) . Villefort is 4 inches taller than the Japanese fighter. This fight is in the welterweight division. Miura was in control early on. He landed shot after shot keeping Villefort going backward. Villefort came in and got a takedown in response, and quickly worked to side control. Villefort exposed Miura’s weakness, and pounded away to force the stoppage. Great fight.

The last prelim fight of the night is between featherweights Henry Martinez (5-1, Boxing/Wrestling) and Cole Province (9-1, Wrestling). Martinez gives away 4 inches, but still has a reach advantage. Martinez dictated the pace of this fight. He did the most damage with Province pressed against the cage, peppering him with punches and elbows. In the third, Province repeatedly went for the knockdown, but Martinez times his punches and nearly knocked Province out. Martinez looked relaxed throughout and cruised to the win. Decent fight.

The first fight on the main show starts with two fighters who are new to Cage Warriors. Diego Saraiva (15-9-1, BJJ) takes on Richard Crunkilton (18-4, Wrestling) in the lightweight division. A less than exciting fight for these two. Both men took turns in control on the ground, and their standup games were non existent. Crunkilton did just a bit more to get the win, but neither fighter was ever in real trouble. Average fight.

Another lightweight battle. This time between Wesley Johnson (6-1, Wrestling) and Jim Miller (17-3, Wrestling). Hopefully we can see some action. Nope, not in this one. Too bad, Miller took Johnson down at will, but couldn’t do anything. The ref broke them up for inaction in each round. The highlight of the fight saw Miller pick Johnson up and slam him down in round 1. The fact that Johnson couldn’t control Miller cost him the fight. Poor fight.

The next fight is in the heavyweight division. Brendan Schaub (7-1, Boxing/BJJ, 260) takes on 22-year old Hae Joon Yang (4-0, Wrestling, 285). Yang has a 7-inch reach advantage. Another dud of a fight. All the action took place in round two. Schaub knocked Yang down, and then did some damage with Yang on his back. Yang panicked a bit at the end but was saved by the bell. Round three was terrible. Yang was scared, and Schaub was content to used his boxing to pick off the youngster. Schaub gets the win in a poor fight.

Well this isn’t turning out so well. The next fight is the co-main event. Tom Watson (11-3, Boxing) takes on Ryan Jensen (17-5, BJJ/Kick Boxing) in a battle of middleweight title hopefuls. Finally, a decent fight. Jensen used good movement and leg kicks to neutralize the boxing of Watson early on. Jensen scored a takedown, but Watson was able to escape before too much damage was done. Watson is always dangerous, and he proved it by nailing Jensen with a series of brutal punches. Jensen was reeling, and Watson kept up the barrage until the ref jumped in to stop the fight. Great fight.

The main event is next up. Welterweight fighters Jesse Taylor (16-5, Wrestling) takes on Shamar Bailey (13-1, Wrestling). Taylor is hopeful that a win here, can put him in line for a fight against Brock Larson for a potential shot at the champ Lyman Good. I really hope this grappler v. grappler fight doesn’t go down like the others have tonight. Taylor is the hometown favorite and has the crowd behind him. Bailey looked tough in round one. Taylor could not get him to the ground, and took some hard shots in the meantime. Bailey just plain overpowered Taylor, and picked him up and slammed him down just before the end of round one. Bailey shot in right away and got a takedown to start round two. While Bailey was working to pass, Taylor was working the rubber guard. After Bailey was stuffed trying to pass, Taylor transitioned to a triangle choke. Bailey was caught off guard and has to tap right away. He looks pissed. Great fight

We had a crowd of 1,314 on hand for the show, and a buyrate of just over 36k. Both are records I believe. The show was rated as being good.

Fight of the Night goes to Jesse Taylor and Shamar Bailey
Knockout of the Night goes to Tom Watson
Submission of the Night goes to Jesse Taylor

Taylor moves one step closer in a fight he was supposed to lose. Tom Watson passes a big test of his lofty ranking. Now, hopefully he can develop a fan base. Henry Martinez continues to develop into a solid fighter. Look for some more pink slips to be handed out in all likelihood.

PilotMan · 03-12-2010, 07:43 AM

Nothing of significant importance happened on either of the other two MMA cards yesterday.

Like a freight train rolling on Cage Warriors is pleased to announce the next PPV event….Cage Warriors 31! The fight will take place in Hawaii. Our first trip west of California. The main event will feature a battle between featherweight title contenders. Joe Soto, who rebounded from his loss to Din Thomas with a submission of Jose Aldo, looks to continue his win streak with a win over another former WEC title contender. This time, making his CW debut, it will against Yves Jabouin. Jabouin fought 25 minutes with Mike Brown last August, only to lose via decision. His last fight was a win over Jens Pulver. Both guys are good stand-up fighters with the ground edge to Soto right now. The co-main will see the debut of two new fighters to Cage Warriors. The first will be former UFC lightweight Nate Diaz. Diaz went 2-1 in 2010 with his only loss to Philipe Nover. He hasn’t come close to title contention, but he certainly has to tools to do so. His opponent will be former WEC fighter Ricardo Lamas. Lamas also went 2-1 in 2010 with his only loss to Shane Roller. There will be 4 other fighters making their first fights with Cage Warriors at the show. Here is the full fight card currently scheduled for the middle of April.

Code:

Cage Warriors 31: Soto v. Jabouin

Joe Soto (11-1, #5) v. Yves Jabouin (16-6) FW
Nate Diaz (13-5) v. Ricardo Lamas (8-2) LW
Magomed Shikshabekov (8-0, #3) v. Steve Bruno (16-5, #10) WW
Glover Teixeira (10-2, #3) v. Ralek Gracie (4-1, #4) LHW
Justin Wren (11-2, #7) v. Rex Richards (9-3) HW

----Prelims----

Ran Weathers (16-5) v. Zac George (20-3) LW
Nate Moore (10-2, #10) v. Gerald Harris (15-4) MW
Mike Swick (13-5) v. Yosmanny Cabezas (10-4) WW
Taiki Tsuchiya (7-2) v. Darren Uyenoyama (8-5) FW
Hans Stringer (12-5-1, #10 ) v. Kevin Casey (4-3) LHW
Assuerio Silva (16-9) v. Eddie Sanchez (10-5) HW
Jacob O’Connell (6-1) v. David Loiseau (18-13) MW

PilotMan · 03-12-2010, 07:47 AM

Priscus Fanagolo (4-3) has been released from his Cage Warriors contract. He still had one fight remaining but at 0-3 he was going nowhere fast. Priscus still works for CFC “down under.”

A whole slew of fighters got their pink slips today. It cost us a bit to buy out the deals, but these guys weren’t going to see the light of day, and we really had no intention of keeping them so all they were going to do was take up room on our cards. Besides it’s time to start reigning in our ever growing roster.

Carlos Quinton (7-3) went 1-3 with us, will be unemployed.
Dan Cramer (4-3) went 1-3 with us, will be unemployed.
Jae Hee Chun (2-3) went 1-3 with us, will be unemployed.
James Lee (13-6) went 0-3 with us, was part of the original title tournament, will be unemployed.
Jason Black (23-7-1) went 0-3 with us. He never saw the third round, will be unemployed.
Joe Heiland (6-3) went 0-3 with us. Still works for MFC in Canada.
Joe Morales (5-3) Went 1-3 with us. Still works for PURECOMBAT.
Josh Curran (3-3) Went 0-3 with us. Was the #2 seed in the HW title tournament. Will be unemployed.
Mark Burch (10-5) Went 1-3 with us. Will be unemployed.
Nick Klein (3-3) Went 0-3 with us. Will be unemployed.
Scott Norton (6-4) Went 0-3 with us. Will be unemployed.
Seth Petruzelli (11-7) Went 0-3 with us. Will be unemployed.

That’s a nice list to purge and not have to worry about finding an opponent for. Clearly we were too big for some of these guys. There are still plenty of places for these guys to find work.

A Shark Fights show in Texas saw current SF featherweight champion Jason Georgiana (10-5) defend his title with a first round submission over Ralph Lopez (6-4).

PilotMan · 03-12-2010, 07:53 AM

A got a letter from Antonio McKee (23-5-2), a lightweight fighter, who was the MFC lightweight champion before we signed him away. Anyway, it looks like he is ready to call it quits at the age of 40. His last fight will be on next weeks card against Dave Jansen. The lightweight division has gotten really crowded and it didn’t look like he was going to find his way back into the top of it.

Two more fighters have turned their notices in that they are leaving Cage Warriors. The first isn’t that big of a deal. Brian Humes (7-3), a heavyweight, who has gone 1-2 with us. Humes has decided that he is better off fighting for that little promotion called Shark Fights, then fighting for us. The second is much harder to swallow. We have defended ourselves from a couple of poachers, but this one hurts to lose. Jesse Taylor (17-5) put together a couple of good wins, and was certainly in the thick of things in our welterweight division. But now he is heading back to Strikeforce and will leave us and MFC. Taylor was ranked #2 in our welterweight division.

In England, Jaime Hern (6-1) beat Henrique Nogueira (8-5-1) with a 3rd round TKO to win the UK UC Light Heavyweight crown.

In Poland, at a KSW show, Ibragim Mogomedov (25-6-1) beat Akhmed Sultanov (6-4) to retain the the KSW heavyweight title. Vladimir Zenin (11-5) won the KSW Lightweight title with a win over Edvardas Norkeliunas (8-6-1).

Another fighter leaving is leaving Cage Warriors. This one isn’t too bad. Ikuo Usuda (7-3) is on the way out, but Usuda was one loss away from being cut anyway. His deal will keep him fighting in Japan with WVR.

Strikeforce Welterweight Champion, Tyron Woodley (8-1) defended his title against former Cage Warriors, Rudy Bears (11-6). The card aired live on Showtime. Other winners were Robbie Lawler (20-5), Marloes Coenen (21-4), and Antonio Carvalho (14-4).

Heath Herring has signed a deal to fight for Poland based KSW. Herring had been working for only Bellator.

UFC 119 was live from Colorado last night. The main event saw Wanderlei Silva (35-11-1) defeat Chael Sonnen (25-12-1) in the first round. Other winners on the card were: Ken Flo (14-4), Shinya Aoki (25-4), Bones Jones (11-0), and Thiago Silva (16-2).

Meanwhile, running opposite that show, WVR 27 ran. The main event saw a Joe Doerkson (44-15) defeat Takenori Sato (11-9-5) to win the WVR Middleweight title. Doerkson has only won 3 of his last 11 fights, and didn’t record a win all of last year. In fact, his last win was against Sato 18 months ago. Marius Zaromskis (16-3) won in his WVR debut. Cage Warrior Yoshihiro Nakao (10-5) lost to former heavyweight champ Marcio Cruz (7-3). Also, soon to be former, Cage Warrior Ikuo Usuda (8-3) won his first fight of 2011 with a TKO.

PilotMan · 03-19-2010, 08:10 AM

Live from Ohio! Cage Warriors 30 is on PPV! The main event features the first defense of the Cage Warriors Heavyweight Title. Brandon Cash will take on Dave Herman for the title. Herman has destroyed his opponents in his time in Cage Warriors. Cash is no slouch and has won his last three fights by KO or TKO. In the co-main, highly touted welterweight contender Jason High will take on Tamden McCrory. McCrory has 6 inches on High, but that won’t matter if High gets him to the ground. High has won his last three fights by submission. In other fights, Per Eklund takes on Takeya Mizugaki, and we see the debut’s of Siyar Bahadurzada and Joe Riggs. Tonight will also be the last fight for Antonio McKee as he retires.

Let’s get right to the action. First up is a battle in the featherweight division. Micah Miller (13-7, Wrestling) is still looking for his first win in CW, but so is his opponent Sergio Gomez (8-5, Striker). It’s a good bet that unless Miller really looks good, that both men are probably out of CW. Gomez wins an early standup battle, but is taken down in round 2. Miller capitalizes quickly and finishes it with strikes. Good fight.

Next up are welterweights Andrew Buckland (11-7, Boxing/Wrestling) and Kyle Pimentel (8-2, BJJ). I don’t see Buckland being worth much, Pimental needs to win this to stay in good graces. Round one kind of stunk, Pimental got two takedowns, but Buckland didn’t seem to hesitate. Pimental was knocked down in round 3, but Buckland couldn’t finish it. Close fight and apparently entertaining. Buckland wins a very close, split decision. Great fight.

Debuting heavyweights are in our next fight. Dan Evensen (13-5, Kick Boxing/BJJ, 270) enters and takes on Lavar Johnson (12-3, Muay Thai, 278). Mostly a standup battle here. Evensen tried to take it to the mat, but was picked off by Johnson’s solid striking. In fact, when Evensen did shoot, Johnson was able to sprawl and catch Evensen on all fours. Johnson spent most of the second round pounding away, but couldn’t finish it. Still, despite giving up round 3, he did enough to steal the fight. Good fight.

Damien Stelly (10-3, Wrestling), a light heavyweight from Georgia, is next in the cage. His opponent for tonight’s fight will be Pat Berry (6-3, Kick Boxing) from New Orleans. Both men are getting their first fights in Cage Warriors. Berry and Stelly tentatively fought early on in round one. Berry caught Stelly coming in and landed a barrage that stunned him. Stelly staggered back, and Berry jumped in with more shots until the ref stopped it. Decent fight.

Another light heavyweight battle is next. Jeremiah Billington (12-3, Wrestling) will take on Victor Valimaki (18-7, Karate). Valimaki took Billington down almost instantly in round 1, but neither fighter could make much progress, and they were stood up toward the end of the round. Round 2 saw Valimaki land a hook that sent Billington reeling. The ref moved close, and Valimaki jumped all over Billington. The ref was quick to stop it. Average fight.

Next up is an exciting featherweight battle between Bao Quach (17-10-1, BJJ) and Hideo Tokoro (24-18-1, Boxing/Wrestling). Quach is a much smaller fighter that Tokoro. Both of these guys are known as very entertaining fighters. This could be good. The fight was good, but not a barnburner. Tokoro was able to block Quach’s takedown attempts, and get two of his own. There wasn’t much to the standup, but the ground game was exciting. Quach came back in round 3 but Tokoro was never in danger. Tokoro ended up winning the fight in a very close, split decision win. Good fight.

40-year old Antonio McKee (23-5-2, Vale Tudo) enters the cage for the last time. He will be fighting Dave Jansen (14-2, Wrestling). Jansen is making his Cage Warriors debut. McKee and Jansen wrestled around for a little while, with Jansen doing enough to control most of the action in rounds one and two. McKee did more in round 3, and tried to take advantage of a tiring Jansen. But it wasn’t enough. Jansen was able to pull out the unanimous decision in three rounds of poor action.

Our main show starts with the debut of Joe Riggs (32-11, Freestyle). Riggs takes on Fabio Nascimento (10-6, BJJ) in the middleweight division battle. This fight was supposed to be more of a tune up fight for Riggs. He was expected to really take the fight to Fabio. He wasn’t really troubled, and did block all of Fabio’s takedowns, and score a couple of his own, but really didn’t do much beyond that. Both men tired in the third round, and wasn’t very exciting. Riggs wins easily, but not impressively. Average fight.

Siyar Bahadurzada (19-4-1, Muay Thai) is highly ranked and making his Cage Warriors debut. His opponent will be unheralded Chris Price (17-2, Boxing/Wrestling). This will be a test for Siyar to see how he matches against our middleweight fighters. Of course, if Price wins, he will solidly move up to title contention. This was a great fight! It was all about striking early on. Siyar took round one with some clinical jabs and leg kicks. Round two saw Price respond with better defense, and some very good counter punching. That meant it was all on round three. Price knocked Siyar down early on, but Siyar was ready, Price let him up, and knocked him down again. Same thing, Siyar gets back up only to get clocked by Price again. Siyar is allowed to get up again, and somehow comes back to take Price down. Price was working hard to defend himself, but it looked like Siyar might just do enough, then the fight ended. Price pulls out the stunning upset.

An international showdown in the lightweight division is next. Japan is represented by Takeya Mizugaki (14-5-2, Shooto) while Sweden is represented by Per Eklund (19-4-1, Freestyle). Eklund is 5 inches taller, but only has a marginal reach advantage. Round one was a see-saw battle. Mostly a lot of grappling for position with no real punches thrown. Both men tried to get it to the ground. Mizugaki got a takedown late, but couldn’t do much in the way of offense. Round two saw Eklund shoot early but Mizugaki was too quick. He slipped behind the Swede and took his back. With Eklund on the defensive, Mizugaki unloaded an vicious ground and pound forcing the ref to stop the fight. Good fight.

The co-main event is next. Jason High (13-2, Wrestling) the submission specialist, takes on Tamden McCrory (15-3, Muay Thai/Wrestling). McCrory is 6 inches taller and has a 6 inch reach advantage. Both of these guys could be tough for current Welterweight champ Lyman Good. McCrory throws a couple of jabs from the outside, then shoots for High. He gets the takedown, but High tries to get him in a guillotine. McCrory is in danger, but escapes. McCrory looks to pass, but is careless, and allows High to grab his head again. This time it’s too tight. Jason High forces McCrory to tap just over 2 minutes into the first round. Fantastic fight.

Up next is the main event. The Cage Warriors Heavyweight Title is on the line. Brandon Cash (8-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 265) is making the first defense of his title against Dave Herman (20-3, Wrestling, 265). Somewhere Darril Schoonover is looking on with interest. This was a pretty good fight for big lumbering heavyweights. Cash and Herman traded shots early with both men being careful not to get over extended. Herman took Cash down but it was debatable about who did more damage. The next round saw both men trade standing up. Cash was tagged here and there, and really didn’t impose himself. But he did in round 3. Cash took the fight to Herman getting a takedown at the end of the round, and looking dangerous by getting side control. Unfortunately for him, the round ended before he could do much damage. Round 4 started and Cash started to look tired. Herman didn’t waste any time and landed a huge straight right that knocked the champion clean out. Dave Herman wins the Cage Warriors Heavyweight title in a great fight.

We had a crowd of 1,615 fighters on hand and a PPV buy rate of just under 40k. The fight was rated as being great.

Fight of the Night goes to Siyar Bahadurzada and Chris Price
Knockout of the Night goes to Dave Herman
Submission of the Night goes to Jason High

We pulled out a very good show, when it wasn’t really expected. Jason High continues to roll, subbing his 4th fighter in Cage Warriors. Chis Price gets another important win for his career. Joe Riggs was disappointing. McKee retires and does so with a good fight, but looking his age. Valimaki and Tokoro don’t have great records, but their wins keep them relevant in their weight classes. There are bound to be some cuts after this. Stay tuned, Good show.

PilotMan · 03-19-2010, 08:16 AM

The third episode of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV has now been scheduled for the last week of April. As usual the show will take place in our back yard of New Jersey. This show really shows how we have grown over the last few months. For the first time, I really feel like we have some genuine stars, so much that many fighters who easily could have been on TV are fighting in the prelims non-televised fights. There are our usual 4 televised fights, plus 8 prelim fights.

The main event, that will air in Canada, the US, and UK will feature a battle for the Cage Warriors Middleweight title. Jared Hess (12-1-1) makes his first title defense, having won the title from Trevor Prangley in November. His opponent has been on a tear. Winning his last 7 fights, all of them by TKO with the exception of submission win in his last fight, and all of them have been in the first round. Fabio Silva (18-5) has been fighting like a badass, and he will get a chance to win his first MMA title on international television. The co-main sees the return of All-American. Phil Davis (7-0) won his last fight on TV over the Frenchman Christian M’Pumbu and now takes on Reese Andy (10-4) another fighter with a wrestling background. The other televised fights see the Cage Warriors debut of Marlon Sandro (20-1), the former featherweight King of Pancrase, Alan Omer (16-2), and former Shark Fights lightweight fighter Brian Cobb (18-5).

Also, our show will see the last fight of MMA legend Pat Miletich. Miletich takes on Canadian wrestler, Gary Wright. Miletich will retire after the fight. Other fighters on the undercard who could easily be on the main show: Jose Aldo, Jason Norwood, James Krause and Ross Pearson. Here is the rundown of the complete show.

Code:

Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV

Jared Hess (12-1-1) v. Fabio Silva (18-5) Cage Warriors Middleweight Title
Phil Davis (7-0) v. Reese Andy (10-4) 
Marlon Sandro (20-1) v. Alan Omer (16-2) 
Brian Cobb (18-5) v. Toby Imada (25-14)

----Prelims----

Gary Wright (11-1) v. Pat Miletich (32-8-2) 
James Krause (13-2) v. Ross Pearson (12-4) 
Jason Norwood (10-2) v. Xavier Lucas (11-1-1) 
Jose Aldo (15-3) v. Henrique Bilcalho (12-4) 
Blagoi Ivanov (4-2) v. Rodrigo Munduruca (8-2) 
George Bush (7-3) v. Mike Hayes (6-2) 
Jason Lambert (23-12) v. Tony Ballout (4-2) 
Mike Ciesnolevicz (17-6) v. Mark Lajhner (6-2)

A few guys here need wins. Especially the guys near the bottom of the card. I feel bad that we weren’t able to do more with Miletich, but I am happy that we have his last fight. I don’t think he’ll win, but that the way it’s supposed to work. Wright is good, and needs a quality win to get back on schedule. Sandro and Omer both have huge potential. I am wonderfully happy to be able to give Silva a title shot, he has been unbeatable lately and has to be the favorite.

Cage Warriors sent pink slips to 6 fighters. The first is Fabio Nascimento (10-7). Fabio was signed after he beat Renzo Gracie, but never showed what he could do in Cage Warriors going 1-3. Kyle Pimentel (8-3) looked good initially but going 1-3 and he’s out. Other fighters who are out are Sergio Gomez (8-6, 0-4), Kala Hose (7-5, 0-3), Jordan Radev (17-6, 0-3), and Jesse Sanders (21-8, 1-3). All of these guys will be unemployed after their terminations.

PilotMan · 03-19-2010, 08:20 AM

APRIL 2011

I am starting to like these meetings now. Things have been running great, and we are starting to make some money. Each month that goes by that we continue to have an operating profit, I am going to be allowed to keep spending and expanding our divisions. And we can push to that #2 spot in the MMA world. It’s a long, long road to the top though. Last month we were able to profit a record high 184k. We set records for attendance (gate receipts up almost 12% over last month ,the previous high), and PPV revenue was over 300k, that’s a 25% jump over last month.

It’s a good thing too, our expenses were also higher as well. Our biggest expense was fighter pay, but that is expected. But the big jump was in signing bonuses, where we handed out almost 90k. The main reason was some more expensive contracts for some newer fighters, and a couple of resignings to get some exclusive deals.

At this time, Cage Warriors is the #3 most popular MMA company in the world, only sitting behind the UFC and WEC. Our national popularity is 28.9%. We are the number #3 company in the US. Cage Warriors is now the #4 promotion in Canada, behind the UFC, MFC, and Kings of the Cage. We are #3 in the UK, behind the UFC and UK UC. We are still #7 in Mexico. We are considered a mid level regional in Canada, and a low level in the UK and Mexico.

The next weight class that we look at is perhaps the deepest group of fighters in Cage Warriors. The lightweight division is just plain stacked. Here is a look at the top 10.

1. Takeya Mizugaki (15-5-2) #5 lightweight in the world, has 2 TKO’s in 2 fights.
2. Richie Whitson (10-1) #7 lightweight in the world. Suffered his first loss to Ben Henderson in Feb.
3. Jeff Curran (33-12-1) Cage Warriors Lightweight Champion
4. Karen Darabedyan (12-1) Planning to fight Curran for the title down the road.
5. Mike Easton (9-1) KOTC fighter just signed.
6. Marcin Held (7-1)
7. Per Eklund (19-5-1)
8. Brian Cobb (18-5)
9. Josh Souder (10-2)
10. Zach Micklewright (9-1)

I think that there are a lot of young and untested fighters in this weight class, and that they will be sorted out over the next few months.

PilotMan · 03-24-2010, 08:27 PM

Bellator ran their latest show from Florida in front of nearly 700 fans. Bellator continues to rise from the depths that they had fallen. They are currently the #8 MMA company in the world. The main event of their last show saw KJ Noons (11-3) KO former Cage Warrior Eric Reynolds (15-6). Other winners on the card were Icho Larenas (7-5), Michael Patt (14-5), Nate Loughran (10-1), and Givanildo Santana (12-1).

Phil Baroni has joined Texas based Shark Fights.

Maximum Fighting Championships continues to push Kimbo Slice as a main event fighter. At their latest show Kimbo (6-3) posted a win in an awful fight with Martin Desilets (9-5). Kimbo is now more popular in Canada than he is in the US. Desilets had lost his two previous fights. In the co-main, Cage Warrior, Ryan Jimmo (15-2) posted a decision win. Other winners were Ariel Sexton (9-2), Travis Galbraith (20-7), and Soa Palelei (12-3).

DREAM 28 took place this morning. The main event saw JZ Calvancante (18-3-1) pick up a win over Mitsuhiro Ishida (18-8-1). Josh Barnett (26-7) picked up the win in the co-feature. Other winners on the card were, Artur Oumakhanov (12-4) over K-Taro (17-8-2) Rudy Lindsey (13-9), and Andre Amade (9-6-1).

Ryu Chonan (19-12) defended his DEEP Welterweight title in Japan with a 3rd round submission win over Simeon Thoresen (15-2-1). At the same show, Koetsu Okazaki (9-1-1) won in his DEEP debut fight

Former UFC and IFL fighter Victor Matyushenko has retired from MMA at the age of 40. Victor held the IFL Light Heavyweight title for 9 months. His final record was 23-6. His last 2 fights were losses to Little Nog, and Keith Jardine.

PilotMan · 03-24-2010, 08:36 PM

Cage Warriors has made the long journey to Hawaii for tonight’s MMA spectacular. The main event tonight sees the Cage Warriors debut of Canadian Kick Boxer Yves Jobouin. Jobouin comes over from WEC where he last beat Jens Pulver. His opponent for tonight will be Joe Soto. Soto has only been stopped 1 times in his career. That was in August of last year where he lost in his bid for the Featherweight crown against Din Thomas. Since then he scored a submission win over another WEC fighter, Jose Aldo. Another win here, and he will be firmly implanted in the title picture again. Cage Warriors also sees others who are new to the organization. The debut’s of Nate Diaz, Ricardo Lamas, Steve Bruno, and Glover Teixeira. The main show starts off with the battle for Texas. Heavies Justin Wren and Rex Richards, two fighters with good wrestling pedigree and ground and pound go at it for Texas bragging rights.

The show is ready to begin. The first battle is between middleweights Jacob O’Connell (6-1, BJJ) and David Loiseau (18-13, Vale Tudo). A tentative striking battle in round one gave way to O’Connell looking to get it to the ground in the second. O’Connell rapidly jumped guard, catching Loiseau in a guillotine choke as he drug him down. Loiseau ad no chance but to tap out. Great fight.

Heavyweights Assuerio Silva (16-9, Muay Thai/BJJ, 257) and Eddie Sanchez (10-5, Striker, 250) are next to enter the cage. Sanchez used good movement and better striking skills to take round 1. He managed to avoid Silva, but Silva was able to take down Sanchez in round 2. A scramble for position saw Sanchez gain side control, then take Sanchez’s back. Silva finished the fight with strikes in round 2. Good fight.

Hans Stringer (12-5-1, BJJ/Muay Thai) makes his CW debut in the light heavyweight division. His opponent will be Kevin Casey (4-3, BJJ). Stringer bloodied Casey early in the first round with an elbow while he was pinned against the side of the cage. Stringer controlled the pace of the fight blocking Casey’s takedowns and controlling Casey against the cage. Stringer easily took rounds one and two, and was in control in the third when he took a tired Casey down. But it was Casey who caught Stringer with a guillotine while he was in half guard. Casey got it locked in good and tight and forced the submission with just over a minute remaining. Great fight.

Taiki Tsuchiya (7-2, Shooto) takes on Darren Uyenoyama (8-5, BJJ/Wrestling) in the featherweight division. Taiki is starting to make a name for himself in Cage Warriors. This was a very exciting fight that was fought at a blistering pace. Uyenoyama pulled Taiki down into guard in the first, but was at Taiki’s mercy. Round two saw a huge takedown from Taiki, a swift transition to mount, and after a couple of tried a solid armbar was locked on that finished the fight. Fantastic fight.

A battle in the welterweight division is next. Former UFC fighter Mike Swick (13-5, Kick Boxing) takes on Judo specialist Yosmany Cabezas (10-4) in his Cage Warriors debut. Swick scored a fast takedown in early round one, worked to mount and took Cabezas back but let him off the hook. Cabezas came back in round 2 and responded with a takedown of his own, Swick locked a triangle choke from the bottom, but Cabezas was able to break it with a slam. Cabezas controlled round 3 with another takedown and spent the round controlling from the top position. The fight wound down with the ref standing them up just before the round ended. Cabezas ruins Swick’s debut with a unanimous decision win. Average fight.

Moving on to the middleweight division for the next fight. Nate Moore (10-2, Wrestling) gives away 4 inches of reach to Gerald Harris (15-4, Wrestling). Harris chooses to shoot almost immediately and gets the takedown. Harris unleashes a hammer blow nearly knocking Moore out. He survives, but Harris maintained control. Moore went for an armbar, but Harris moved to side control. More ground and pound from Harris and the ref was forced to stop it. That’s the Harris that we should have been seeing all along. Great fight.

The last of the prelim fights sees two lightweight square off in the cage. Ran Weathers (16-5, Boxing/Wrestling) is ready to take on Zac George (20-3, Wrestling). Both men have been on a roll lately. What would you expect from two grapplers? Weathers scored 3 takedowns, George 1. Weathers controlled the grapple better, and inflicted more punishment overall. Weathers walks away with an important win. Decent fight.

The battle for Texas is next. Justin Wren (11-2, Wrestling, 285, Arlington) takes on Rex Richards (9-3, Wrestling, 290, Lubbock). Richards stands 3 inches taller and has a 7-inch reach advantage. Richards went for it right away, but Wren was equal to the task. Wren used good standup to take the first round. Richards went for the takedown right away, slamming Wren all the way across the cage. Too bad for him that Wren had grabbed his neck and locked a guillotine choke on. Richards tried to escape but tapped our before passing out. Fantastic fight.

Glover Teixeria (10-2, BJJ/Kempo) make his Cage Warriors debut against Ralek Gracie (4-1, BJJ) in a light heavyweight division. Both men traded early then closed and grappled. Teixeria landed a nasty uppercut from the clinch that Gracie took right on the chin. He went down, and Teixeria jumps on him, locks the armbar on and finishes the fight. Fantastic fight.

Welterweights Magomed Shikshabekov (8-0, Sambo) takes on Steve Bruno (16-5, Muay Thai) in his CW debut. Shikshabekov is starting to gain some momentum. Shiksabekov took Bruno down at will, and controlled the fight for the most part. Bruno kept working for the guillotine from the bottom and did get one at the end of the first round. Shishabekov was better in round 2, getting to half guard, then transitioning quickly to mount, where he applied an armbar so fast, that it had to be replayed over to see just how fast it happened. Bruno tapped with 1 second left in the round. Great fight.

The co-main event is next. This is a battle of lighweight fighters. Nate Diaz (13-5, Boxing/BJJ) is primed to take on Ricardo Lamas (8-2, Wrestling). Diaz is a full 4 inches taller and has a 6 inch reach advantage. Diaz is fully expected to take this fight but apparently he didn’t do enough training from his back. Lamas took him down early on, passed to mount quickly and submitted him in just over 3 minutes of the first round. Good fight.

Yves Jabouin (16-6, Kick Boxing) enters the cage for the main event of the night. His opponent, Joe Soto (11-1, Wrestling) follows him in shortly after. These two are featherweight contenders. Jabouin couldn’t stop Soto’s takedowns, but his defense from his back was solid. Soto wasn’t able to inflict much damage but dominated the entire fight. Soto moved well on his feet and ducked a couple of wild shots that were meant for pain. Soto’s dominance maybe didn’t end the fight, or really impress that many fans, but never the less, he won. Average fight.

We had a gate of 1,201 fans and a PPV buyrate of just under 30k. The show was rated as being very poor.

Fight of the Night goes to Taiki Tsuchiya and Darren Uyenoyama
Knockout of the Night goes to Gerald Harris
Submission of the Night goes to Justin Wren

I knew that the fans weren’t going to eat this up. Soto just isn’t popular enough yet. Ricardo Lamas with the huge upset over Nate Diaz, not only that, but Mike Swick, Steve Bruno, Hans Stringer and Yves Jabouin also didn’t fare so well in their debuts either. Soto clearly belongs in the upper echelon of the featherweight division. Justin Wren is also staking his claim to another title shot. Magomed Shikshabekov is proving to be uber dangerous, and the guy that nobody wants to fight.

PilotMan · 03-24-2010, 08:39 PM

Justin Wren may be staking his claim to another title shot, but unfortunately for him as well as me, a letter came from the state athletic commission. They said that there were some problems with his sample, and that they had determined that he was going to be suspended for a year. That, makes him the highest profile fighter in Cage Warriors to get busted for drugs. Wren is still really young, so a year off hurts, but still shouldn’t affect his overall career arc.

At a CFC fight in Australia, middleweight champion Hector Lombard (25-2-1) defended his title with a win over Eduardo Pamplona (12-4) with a first round submission. Cage Warrior Andy Kappas (4-3) was beaten in the first round.

Jason “Mayhem” Miller (25-8) has beaten Cung Le (8-1) and won the Strikeforce Middleweight title. He did it with a TKO in the first round over the kick boxer. Fedor (32-3) got back to his winning ways with a TKO over lightly regarded heavyweight Carl Seumanutafa (4-4). Jake Shields (26-5-1) got by Scott Smith (14-8) with a first round submission. Terry Martin (22-8) and Gilbert Melendez (19-3) were also winners on the card. This was a huge show. Melendez win came against Cage Warrior fighter Bobby Stack (9-3). Ben Holscher (8-2), another Cage Warrior, won in a prelim fight.

Rafael Assuncao (17-2) won in the main event of WEC 57 over LC Davis (15-4). Other winners on the card were Shane Roller (9-3), Chase Beebe (16-6), Tetsu Suzuki (9-8-3), and Fredson Paixao (12-4).

PilotMan · 03-28-2010, 08:29 PM

Cage Warriors is proud to announce the official booking for Cage Warriors 33. Cage Warriors 33 will take place live on PPV from California. The main event of the evening will be a battle for the Cage Warriors Interim Featherweight Title. The reason for the creation of an interim title is that Din Thomas has again chosen to be booked in Japan, instead of following my best wishes and taking a fight with Cub Swanson. So, since scheduling seems to be a real problem, we have booked Cub Swanson in a title fight against none other than Issei Tamura. Tamura shocked everyone with a solid win over Abel Cullum, and his fight against Cub Swanson will be another tough battle, except that this time, it’s for the title, Hopefully, with the creation of an interim title, we will have a better shot to unify them down the road.

The co-headliner of the night is a double debut for new fighters to Cage Warriors. First ,Mike Easton comes in from King of the Cage on a win streak, but he will face a tough test in former UFC, and of late, Bellator, fighter Roger Huerta. Easton is young and untested, with 27 pro fights and only 4 losses, Roger Huerta will be that test.

Here is a rundown of the entire card:

Code:

Cage Warriors 33: Swanson v. Tamura

Cage Warriors Interim Featherweight Title Fight
Cub Swanson (17-2) v. Issei Tamura (9-0) FW
Mike Easton (9-1) v. Roger Huerta (22-4-1) LW
Jon Madsen (6-0) v. Josh Hendricks (18-5) HW
Stanislov Nedkov (12-0) v. Stipe Bekavac (16-3) LHW
Rich Clementi (35-16-1) v. Joseph Benavidez (11-4) LW

----Prelims----

Jacob Volkmann (10-0) v. Jesse Bongfeldt (20-3) WW
Jay Hieron (18-5) v. Rory MacDonald (9-1) WW
Ben Rothwell (31-8) v. Chris Tuchscherer (17-2) HW
Marcus Sursa (8-5) v. Valentino Petrescu (8-2) LHW
Cameron Dollar (5-3) v. Martin Stapleton (6-3) LW
Reggie Orr (10-9-1) v. Jeremy Horn (83-21-5) MW
Isao Hirose (8-2) v. Roberto Vargas (8-4) FW

Some big names on the undercard here, Hieron, Rothwell, Sursa and Horn. Plus Volkmann and Bongfeldt could be a main show fight. I expect this show to be awesome.

PilotMan · 03-28-2010, 08:35 PM

UC UK crowned a new welterweight champion when Hernani Perpetuo (9-1) knocked out Jim Wallhead (20-6) in the second round.

It’s been a little while since we were back in New Jersey, but we are here, and we are on television, live broadcast to 3 countries. The show is headlined with the first Cage Warriors Middleweight Title defense for Jared Hess. He takes on Fabio Silva, a man with 7 first round stoppages in a row going back to September of ‘09. We also see the return of All-American Phil Davis, one of my favorite fighters. He is going up against Reese Andy who is older, smaller, and still dangerous just ask Kevin Casey. A total of 12 fights are scheduled for tonight. We are ready to begin.

A battle in the light heavyweight division between Mike Ciesnolevicz (17-6, Hybrid Fighting) and Mark Lajhner (6-2, Judo). There’s a good chance that whoever loses this fight will be gone from the company. A very boring fight, and not a good show from either man. Lajhner managed to stay up for two of the thee rounds and took the fight, but it was awful.

Quickly moving on, we now have a battle between middleweights Jason Lambert (23-12, Wrestling) and Tony Ballout (4-2, Shoot fighting). Lambert hasn’t looked very good at all, and looks to put all of his experience behind him to try and win this. Ballout came out aggressively but found himself scrambling on his back. Lambert ripped off a number of shots from side control and this one was over rather quickly. Fantastic fight.

George Bush (7-3, Wrestling, 255) is the first into the cage. He is looking to get back to his winning ways, but first he has to get by Mike Hayes (6-2, Freestyle, 255). Another man looking to get back to some wins. The one that almost got away. Bush took control early and mounted Hayes in round 1, but didn’t put it away. By round 3 he was very tired, and Hayes took advantage of it. Bush ate a couple of big punches and ended up on his seat. He stayed on the defensive and survived the round to survive the fight and steal the win. Decent fight.

Another heavyweight battle is next. Blagoi Ivanov (4-2, Sambo, 265) and Rodrigo Munduruca (8-2, Muay Thai/BJJ, 285) are ready to battle. I really don’t know what to expect here. Ivanov proved to be way too much for the bigger man here. He didn’t get the takedown until a little later, but when he did it was over. Munduruca was pounded out in short order in round 1. Great fight.

Jose Aldo (15-3, BJJ) takes on Henrique Bilcalho (12-4, BJJ/Muay Thai) in the featherweight division. Aldo is looking for a win here in Cage Warriors, but he can’t look past Bilcalho who has proven to be a tough fighter. A striking battle starts the whole thing and Bilcalho looks good early on, but Aldo landed a great flurry that put Bilcalho on the defensive. Aldo jumped all over him and forced the early stoppage. Great fight.

Welterweights Jason Norwood (10-2, Boxing/Wrestling) and Xavier Lucas (11-1-1, Boxing) are set to go in the cage. This should be a very good fight. Lucas’ one sided skill set was just exposed. Lucas couldn’t stop Norwood as he went down almost immediately. Norwood passed to mount fast, and pounded the X-man out in under 85 seconds. Great fight.

A battle of lighweights is next. Both men are coming off of losses, and one will get back in the win column tonight. James Krause (13-2, Wrestling) and Ross Pearson (12-4, Boxing/Wrestling) are in the cage. Krause is 4-inches taller than Pearson. Krause was expected to be able to handle Pearson but Pearson was all he could handle. Pearson used clinical strikes and good takedown defense to take the round. Krause finally got the takedown in round 2 and even worked to mount, but the round ended before any more damage could be done. Pearson won another striking battle in round 3 as he landed a good mix of punches and kicks to take the round and the right. Decent fight.

The last prelim fight is the last MMA fight for Pat Miletich (32-8-2, Freestyle Jiu-jitus) will end his career against Gary Wright (11-1, Wrestling). He can take from this that he fought a quality opponent, as Wright is just coming off of his first career loss. Miletich is 16 years older than Wright. 41 seconds. That’s all it took to close the career of a MMA legend. Wright took Miletich down and just beat the crap out of him. And just like that, it’s over. Great fight.

The main show starts off with a battle between lightweights Brian Cobb (18-5, Wresling) and Toby Imada (25-14, Judo). Cobb comes in for a takedown, but Imada stops him and clinches up. A really nice Judo toss lands Cobb on his back, but Imada leaves his arm vulnerable and Cobb is able to see to side control. Cobb shows good control successfully taking Imada’s back and locking a rear naked choke on. Imada taps to get the win. Fantastic fight.

The next card on the show is a battle of debuting featherweight fighters. Marlon Sandro (20-1, BJJ/Muay Thai) and Alan Omer (16-2, Submission Wrestling) have 3 losses 39 combined fights. Sandro is 12 years the senior of Omer. Sandro still has it. He scored takedowns in all three rounds, and used some elbows to open Omer up in the third. Omer was really never in control of this fight, Sandro seemed to do what he wanted to get the decision win in an average fight.

The co-main event is next. Light heavyweight fighters Phil Davis (7-0, Wrestling) and Reese Andy (10-4, Wrestling) are ready to go. Phil Davis has yet to really be tested. This was supposed to be a little test, but Andy wasn’t. Davis took him down early, and moved to side control quickly. Davis landed a couple of knees, and followed up with some big punches. Andy wasn’t dealing with them very well, and Davis simply overwhelmed him. Davis takes the fight in the first round. Fantastic fight.

The main event is next. Five rounds of Cage Warriors action in the middle weight division. The Champion, Jared Hess, (12-1-1, Wrestling) from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma defends his title against Fabio Silva (18-5, Muay Thai) from Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. If Hess gets out of the fist round it will be the first time in almost 18 months that Silva has been there. Hess’ conditioning was a real problem in his title fight, and his opponent was also tired. He shouldn’t plan on Silva tiring. This one had a little bit of everything. Hess survived the first round, and took it to the 4th. Hess was getting beaten in the stand up game, but scored 2 takedowns and dominated the ground game, except for that one moment when Silva had a triangle choke locked on and Hess broke it with a power bomb. Ohh that was good.. The conditioning of Hess was once again a problem. A tired Hess slowly came in looking for a takedown in round 4, and was greeted with a short right hook that knocked him out. Fabio Silva keeps his winning streak alive in great fashion with a 4th round KO. Great fight.

We had a crowd of 592 on hand in New Jersey. The show was rated as excellent.

Fight of the Night goes to Brian Cobb and Toby Imada
Knockout of the Night goes to Fabio Silva
Submission of the Night goes to Brian Cobb

Our show drew a record high 479k viewers across the three countries. That’s more than the other 3 current TV shows combined, 2 Strikeforce shows and one WVR show.

01-13-2010, 01:35 PM	#101
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	NOVEMBER 2010 Another month in the books, and another successful one at that. The company posted a loss of 42k last month, which is less than most of the past 6 months. Our gate revenues seem to be holding steady right now, while our merchandise sales are taking off. Revenue from merchandise very nearly tripled from last month. At the same time, our expenses have also been on the rise. Marketing costs have nearly quadrupled in the last month. The other expense that has seen a rise is our general admin and overhead. I have been on a bit of a hiring spree and handed our over 20k in bonuses last month. That is a high since we started last year. I just can’t pass up the chance to get some of these fighters signed. We have made great leaps over the past year, and have officially moved up and out of the regional standing. Our shows are gaining national attention, and our fighters are too. We are at 10% popularity now, and we have added some regional popularity now in Canada and Mexico. This jump has been the prime reason for us getting a new TV show and PPV deal. After WVR’s last show we have climbed to the #4 promotion jumping over WVR who had a weak show. I know that we have some weak shows coming up, and I also know, that we can expect to plateau for a little while. Strikeforce, WEC and UFC are the only promotions ahead of us in the World, and in the US. WVR is still the top promotion in Japan, with DREAM, and Shooto next. Reaching this pinnacle also allows me, according to my own stipulation, to start to sign guys to exclusive deals. That fact alone makes this series of latest signings very important. Last month we looked at the lightweights, and this month we look at the welterweights. Lyman Good won the title, and sits on top of the pile. Cage Warriors Welterweight Rankings 1. Lyman Good (13-0) Cage Warriors Champion, #3 in the World 2. Jesse Taylor (16-5) 3. Gary Wright (11-0) 4. Brock Larson (29-3) 5. Pat Miletich (32-7-2) The old man is back and fighting here now. 6. Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0) 7. Jason Norwood (9-2) Lost to Good in the first title fight. 8. Ryan Ford (12-3) Scheduled to get the next title fight against Good. 9. Jason High (12-2) 10. Yosmany Cabezas (10-3) This is a pretty stocked weight class and is getting stronger by the month. I can see almost all of those guys going around and around for some time. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-13-2010, 01:38 PM	#102
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Marius Zaromiskis (15-3) retained his DREAM welterweight title with a win over Ryo Chonan (18-12). Also on the DREAM card, Cage Warrior, Raphael Davis (10-1) handed Mario Miranda (13-1) his first career loss with a first round TKO. Sean Sherk (33-5-1) has officially retired. His last fight was a loss to Gray Maynard last year. UFC 108 ran a day before our next show. The main event saw Josh Koscheck (16-4) defeat Matt Serra (10-8). Martin Kampmann (16-3) picked up the win in the co-main against Karo Parisyan (18-6). Other winners on the night were Yushin Okami (25-5), Shane Carwin (12-1), and Kenny Florian (13-4). After the fight it is widely reported that Matt Serra will be leaving the UFC in the near future. Rumors are that the company is unhappy with his performance. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-13-2010, 01:44 PM	#103
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors 21: Herman v. Bush, and our first PPV show, airs live from New Jersey. Our show features two title fights. The first fight is set to begin. A pair of welterweights are first off tonight. Jesse Juarez (12-6, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Norman Paraisy (5-3, Boxing/Wrestling). Both fighters are coming off of losses. Paraisy used a good ground game to keep Juarez on the defensive. Paraisy worked to mount in the second round, and after taking a lot of damage, Paraisy grabbed an armbar and got the submission. Good fight. Two lightweights are next Koetsu Okazaki (7-1-1, Freestyle) makes his debut by taking on Scott McAfee (8-1, BJJ). Okazaki makes short work with a good takedown, and good grappling. McAfee gave up his back and Okazaki forced him to tap in the second round. He didn’t seemed fazed at all. Good fight. Christian Uflacker (3-1, BJJ) takes on Thomas Longacre (5-1, Kick Boxing/Muay Thai) in the lightweight division. Both fighters won their last fight. Uflacker made no bones about it, he meant to take this to the ground, and he did, scoring no less than 6 takedowns. The problem was, that Longacre was able to escape back to standing from almost every single one. Longacre almost knocked him out with a big kick, but couldn’t take advantage, and the last round was combo of good strikes and takedown escapes. Longacre pulled out the narrow decision. Decent fight. The next fight is between featherweights Bao Quach (16-10-1, BJJ) and Darren Uyenoyama (7-4, JJ/Wrestling). Both fighters have proved tough fighters but haven’t made themselves into contenders yet. An active and entertaining fight between them. Whether it was standing or grappling both men moved to try submissions and strikes, takedowns, and takedown defense. It was a close fight but Quach was the better man today. Decent fight. Our last prelim fight is in the middleweight division, between top contender Tom Watson (10-3, Boxing) and Fabio Nascimento (10-5, BJJ). Watson barely won in his debut, and Nascimento hasn’t been on the tear since his win in Brazil over Renzo Gracie. Watson shocked the world with a takedown attempt and almost lost it, when it was Fabio who was in control. Watson suffered in the first round, and in the second his strategy changed. Watson was sharp with his punches, landed a serious combo, and sent the Brazilian flying back. Watson wins with a TKO in the second round, Good fight. A pair of light heavyweights start off the main show. David Heath (12-5, Wrestling) takes on Ryan Jimmo (13-2, Karate). Heath makes his debut against the tough Jimmo. Just as predicted, Heath wanted to get this to the ground, but paid the price multiple times with good striking from Jimmo. In fact, Jimmo almost knocked Heath out twice, and defended well when he was on his back in the second round. Heath tired out, and Jimmo stayed safe with clean strikes and good defense. Jimmo spoils the debut of Heath. Decent fight. Featherweights, Jose Aldo (15-2, BJJ) is set to make his Cage Warriors debut against Joe Soto (10-1, Wrestling). Aldo is among the best in the world in his weight class, while Soto, is coming off of his title defeat. Heckofa fight! Aldo looked like he wanted nothing to do with Soto up close, and he used some great strikes to keep him off. He couldn’t keep it that way though, and Soto took him down quickly once he got a hold of him. Soto bullied Aldo early in the second, and got a takedown from the clinch. Soto moved quickly to an Americana and Aldo was powerless to stop it. Fantastic fight, as Joe Soto pulls off the huge upset. The first of the title fights is about to begin. Trevor Prangley (22-6, Wrestling) takes on Jared Hess (11-1-1, Freestyle) for the Cage Warriors middleweight title. What do you expect from a pair of grapplers. Both men expended a lot of energy early on, while neither did much damage. Hess’ age and skill was good early on, but as both men tired it looked like Prangley would steal it with his tactics. The last round was ugly, but Hess just managed to do enough to win 48-47 on all three cards. Jared Hess is the first Cage Warriors Middleweight Champion! Poor fight. The next fight is for the Cage Warriors Heavyweight Title! Justin Wren (10-1, Wrestling, 285) is set to take on Brandon Cash (7-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 265). This fight is all about striking. Cash looked good early on, and Wren didn’t seem to want to get close either. Towards the end of the first round, Cash knocked Wren down with a straight right, Cash wasted no time, and moved to unload more damage. Wren had no hope as Cash blasted him again, and the ref jumped in with one second before the end of the round. Brandon Cash is the first Cage Warriors Heavyweight Champion. Great fight. We finish with our main event between Dave Herman (18-3, Wrestling, 265) and George Bush (7-1, Wrestling, 255). How can we top the title fight? Herman is huge next to the older fighter. He has a full 4 inches and 6 inches of reach advantage. Bush went for an early takedown, but Herman pulled him into a close grapple. Herman picked up Bush and slammed him down. Bush defended well early on, but Herman was able to move to side control, and fired off more powerful shots. Finally, doing enough damage to force the stoppage. Great fight. We had 971 in attendance for our show and over 22,000 buys on our first PPV. Too bad the show was rated as being Awful. Fight of the Night goes to Bao Quach and Darren Uyenoyama Knockout of the Night goes to Brandon Cash Submission of the Night goes to Joe Soto Yeah, it wasn’t all that hot for our first PPV show, but that was to be expected. I know that Herman and Bush had no business being the main event. Jared Hess and Brandon Cash come away with titles, and neither was expected to win. The Soto/Aldo fight was huge, just huge, and vaults Joe Soto into a new level of fighter. Ryan Jimmo and Tom Watson both saw their stock rise, and a few for wins for Longacre and he could be back into the top contenders, but lightweight is very tight. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-15-2010, 06:51 AM	#104
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Our first episode of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV is now scheduled to air on The Fight Network the last week of December in New Jersey. I needed to announce the show this far out just to be able to secure the two fights that I really needed on that card. Suffice to say that Cage Warriors will finish the year with a title holder in every weight class. At a Shooto show in Japan, Dean Amasinger (6-2) made his debut in a title fight against A Sol Kwan (7-5), winning the welterweight title with a third round TKO. Cage Warrior, Issei Tamura (8-0) stayed undefeated with a win over unheralded Tenkei Oda (7-8-2). We are undergoing some huge roster shuffling. We have been adding some higher profile fighters the last few weeks, and they will be fighting early next year. Also we are going to start to see some of the fighters who just didn’t cut it leave. Our roster is starting to get a bit bloated, but we still need to rely on our huge roster to keep running quality shows, while we don’t have lots of guys under exclusive deals. The great(?) Fedor was on the card fighting in the main event for Strikeforce. But, he was beaten in three rounds in his rematch with Brett Rogers. Chase Beebe (15-6) won in the co-main. Also winning on the card was Robbie Lawler (19-5), Hatsu Hioki (25-4-2), Dan Cormier (3-1). Former CW fighters Terry Martin, and Shonie Carter fought in the prelims. Martin won, while Carter was beaten. UFC ran a card opposite Strikeforce. This card was better with GSP (22-2) defending his 170lb title against Mike Pierce (10-2) with a submission late in the 5th. In the co-main event Ed Herman (16-8) defeats Michael Bisping (17-4). Other winners Aleksander Emilianenko (17-3) beat Roy Nelson with a KO at :50, of round 1. Big Nog (34-6-1) beat Frank Mir (14-4), and Matt Hughes (43-8) won again. Maximum Fighting Championships Dean Lister (13-6) defended his Middleweight title against Jason Day (19-9). Other winners on the card were Jess Liaudin (15-11), Ryan Machan (10-4), Ariel Sexton (8-2) and Antonio Mendes (17-5). A couple of our fighters are leaving the us. First is Crafton Wallace. Wallace lost his debut fight and had his second fight scheduled for two weeks from now. Wallace was supposed to fight the second week of December, but with him leaving there is no reason for him to fight. So Kala Hose (7-4) will take his place fighting Reggie Orr (9-9-1). The second is Rudy Bears (10-5) who lost his two CW fights, but the first was a headlining show against undefeated Gary Wright, in a close split decision. Neither fighter will be missed all that much. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-15-2010, 07:07 AM	#105
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Ben Henderson and Donald Cerrone are on tap for Cage Warriors 22. Also tonight, I have added two low profile prelim fights to the card. I needed to get some of these other guys some fights to see if they can break apart from the pack. The first fight on the card in between two welterweights. Jesse Sanders (20-7, Boxing/Wrestling) and Scott Norton (6-3, Submission Wrestling). Both fighters are still looking for their first wins here in CW. Sanders dominated the fight with a quick takedown, work to mount and finish before the round ended. Great fight. Lightweights Carlos Quinton (6-2, Muay Thai) and Jose Morales (4-2, Wrestling) are up next in the bonus prelim. Quinlon was supposed to have the better stand up but Morales landed the better punches, while Quinlon controlled all the action on the ground. Quinlon finally breaks his losing streak, and Morales has now lost 3 in a row. Average fight. Jae Hee Chun (2-1, Muay Thai) and fellow featherweight Taiki Tsuchiya (5-2, Shooto) are set to go next. Taiki has a 7-inch reach advantage over the smaller Chun. Chun again struggled while Taiki scored a couple of takedowns and Chun showed that his ground game is weak. Taiki got his back and forced Chun to submit. Good fight. Middleweight Bryan Baker (11-3, Judo/Wrestling) and Jeremy Horn (82-20-5, Freestyle JJ) are hoping that they can get another win and start a long winning streak. Not an exciting fight. Lots of grappling and leaning up against the cage. Horn and Baker traded positions and Horn scored two takedowns to Baker’s one. But it was Baker that did the more effective work, and who pulled out the narrow victory. Average fight. Light Heavyweights Travis Wiuff (59-14, Wrestling) and James Lee (13-5, Wrestling) are the next pairing. Neither fighter has been good, both have been boring and believe it or not, Wiuff is only 32 with all those fights. Wiuff used solid striking to control round one, and in the second round, he took Lee down and pounded away, worked to mount, and finished it in fine fashion. Good fight. Alex Trevino (7-2, Boxing/Wrestling) and Andrew Buckland (10-7, Boxing/Wrestling) are set against one another at welterweight. A close fight between these evenly matched fighters. Buckland’s takedowns and strikes were good enough to overcome Trevino. Average fight. Hae Joon Yang (3-0, Wrestling, 285) takes on fellow heavyweight Mike Hayes (6-1, Freestyle, 255). Yang is so big, he scored one quick takedown, and Hayes couldn’t control the bigger man from underneath. Yang worked to mount and used his ground and pound to force the fight stoppage. Great fight. A featherweight fight is next between Buck Bisbey (10-1, Hybrid) who is making his debut in CW. He is taking on Hideo Tokoro (23-18-1, Boxing/Wrestling). Tokoro proved to be too much for the debuing Bisbey. He was really in no trouble, but still made a game fight of it. Decent fight. Two light heavyweight contenders are next on the show. Jake O’Brien (13-4, Wrestling) is going up against Victor Valimaki (18-6, Karate). An exhausting grappling fight in the first round. Both men pushed and reversed each other over and over. Valimaki looked tired at the end of the round. In round two he definitely was tired. O’Brien knocked him down, and despite some good ground work by Valimaki, O’Brien landed some heavy blows and eventually forced the stoppage. Good fight. Welterweights Drew Fickett (37-13, Wrestling) and Hiromitsu Miura (10-7, Judo) are next up. Miura was all over Fickett. He kept the fight standing, he landed clean punches. He knocked Fickett down with a brutal shot, but it was in the 3rd where Fickett finally got Miura down, worked to mount and secured an armbar as time ran down that settled the fight. Miura had the win, but it was Fickett that ultimately prevailed. Great fight. The co-main event is between Alberto Crane (15-3, BJJ) and Ran Weathers (15-5, Boxing/Wrestling). Both lightweights have been on a winning streak and both are just outside the top contenders. Crane wanted to get this fight to the mat, and he succeeded in the first round, but Weathers survived and in the second found his range. Weathers caught Crane following a jab when he was coming forward, and hammered him into the middle of next week. Great knockout. Good fight. The main event is our big one between Ben Henderson (11-2, Wrestling/Taekwondo) and Donald Cerrone (11-2, Wrestling/Kick Boxing). This is the second time these two have squared off, but the first for our company. Cerrone wanted to put his mark on this fight, and to make up for the first loss against Henderson. He did all that in the first, by having better strikes and doing more damage. Round two was the same and he built up a nice lead to cruise with, but that’s not exactly how it ended. Instead, a desperate Henderson clocked the Cowboy, and sent him to the mat. Henderson followed up quickly locking in an armbar and getting the rapid submission win in dramatic come from behind action. Good fight. We had a crowd of 718 on hand for the fight and it was rated as very poor. We did another 21.5k buys on PPV. Fight of the Night was Drew Fickett and Hiromitsu Miura Knockout of the Night was Ran Weathers Submission of the Night was Taiki Tsuchiya I have to say I am more than disappointed in the result of the show. I figured we would do better than that. However, our fighters continue to improve, and gain in popularity, and these shows are going to be part of our growing pains over the next year or longer. Ran Weathers win over Crane was a surprise and really moved him up the list. With as thick as the lightweight division is though, it will take a couple more wins to get to the top. Hideki Tokoro did great. A tough and entertaining fighter. Yang goes to 4-0, a big, young, green heavyweight that will take some more time to develop. James Lee is all but done in Cage Warriors. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-15-2010, 07:15 AM	#106
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Another letter from the athletic commission was on my desk this morning. This is the 3rd suspension that we have had this year. This time, it’s for Bryan Baker (12-3). Baker had pulled together a nice win streak of late and was working his way up the division. Not a contender at this point, he is only 25, and will have time to get his career back on the right path. He also works for Maximum Fighting Championships, who will also be missing his services. Cage Warriors 24 marks the end of the calender year. We will have run 24 shows, 2 per month, and have completed a full year fight schedule. Our last show is a good one, and features the most popular fighter in Cage Warriors taking on a new face to the company. Daniel Puder, who is just on the outside looking in a title shot will go in the cage with Assuerio Silva. Silva is a former PRIDE and UFC figher who had been fighting in Pancrase and held the Heavyweight King of Pancrase Title. Silva has abandon that title for his chance to return to the US, his first fight since 2007, when he lost to Cheick Kongo. The other big name debuting on the card is that of UFC legend Pat Miletich. Miletich had been retired but only recently got back into the cage for Shark Fights. He won 3 fights for them and is now here in Jersey, taking a step back toward his former glory. His opponent will be the toughest that he has faced since his return. Jason High has been on a tear, quickly moving up the welterweight ranks. His last win, a submission over seasoned vet Chris Wilson, moved him on to the contenders list, where he he is ultimately looking for a shot at Lyman Good. Here is a look at the full card. Code: Cage Warriors 24: Puder v. Silva Daneil Puder (9-0) v. Assuerio Silva (16-8) HW Pat Miletich (32-7-2) v. Jason High (12-2) WW Benji Radach (20-7) v. Chris Price (16-2) MW Kevin Casey (4-2) v. Andy Reese (9-4) HW Cole Province (8-1) v. Brandon Foxworth (17-6) FW ----Prelims---- David Baron (16-5) v. Kyle Bradley (13-7) LW Xavier Lucas (10-1-1) v. Bryan Travers (12-2) WW Rex Richards (7-3) v. Mark Burch (10-3) HW Rawdon Lee (2-1) v. Jeremy Williams (5-1-1) LHW Andy Kappas (3-2) v. Kim My (2-1) WW Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-3) v. Russ Miura (5-3) FW Ikuo Usuda (6-3) v. Sergio Gomez (8-4) LW Andy Reese, Xavier Lucas, and Rex Richards are all new to the Cage Warriors roster. Rawdon Lee was in the original LHW title tournament but an injury took him out. He is just now making his Cage Warriors debut. The Radach/Price fight should be very good, it will be a test of that gaudy record of Price’s. Radach is no pushover. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-20-2010, 07:48 PM	#107
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	The Cage Warriors Featherweight Champ was in action in Japan, fighting for tiny Cage Force. He won his fight via decision in a poor fight. Din Thomas pushes his record to 28-8. It’s too bad that he did that, we could have been looking at a fight with Cub Swanson on TV for the last week of the year if he wouldn’t have. Thomas isn’t likely to fight now until April. In other action in Japan, WVR ran a show with the main event between Jorge Santiago (23-9) and Joe Doerksen (43-15). Santiago won via first round submission. Lightweight Cage Warrior Kwang Hee Lee (8-3) was also on the card and picked up a win via 3rd round TKO. The Shark Fights featherweight title changed hands last night as Jason Georgiana (9-5) beat Joe Pearson (31-14-1) by first round submission to win the title. WEC announced a show where the headliner would be a battle between Cub Swanson and Jens Pulver. The next day they cancelled the show. UFC 115 was last night from Miami, Florida. The main event saw Rampage Jackson (32-8) knock out Tito Ortiz (16-7-1) early in the second round. The co-main saw Little Nog (17-4) grab a win over Matyushenko (23-6). Other winners on the card were Tyson Griffin (15-3), Marcus Davis (17-5), and George Sotiropoulos (11-2). WEC WrekCage was on last night, and the main event saw Wagnney Fabiano (15-3) knock out LC Davis (15-3), but it was a poor fight. Other winners on the card were Ed Radcliff (10-1), Fredson Paixao (11-4), and Ricardo Lamas (8-2). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-20-2010, 07:51 PM	#108
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV has it’s first episode on The Fight Network scheduled for the last Saturday of the year. Like I said earlier. We are going to finish the year with a title holder in each division. I finished the bookings for the show, it features 8 total fights, with two title fights. I have high hopes for our show, and hope that it’s a strong outlet for our talent, and give us a broader audience with which to reach. The main event will be for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight title, and is between Marcus Sursa and Jimi Manuwa. It’s fitting that Manuwa get to fight for the title since he was the first fighter that signed for Cage Warriors. The co-main is a battle for the lightweight title, and is between two very experienced, veteran fighters. Jeff Curran will take on Rich Clementi for that title. Raphael Davis will standby to face the winner of the light heavyweight title, and the lightweight challenger will be Karen Darabedyan. Here is the full card for our TV show. Code: Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV Marcus Sursa (8-4) v. Jimi Manuwa (6-0) for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight Title Jeff Curran (32-12-1) v. Rich Clementi (35-15-1) for the Cage Warriors Lightweight Title Christian M’Pumbu (14-2-1) v. Phil Davis (6-0) LHW Yves Edwards (37-16-1) v. Chris Wilson (15-8) WW ----Prelims---- Bobby Stack (8-2) v. Carlos Quinton (7-2) LW Dan Hornbuckle (21-3) v. JJ Ambrose (11-3) WW Dong Yi Yang (8-2) v. Josh Curran (3-2) HW Jason Black (23-6-1) v. Keita Nakamura (16-7-2) LW All American wrestler and rising MMA star Phil Davis takes on European fighter Christian M’Pumbu, who makes his US debut. Our show opener should be good between two established fighters in Yves Edwards and Chris Wilson. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-20-2010, 07:54 PM	#109
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	DECEMBER 2010 The end of 2010 finance meeting went well. It had to, our growth and expansion has been fantastic, and despite the fact that we lost money for most of the year, we turned a profit at the end of the year, mostly in part to the PPV deal that we signed with Shaw PPV. Our P&L looked good as we made a profit of 113k, that erases almost all of the losses of the last 3 months. We look forward to more good months ahead. Our PPV revenue was over 183k, and that alone was where our profit came from. Our ticket sales were actually down to the lowest levels in the last quarter. Sponsorship has increased while our merchandise sales are off slightly. Our fight prize money expense has risen again to an all time high of over 85k. We did run some longer cards, so it shouldn’t come as any surprise that it happened. Our production costs tripled this month, while marketing dropped with our drop in popularity. We handed our 25k in signing bonuses, a new high, but again, I think we brought in some high quality guys who are going to put butts in the seats, or good fighters who haven’t been given a shot to fight in the US. We finished last month having advanced to a national level of popularity, but two successive shows have put us back down to 81.3% in the US. I have a feeling that we are going to be teetering on this point for a while. We have 3 show to finish the year, I think they are good shows, and I am curious to see how our TV exposure affects our popularity. We are currently the #6 promotion in the world having fallen behind MFC and WVR. We are still #4 in the US. Last month we looked at welterweights, so this month we look at the middleweight division. Multiple new hirings have added fighters to this list that have yet to debut with CW. Cage Warrior Middleweight Rankings 1. Tom Watson (11-3) - UK based fighter still gaining pop in US. 2. Jared Hess (12-1-1) - Cage Warriors Middleweight Champion 3. Siyar Bahadurzada (19-4-1) - Based in Japan, Siyar comes to the US 4. Fabio Silva (17-5) - Likely to get first crack at Hess. 5. Joe Riggs (32-11) - Big name former UFC and Strikeforce fighter is new to CW 6. Trevor Prangley (22-7) - Lost to Hess in title fight. 7. Jacob O’Connell (6-0) - Green but rising 8. Benji Radach (20-7) - Won in his CW debut 9. Nate Moore (9-2) - Rising star 10. Gerald Harris (14-4) - Drops a long way after his loss to the departed Martin. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-24-2010, 07:47 PM	#110
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Bellator 21 was last night and the main event was a battle of light heavyweights. Poai Suganuma (12-3) beat Ian Freeman (19-10-1), and on the same card, Cage Warrior Eric Reynolds (15-5) was TKOed in the 2nd round by KJ Noons (10-3). Over in Poland, Ibragim Magomedov (24-6-1) retained his KSW Heavyweight title with a win over Tadas Rinkevicius (17-6). In Japan, Takyua Wada (20-8-10) retained his Welterweight King of Pancrase title with an unexciting win over Asaki Honda (5-4-1). The fight was buried on the card. At DREAM’s last card Riki Fukuda (18-5) won over Zelg Galesic (11-7) in the main event. On the same card, Ryan Ford (12-4) who is due for a title shot against Lyman Good was defeated Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6), when Hironaka submitted him in the first round. Incidentally, Hironaka has also recently signed with Cage Warriors and will join the organization when he leaves Japanese based Cage Force. Although this fight was at welterweight, Hironaka is the Cage Force Lightweight champion. And will be fighting at lightweight for Cage Warriors. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-24-2010, 07:55 PM	#111
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors 23 is the first show that we have run outside of New Jersey. This time, we take our show straight into the teeth of the lion with a show in Las Vegas, Nevada. Our main event tonight is between Brock Larson and Gary Wright. Both Larson and Wright are at the top of the welterweight division, and this battle should be epic. Larson has a big experience advantage, and both fighters have been on a winning streak. Also fighting is a solid matchup between Antonio McKee and Zac George. In total 12 fights on the card. Our opening fight of the night is a striker/grappler fight between Joe Heiland (6-2, Striker) and Kyle Pimentel (7-2, BJJ). These fighters are in the welterweight division. After some tentative striking, Pimental shot and got a takedown. Heiland was helpless as Pimental unleased a ground and pound that stopped the fight. Great fight. Next up is a pair of lightweights in Charles Diaz (4-1, JJ) and Matt Grice (10-3, Wrestling) are going to fight in the cage. Two grapplers choose to spend 15 minutes striking. Diaz was the only one who even shot, and he managed 2 takedowns, but both were at the end of the round and no damage was done. Diaz was rocked hard by Grice in the second round, but managed to survive the fight. In fact, he won a unanimous decision over the more experienced Grice. Decent fight. Welterweights Jean-Francois Bedard (1-2, Kick Boxing) and Jin-Kyu Lee (2-1, Striker) will battle it out next. Neither fighter has really started to establish himself here. Bedard started with a big kick, but walks right into a mean hook, knocking him completely out. Lee finishes it quickly. Great fight. Besiki Gereneva (6-1, Sambo) takes on Bobby Rehman (7-2, Muay Thai) in the light heavyweight division. Rehman scored some great punches early on stunning Genereva and a couple more knocked him down. He survived the ground and pound, but Rehman transitioned to an arm triangle and Genereva didn’t survive that. Great fight. Middleweights Kala Hose (7-4, Striker) looks for his first win against Reggie Orr (9-9-1, Boxing/Wrestling). Apparently Orr looked at some fight footage of Hose, and saw that he sucks on his back. Orr took him down, controlled him, pounded on him, and left him defenseless. The ref stopped the fight shortly thereafter. Great fight. A pair of big heavyweights get in the cage next. Rodrigo Munduruca (8-0, Muay Thai/BJJ, 285) will put his perfect record on the line against Neil Cooke (6-1, Boxing/Wrestling, 290). Big boys indeed. Cooke has 4 inches of height, but it is Munduruca who has the reach advantage. Cooke just plain destroyed Munduruca. He took him down, pounded the crap out of him, dropped some elbows, took his back, pounded on him again, and finished him with a rear naked choke. Good grief. Great fight. The last prelim fight is between debuting contender Renan Barao (20-1, BJJ) as he takes on tough customer Matt Fiordirosa (12-3, Wrestling). Firodirosa has a 5 inch reach advantage, and is a proven hard to beat fighter. This fight is in the featherweight division. Fiordirosa was stunned early as Barao took him down early on in the first and controlled him through the round. But the other rounds were weak as Fiordirosa could only manage to push Barao up against the cage and hold him there, without really doing anything else. I guess that wins fights, because it was enough. Barao suffers his second loss. Average fight. The main card starts with two lightweights. Ville Manninen (6-1, Grappler) will take on Joe Durate (6-2, Muay Thai). An exciting first round saw Duarte take Manninen down, then get caught in a triangle choke, pick up Manninen and slam him down hard, then pound the rest of the round. Manninen survived the round, and took the second with good work, but in the third it was Duarte that owned the fight. Taking down Manninen and controlling the round, but not really doing any damage. Duarte won the fight, it was decent. The next fight is between light heavyweights Jeremiah Billington (12-2, Wrestling) and Ralek Gracie (3-1, BJJ). Both Billington and and Gracie are looking to rebound from losses in their last fights. Gracie looks like a Gracie here. His ground game was strong, and even though he was pushed around in the second round, he made Billington pay for a mistake by getting a guillotine and locking it in and finishing it in the second round. Great fight. Lightweight Antonio McKee (23-4-2, Vale Tudo) makes his way to the cage. He will take on Zac George (19-3, Wrestling). George is 13 years younger than McKee and has a 4-inch reach advantage. Round one wasn’t all that, but George won it in boring fashion. George took McKee down fast, but McKee defended well. A scramble for position resulted in George getting an ankle lock on McKee, and sinking it in fast. McKee didn’t stand a chance. Good fight. Zac George on the rise with a good win over McKee. The middleweight division is the home for the co-main event. Jacob O’Connell (6-0, BJJ) will take on Nate Moore (9-2, Wrestling). Both men are working their way up the division, and looking good. Who will come out on top? The fight started off slow with both men grappling and doing nothing more. Moore does more in round two, and in round 3 hit’s a barrage of clean strikes that forces the ref to stop the fight. O’Connell, suffers the first loss of his career. Average fight. Our main event is next. Brock Larson (29-3, Submission Wrestling) looks to stop the winning streak of Gary Wright (11-0, Wrestling). Larson is slightly taller, and has a slight edge in reach. Both men are undefeated in Cage Warriors. Brock Larson didn’t waste any time in this fight. He was aggressive and took Wright down early on, and nearly finished the fight in round one, working to mount. Round two went pretty much the same. Larson took him down early. Wright didn’t know where he was coming from, and Larson locked an Americana on him and that was the end of the fight. Larson hasn’t even been tested here in Cage Warriors. Wright suffers his first loss of his career. Great fight. We had 928 fans on hand in Las Vegas, and an additional 29,298 buys on PPV. That’s a good viewership jump from two weeks ago. Our show received an excellent rating. Fight of the Night goes to Joe Duarte and Ville Manninen Knockout of the Night goes to Jin-Kyu Lee Submission of the Night goes to Zac George Brock Larson, Nate Moore, Zac George, Ralek Gracie, are all putting themselves into a position where they are a fight or two away from a title shot. Some of these guys probably should get one right away, but you know how these things go sometimes. On the flip side, Matt Grice and Jean Francois Bedard, have nothing to give our organization and their relationship with this company will need to be reassessed. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-24-2010, 07:57 PM	#112
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	On the same night as Cage Warriors 23, Purecombat also ran a show. Mostly fighters that wouldn’t stand a prayer on our roster. Brett Cooper (10-4), a former IFL and Affliction fighter retained his welterweight title with a win over Jason Pierce (10-2). Kings of the Cage also ran a show and the only thing worthwhile on their card was a fighter by the name of Alan Omer (16-2) who won his 3rd KOTC fight. Omer’s agent will be getting a call from us. He has potential at the early age of 22. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-27-2010, 09:51 PM	#113
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors will kick off the new year with Cage Warriors 25. The show will be at our home in New Jersey. The main event will again feature two new fighters to Cage Warriors, but not new to the world of MMA. Our exciting main event is between former WEC Bantamweight fighter Takeya Mizugaki, who is stepping up to lightweight, and former WEC lightweight contender James Krause. Krause will tower over Mizugaki by 5 inches. Mizugaki is also the Cage Force Bantamweight champion. A big step up in weight for Mizugaki, and a chance for Krause to prove himself in our tight lightweight division. The co-main is a welterweight battle between rising stars Magomed Shikshabekov and Rich Anderson. Here is the entire card rundown. Code: Takeya Mizugaki (13-5-2) v. James Krause (13-1) LW Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0) v. Rich Anderson (4-0) WW Jim Miller (17-2) v. Per Eklund (18-4-1) LW Brendan Schaub (6-1) v. Yoshiro Nakao (10-3) HW Isao Hirose (8-1) v. Yahir Reyes (16-7) FW ----Prelims---- Kirill Sidelnikov (6-3) v. Neil Joslin (6-0) HW Cristobal Verissimo (4-0) v. Dragan Tesanovic (6-1) MW Noah Thomas (14-7) v. Ryan Stonitsch (9-2) WW Jason Brilz (17-2-1) v. Seth Petruzelli (11-6) LHW Karn Grigoryan (6-1-1) v. Lolohea Mahe (5-3) LHW So on the main card, we also see the debut of European fighter Per Eklund. Eklund isn’t very well known here, but he brings a wealth of talent to CW. In the prelims we see another debut, this one by former UFC fighter Jason Brilz. He will have to make something of himself against Petruzelli. It shouldn’t be too hard, Petruzelli hasn’t done anything with his time here. We also get to see some of the younger talent like Verissimo, Joslin, and Sidelnikov. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-27-2010, 09:55 PM	#114
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	In Japan, John Alessio (28-14) defeated Yoon Young Kim (13-6) to win the WVR Welterweight Title. Lightweight fighter Eric Reynolds (15-5) will be leaving us. He has signed an exclusive deal with Bellator. Good luck to him. He was 1-1 with CW, and wasn’t in the picture to contend for a title any time soon. Especially given the recent signings that we have had. In Japan, Rambaa Somdet (8-3) successfully defended his flyweight title with a with a win over Homare Kuboyama (7-9-1). On the same card, Cage Warrior Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2) was defeated in the first round. Elsewhere in the US, Jefferson Silva (5-2) defeated Marcus Jones (5-3) to retain his X-1 Heavyweight title. DREAM have cancelled a TV show that was scheduled and the reason was a lack of available fighters. Their TV contract with Tokyo Broadcasting has been cancelled. Down under, CFC Middleweight Champ, Hector Lombard (24-2-1) made his 7th defense of his title with a win over Dylan Andrews (9-3). In Strikeforce, Jay Hieron (18-5) lost his welterweight title to Tyron Woodley (7-1) when he was TKOed in the first round. In co-headliner Jacare Souza (12-3) won easily over Scott Smith (14-7). Chris Cyborg (8-2) won her rematch with Gina Carrano (8-3) with a TKO in the 3rd. Also winning on the card was Fabricio Werdum (16-4-1), Sokoudjou (9-6). Cage Warrior Spencer Herns (3-1) won on the undercard. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-27-2010, 10:01 PM	#115
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Man, it has been an incredibly busy week. We have been in negotiations with multiple fighters, and have managed to sign most of them. Our roster is reaching the bloated point, but over the next year, some of those guys will start to be weeded out, as we decide who is the best to keep moving forward over the long run. It is fight night here in New Jersey, and we are not only going head to head against Maximum Fighting Championships in Canada, but also against the UFC, who is running a card on the same night. The UFC show is headlined with a fight between Wanderlei Silva and Vitor Belfort. Rashad Evans, Gray Maynard and Takanori Gomi are also on the card. Kimbo Slice is headlining the MFC card. Our card is highlighted by Daniel Puder, our super-popular heavyweight who will take on Assuerio Silva in his CW debut. Pat Miletich, Benji Radach, and Jason High are also on our card. We start off with a lightweight battle between Ikuo Usuda (6-3, Wrestling) and Sergio Gomez (8-4, Striker). Neither fighter has had a great year, a win to finish is what they are looking for. The first of the stand up v. ground fighter fights results in a win for the grappler. Usuda wasted no time in taking Gomez down, and used strikes from the ground. Gomez gave up his back, but it was the strikes of Usuda that finished the fight. Good fight. Featherweights Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-3, Kick Boxing) and Russ Miura (5-3, BJJ) are next in the grappler/striker wars. Hwang didn’t have anything to offer standing, and spent the first and second rounds defending from his back. Miura tried submission after submission but Hwang was up to the task. Eventually Miura, from the mount, secured an armbar that Hwang couldn’t defend. Good fight. Andy Kappas (3-2, Submission Fighting) will take on Kim My (2-1, Wrestling). These two welterweights figure to be spending some time locked up on the cage. Hopefully someone knows how to finish. But no, neither fighter knew how to finsh. Instead what we were treated to was a couple takedowns, and an exciting third round where reversals sub attempts, and escapes abounded. Kappas edged out a narrow victory. Great fight. Rawdon Lee (2-1, Boxing/Wrestling) makes his debut at 205 against Jeremy Williams (5-1-1, Boxing). Williams comes in a big underdog. Meh. A pretty boring fight to be honest. Lee showed good grappling skill, and took Williams down at will, but couldn’t’ do much beyond that. Lee ran out of gas, and Williams took the 3rd round, even though he spent most of it on his back. Lee gets the win. Average fight. Heavyweight Rex Richards (7-3, Wrestling, 290) makes his Cage Warriors debut against Mark Burch (10-3, Brawler, 285). Richard made short work of Burch, taking him down almost immediately and peppering him with some monstrous elbows until the fight was stopped. Good fight. A couple of welterweights are the next to enter the cage. Xavier Lucas (10-1-1, Boxing) makes his Cage Warriors debut taking on Bryan Travers (12-2, Wrestling. So far, grapplers have won all of the match-ups. Travers got Lucas to the mat in the first, but he was soundly beaten the rest of the fight. Lucas showed good strikes, and a reasonable defense on the ground. Lucas finished the fight in the 3rd with a brutal flurry, that put Travers out on his feet. Great fight. We finish the undercard in the lightweight division, with a battle between 37-year old David Baron (16-5, JJ) taking on 28-year old Kyle Bradley (13-7, Boxing). A back and forth battle that saw Baron lay on Bradley in the first round, Bradley knock the crap out of Baron, and Baron take it all in round two. Baron stay safe and get a late takedown to steal the round. Baron wins a very tight split decision. Decent fight. On to the main show. Cole Province (8-1, Wrestling) takes his All-American wrestling skills against submission artist Brandon Foxworth (17-6, Submission Fighting). In this fight, there was one fighter, and one punching bag. Province landed multiple huge punches in the first, and in the second, after a takedown, took Foxworth’s back, and easily pounded him out. Great fight. Kevin Casey (4-2, BJJ) takes on debuting Reese Andy (9-4, Wrestling) in the Light heavyweight division. What can I say here? Neither fighter looked like a superstar out there. Neither fighter was really hurt at all, and it was only the better takdown defense of Andy and his better ground game that won the fight. Average fight. In the middleweight division, Benji Radach (20-7, Facesmashing Fu) will take on Chris Price (16-2, Boxing/Wrestling). An entertaining fight between these two fighters. Radach dominated round one, with a good ground and pound. Price controlled round two, by getting Radach to the ground and controlling him, but not doing too much damage. Price won the fight in the third round, he took Radach down, but still didn’t do too much offensively. But it was enough. Decent fight. Big win for Price. 42-year old Pat Miletich (32-7-2, Freestyle JJ) maked his Cage Warriors debut against Jason High (12-2, Wrestling). This is a battle between highly ranked welterweights. Miletich looked good early on, being elusive, and working for a submission early on in round one. As the fight moved on though, conditioning looked to be a factor, and High slowly started to take over. Late in round 2, High caught Miletich with a strong punch knocking him down. With Miletich stunned, High chased him in and locked a kimura on him for the win. Good fight. Our final fight is in the heavyweight division, and is between Daniel Puder (9-0, Wrestling 255) and Assuerio Silva (16-8, Muay Thai/BJJ, 257). A striking battle in round one that spilled over into round two. Puder caught Silva with a vicious shot, and quickly followed up forcing the stoppage in round 2. Average fight. We had 976 for the show and 31k in PPV buys. The show was rated as being fantastc. Fight of the Night goes to Jason High and Pat Miletich Knockout of the Night goes to Daniel Puder Submission of the Night goes to Russ Miura Daniel Puder continues to decimate all-comers here. He will get a title shot, it’s only a matter of time. His popularity has gotten so high, that I am wondering how I am ever going to afford to keep him. Pat Miletich makes a good debut, but he isn’t fooling anyone. He is a long way away from contending for a title shot. Chris Price passed a tough test in Benji Radach. That was a good win for him. All of our debuting fighters looked good out there. Timing is just the most important thing. We did record numbers considering that we were going against the UFC and MFC. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-31-2010, 12:04 PM	#116
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	At UFC 116, Wanderlei (34-11-1) scored a 26 second TKO of Vitor (20-10) in the main event. For some reason the UFC heavyweight title was between Todd Duffee (8-0) and Gabe Gonzaga (13-5). It was Duffee that won the fight to win his first title. Other winners on the card were Rashad Evans (15-1-1), Gray Maynard (11-0), and Nate Marquard (30-10-2). ON the MFC card, Kimbo Slice (5-3) lost to Antoine Hayes (8-6). Other winners were Soa Palelei (11-3), Travis Galbraith (19-7), Ryan Heck (9-2), and Jon Madsen (6-0). Tough week, but three of our fighters are getting pink slips this week. The first is Brandon Foxworth (17-7). Foxworth went 1-3 in Cage Warriors and his only win was a submission that came out of nowhere in a fight that he was losing. His good record was all for show apparently. Hopefully he gets some work with one of the lower promotions and does well. The second fighter to be released is Jean Francois Bedard (1-3). Bedard went 0-3 in his fights with us, and although his fights were entertaining, he isn’t going anywhere, and won’t draw anyone to us…ever. The last fighter is Jeong Hyeon Hwang (2-4), the kick boxer from South Korea, went 0-3 in CW. He was submitted in 2 of his 3 losses. Like Bedard, he isn’t going anywhere for us. In Texas, Emyr Bussade (13-5) won the Shark Fights weltweweight title with a win over Anthony Waldburger (13-6). Over in the UK, Robbie Oliver (18-8-1) retained his UC UK featherweight title with a 5-round decision over Michal Hamrsmid (15-9). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-31-2010, 12:10 PM	#117
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	We bring you to the first Cage Warriors TV special, Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV! This is the first TV special, and we have some really killer fights in store. Our two remaining vacant titles are on the line tonight, as well as the debut of European light heavyweight Christian M’Pumbu, as he takes on 4-time All-American Wrestler Phil Davis. Rounding out our televised portion of the card are MMA vets, Yves Edwards and Chris Wilson in a striker/grappler showdown. Let’s get right to the undercard. The first fight of the night is in the lightweight division, between two fighters who are trying to gain some momentum. Jason Black (23-6-1, Wrestling) will take on Keita Nakamura (16-7-2, Wrestling). Both men wanted it to the ground so that is where it ended up going. Black took Nakamura down in round one, and spent it defending against sub attempts, and couldn’t improve his position. Nakamura got the takedown in round two, and he managed to get to full mount, where he was able to finish the fight with strikes. Good fight. The next prelim fight is at heavyweight between Dong Yi Yang (8-2, Wrestling, 240) and Josh Curran (3-2, Brawler, 285). Yang gives up 45 pounds but he has a 4-inch reach advantage. After a couple of circles, Curran comes in and misses with a punch, and Yang catches him with a nasty hook that sent Curran down and out in quick fashion. Great fight. Welterweights Dan Hornbuckle (21-3, Muay Thai/BJJ) and JJ Ambrose (11-3, BJJ) are the next fighters to enter the cage. Hornbuckle is coming off of his loss to Brock Larson. Ambrose dictated the flow of the fight and took Hornbuckle down in round one, but neither could mount any offense. A lot of missed knockout punches, but no damage done. In a surprise Ambrose steals the fight from the favorite Hornbuckle. Poor fight. The last prelim before the main show stars is at lightweight. Bobby Stack (8-2, Wrestling/Muay Thai) takes on Carlos Quinlon (7-2, Muay Thai). For 12 minutes Quinlon dominated Stack with better technical punches, better defense and good cage control. Then Stack got a takedown. He quickly passed to side and full mount. Quinlon was helpless on his back, and Stack did enough damage to force the stoppage with only 13 second remaining in the fight. Fantastic fight. The main show begins with Bas Rutten and Bill Goldberg cage side for out broadcast. Yves Edwards (37-16-1, Thugjitsu) comes out for his fight with Chris Wilson (15-8, Kick Boxing) in the welterweight division. Chris Wilson quickly closed the distance, and took the grappler down. Pressed against the cage Edwards was helpless as Wilson transitioned from side control and took Edwards’ back. Wilson went for an armbar but Edwards fought it off, then Wilson just started throwing bombs and elbows. The ref had to jump in with just 2 second remaining in round 1. Good fight. All the way from Paris, France, Christian M’Pumbu (14-2-1, Muay Thai/BJJ) makes his Cage Warriors debut against All-American wrestler Phil Davis (6-0, Wrestling) in the light heavyweight division. Davis worked quickly taking down the JJ fighter, and smoothly overpowering him on the ground. By the 2:30 mark of round 1, Davis had mounted the Frenchman, and landed punch after punch forcing the stoppage of the fight. Fantastic fight. The first of our title fight is next. Jeff Curran (32-12-1, BJJ) steps into the cage to take on Rich Clementi (35-15-1, Boxing/Wrestling) for the Cage Warriors Lightweight title. Whoever wins this fight, will need to defend against Karen Darabedyan, and a host of fantastic lightweight fighters. Well it wasn’t Rocky that’s for sure. Some pretty good action early on, but both fighters tired by round 3. Curran scored multiple takedowns, but Clementi was able to escape or reverse most of them. The ref had to break them up a couple of times for inaction. Curran was the aggressor for most of it, and his grappling skills against the cage were good despite being the smaller man. In the end, Jeff Curran came away with a unanimous decision and becomes the first Cage Warriors lightweight champion! Decent fight. The last fight of the night is for the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight title. Marcus Sursa (8-4, Wrestling) takes on Jimi Manuwa (6-0, BJJ) with the victor having to defend against Raphael Davis. Sursa upset Ralek Gracie to get to this point. This fight was a little better than the previous one. Both fighters went back and forth each taking turns with the advantage, and each time Jimi Manuwa came out just a bit better. The first three rounds came and went with Manuwa edging out each round. Both fighters looked good at the start of round 4, in between rounds you could hear Sursa’s corner tell him to get it to the mat. Sursa listened and shot in for the takedown, but Manuwa nailed him with a straight right that put Sursa out. Jimi Manuwa becomes the first Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight champion. Good fight. We had a gate of 551 for the show in New Jersey and the show was rated as being excellent. Fight of the Night belongs to Bobby Stack and Carlos Quinlon Knockout of the Night belongs to Jimi Manuwa Submission of the Night belongs to nobody, we didn’t have one. A great show and a great start to our MMA run on TV. Curran was the underdog in his fight with Clementi. Phil Davis is a monster in training, and Yves Edwards may be on the precipice of taking the big slide down. That was a pretty rough fight against Wilson. Jason Black is about done except for our contractual obligations. We had 439,000 viewers across the three countries for our show. The big man will be happy with those numbers. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

01-31-2010, 12:14 PM	#118
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	JANUARY 2011 Our first full year of cards, and boy, what a year it was. We started and finished (sort of) tournaments in each weight class, and crowned champions in each. We started the year as a total unknown and finished it as a major MMA organization, and one of the few with a TV and PPV contract. We now look to this year. December was the most expensive and most profitable month on record. Cage Warriors posted a profit of over 150k for the month alone. Our biggest revenue increases were at the PPV level where additional buys brought additional moneys. Ticket sales were up slightly, and we did receive some money for the TV broadcast on The Fight Network, but those gains were offset by higher production, a drastic increase in marketing costs, admin overhead, and of course fighter prize money. All of that is to be expected with our corporate growth. After the great last two months that we had, another couple of months at this level, and we will be back to our starting point of 5 mil in cash. Our roster is up to 230 fighters now. That breaks down to an average of just under 40 per weight class. I thought that we would be able to go higher, but what we are going to see this year is an under-utilization of fighters and contracts begin to expire. That or we look to acquire another promotion that we can send some of our younger guys to. We have more than enough fighters to continue the scheduling pace that I have set. And the fight matchups are innumerable. That kind of flexibility will only serve us in the future. With the wild success of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV we finished the year as the #3 promotion worldwide, and the #1 promotion other than a Zuffa owned company. That is bound to drop though, we only have one fighter who can carry the company at that level. We are rated 24.7%, which is a low level national popularity. We also are rated as a mid-level regional in Canada, and have minor popularity in Mexico and the UK. The UFC is still the world’s MMA leader, with the WEC a distant second. Cage Warriors is 3rd, and Strikeforce is #4. Five is Maximum Fighting followed by the two Japanese promotions, WVR and DREAM. Bellator has rebounded to #8, UC UK is #9 and Shooto has climbed to #10. This month we take a look at the Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight division. Here are the top 10. 1. Jimi Manuwa (7-0) - Cage Warriors Light Heavyweight Champion 2. Raphael Davis (10-1) - First in line for the title shot 3. Ralek Gracie (4-1) - Still green, but in the title hunt 4. Marcus Sursa (8-5) - Lost in the title final 5. Shane Primm (7-1) - Former Bellator fighter makes his debut this month 6. Jake O’Brien (14-4) 7. Phil Davis (7-0) - Stud in the making 8. Stipe Bekavac (15-3) - Croat fighter will make his US debut soon. 9. Ryan Jimmo (14-2) 10. Reese Andy (10-4) Light Heavyweight certainly isn’t as packed as some of our other weight classes. Jimi Manuwa and Phil Davis are our most popular fighters but that can be attributed to their TV debut’s last month. I just don’t see too many fighters in this division who are capable of slowing Davis down in the future. Still, a lot of the guys here are young and developing, and Manuwa will have his hands full with another Davis, hopefully this year sometime. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam Last edited by PilotMan : 01-31-2010 at 12:14 PM.

02-05-2010, 02:12 PM	#119
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	YEARLY AWARD RUNDOWN The fighter of the year was Masakazu Imanari (20-6-1). Imanari is currently the DEEP Bantamweight champ, but all of his fights over the last year were fighting for WVR. He went 4-0, and is currently the #1 ranked bantamweight in the world. Personally, I felt that Fabio Silva had a better year. Cage Warriors had two fighters win awards. The first was rookie of the year. That was won by Hae Joon Yang. Yang is only 4-0, but won 3 decisive fights to put himself on the path to stardom. The next winner was Rise of the Year. That was Issei Tamura (8-0). The featherweight won 4 fights this year. Three of them were in Cage Warriors and the last was in Japan for Shooto. Tamura is currently ranked #3 in CW, and #4 in Shooto. The show of the year was UFC 105. Rampage was awarded the knockout of the year for his win over Tito. Ryan Bader’s submission win over Lyoto Machida was the submission of the year. And main event of the year was Brock Lesnar v. Shane Carwin. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-05-2010, 02:13 PM	#120
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Strikeforce on CBS was on last night. I watched. Being in the business you have to. Great main event. Josh Thompson (19-2) retained his lightweight title with a second round KO over Victor Ribero (21-5). With that win Thompson defended his title for the 3rd time. Other winners on the card were Frank Shamrock (24-11-2), Cole Escovedo (16-5), and Zoila Frausto (6-0) who retained her women’s title with a win. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-05-2010, 02:20 PM	#121
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors 25 is going head to head against Kings of the Cage tonight. I know that our show is better, but I also know that our show won’t live up to expectation either. I am just hoping for the best out of this show. Our main event between Mizugaki and Krause will hopefully live up to it’s billing, while the co-main between rising stars Shikshabekov and Anderson will be good too. Actually, we have some great fights from the undercard on up to the main show. Brenden Schaub, Jim Miller taking on a debuting Per Eklund too. Let’s get right to the action. We start off with action from the light heavyweight division. Karn Grigoryan (6-1-1, Freestyle) takes on Lolohea Mahe (5-3, Brawler). Both men have been on the losing side recently. Mahe is useless. Even in a striking battle he sucks. He wound up on his back here, and Grigoryan dismantled him with strikes until the fight was stopped at the end of the second. Decent fight. Next into the cage is the CW debut of former UFC fighter Jason Brilz (17-2-1, Wrestling). His opponent for this light heavyweight battle is Seth Petruzelli (11-6, Brawler). Brilz should be able to win this one easily. And he does, Brilz quickly closed the distance and knocked Petruzelli down with a hard uppercut. Brilz quickly dove in and landed some bombs, knocking Petruzelli completely out. Great fight, good debut for Brilz. Welterweights are next into the cage. Noah Thomas (14-7, Wrestling) takes on Ryan Stonitsch (9-2, Muay Thai). Stonitsch used pinpoint strikes to both do damage and keep Thomas from taking him down. Thomas’ only answer was to keep trying for that takedown. Stonitsch caught him with a big head kick while he was coming in, and Thomas went down hard. Stonitsch didn’t even bother to follow up. Great fight. Cristobal Verissimo (4-0, Kick Boxing) is the first to enter the cage. His opponent will be Dragan Tesanovic (6-1, Submission Wrestling). Tesanovic has the better resume, Verissimo is only 19. A very entertaining first round gave way to a terribly boring fight. A lot of grappling seemed to play right into Tesanovic’s strategy, as he controlled a lot of the action against the cage. Verissimo really had no way to overcome Tesanovic, who won via decision. Poor fight. Our last prelim fight is a battle of young heavyweights. Kirill Sidelnikov (6-3, Sambo, 242) takes on Neil Joslin (6-0, Freestyle Wrestling, 273). A lot of action considering both are big men. Joslin took the last 2 rounds behind some good grappling, and good cage control. Sidelnkov was in big trouble in the second, but he survived to see the third, but was out of gas. Decent fight. The main show starts off with a battle of featherweight fighters. Isao Hirose (8-1, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Yahir Reyes (16-7, Boxing/Wrestling). Reyes is 7 inches taller and has a 7-inch reach advantage going in. Reyes’ size certainly played to his advantage here. Most of the fight was fought on the ground with Hirose spending quite a bit of it on his back. Reyes at one point was caught in a triangle but picked up Hirose and slammed him down to regain contol. That was the story of the fight. Reyes won a close decision. Average fight. Heavyweight fighters Brenden Schaub (6-1, Boxing/BJJ, 260) and Yoshihiro Nakao (10-3, Wrestling, 240) are set to tangle. Schaub took Nakao down right away at the start of the fight. Nakao took a big shot, and Schaub transitioned to mount fast. A few more punches and it was all over. Nakao didn’t stand a chance. Fantastic fight. A battle in the lightweight division next. Jim Miller (17-2, Wrestling) is giving away 4 inches as he takes on Sweedish fighter Per Eklund (18-4-1, Freestyle) in his Cage Warriors debut. Miller took this fight to the ground right away. Like the previous fight this one looked like it was going to be over quickly, and it was. Eklund hooked a guillotine on Miller after he made a mistake and choked him out. That fast. Fanstastic fight. The co-main is next. Magomed Shikshabekov (7-0, Sambo) takes on Rich Anderson (4-0, Submission Wrestling). One fighter will suffer his first loss of his career. There was some discussion earlier that Anderson didn’t have a good camp. That he was sidelined by illness. Shikshabekov got a takedown, and passed to side control where he worked an Americana armlock to secure the win in just over 2 minutes. Fantastic fight. Our main event between Takeya Mizugaki (13-5-2, Muay Thai/Shooto) and Jerry Krause (13-1, Wrestling) is next. Both fighters are getting their first taste of the main event at Cage Warriors. Krause towers 5-inches over Mizugaki. Krause went for the takedown, but found himself on the mat having given up side control. Mizugaki used his knees and elbows on the mat to soften Krause up, before finishing the fight with more elbows and some hard strikes. The ref didn’t waste any time in stopping it. Great fight. We had a crowd of 1,142 on hand and had a PPV buyrate of just over 28k. The show was rated as being poor. Fight of the Night goes to Yahir Reyes and Isao Hirose Knockout of the Night goes to Ryan Stonistch Submission of the Night goes to Per Eklund The fights went pretty much as expected. Eklund’s win over Miller was unexpected. I was surprised by the number of early finishes that we had, some good KO’s and generally good fights. Jason Brilz makes a good debut, while Petruzelli, Thomas, and Mahe look like they are about done. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-08-2010, 11:47 PM	#122
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Kings of the Cage ran their show against ours. Their Main Event saw Manny Rodriguez (4-1) win the KOTC Heavyweight title for the second time in his career. He beat Gan McGee (14-5). The lightweight title was also on the line. Rafael Dos Anjos (13-4) beat Poppies Martinez (17-6) to win the title. Cage Warriors 27 has been booked. Again considering our popularity, the show won’t help us out that much. But it is still an exciting card. Lyman Good (13-0) will defend his Cage Warriors Welterweight title in the main event against mandatory challenger Ryan Ford (12-4). Ford hasn’t fought for us in over a year, having spent all of last year in Japan. He was 1-2 while he was there. Not exactly good lead in for our fight. But, he gets the first shot anyway. The co-main is a heavyweight battle that pits two potential contenders. Blagoi Ivanov (4-1) takes on Rex Richards (8-3). Richards is going to come into the fight with at least 25 pounds on Ivanov. Our card also has the debut of Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1) a jiu-jitsu fighter who previously held the KOTC featherweight title. His opponent will be Henrique Bilcalho (12-3). Bilcalho’s a tough fighter who will certainly test the meddle of the former champ. Here is the rest of the card Cage Warriors 27: Good v. Ford Code: Lyman Good (13-0) v. Ryan Ford (12-4) CW Welterweight Title Fight Blagoi Ivanov (4-1) v. Rex Richards (8-3) HW Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1) v. Henrique Bilcalho (12-3) FW Andre Gusmao (8-1) v. Danny Valimaki (5-1) LHW Gerald Harris (14-4) v. David Loiseau (18-12) MW ----Prelims--- Jason Norwood (9-2) v. Sidney Silva (9-3) WW Marcin Held (6-1) v. Ricardo Tirlone (9-3) LW Bill Boland (6-1) v. Kwang Hee Lee (8-3) LW Bryan Humes (6-3) v. Don Frye (20-12-1) HW Frye’s retirement fight Jeremy Williams (5-2-1) v. Mark Lajhner (6-1) LHW Peter Dominguez (1-3) v. Sadhu Bott (4-1) FW Dan Cramer (3-2) v. Nick Klein (3-2) MW This card also has the return fights for Marcin Held and Jason Norwood, after their last losses. Don Frye retires after he gets killed by Bryan Humes. Humes needs an easy fight to get back to his winning ways. David Loiseau makes his debut. He hasn’t had a very good run of late. The former UFC, MFC and EliteXC fighter hasn’t won in over 5 years. I don’t expect him to win here either, but at least we can take advantage of his popularity for the next three fights or so. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-08-2010, 11:50 PM	#123
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Over in Japan Andrews Nakahara (6-2) won the DREAM middleweight title with a 3rd round TKO over Kazushi Sakubura (28-13-1). At the same show, Cage Warrior, Darren Uyenoyama (8-5) won a fight to break his losing streak. WEC 54 featured Mike Brown (24-4) defending his WEC featherweight title by handing the a loss to Mackens Semerzeier (8-1). In the co-main, Cage Warrior, Cub Swanson (17-2) won over Chad Mendes (4-2). Other winners included Yves Jabouin (16-6) who beat Jens Pulver (22-16-1). Pulver has lost 8 in a row and 10 of his last 11. His last win was over 2.5 years ago, over Cub Swanson. Shane Roller (8-3) and Dominck Cruz (17-2) were also winners. At an X-1 show in California, Darrill Schoonover (13-0) remained undefeated with a win over Analu Brash (2-3). Kaz Fujita (15-10) has retired from the world of MMA. Fujita finished his storied career working for WVR, and losing his last four fights. In the Great White North, MFC heavyweight champion Steve Bosse (9-1) defended his title against Ralph Kelly (6-10). Other winners on the card were Bobby Lashley (6-1), and Thales Leites (17-3). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-08-2010, 11:56 PM	#124
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Ten fights on the Card for Cage Warriors 26, and our first show in California. The main event of the night will be between Dave Herman and Eddie Sanchez. A classic striker/grappler battle. Our show also features the debut of former UFC fighter Tamden McCrory. Three former Bellator fighters also debut on the card. They are Ross Pearson, Toby Imada, and Shane Primm. The fighters for the first fight are getting ready to enter the cage. From the featherweight division, Roberto Vargas (8-3, BJJ) will have his hands full as he takes on Taiki Tsuchiya (6-2, Shooto). Vargas has been favored in early discussions. A solid, entertaining fight. Tsuchiya did not allow himself to be takendown, and looked to be in better condition than Vargas. Taiki shocked Vargas by taking him down in the third, then moving into position and took Vargas’ back where he locked in a rear naked choke, for the win. Good fight. Next up, lightweights. Anthony Njokuani (11-4, Muay Thai) takes on the much smaller Mark Oshiro (11-4, Freestyle). Njokuani towers above Oshiro as he stands at six feet, and he has a nine inch reach advantage. This fight was all standup, and you would have thought that would have benefited Nkokuani, but it was the Oshiro who won the fight with clean boxing, and better defense. A disappointing outcome for the heavily favored Njokuani. Average fight. Big Brad Imes (14-7, Wrestling, 285) enters the cage. He takes on George Bush (7-2, Wrestling, 255). Both fighters have are coming off of losses. Imes stands 6 inches taller than Bush, and has 30 pounds on him. Bush rocked Imes with some big shots in round one, knocking him down once, and staggering him, but he couldn’t finish him. Imes kept trying to take the fight to the ground and succeeded in the second. Bush was out of his element there, and Imes managed to pound out the victory. Fantastic fight. Two more lightweights are next to enter. Our debut of Shannon Gugerty (12-3, BJJ/Muay Thai) as he takes on Japanese fighter Katsunori Kikuno (14-3-2, Judo/Karate). Gurgerty gutted this one out. He scored 5 takedowns, and maintained the dominant position for most of the fight, but Kikuno was slippery enough to stay away, and avoid taking damage. Kikuno did little to get the win. Decent fight. The last prelim fight is in the middleweight division. Six foot, six inch Kendall Grove (11-7, Muay Thai/BJJ) makes his Cage Warriors debut against Louis Taylor (5-2, Striker). Grove was the favored fighter coming in. It was thought that he was to big and too skilled. Well, we found out that Taylor has a pretty good takedown defense, and his strikes were clean and accurate. Grove jumped guard in the third round, and Taylor was good enough to keep control then, and move to side control to do some damage. Taylor sneaks out the good win in a good fight. The main show begins with young welterweights. Ben Holscher (7-1, Wrestling) enters to take on Joe Scarola (5-1-1, BJJ). Holscher was thought to be the better all around fighter in this fight, but that’s not what I saw in the cage. Scarola landed better punches, got better takedowns, and had more sub attempts. Average fight. Light Heavyweights Shane Primm (7-1, Boxing/BJJ) and Valentino Petrescu (8-1, Vale Tudo) are next on the main show. Primm comes in with the much bigger reputation. A pretty sad fight. Primm won rounds one and two, and then cruised. Neither fighter was close to finishing the fight, and Primm won a close decision. Poor fight. Lightweight journeyman Toby Imada (24-14, Judo) is set to take on Ross Pearson (12-3, Boxing/Wrestling) in the debut for both fighters. Toby Imada handily won rounds one and two with a judo toss, and better striking. Pearson came roaring back in round 3, knocking Imada down with a big punch. Imada hung in there and made it to the end of the round, where he won the unanimous decision. Decent fight. Welterweights Tamdan McCrory (14-3, Wrestling/Muay Thai) and Yosmanny Cabezas (10-3, Judo) are making their debut’s here in Cage Warriors. McCrory is a heavy favorite. McCrory took Cabezas down right away, and moved to side control quickly. Some big punches forced the stoppage. Fantastic fight. The main event is next. From the heavyweight division, Dave Herman (19-3, Wrestling) takes on Eddie Sanchez (10-4, Striker). Herman landed a couple of sharp punches, and then pulled Sanchez close. He locked on a Muay Thai clinch and drove a knee into the forehead of Sanchez and knocked him completely out. Fantastic fight. We had a gate of 1,021 for our show and a total of 26k PPV buys. Our show was rated as Poor. Fight of the Night was Brad Imes and George Bush Knockout of the Night goes to Dave Herman Submission of the Night goes to Taiki Tsuchiya Alright, so it was a crummy show, but honestly, at least it had some good fights. Dave Herman wins another main event. Brad Imes continues his win then lose, then win streak. Anthony Njokuani has been a disappointment so far. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-13-2010, 08:45 PM	#125
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Pancrase has signed KSW Heavyweight champion Ibragim Magomedov (24-6) to a contract. This will be Magomedov’s first return to Japan since his loss to Cro-Cop in 2005. Magomedov is clearly the cream of the crop in Pancrase’s heavyweight division. Elsewhere in Japan, at a WVR show, Satoshi Ishii (4-2) beat Mu Bae Choi (10-5) to win the WVR Heavyweight title. Also on the card, Fabio Silva (18-5) win again Moise Rimbon (15-11-3) with a first round submission. Silva hasn’t lost or been out of the first round in 17 months. That’s 7 wins in a row. Title shot? In Texas, Shark Fights 20 went off without a hitch. Vinicius Magalhaes (7-4) defended his SF Light Heavyweight title with a win over Kyle Bracey (5-2). Over in England, Roman Shipp (3-2), who came to Cage Warriors undefeated, but hasn’t fared so well, got back to his winning ways with a 2nd round TKO. Back in Japan at Pancrase’s latest show, MMA stalwart Yuki Kondo (52-24-6) retained his middleweight title with a win over Rikuhei Fiji (8-4). UFC 118: Penn v. Sanchez ran yesterday. This was the first time that these two have squared off, and it was Sanchez (25-2) pulling off a 4th round submission over Penn, to win the UFC Lightweight title. BJ Penn (16-6-1) after holding the lightweight title for 3 years and defending it 4 times. Anderson Silva (26-5) won in his return to the cage after losing his title to Denis Kang. Other winners on the card were Mark Bocek (7-2), Alexandre Ribero (5-0), and Sergei Kharitonov (18-4). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-13-2010, 08:49 PM	#126
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	FEBRUARY 2011 As I head downtown to the monthly leadership meeting, I can’t help but think that things are finally heading in the right direction, and that we are doing the right things to position our company where it needs to be to be the best MMA organization around. Our accountants start the meeting and are pleased to announce the best fiscal month in company history. Last month CW Inc. posted a profit of 166k, almost a 10% bump from last month. PPV revenue declined slightly, but gate totals and an increase in sponsorship money helped. Since we didn’t run a TV show, our expenses were also much less. We have continued to sign new fighters and I had to spend some time explaining why. First off, a lot of the guys that we have under contract were signed to long term deals, and we have an obligation to them, regardless of how they perform, at least until their guaranteed number of fights is up. Obviously, as contracts start to come due, the middle of this year, we will see fighters start to leave the company. As we have expanded so rapidly, and out popularity has grown so much, we need to continue to bring in better fighters to keep being able to put on quality shows. We are only down 167k from the original 5 million dollar investment. Once we are profitable and above that mark, expect the pocketbooks to open up a little more so that we are able to sign some even bigger names, as well as retain the ones that we have made bigger. Speaking of popularity, Cage Warriors currently stands as the #5 promotion in the world. We are just behind Maximum, and Stikeforce, and of course the UFC, and WEC. The top promotion in Japan is World Victory Road, with DREAM and Shooto next. Bellator and UC UK round out the top 10. We are currently the #4 promotion in the US, #5 in Canada, #7 in Mexico, and #7 in the UK. We are growing, and our TV exposure overseas will serve us well in the future. This month we are taking a look at the top fighters in the heavyweight division. Remember our heavyweight division goes all the way up to 290lbs. Code: 1. John Madsen (6-0) Yet to debut, he has been fighting in Canada. 2. Daniel Puder (10-0) The most popular fighter in CW, #8 HW in World 3. Brandon Cash (8-1) Cage Warriors Heavyweight Champion 4. Darrill Schoonover (13-0) Has a guaranteed title shot. 5. Brenden Schaub (7-1) 6. Blagoi Ivanov (4-1) 7. Justin Wren (10-2) 8. Hae Joon Yang (4-0) 2010 MMA Rookie of the Year 9. Neil Cooke (7-1) 10. Dave Herman (20-3) Slowly making his way to the top. Our heavyweight division has a lot of very young fighters. I expect great things from them down the road, but the big names just are not here. There is a strong chance that Puder will have one more fight, possibly with Madsen or Herman with the winner getting a title shot after Schoonover and Cash go at it a few months down the road. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-13-2010, 08:51 PM	#127
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	February is going to be a busy month, with 2 PPV’s and a TV show airing there will be plenty of Cage Warriors action to be had. The first fight will be Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV from New Jersey. The main event will be two featherweight contenders, Abel Cullum and Issei Tamura. Clearly Cullum is the more experienced, and has been on the big stage longer, but Tamura is the rising star, and was the 2010 MMA Rise of the Year winner. This will be his biggest test. The co-feature will be between Light Heavyweights Jake O’Brien and Travis Wiuff. Also fighting will be former Kings of the Cage Lightweight champion Cameron Dollar as he makes his CW debut. Here is the entire television card. Code: Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV Abel Cullum (19-2) v. Issei Tamura (8-0) FW Jake O’Brien (14-4) v. Travis Wiuff (60-14) LHW Alberto Crane (15-4) v. Donald Cerrone (11-3) LW Cameron Dollar (5-2) v. Zach Micklewright (8-1) LW ----Prelims---- Justin Wren (10-2) v. Rodrigo Monduruca (8-1) HW Martin Stapleton (6-2) v. Scott McAfee (8-2) LW Alexander Trevino (7-3) v. Jesse Sanders (21-7) WW Brian McLaughlin (7-1) v. Christian Uflacker (3-2) LW Michael Pastou (5-1) v. Derrick Gumble (6-1) WW Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2) v. Stephen Ledbetter (8-6) LW __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-16-2010, 02:39 PM	#128
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	One week after our TV show our next PPV will air from Las Vegas, Nevada. The main event will be a big lightweight battle between two of our top contenders, Richie Whitson, and Ben Henderson. Outside of the main event there will be 6, count ‘em 6 fighters debuting on the main show. And I know I said he wouldn’t be back, but Dave Menne makes his return to Cage Warriors as he fights on the undercard. Here is the full slate of fights. Code: Cage Warriors 28: Whitson v. Henderson Richie Whitson (10-0) v. Ben Henderson (12-2) LW Javier Vasquez (16-4) v. John Hosman (20-5-1) FW Marcus Hicks (11-3) v. Drew Fickett (38-13) WW Stipe Bekavac (15-3) v. Tony Lopez (16-4) LHW Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6) v. Paul Sass (10-1) LW ----Prelims---- Mark Burch (10-4) v. Ricco Rodriguez (37-13) HW Jeremy Horn (82-21-5) v. Tony Ballout (4-1) MW Dong Yi Yang (9-2) v. Neil Wain (6-2) HW Dave Menne (43-17-2) v. Justin Davis (10-8) WW Cristobal Verissimo (4-1) v. Koa Ramos (4-2) MW Demico Rogers (4-3) v. Lolohea Mahe (5-4) LHW Jae Hee Chun (2-2) v. Joe Morales (4-3) FW Wow! A lot of new guys here. Vasquez, Hosman, and Hicks all come from the WEC, while Bekavac comes over from UC UK, and Lopez from KOTC where he once held the Heavyweight title there. Hironaka is the former Cage Force (Japan) lightweight champion, and he still works for DREAM. The undercard is underwhelming. Hopefully some of the guys can get started winning. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-16-2010, 02:44 PM	#129
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Kings of the Cage Middleweight Champion, and former Cage Warrior, Crafton Wallace (19-4-1) defended his title with a 25-minute fight over Floyd Sword (11-4). I went to the latest Strikeforce show last night. Their show was live from New Jersey, and the main event was a battle between King Mo (8-0) and Babalu Sorbal (36-11) for the Light heavyweight title. King Mo ended the fight in the 4th round with a KO. Other winners on the card were Charlie Valencia (12-6), Gilbert Melendez (18-3), Kazuo Misaki (25-9-2), and Nick Diaz (21-8). It was a good show, and was attended by over 1500 people. DREAM ran an opposing card in Japan. Kid Yamamoto (21-2) won over Hiroyuki Takaya (12-9-1) with a first round submission. American Joe Warren (6-3) won in the co-main over Yoshiro Maeda (28-9-2). Bellator debuted their highest profile fighter, Heath Herring (29-16) in the main event. He won easily with a first round submission over Jeff Monson (34-9). In the co-main, Cage Warrior, Wilson Reis (11-3) won with a first round submission over Jimmie Rivera (5-3). Another Cage Warrior was also a winner on the same card. Jesse Juarez (13-7) won by first round TKO. Juarez is undefeated in Bellator, but winless in Cage Warriors. Omar De la Cruz (8-2) is also a Cage Warrior, but hasn’t had a fight with us. He also won on the card in a close fight with Virgil Lozano (8-3-1). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-16-2010, 02:54 PM	#130
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	We have brought Cage Warriors to Florida, right in the backyard of Bellator. Our show is also being broadcast via PPV to the rest of the US, and Canada. The show features the first defense of Lyman Good’s welterweight title. Good comes in a big favorite over Ryan Ford. Especially since Ford didn’t fare well the last half of last year. Ford is a talented all-around fighter, who will be tested by the workhorse, Good. Cage Warriors 27: Good v. Ford The show opens with a pair of inexperienced middleweight fighters. Dan Cramer (3-2, BJJ) and Nick Klein (3-2, BJJ) are ready to go. You know, two guys with similar strengths like these two sometimes ends up with the worst. Neither could put their JJ to use, so we ended up with a crappy striking fest. An awful fight sees Dan Cramer eeek out a win. The next fight is in the featherweight division. Peter Dominguez (1-3, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Sadhu Bott (4-1, BJJ). Both fighters are looking to change their fortunes. Bott has a 5-inch height, and 6-inch reach advantage. This was a strange fight. Bott scored a takedown early on, but couldn’t do anything with it, then kept trying, but it was Dominguez who was able to stuff him. Dominguez didn’t offer much until the third, when Bott was tired. He took advantage and stole a narrow decision. Average fight. The next fight features two light heavyweights. Jeremy Williams (5-2-1, Boxing) takes on Mark Lajhner (6-1, Judo). Both men are very similar physically, and are looking to turn it around. Williams used good takedown defense, and solid striking early on to set the pace. Lajhner came back and had Williams in trouble in the second when he drug him to the ground in a guillotine choke. Williams escaped but it looked like Lajhner wore himself out. In the third, he was a sitting duck, as Williams picked him apart with clean shots, and a big hook. Lajhner survived, but he lost the fight. Decent fight. The Don Frye (20-12-1 Wrestling, 230) retirement fight is next as he takes on Bryan Humes (6-3, Boxing/Wrestling, 285). Humes didn’t keep us wondering. He took Frye down fast and worked him to an arm triangle fast. Frye had no real answer and only lasted 90 seconds. Great fight. Young fighters in the lightweight division are next up. Bill Boland (6-1, Wrestling) takes on South Korean Kwang Hee Lee (8-3, Kick Boxing). An exciting fight! Boland and Lee mixed it up early, with Boland pressing often. Lee managed to stay on his feet and his crisp strikes and a knockdown took the first round. A slow kick saw Boland succeed in taking Lee to the ground. Boland looked at ease as he transitioned across Lee’s body and locked up an arm, and secured the Americana. Lee was helpless and tapped. Excellent fight. 19-year old Marcin Held (6-1, BJJ) enters the cage to take on Ricardo Tirlone (9-3, BJJ). Held is still stinging from his first professional loss to Rich Clementi. This is the way grapplers should fight. Held scored an early takedown, but fell into a guillotine. He then picked up Tirlone, and slammed him down breaking the hold. That’s the way this fight went. Held was able to get takedowns, and sweep Tirlone when he got the takedown. There were quite a few reversals throughout, and it was Held who managed to pick up the hard earned win. Decent fight. Our last prelim fight is at welterweight. Jason Norwood (9-2, Boxing/Wrestling) takes on Sidney Silva (9-3, BJJ). This marks Norwood’s return to the cage after his loss to Lyman Good. In what was to be a close affair, Norwood looked unbeatable. He attacked quickly, taking Silva down and working to mount right away. An armbar finished it. Great fight. Our main show starts with newcomer David Loiseau (18-12, Vale Tudo) coming in to take on Gerald Harris (14-4, Wrestling). Harris is making his return to the cage after a long layoff following his elimination from the middleweight tournament. No holding these guys back! Harris shoots right away, but is tagged by a nasty shot, and moves back on wobbly legs. Loiseau comes in and throws a kick, but Harris catches it, and takes him down. Harris, in half guard, gets a kimura on and forces the tap. Lots of action for 1:47 worth of fighting. Great fight. Light Heavyweight Andre Gusmao (8-1, BJJ) takes on Danny Valimaki (5-1, Wrestling) in the next fight on the card. Gusmao has been total destruction so far in CW. Wow, from the good to the bad. Gusmao got the takedown, but just laid there. Valimaki was clueless, and couldn’t do anything. Lots of uninspired action. Gusmao gets the win but the fight was awful. Featherwight Jiu-Jitsu specialist Jorge Evangelista (11-3-1, JJ) makes his CW debut against tough customer Henrique Bilcalho (12-3, BJJ/Muay Thai). Let’s hope for a better fight here. And it is! Bilcalho controlled the action early on, and held Evangelista against the cage and peppered him with short punches, elbows and knees. He was controlling the action, but the ref didn’t think it was enough and moved them apart. Evangelista took advantage and got a fast takedown. Bilcalho defended well but was mounted with a minute to go Evangelista took advantage and locked in an armbar for the win. Excellent fight. The co-main in the heavyweight division is next. Ranked Blagoi Ivanov (4-1, Sambo, 265) looks to legitimize his ranking with a win over Rex Richards (8-3, Wrestling, 290). Richards got a fast win in his debut, and has a big size advantage here. Richards made an impact….literally. Early on in round 1, Richards got Ivanov up and slammed him down. Richards then used some incredible ground and pound to end it early in a decisive win. Decent fight. Our main event is next! Five rounds of action in the welterweight division. Lyman Good (13-0 Kick Boxing) puts his title and undefeated record on the line against Ryan Ford (12-4, Boxing/Wrestling). Hopefully it lives up to it’s expectations. Ryan Ford starts off great. He gets a takedown early in round one, and keeps Good on the defensive. The second round goes the same, but Ford starts to tire. Good takes round 3 with clean strikes but not much else. In round 4, Lyman Good puts Ford down with a big shot. Ford defends himself but Good has side control. Good suddenly takes Ford’s back and launches a brutal ground and pound. He doesn’t let up until the ref pulls him away. Good retains in a good fight. We had a gate of 894 and 25k PPV buys. The show was rated as being very poor. Fight of the Night goes to Bill Boland and Kwang Hee Lee Knockout of the Night goes to Rex Richards Submission of the Night goes to Bill Boland I know the show was rated poorly, but it had a great main event. Lyman Good is now free to defend against the cream of the crop and he will be challenged right away. Ford is good, but his cardio let him down. Rex Richards has made an real impact. Ivanov was just beaten badly. There were some other really positive results in there too. I am glad to see Don Frye retire, he wasn’t going to be around for long anyway. Of course, we had some terrible fights. And that is something that I need to work on and remember as I make these fights. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-21-2010, 05:48 PM	#131
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	The next day Cage Warriors is proud to announce the card for Cage Warriors 29. The show is scheduled to take place in San Francisco, California. The main card will feature Cage Warriors debut’s by 4 fighters. The main event of the card will be a welterweight battle between Jesse Taylor and Shamar Bailey. Bailey had been a rising star with Strikeforce, and now fights exclusively for Cage Warriors. Both men are on winning streaks and both are primed at the top of the contenders list behind Lyman Good. The co-main for the show features a middleweight battle between Tom Watson, the top-ranked boxing-mma star from England. His opponent will be former UFC fighter and UFC contender Ryan Jensen. Jensen’s jiu-jitsu skills will pose a serious test to Watson, but a win for Watson could put him solidly in line for a potential title shot. Also on the card is a battle between former Bellator fighter Diego Saraiva and WEC vet Richard Crunkilton. Here is the full card for the show. Code: Cage Warriors 29: Taylor v. Bailey Jesse Taylor (16-5) v. Shamar Bailey (13-1) WW Tom Watson (11-3) v. Ryan Jensen (17-5) MW Brendan Schaub (7-1) v. Hae Joon Yang (4-0) HW Wesley Johnson (6-1) v. Jim Miller (17-3) LW Diego Saraiva (15-9-1) v. Rich Crunkilton (18-4) LW ----Prelims---- Henry Martinez (5-1) v. Cole Province (9-1) FW Danillo Villefort (11-3) v. Hiromitsu Miura (10-8) WW Orvil Palmer (5-1) v. Neil Cooke (7-1) HW David Heath (12-6) v. Christian M’Pumbu (14-3-1) LHW Spencer Herns (3-1) v. Dan Cramer (4-2) MW Jussier da Silva (4-1) v. Shoji Maruyama (7-7-1) FW Besiki Gerenava (6-2) v. Priscus Fogagnolo (4-2) LHW __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-21-2010, 05:52 PM	#132
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Fury FC in Brazil also put on a card the same night as us. Rafael Natal (14-2) won the middleweight title with a KO over Antonio Schembri (6-6). In Japan, DEEP 57 was run. The main event featured a title defense at in the featherweight division. Current holder, Daiki Hata (14-6-3) defended his title with a win over Zach Makovsky (8-4). At Cage Force 23, also in Japan, Isao Terada (8-7-4) retained his bantamweight title with a win over Daisuke Endo (5-4). On the same night, PURECOMBAT ran a show with Doug Marshall (12-3) retaining his middleweight title with a win over Zach Trammel (7-3-1). We are contacting Marshall’s agent to discuss a contract with Cage Warriors. Wilson Reis (11-3) has decided to sign an exclusive deal with Bellator. He will be locked up by them for less than a year and a half. I like Reis, and hate to see him go. I have a feeling that 16 months from now, we will be much bigger than he is. UFC 118: Kang v. Hendersonwas live last night from Ohio. Kang (35-11-4) is the current middleweight champion and he defended his title with a 2nd round TKO over Dan Henderson (26-8). Shane Carwin (13-1) stopped Cro Cop (26-9-2) inside of a minute in the co-feature. Other winners on the card were Melvin Guillard (25-8-2), Rich Franklin (26-7), and Yoshihiro Akiyama (15-2) who beat Renzo Gracie (14-9-1). Gracie is now 0-2 since his return to the UFC. The UFC has already come out and stated that they will not be renewing his contract. Funny thing, Omar De la Cruz (8-2) who we signed some time ago, but for one reason or another hasn’t fought for us yet, has decided to turn his notice in and sign an exclusive deal with Bellator. It’s a similar deal to what Reis signed. He didn’t make an impact for us, so I am not that sad to see him go. I just think that like Reis, he has some potential. At a Shooto show in Japan. Shooto Bantamweight Champion Masakatsu Ueda (13-0-2) defended his title with a submission win over Marcos Galvano (8-5-1). WEC was in Ohio with a big PPV show that featured the bantamweight champion Brian Bowles (11-1) defending his title against Rani Yahya (18-4). Yahya took Bowles the distance and won via decision to gain the title. Yahya is undefeated in the WEC. Other winners on the card were Ox Wheeler (12-2), Uriah Faber (26-2) (who handed Diego Nunes (15-1) his first professional loss), Karen Darabedyan (12-1), and Mike Budnik (9-4). __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-21-2010, 05:58 PM	#133
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV’s second episode is tonight, and airing in the US, Canada, and the UK. The main card is only 4 fights, but the rest of the card is still loaded. The main event is between Issei Tamura and Abel Cullum. Tamura will have his hands full with the more experienced fighter and this will be his chance to prove himself to us here, that he is worthy of a possible title shot. The first fight of the evening is in the lightweight division. Hidenori Nishino (4-5-2, Shooto) takes his gaudy record against (8-6, Boxing/Wrestling) in what amounts to a loser out fight. Ledbetter is shorter, but has a 5-inch reach advantage. Nishino is 2-0 in CW, while Ledbetter hasn’t fared so well. Nishino shot early, and didn’t get the takedown, but got Ledbetter against the cage. From there, he used some unorthodox style and took Ledbetter’s back. Ledbetter when down face first in confusion, and Nishino quickly locked a rear naked choke to finish the fight. Great fight. A pair of welterweights enter the cage. Michael Pastou (5-1, Freestyle) takes on Derrick Gumble (6-1, MMA-influenced JJ). Gumble is the bigger fighter. Pastou goes for and gets an early takedown, then uses a solid ground and pound attack to finish the fight in the first round. Great fight. Lightweight, hometown boy, Brian McLaughlin (7-1, BJJ) takes the cage first in his fight against Christian Uflacker (3-2, BJJ). Wow, that might be the worst fight ever in the history of MMA. Uflacker took McLaughlin down 3 times, the ref stood them up 3 times and absolutely nothing happened in between. It was awful. Uflacker wins by default. Another welterweight battle. Alex Trevino (7-3, Boxing/Wrestling) enters to take on Jesse Sanders (21-7, Boxing/Wrestling). Trevino used good boxing skills to set up his ground and pound, and dominated the first two rounds before finishing it in the 3rd with the exact same tactics. Sanders was completely overmatched. Good fight. Another lightweight battle is next. Martin Stapleton (6-2, Boxing/Wrestling) comes from England to face Scott McAfee (8-2, BJJ) who hails from Alaska. There was quite a bit of action in this one. Stapleton controlled the action in round one, by bullying McAfee around the cage, and taking the fight to him. The second round saw a takedown from McAfee reversed by Stapleton but then when he tried to stand up, the Jiu-Jitsu specialist seized his arm, and locked a tight armbar on from guard to finish the fight. Fantastic fight. The final prelim fight takes place in the heavyweight division. Previously undefeated fighter Rodrigo Munduruca (8-1, Muay Thai/BJJ, 285) takes on Justin Wren (10-2, Wrestling, 285). Wren was defeated his last time out by Brandon Cash in his shot at the Cage Warriors Heavyweight title. Wren has to be the favorite here. Both men moved close and grappled to start the fight. Wren pushed Munduruca against the cage, and floored him with a sharp hook. With Munduruca on the mat, Wren was able to secure an arm, and force Munduruca to tap out just over 2 minutes into round 1. Fantastic fight. The televised portion of the show features a lead in by Bas Rutten and Bill Goldberg discussing the main event. From there, the move to the next fight. Former UFC fighter and KOTC lightweight champion Cameron Dollar (5-2, Wrestling) makes his cage warrior debut against former WEC fighter Zach Micklewright (8-1, Wrestling). Micklewright is also making his debut, he trains under Pat Miletich. Dollar pressed the fight early on using his skills to take Micklewright down. Micklewright however, was able to reverse with some good JJ, and finished the first round with side control. The second round started in similar fashion except it was Micklewright who pushed Dollar against the cage. Dollar reversed but made a mistake and Micklewright was able to lock a standing choke. He drug Dollar down, and choked him out. Decent fight. The second fight on the card features two more lightweights. Alberto Crane (15-4, BJJ) comes into the cage to take on Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone (11-3, Wrestling/Kick Boxing). Both fighters are considered highly rated, but not quite championship material yet. Both are coming off of losses. Cerrone has a 3-inch height advantage, but an incredible 10-inch reach advantage. Can Crane get inside that reach, especially against a kick boxer who knows how to use his feet? The first round was quiet with both fighters fighting from the outside. Round two saw Crane really go after Cerrone, and try and fail over and over to get it to the mat. Ceronne landed a short hook that put Crane on his seat, but recovered quickly, and at some kicks to the legs. The third saw good stand up from Cerrone with using his jab and countering well. Crane clearly wasn’t totally recovered as another hard shot put him down. Cerrone chased in this time and finished the fight with an armbar on the dazed fighter. Great fight. We have a light heavyweight fight for the show next. Jake O’Brien (14-4, Wrestling) takes on Travis Wiuff (60-14, Wrestling). Both men are just outside the top contenders, and hoping that a win can get them that much closer to a fight with Jimi Manuwa. The fans loved this fight. Wiuff took the fight to the mat and controlled O’Brien throughout the first round. O’Brien answered in round two by taking Wiuff down, and then mounting him and throwing a barrage of punches to force a stoppage on the vet fighter. Fantastic fight. Our main event is up next. Featherweights Abel Cullum (19-2, Freestyle) and (8-0, Shooto) take the cage for the last fight of the night. With only 2 losses between them this looks to be an exciting fight. This will clearly be Tamura’s toughest fight of his career, but for Cullum he generally fights at flyweight, and this is 2 weight classes above that. And that as they say folks is that. The fighters were very tentative at range and Culllum was the first to close, shooting and getting an easy early takedown. Cullum tried to pass, but Tamura defended well, and used a kimura to reverse and take side control. Tamura continued his hard work, and Cullum gave up his back. Tamura then quickly secured a rear naked choke to win the fight. The big underdog Tamura, pulls out another big win. Great fight. We had a crowd of 404 in New Jersey for the show. The show was rated as excellent. Fight of the Night goes to Donald Cerrone and Alberto Crane. Knockout of the Night goes to Jake O’Brien. Submission of the Night goes to Hidenori Nishino. Tamura’s win was a huge upset. I fully expected Cullum to win that fight. O’Brien hasn’t lost since his opening loss to Ralek Gracie. Cerrone rebounds from his loss to Ben Henderson nicely, while we see the likely end of the line for Stephen Ledbetter, and perhaps a couple of others. The show is rated very good, and that will keep us in the national spotlight for a little while longer. I am still hoping that we can make legit stars our of some of these guys, instead of poaching the better talent. Of course, poaching is always fun. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-27-2010, 06:43 AM	#134
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	Stephen Ledbetter (8-7) was cut loose last night. He was a huge disappointment and never managed to put any good fights together. Down under, the CFC lightweight title changed hands as Tristan Yunker (16-9) defeated Bernardo Magalhaes (7-2). Also on the card was Cage Warrior Kevin Croke (5-2). Croke’s only two losses have been in Cage Warriors, and again he won here to stay undefeated in CFC. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam

02-27-2010, 06:51 AM	#135
PilotMan Head Coach Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Seven miles up	One week after the second episode of Cage Warriors FIGHT! TV, our next PPV is scheduled to run. The show marks our return to Nevada, and features a main event battle between Richie Whitson and Ben Henderson. A highly anticipated fight that some are saying should be for the title. Well we all know that the title is currently around the waist of Jeff Curran, and that he is supposed to make his first defense against Karen Darabedyan. Darabedyan is still planning on taking a few months off after his WEC appearance, and the likelyhood of a fight with Curran is slipping. However, like we will see tomorrow, title bookings can change. Our show is set to begin with a fight in the featherweight division. Jae Hee Chun (2-2, Muay Thai) is against Joe Morales (4-3, Wrestling). Morales, a natural lightweight has dropped weight classes and is 6 inches taller, and has a 5 inch reach advantage. This fight started fast with Chun being knocked down by a hard punch, and then surviving the onslaught that followed. Morales dominated the first round. The second round started better for Chun who used his legs more, but it was the hard punching of Morales that hurt Chun again. In the third, Chun moved better, and landed the better of the shots on the outside. Morales pulled off the 2 rounds to 1 win even though it could be said that he should have been able to finish the fight. Decent fight. Up next is a light heavyweight battle between Demico Rogers (4-3, BJJ) who is dropping from heavyweight to face Lolohea Mahe (5-4, Brawler). Rogers comes in as the taller fighter, but it is Mahe who has the reach advantage. You knew that Rogers was going to try and get this to the ground and that when he did it would be over. Rogers wasted no time in trying but it took a little while before he could get the big Hawaiian down. But when he did that is exactly what happened. Rogers pounds out Mahe for the win in a good fight. Next up is a middleweight battle between Cristobal Verissimo (4-1, Kick Boxing) and Koa Ramos (4-2, Hybrid fighting). Cristobal came out very aggressively and took Ramos down, slipped to mount and brutally finished the fight with some very strong punches. He must be out to make a point after his last fight resulted in his first pro loss. Great fight. Dave Menne (43-17-2, Freestyle) makes his Cage Warriors return, just over one year after being suspended for illegal drugs. He returns to fight Justin Davis (10-8, Boxing/Wrestling). I’m pulling for Davis, as I am still holding that grudge. The first round was all strikes…missed strikes. Both men were very tentative. Davis landed the better of the weak blows. The fight ended in the second when Davis pinned Menne against the cage and nailed him with a wicked uppercut that floored Menne. Davis didn’t let up until he was forcibly pulled off. Get that man a bonus! Good fight. Big heavyweights enter the cage for the next fight. Dong Yi Yang (9-2, Wrestling, 240) hopes to come out on top in his fight with Neil Wain (6-2, Brawler, 285). Korea v. England here. Both men are a few fights away from being anything in the heavyweight division. You gotta give it to Yang. He was floored not once, not twice, but three….count ‘em three times in the first round. Each time he was able to get back to his feet, and he lived to see the next round. He was knocked down again after a failed takedown in the second, but again, he got back to his feet. Wain ran out of gas in the third, but still easily won the fight. Decent fight. Moving on, middleweight vet Jeremy Horn (82-21-5, Freestyle) takes on Tony Ballout (4-1, Shoot fighting) in what amounts to the biggest fight disparity ever here in Cage Warriors. Horn showed his skills in the cage may be in decline but his brain still knows where to go. Horn took Ballout down and had him in trouble in the first, but Ballout survived. Horn took the second round in similar fashion before he ran out of gas in the third. Ballout took it the distance but lost in a poor fight. The last of the prelim fights sees Mark Burch (10-4, Brawler, 285) take on Ricco Rodriguez (37-13, BJJ/Wrestling, 262). Wow, where was this Rodriguez in these other fights? He took Burch down fast, and quickly mounted him before pounding him out in just under 2 minutes of the first round. Great fight. The main show starts with the first fight, in the lightweight division, being between Kuniyoshi Hironaka (20-6, BJJ) and Paul Sass (10-1, Muay Thai/BJJ). Hironaka is making his Cage Warriors debut. Fight of the night so far. Hironaka tried to take this to the mat from the start of the fight, but Sass defended well and used some clinical strikes to keep him away. Sass was taken down in the second, but was able to reverse, and after some neat grappling both men escaped back to their feet. With Sass seeming to take both rounds Hironaka secured an early takedown in round three. He dominated most of the round and looked dangerous throughout. Sass managed to reverse, and survive the round. Now, we know that judging can be off sometimes. But two judges saw it 29-28 for Sass, while the third saw it 30-27 for Hironaka! WTF! Luckily it didn’t affect the outcome of the fight, but wow. Good fight. Stipe Bekavac (15-3, Kick Boxing) makes his debut against Tony Lopez (16-4, Kick Boxing). Both men are making debuts here in Cage Warriors. Lopez has 5-inches in height and 5-inches in reach. A pretty solid stand up fight that saw Bekavac come out in just about every exchange. Bekavac took every round, as neither fighter was hurt. Average fight. Welterweights are in the cage next on the main show. Marcus Hicks (11-3, Wrestling) enters the cage to face Drew Fickett (38-13, Wrestling). Hicks is 4 years older, but Fickett is vastly more experienced. Hicks came forward without fear, like he usually does. He wrestled with Fickett and pushed him against the cage. Fickett took Hicks to the ground in a headlock, but couldn’t finish him with the guillotine. Hicks tries some ground and pound, but left his arm in a little too long and Fickett transitioned to an armbar that he used to finish the fight. Great fight. The co-main is between two former WEC fighters who are already in a higher profile fight. Javier Vasquez (16-4, BJJ) takes on John Hosman (20-5-1, Wrestling) in the featherweight division. Vasquez came in fast and hard. Both men crashed hard against the cage with Hosman on his butt, and Vasquez on top of him. Vasquez began working for the guillotine right away, but Hosman defended, at least at first. It was only a matter of time. Hosman couldn’t move Vasquez at all and began to panic a bit when Vasquez finally sunk in the finishing maneuver. Fantastic fight. The main event is the last fight on the card. Lightweights Richie Whitson (10-0, Boxing) will put his impeccable record on the line against he toughest test of his young career. Ben Henderson (12-2, Wrestling/Tae Kwon Do) has already seen some great fights in his young career, and looked to be on a title path in the WEC before coming to Cage Warriors. Both men are just about equal physically. Whitson is currently the #3 lightweight in the world. It is said that the best fighters are the best because they never take any damage and lie in wait for the right moment to strike. Both men looked for plenty of opportunities but the other’s defense was better. Henderson used his great wrestling skills to keep Whitson against the cage for most of the first round, and used it again in the second. Henderson started to look tired in the third, and Whitson looked more desperate. Henderson got caught in a guillotine and taken down with it, and for a moment it looked like Whitson would finish it, but Henderson somehow managed to hold on until the end. Henderson puts another notch in his belt, and Whitson takes his first MMA loss. The crowd liked the end , but were unhappy for most of the rest of the fight. Poor fight. We had a crowd of 1,195 on hand, with just over 35k PPV buys. The show was rated as being average. Fight of the Night goes to Kuniyoshi Hironaka and Paul Sass Knockout of the Night goes to Ricco Rodriguez Submission of the Night goes to Drew Fickett Some fighters clearly improved their stock her. Bekavac, who was previously unknown gets a nice win on the main card. Paul Sass did very well against a Japanese Champion. Drew Fickett needed a win to get back toward title contention. Javier Vasquez made quick work, and looks like he could be a real challenge for anyone in that division. Some others hope to just turn their boat around, and others may be out of work. __________________ He's just like if Snow White was competitive, horny, and capable of beating the shit out of anyone that called her Pops. Like Steam? Join the FOFC Steam group here: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/FOFConSteam