This week in fight sports (February 14)

No this isn’t a new segment and I won’t be doing this very often if ever again, but there’s been a whole bunch of things go on the last few days and I’ve been bust at work so I thought I’d address as many of them as I can in one article.’

Mundine decisions Taylor, calls out Sturm
Mundine won a boring 12 round decision over Shannan Taylor again showing that he isn’t anywhere near a world class puncher as Taylor has been knocked out by smaller opponents before. Taylor resorted to fouling Mundine in the later rounds and probably should have been DQ’d. Mundine boxed well but didn’t take any chances and complained to the ref everytime Taylor mounted an offence. After the fight Mundine decided that since Green has come out of retirement, all of a sudden he doesn’t need to fight him (after he’s called him out ever since Green retired) an said he’ll be fighting Felix Sturm in Germany to ‘avenge his loss to Ottke.’ Hopefully Sturm cleans his clock.

Tank Abbott and Ken Shamrock score wins, set up super fight
Tank Abbott and Ken Shamrock showed yesterday that their recent losses were all flukes by dominating quality opposition yesterday. Tank scored a 29 second KO win over PRIDE veteran Mike Bourke, dropping him with a right hand and finishing him off with ground and pound. The performance was in the league of Rampage Jacksons win in the third fight against Wanderlei Silva although it’s debatable which knockout was more impressive. Ken Shamrock gave up 180lbs in weight but dominated submission specialist Ross Clifton. In a fight that made Arlovski’s first win over Tim Sylvia look normal, Shamrock dropped his opponent with a right hand before finishing with an armbar from side control. The pair are expected to fight in the middle of this year. Shamrock promised to end Tanks career if he doesn’t ‘put his beer down and get in the gym’ while Tank said he wished it was Ken Shamrock who was eating his right hand instead and told the fans to have a beer for him.

Margarito gets one year ban
Antonio Margarito has been suspended for one year for the plastering of the hands incident in his fight with Shane Mosley. This whole thing sucks to be perfectly honest. While I don’t think Margarito should be punished for something that his corner did, the whole incident puts a question mark on some of Margarito’s best performances. While a lot of precaution is taken by officials before the fights and I’m sure that if he had tried it before hand he would probably have been caught, you can’t help but wonder if Margarito has cheated before. If Margarito’s ban doesn’t get overturned I don’t think we’ll see him fight on US soil ever again. The fight puts an end to a likely rematch with Miguel Cotto that was set up for mid this year but could also pave the way for the Mosley-Cotto rematch we all want to see.

Canadian officials ask UFC to bend over for April event
UFC 97: Redemption is in jeopardy after the Quebec governing body that deals with combat sports wants the UFC to change their rules in order for the event to comply with their standards. The changes include no knees, no elbows and the referee checking on a fighters condition in the event of a knockdown before the fight continues. So basically, they want some fucked up hybrid sport with punching, kicking and grappling like a slightly more violent version of Pancrase. Dana White should remind them what the UFC will do for their economy and if he doesn’t budge then tell them to go shit in their hat and pull it over their ears and take the event to Vegas.

Nate Campbell loses titles on scale
Instead of losing his titles in the ring to Ali Funeka, Campbell weighed in at 138lbs, 3lb over the 135lb Lightweight limit and forfeited his belts. The titles are still on the line for Funeka should he be victorious but it further frustrates fans as what is the most talent rich division in boxing again gets put on hold from fighters not making weight. Hopefully Funeka tears Campbell a new one and then doesn’t take the titles back to South Africa and instead does what Campbell would have and fight the winner of Juan Manuel Marquez and Juan Diaz. Still, Campbell moving up sucks because there was a few good fights involving him including a rematch with Juan Diaz. Maybe Campbell and Guzman can try and fight each other again (Guzman failed to make weight for their clash last September) at 140lbs with a 5lb allowance.

Shamrock vs Tank is Finally on!

I don’t often report MMA news as I don’t have the time to cover MMA like other sites do, but some news is just that big that you can’t leave it uncovered. It’s very rare that you get news like this so I thought I’d better put something up here in case I lose readers to other more dedicated blogs that want to talk about the important issues. Sometime in April, UFC Hall of Famer meets David ‘Tank’ Abbott in a highly anticipated bout. Okay by now you’ve guessed that I’m being sarcastic and I won’t do a 100% sarcasm post so I’ll be serious now. There remains only one obstacle and it is quite a hurdle considering both guys recent form; their next opponents.

I’m not sure what organisation the fights are under (other then Ken Shamrock is meant to be the promoter), but Ken Shamrock will be featured in the Main Event of the upcoming February 13 ‘Valentine’s Eve Massacre’ show. His opponent will be 6’8, 350lb journeyman Ross Clifton. Clifton’s record stands at 6 wins and 8 losses, with all but 1 of his fights ending inside the distance. Normally I’d dismiss this as a bad bit of matchmaking, but given Shamrocks recent form and his inability to do anything with Robert ‘Buzz’ Berry, I can’t write Clifton off in this bout. Shamrock is honestly that bad these days that someone like Clifton could beat him. Shamrock will have to get Clifton on his back and if he does he’ll win in whatever manner he wants.

Tank Abbott will feature in the co-main event against Mike Bourke, an equally short and equally round opponent who should make the fight interesting as long as he doesn’t take Tank down. Rourke is a PRIDE veteran, losing by double arm bar in one of the early PRIDE bouts to ‘The Diet Butcher’ Alexander Otsuka. His record stands at 8-11-1 with all but three of his 20 fights ending inside the distance. It’s really not much of an issue whether or not Tank loses this fight because he loses most of his fights, but I think Rourke will beat him. Tank rarely trains anymore and I think Rourke will survive the initial 30 second onslaught, put him on his back and submit him.

This truly is a horrible piece of promoting. This fight (Tank vs Shamrock) has nearly come to fruition a few times. They were scheduled on the same side of the bracket at Ultimate Ultimate 96, but Shamrock pulled out with a broken hand. Also at UFC 48 this fight was looking at being a main event, but Kimo and Shamrock after Tank got choked out by Kimo at UFC 43. Still, if these old guys wanna keep fighting and embarrassing themselves, it’s probably better they do it against each other rather then against younger guys who could seriously injure them. This is a fight that I would have liked to see in the early UFC days and to be honest as disgusting as the thought of these two fighting now is, I’ll probably watch it. Afterall, I watched YAMMA Pit Fighting! I don’t want to be one of those poor souls who sees something second hand like YAMMA ring announcer Scott Ferrall.