The following is a scene from one of my favorite movies: Troy.  It applies directly to the video above.

Messenger Boy: Are the stories true? They say your mother was an immortal godess. They say you can’t be killed. 
Achilles: I wouldn’t be bothering with the shield then, would I? 
Messenger Boy: The Thesselonian you’re fighting… he’s the biggest man i’ve ever seen. I wouldn’t want to fight him. 
Achilles: Thats why no-one will remember your name.

I completely sympathize with the Messenger Boy.  Brock Lesnar is the Thesselonian.  Make sure you take notice of the part of the video where Brock is practicing his hammerfists from the mount.  Even with 16 ounce gloves and a pillow I wouldn’t want him doing that to me.  If he wanted to have a kuuurrs light, I said a kuuuuuuuurs light. I might be ok with that.

source: Bloody Elbow

If they were smart they would make this the headliner for UFC 103 with Franklin vs Ortiz as the lead in. That would turn one of the potentially weakest cards in UFC history into the biggest heavyweight fight in MMA history with, coupled with Ortiz’s return against a worth opponent. 250,000 pay per view buys would turn into a million plus.  Call me Joe Silva Fukerton.

Source: Bloody Elbow

Source: Bloody Elbow

Bradshaw is one of my favorite wrestlers and top villains of all all time. He was epic calling matches for Smackdown some months/years ago and I love mixed martial arts.  Who hasn’t implimated the clothesline from Hell on a lippy girlfriend or noisy toddler?  If this is all true, I ask you why wouldn’t I want to shove a pineapple up my ass in anticipation of this Lords of Pain story.

The Vyper Fight League and Vyper Productions are proud to announce the addition of John “Bradshaw” Layfield, formerly WWE’s “JBL,” and Layfield Energy Company to the VFL product. John Layfield, coming fresh off of his retirement from professional wrestling, will be joining the VFL broadcast team as one of its hosts. Layfield is a former WWE Champion; the longest reigning in Smackdown history, a former broadcaster on WWE Smackdown, regularly appears on Fox News Channel’s The Cost of Freedom, is a best-selling author, and is the president and owner of Layfield Energy Company. John Layfield joins the VFL at its inaugural event, Enter the Vypers Pit, on Friday April 24th, 2009, at 4400 Shepherdsville Road in Louisville, Kentucky.

A separate as these two entities are (pro wrestling and mma) it makes perfect sense for them to overlap. Their fans are used two dumping 60 dollars in the crapper for a PPV (myself included).  Their fans both enjoy violence and high impact entertainment.  And I am informed by my friends Luke Thomas that Vince McMahon tried to buy Pride FC before it was aquired by the UFC.  

Brock Lesnar is arguably the biggest draw in mixed martial arts today.  Kurt Angle and Bobby Lashley make headlines all the time in the world of MMA.  Tank Abbot, Frank Trigg and Ken Shamrock have had runs in professional wrestling.   Clearly Vince and Dana have flirted with each others industry several times in the past, it will be interesting to see if these two titans are gonna dance all night or take each other home.  Either way, I’m doing snap kicks in anticipation.

Who in there right mind would say that shit? Even if it’s true I wouldn’t to take a swing at that hornet’s nest and miss. That is, unless you are the man that already made the newly crowned UFC Heavyweight Champion tap out the first time you faced him. Frank Mir comes across as a little douchey at times, but I take him at his word regarding Lesnar.  Fanhouse has some interesting statements from Mir regarding Lesnar, Fedor and Nogueira:

…while Mir had nothing but praise for Nogueira, he has a different attitude toward the man he’ll fight if he beats Nogueira, Brock Lesnar. Mir has already defeated Lesnar once, at UFC 81 in February, and he says he’s certain that if they fight again, he’ll win again.

“Brock Lesnar will never be able to beat me because he has no submission skills,” Mir told me. “What’s he going to do, knock me out? No one has never knocked me cold. What’s he going to do, arm bar me? No way. He is powerful. He is big. But martial arts isn’t filled with guys from the NFL. Lesnar had to grab the cage not to get taken down by Randy Couture, who’s 220 pounds. Lesnar isn’t the phenom that everyone makes him out to be. He started at 30. Have you ever seen a boxer start at 30 and become a world champion?”

“Fedor’s the best heavyweight in the world,” Mir told me. “I hope one day I could fight him and do well, but right now he’s better than I am. As a martial artist you have to be truthful about yourself so you can approach your training properly and get better. Fedor has great killer instinct, he’s tough, he’s strong. If I fought him I’d try to catch him in a submission, but I don’t know if Fedor can be beaten. He’s the best heavyweight.”

That’s some good shit.  Mir goes onto say that if Nogueira and Fedor fought with no time limit that Nog would win.  He also admits that Brock Lesnar was “completely kicking his ass” but at no time was he thinking of quitting.  I don’t know if Frank can get past Minotauro, but if he does there is no reason to think he can’t make Lesnar second guess himself into making a mistake.  He did it when their record was even.  Now Lesnar is one in the hole.  It will be interesting to see how that effects Brock in the cage, because not much else has.

M1’s offical statement MMA Junkie:

M-1’s Official Statement on Brock Lesnar’s victoryM-1 would like to congratulate Brock Lesnar on his UFC heavyweight title victory as well as acknowledge Randy Couture’s return to active competition after a layoff that lasted over a year. 

Couture and WAMMA heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko had publicly acknowledged a desire to fight each other multiple times over the course of the past year. While M-1 and Fedor remain interested in a match against Couture, we would also like to publicly state for the record that we would welcome a superfight between Fedor and Lesnar that would be held as a co-promoted event between the UFC, M-1, and Affliction Entertainment.

We’ve invited the media to speak with us today to not only make it clear we would welcome a Fedor vs. Lesnar matchup but to act in a preemptive fashion to address the possibility that UFC officials will try and position Lesnar as the No. 1 heavyweight in the world, much like they have tried to use a marketing ploy to brand Anderson Silfva as the number one pound-for-pound fighter in the world.

In the past, UFC president Dana White and Zuffa, LLC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta have tried to claim that Fedor was “overrated” and that his “record was irrelevant.” They make these claims in spite of the fact that Fedor holds career victories over UFC champions past and present. While we have tremendous respect for the contributions Mr. Fertitta and Dana have made to this sport, we do not believe they are sincere in their statements.

It is the position of M-1 that the UFC has adopted an anti-Fedor policy because multiple attempts to sign him have not been fruitful. For a company that has tried to market itself as the number one promotion in the world, they are unable to accept the fact that the number one fighter in the world does not reside on its roster of contracted fighters.

We believe that the UFC has determined that it’s much more inexpensive for them to use their marketing resources to use smoke and mirrors to brand a fighter as the pound-for-pound best as opposed to actually paying the pound-for-pound best what he is truly worth on the open market.

While Brock Lesnar is an accomplished athlete and a talented fighter, we do not consider him to be the number one heavyweight in the world. Until someone beats him, we strongly believe that Fedor should continue to be recognized as the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. In a match between Fedor and Lesnar, we do not feel that at this stage Lesnar would be able to make it out of the first round.

For those who feel our statements in regards to Fedor are self-serving, we’d like to refer you to a video interview on the website RawVegas.tv in which at his UFC 91 after-party Couture himself acknowledges that “Fedor would probably tear Brock up at this point.”

Jerry Millen, M-1 Vice President

This will not happen for many reasons.  Firstly, Fedor would likely beat Brock Lesnar.  How would that benefit the UFC?  Dana’s policy on hating Fedor is based mostly on his contention that Fedor hasn’t fought any of his heavyweights.  That makes him unproven in White’s eyes.  What happens if a fighter not under UFC contract smashes the new golden boy?  Not only does that prove Fedor’s status, but it shows the UFC isn’t the only game in town for the best fighters on the planet.  Dana has shown he is all about having total control.  That is why the UFC is still still relegated to Spike and not on a major network.  He will not relinquish control, nor should he.

What control would Dana White have over Fedor Emelianenko?  If Lesnar lost to him, who in the UFC stable could beat him?  Fedor has half the notoriety but is twice the fighter.  He has a huge reputation with the MMA hard cores but hardly any mainstream recognition.  That means the PPV numbers might not even top Couture/Lesnar.  I would be the first to savage my privates if a Fedor stepped into the cage with Lesnar, but Dana won’t do it.  Under the current circumstances, he shouldn’t do it either.  Get Fedor under contract with the UFC.  Then spread out some paper towels for MMA fans all over the globe.

I thought Randy would test Lesnar.  I think he did in some areas.  If there is a rematch I’ll pick Couture again. He was wearing the bigger man down against the cage and Brock couldn’t stay on top of the older fighter when they got to the mat.   Randy came in too light and the year off did him no favors.  That being said, the advent of Brock Lesnar becoming heavyweight champion is a boon for the UFC.  A former pro wrestler will drive no MMA fans away.  They can still wax philosophical about possible Fedor opponents and root for someone to knock Lesnar off his hastily built high horse.  One of the many things that Lesnar will do is put the MMA bug in even more professional wrestlers heads.  Those with amatuer wrestling backgrounds would be fools not to consider taking a shot if they have grown weary of the WWE’s grueling road schedule.  Certainly those with Lesnar’s gentic makeup and God given abilty are few and far between, but he has paved the way.

Let’s talk about some of the other things Lesnar does for the sport.  At the very least Lesnar brings excitement to a stale division.  At the most he has single handedly taken the UFC into the mainstream.  I don’t want to get carried away and I don’t want to take away anything from what the UFC had built before Brock Lesnar joined the company.  The fact is that more people watch when Lesnar fights and the UFC gets more coverage from mainstream sports outlets when Lesnar fights.  The video above is just one example.

This isn’t like Kimbo Slice.  This isn’t some paper champion that is being fed tomato cans to keep him propped up. Dana White (at Lesnar’s request) fed Brock to the wolves.  His first 3 fights have included two UFC Heavyweight Champions, former and current.  He manhandled UFC/PRIDE/K1 vet Heath Herring  in his third career MMA fight.  Brock Lesnar’s baptism by fire should give him near instant credibility as champion coupled with his big name and even bigger body.  That’s a marketing major’s dream.  Why wouldn’t ESPN be all over this guy?

What MMA has working for it as a sport is almost instant appeal.  Wrestling fans or sports fans who are drawn into watching a pay per view because of Lesnar will almost certainly find something to like with the rest of the fight card.  Last night had very few big names other than the main event.  What it did have were some tremendously entertaining fights.  Jeremy Stephens’ knock out, Kenny Florian doing what Kenny Florian does and Gabriel Gonzaga nearly decapitating Josh Hendricks in the first round.   If you can get em in the door, they will become fans.  I firmly believe that.

I was rooting for Randy Couture but I was happy to see the way Lesnar handled the win.  He was very respectful to the man he beat and seemed to have gotten over the “me first” attitude he displayed after he beat Herring.  I was rooting for Randy, but I root for the sport first and foremost.  With this victory I think that Brock Lesnar may have done more for this sport than any other fighter could have.  This is no slight to Liddell, Rampage, Shamrock or any other fighter that has paved the way.  Brock Lesnar is bigger than life, and hopefully he can be the one to make the UFC even more bigger than life.

ESPN is all over this fight.  I hope that continues for the next few UFC events.  Aside from that, watch this video of MMA Live’s coverage of the weigh-in for UFC 91.  Randy Couture looks like he is half the size of Brock Lesnar.  For those of us rooting for The Natural, it is a nerve wracking image. See for yourself.

Thanks to Combat Lifestyle for the photos.  I’ve been a really big mixed martial arts fan for over a year now.  It’s not too long, but in that year I have watched every fucking fight that has been on television.  UFC, WEC, EliteXC, Affliction, hell even Yamma Pit Fighting.  I have been to half a dozen fights live including UFC 88 in Atlanta.  I got to see Rich Franklin, Dan Henderson, The Iceman and a slew more fight up close and personal.  For the past three to four months I have been making a few picks and placing a few bets on MMA fights.   I’m no mastermind, I’m clearly no expert. However, my record is such that I am fairly confident in my general knowledge of the sport.  Knowing all of that, how the hell can you pick this fight?  We are talking about one of the most cerebral fighters in history going up against the damn Cloverfield monster.  It’s Captain America vs The Hulk live and in person. 

I picked my winnner midway through this past week.  Brock Lesnar is a monster.  I’ve never seen a real life human being who is built like this freak that can actually move around.  You expect to see him on stage with Ronnie Coleman and Jay Cutler posing awkwardly and smeared with orange tanning cream. The difference being those guys can barely walk.  Lesnar can certainly do more than that.  Couture started out as the favorite in this contest but as of today (thursday), many sports books have him as an underdog.  Lesnar can wrestle, scramble, strike and has proven he has the endurance to finish a fight.

That being said, we here at The Fukerton are picking Randy “The Natural” Couture to win the fight via TKO in the second round.  When have we seen Lesnar take a punch?  When have we seen Lesnar on his back? When has we seen Lesnar against the cage?  I think we will most certainly see some of those things come Saturday.  Lesnar is big, but Couture has fought big men before this.  Put eloquently by Betus.com:

On March 3, 2007 Couture entered the Octagon at 6′ 2″, 220 pounds and the +110 MMA betting underdog at UFC 68 in hopes of reclaiming his title against a mammoth 6′ 8” and 268-pound Maine-iac named Silva who wore the belt, priced at -135 by BetUS UFC odds experts.

For 25 minutes the two went to war in what was one of the best fights in UFC history. What the 45-year-old Couture lacked in size, he made up for with heart, determination and raw fighting skills in warrior like fashion. Couture initiated the striking as the aggressor versus Sylvia, taking him to the ground in the first round clearly frustrating the Maine-iac. In the best fight of his Hall of Fame career, Couture dominated throughout much of the bout to score an unanimous decision victory for his third championship.

Randy isn’t going to have his skirt blown up Lesnar that can bench press more weight.  Brock is completely overrated in my eyes.  I know why he is getting this shot, I agree with him getting this shot, but he has not earned it.  Selling PPV’s makes you good for buisness. It doesn’t make you a champion.  I love watching Lesnar fight, but I smell wax wings.  Icarus learned the hard way and so will this man.  I have no doubt in my mind that Brock Lesnar will be the UFC heavyweight champion one day, and most likely one day soon.  I just don’t see it being this Saturday.

Leave it to an ESPN anchor to look unprepared and misinformed in an interview that I would kill to have.  Dana White in person.  So, Michael Kim, the biggest fight in UFC history is days away, and you spend half your time with White talking about Kimbo Slice?  Kimbo slice who got knocked the fuck out?  Kimbo Slice that has no job?  I love Slice, but what the SHIT does he have to do with Brock Lesnar taking on Randy Couture?  Way to bring up UFC 100, btw.  The UFC has 3 mega fights coming up including GSP vs Penn, but you bring up a PPV that’s months away. 

Kudos to Mr. President for saying that Kimbo on the cover of ESPN the Magazine made him ill.  Saying that on ESPN proves he’s not going to kowtow to this network for media coverage.  Shame on ESPN for sticking a huge interview on ESPN 2 on a limp dick show like First Take that no one watches.  This should have been on the 6pm Sportscenter at the very least.   If White is willing to give them studio time, why is not on Rome is Burning, PTI and Sportscenter?