Issue 092

September 2012

This is your page to tell us what you think of all things Fighters Only and MMA. Get your feelings off your chest where it really matters – in print! Send us your best pictures with your favorite fighters, or copies of FO, and we’ll print them too. [email protected]

THERE ARE (NO) RULES

Just a quick thought for you guys. Let’s say one day the UFC starts losing ground and dropping off the radar. Maybe it’s getting superseded by a sexier, more exciting sport. Do you think the company might, in a potentially desperate maneuver, actually start dropping rules? Like allowing knees on the ground, letting you head butt, that kind of stuff. Companies in a panic do weird things, and there can’t be a faster way to get people’s attention. How about if they do that but keep going and basically end up on UFC 1 rules? Then it just essentially eats itself like some weird mixed martial arts circle of life. I know, I know, I’m ranting, but can you imagine?

Craig Bateman, via email

BRAVO BELLATOR

Even though Bellator Fighting Championships is classified as a somewhat distant second to the UFC, I have to say that I think they’re geniuses. To let their middleweight wrecking machine in former champ Hector Lombard go to the UFC was an absolute masterstroke. And that they might do the same with former 155lb champion Eddie Alvarez do the same is just as smart, not stupid like so many people believe right now.

Bellator obviously knows both are talented fighters and believe that when given the opportunity they’ll both fight their way to title shots and possibly to title ownership. Can you imagine what that does for the Bellator brand? It completely legitimizes it. How can you think of Bellator as a UFC knock-off when their fighters run through UFC opposition? You simply can’t. It raises Bellator’s stock and those of the company’s fighters, and basically establishes the promotion as a breeding ground for UFC-quality talent.

What’s the downside? That they might lose? So what, people will just keep on thinking what they think right now – that Bellator is second tier. That is until Bellator produces another dominant fighter who wants to jump to the UFC and will likely make a run at the title.

Rick Raymond, via email

FIGHTER TWEETS

ANDERSON SILVA (@SPIDERANDERSON)

I really like this guy, my friend @justinbieber, miss you Bro!!!! #neversaynever @showdavida

DANNY CASTILLO (@LASTCALL155)

Dear ladies of Las Vegas, Please do a better job at hiding the price tags on the dresses ur gunna return on monday. Thank you, Me.

ANDY OGLE (@THELITTLEAXE)

I miss the house and I miss the lads #weirdbuttrue

SHANE CARWIN (@SHANECARWIN)

Is there such a thing as a big and tall ninja? I think I could become a pretty kick a$$ ninja.

SNOOP DOGG (@SNOOPDOGG)

Ain’t that sum bulls**t Boxing is a wrap. Going bacc on that ultimate fighting.

The posts that caught our eye this month in the online world of Fighters Only

@missjessica41: @FightersOnly LOVE that you put @joerogan on the cover. i dont know what i would do w/o him! listening to him during the fights is the best.

@AndySalasMMA: @ the airport, doing a little reading before my flight @FightersOnly

@Jack_Kelly92: Surprised that @FightersOnly doesn’t pull out due to injury at the moment!! #mma #UFC

@leash_b: Just got the @GeorgesStPierre cover of @FightersOnly & I love it! Plus the

@RondaRousey section is great! #womenruletheworld #loveforMMA

@ScottSteever: @FightersOnly great article this month on the disaster that was Yamma Pit Fighting. Your reasons for why it didn’t work were dead-on!

GALLERY

Hey guys, love the mag! You guys do a great job, keep it up. I thought I’d send in my latest drawing of ‘The Spider.’

Andy Armstrong, Heathmont VIC

My kids after winning medals in the BJJ event at the BodyPower Expo in the UK. Salim Bougoffa, via email

Me with Tom Watson, Brad Pickett and Ross Pearson. 

Steph Hart, via email