UFC Fight Night: Nogueria vs. Nelson Primer - Ryan LaFlare

UFC

Odds are if there's a UFC going down on the other side of Earth, Long Island native Ryan LaFlare might be fighting in it. And hey, on April 11 there's a UFC Fight Night in Abu Dhabi, so guess who's on the card? UCL veteran and former ROC champ LaFlare once again gets to fly far from home for a chance to step into the Octagon, and his opponent is inexplicably John Howard, who himself lives in Boston but for some reason this bout that would have great appeal in the Northeast must happen in the Middle East.

Dead Serious MMA - 3.29.14

NEW JERSEY

Saturday night saw some quality amateur MMA go down in North Jersey, courtesy of promoter Frankie Perez's Dead Serious MMA and 24 fighters who pretty much left it all in the cage. With three championship belts on the line, sanctioning by the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board, and Frankie Perez Jr. playing the role of DJ (the same Frankie Perez Jr. who will be scrapping for a belt at the next Ring of Combat), it was a high-stakes, well-run, family affair. Highlights of the night included:

In Case You Missed It... Eddie Bravo vs. Royler Gracie II

AWESOME

An event featuring just grappling isn't for everyone, but to those who've spent a significant time on the mat, a rematch between 10th Planet Jiu-Jitsu founder Eddie Bravo and the legendary Royler Gracie is probably one of the most compelling pairings in submission wrestling world today. And yes, they had their rematch yesterday, and yes, it was 20 minutes of coolness.

Sunday Link Dump - 3.30.14

NEW YORK

We've got a nice little stretch of downtime this weekend and next, with no UFCs, just some Bellators and other odds and ends shows. So what should you do to get your MMA fix? Catch up on your reading, of course, and to get you started, here are a few links to things that are relevant to your interests.

Dead Serious MMA: Nate Fultz vs. Hillel Dombroff

via IFTTT

Dead Serious MMA: Mike Trizano vs. Gio Sanfratello

via IFTTT

Dead Serious MMA: Vic Anteqieta vs. Jake Freidland

via IFTTT

Dead Serious MMA: Javier Colon vs. Bryan Santay

via IFTTT

What Are You Doing Tonight?

AWESOME

I'm going to be cageside for the Dead Serious amateur MMA show in North Bergen, N.J., but in case you're home and hankering for some action, and you don't want to wait for the top fights on the World Series of Fighting card on NBCSports, then you might want to check out Metamoris 3.

See Cris Cyborg Lose a Muay Thai Bout

MUAY THAI

She may be one of the baddest female MMA fighters on the planet, and the last legitimate opponent to Ronda Rousey, but Cris Cyborg isn't invincible. Last night, she took on a vastly more experienced kickboxer at Lion Fight 14 for a championship belt in Muay Thai, and though Cyborg fought valiantly, she pretty much got her ass kicked.

Observations From My Couch: Bellator 114

BELLATOR

• Bubba Jenkins needs to adopt a pseudonym and a disguise for a while. There's way to much hype attached to him that he's not living up to, and he needs a ton more fights before he gets good.
• I could have sworn Will Martinez looked like he was nursing some sort of leg injury, especially in the third round. Do anyone else see that?
• It doesn't matter if Daniel Weichel wins the featherweight tournament - he'd get slaughtered by the other 145 pounders who currently reside at or near the top.

GLORY Fighter Mark Miller Needs Help

AWESOME

GLORY fighter Mark Miller is in dire medical straits. But his sponsor, HeadBlade, is stepping up to help. Here's Liverkick.com with some details:

HeadBlade, one of Mark’s sponsors has recognized how tough this HeadBlade user has been over the years and now they are looking to give back to Miller with your help. HeadBlade will be running a special, two-week long campaign to help raise money for Mark where using the coupon code “FightShark” at checkout will get you a 10% discount off of their entire stock, with a portion of the proceeds going to help Mark with his medical bills. So if you are sporting a freshly-shaved head, want to, or know someone that does head over to http://www.HeadBlade.com and enter the code “FightShark” at checkout to receive an instant 10% discount and to help out the storied Kickboxer.

VICTORY 5: The Next Big Must-See MMA Event in NYC

NEW YORK

The next big must-see MMA event in New York City is without a doubt Victory Combat Sports' April 25 installment, which promises to once again fill the Armory on Lexington Avenue with thrilling, high-quality violence.

VICTORY 5 will have lightweight champ Marcus Surin defending his belt, while Golden MMA welterweight champ Bernardo Cano will attempt to be a cross-promotional title holder when he takes on Rob Ovalle for the VCS 170-pound strap.

April 25 will also see the opening rounds of featherweight and lightweight four-man tournaments.

Thus far, VCS has done a spectacular job putting forth a quality product, and VICTORY 5 should be no different. You can bet that I'll be cageside for this one.

Sherdog Gives CFFC Some Much Deserved Love

NEW JERSEY

Local promotions come and go, so one true benchmark of success is longevity - a trait the New Jersey-based Cage Fury Fighting Championship definitely has (their first show was back in 2006). But another sign that they're doing something right is the number of talented fighters who use the organization as a stepping stone to the "big show", and in that regard, CFFC is kicking ass.

Veteran Sherdog scribe Lutfi Sariahmed, whose beat is the New Jersey circuit, goes into a bit of detail about CFFC and that latter gauge of success in this piece. It's for sure some well-deserved acknowledgment of the product CFFC is churning out. Give it a read.

Throwback Thursday: Greg Soto vs. Andrew Montanez

NEW JERSEY

February 18, 2006. That's the date this pic was taken, a pic that has future UFC fighter Greg Soto taking on Andrew Montanez in a cage erected in Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City. Can you guess what makes what's going on in it so momentous? If you said that it's the first ever amateur MMA event in New Jersey, well, wow, you got that one correct and I'm pretty damn impressed.

Constitutional Insurgency: Inside Zuffa's Other Battle for MMA in New York

NEW YORK

Wars nowadays are rarely fought with two armies advancing upon each other, guns and cannons firing into the approaching massed ranks while generals stand upon hilltops to watch their marching wooden pieces fall. No, conflicts are instead contested on different fronts, with different tactics and kinds of soldiers, soldiers waging battles quite unlike what’s transpiring on that very open and bloody field.

In the First Boer War, it was Dutch settlers-turned-guerrillas, skirmishing against British rule, while in the Second World War, French and Polish resistance fighters made life rough for occupying Germans. More recently, the opening phase of Operation Enduring Freedom saw small groups of U.S. Special Forces unite Afghanistan tribesman to topple the Taliban government.

And in New York, while a very public and political war is being waged by lobbyists and legislators in Albany to change the law banning professional mixed martial arts – a law in place since 1997 – a squad of irregulars (a.k.a., lawyers) are emerging from the brush to attack and raid and set fire to the very Constitutionality the law was presumed to have been constructed upon.

On Tuesday I saw that side of the war up close, and amidst the flying bullets and sudden charges with fixed bayonets, I was able to stick my head up and survey the melee.

From what I could see, it’s going pretty damn well for those who want pro MMA in New York.

Even More Fighting in Central Park

NEW YORK

The most notable thing about this video of Sunday's sparring session in Central Park is not that it was somewhat chilly out and yet Will Cavali wore a short-sleeve shirt. No, what's notable is that there's someone out there with the nickname "Blackie Chan".

Badass New York MMA Video

NEW YORK

Columbia School of Journalism students are the best, especially when they choose MMA in New York as a topic for their projects and dive head-first into the realm of Big Apple fistfights with their cameras at the ready. Here's one such example, courtesy of Gretchen Malalad. She went to a recent UCL and a NYFE, and captured a good bit of stuff. Enjoy!

More Fighting in Central Park

NEW YORK

This is New York City, so it's no thing to walk through Central Park and see some dudes fighting. What would be odd and out of the ordinary is to see fights in Central Park that aren't to the death, but that's a story for another day.

Here's Wing Chun Man Shawn Obasi taking on MUSU's Will Cavali. Enjoy.

Flashback: The Underground Combat League - 12.11.11

NEW YORK

From 2003 to 2012, the only consistent option for watching MMA fights up close and personal in New York City was the Underground Combat League. At the UCL, aspiring fighters took on fakes and wannabes, thugs squared up against martial artists, and about an equal number of the truly talented battled it out with stone-cold psychopaths and villains. The rules were nebulous. Safety precautions were nonexistent. And to know of an upcoming event was to be part of an extremely selective circle of people.

Yeah, it was awesome.