Monday, November 2 6:29 pm PT: Paul Heyman says so:
It was about three and a half weeks ago, when I was on the phone with Brock, and he sounded just so tired. I asked him if this training camp was harder than the others. He shocked me with his answer. "I'm just exhausted," he admitted, "I train, I come home, and I crash. I'm going to take a day or two off and just try to shake this thing."
Read the full article at CraveOnline’s Heyman Hustle.
Monday, November 2 2:40 pm PT: Amateur wrestling, which had its first major North American presence in MMA with Dan Severn’s 1994 UFC debut, has long been a very rough way to make a living: there just isn’t much of one unless you get an Olympic medal and some endorsements. (This on a good day: if you can name 2008’s gold medalist, you’ve seen Bob Costas more than I care to.)
Recognizing the financial pitfalls of that career, Colorado wrestling organizer Ed Gutierrez is making more overt attempts to indoctrinate his wrestlers into a pro fighting career. This past weekend, he tied in an MMA event with a wrestling meet, creating a fairly seamless connection between “amateur” grapping and pro fighting.
"This weekend is a pilot for us," he said. "But if we have the interest, we`d like to link the two together."
Some (Daniel Cormier) don’t have a problem graduating to the mayhem, while others (Cael Sanderson) don’t have it in them. There probably isn’t any total normalcy in a life of punching people in the head, but tethering it to wrestling could make it appear a little less lurid.
Why should this interest you? Because Zaromskis is one of the most exciting fighters to emerge in the past several years: he’s ended his last three fights via head kick -- a run not even Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic could manage -- and appears as coldly methodical about hurting people as an Army sniper.
It would be more fun to have an unsedated colonoscopy than to fight Zaromskis. This is a compliment.
Zaromskis is a welterweight, which means bouts with Nick Diaz and Jake Shields are possibilities. Stockton vs. Lithuania sounds brutally promising. (Front row: Maybe bring one of those plastic partitions, like at a Gallagher show.)
Dana White, Mauricio Rua, and the fans wanted it: Lyoto Machida’s metacarpal did not. According to Yahoo! Sports, the Machida/Rua rematch, originally (and optimistically) eyed for a Jan. 2 date, will have to wait until Machida’s hand is cleared from surgery.
Why is this good news? Because if the fight had gone on their New Year’s event, it would’ve given both men only eight weeks for a training camp just weeks after they had first prepared for one another: that’s a grueling schedule for anyone. The last thing the world needs is another bout filled with footnotes.
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