MMA Universe

Full replay after the jump.

Replay courtesy of UFC.com.

No, not really, but that’s the latest back-and-forth conversation between epic “Twitterer” and NFL Pro Bowl wide receiver, Chad Ochocinco, and UFC President Dana White:

“Dana this Ocho Cinco, I want to fight your #1 and #2 best fighters asap,exhibition to raise money for a charity of choice!!!!!! … matter of fact I want Anderson Spider Silva—please don’t ignore me or you’ll have to fight me yourself!!! Sincerely Esteban … Mr. White this a serious matter, we can help alot organazations with this fight, I have a good chance at winning against Silva … Awesome! I’m fighting Anderson Silva-I can’t wait to throw my child please combo with a kiss da baby leg kick,Silva can shut the front door! … oh I’m dead serious, this will be one that goes down in history, Ocho defeats Silva in surprising upset, it’s on!!!”

White responded:

“If you are really serious @OGOchoCinco, contact me. We’ll put a fight together for charity…. I need a Jan 2nd fight. Ocho Cinco vs Anderson Spider Silva. PS – I’m too old to fight anyone.”

Guess it’s a better idea than sending mustard to the Pittsburgh Steelers (who play at Heinze Field) this weekend … or maybe not.

Spike TV will once again air a portion of an upcoming Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) fight card on its network prior to a major pay-per-view (PPV) broadcast, according to MMAFanHouse.com.

Fans will be treated to one hour of uninterrupted mixed martial arts competition when Marcus Davis collides with Ben Saunders in a welterweight showdown and middleweights Kendall Grove and Jake Rosholt mix it up on the UFC 106: “Ortiz vs. Griffin 2” under card at 9 p.m. ET on Nov. 21.

Similar to UFC 103 in Sept. and then UFC 104 in Oct., which both attracted about 1.4 million viewers as the promotion began to test the idea along with its cable television partner, the UFC 106 featured prelim bouts will air commercial-free and possibly showcase additional prerecorded action if time permits.

It will, naturally, lead into the PPV telecast at 10 p.m., which will be available for purchase at $44.95.

UFC 106 features a rematch between former light heavyweight champions, Tito Ortiz and Forrest Griffin, filling the gaping main event void left by Brock Lesnar, who was forced to withdraw from his heavyweight title defense against Shane Carwin because of a serious illness.

Top welterweight contender, Josh Koscheck, will once again step up on relatively short notice to see if the hard-hitting Anthony Johnson belongs among the division’s elite.

To check out the latest UFC 106 fight card click here.

Remember that MMAmania.com will provide LIVE blow-by-blow, round-by-round coverage of UFC 106, beginning with the Spike TV telecast. In addition, we will deliver up-to-the-minute quick results of all the under card action on fight night.

Brock Lesnar? Sick. Lyoto Machida? Hurt. Anderson Silva? Recovering. Georges St. Pierre? Rehabbing. BJ Penn? Busy.

That’s the hand the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) was dealt as it prepares for its traditional blockbuster year-end pay-per-view (PPV) event, which is slated for the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Jan. 2.

So with all its champions unable to headline the card, the promotion today announced that former UFC interim heavyweight champion and mixed martial arts legend, Antonio Rodrigo “Minotauro” Nogueira, would indeed face off against undefeated rising star, Cain Velasquez, in the UFC 108 main event of the evening.

But just because there is no title at stake doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot on the line.

UFC President Dana White explains the significance:

“Nogueira vs. Velasquez is a great matchup between the present and the future of the heavyweight division. Nogueira showed in the Couture fight that he still has plenty left to offer at the top level of the game, and Velasquez was devastating in his win over Ben Rothwell, so with both guys in top form, we’re definitely going to see a number one contender emerge from this fight to take on the winner of the Brock Lesnar vs Shane Carwin title fight.”

UFC 108 was expected to feature a reshuffled main event between ailing heavyweight champion, Brock Lesnar, and number one division contender, Shane Carwin. However, Lesnar is still suffering from a serious illness, mononucleosis, which scrapped the intended main event at UFC 106 on Nov. 21.

As expected, former 205-pound champion, Rashad Evans, will collide with Brazilian slugger, Thiago Silva, in the co-featured fight of the night.

Stay tuned to MMAmania.com for more on UFC 108 as it develops and everything else.

UFC President Dana White thinks Fedor Emelianenko is a fraud. A flabby relic from the mismanaged days of PRIDE that now hides behind the iron curtain, emerging only to fight hand-picked opponents that pose no threat to a self-proclaimed legacy.

In fact, White is so sure that the Russian heavyweight is at the bottom of the divisional rankings that he was willing to write him a blank check after Affliction MMA imploded under the weight of its own spending.

That makes sense.

Imagine how quickly the men in white coats would come to collect you if you walked onto the lot of an auto auction and told the yard barker: “I’ve got a check for five million dollars, please give me the biggest piece of shit on the lot.”

Ever since the fall of PRIDE, there have been a lot of hard feelings between the UFC and Emelianenko’s camp and I suspect a great deal of that has been “The Last Emperor’s,” ability to escape the Zuffa monopoly.

Men with White’s power and ultimately White’s greed are used to getting what they want. What do men in power want? Everything. Yet “those crazy Russians” have balked at every attempt the UFC has made to secure the WAMMA champion as their own.

And why wouldn’t they, especially when M-1 can have a monopoly of their own? As long as Emelianenko keeps winning, Vadim and the Finkelchtein Express can continue cashing in at the expense of other promotions who need an established headliner.

In the world of playground politics we call that “Finders Keepers, Losers Weepers.”

While M-1 and UFC continue to argue over who the bigger A-hole is, fans of mixed martial arts are left with one of the most heated debates in the history of this young sport.

Is the man known as “Fedor” the greatest mixed martial artist of all time?

That, like the asinine “pound-for-pound” ranking system, is impossible to prove with any sort of irrefutable evidence.

I’ve been following Emelianenko since his win over Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at “PRIDE: Shockwave 2004.” I expected him to lose that fight against “Big Nog,” because at the time I didn’t think anyone could overcome “Minotauro’s” incomparable balance of boxing and jiu-jitsu.

And therein lies the problem with trying to qualify the greatness of a fighter such as Emelianenko. Many pundits believe, as Dana White does, that current UFC Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar would smash the M-1 star with relative ease.

It’s certainly within the realm of possibility.

No fighter is invincible. Anderson Silva has put together a string of victories that on paper look like the work of fiction, going 11-0 since that same event in 2004 and stopping ten of those fights by (T)KO or submission.

Yet during the span of his career, “The Spider” was also submitted twice, by fighters that would never be mistaken for title contenders.

Another one of today’s top stars, Georges St. Pierre, has completely re-written the playbook on wrestling defense inside the Octagon. “Rush” seems to grow more dominant with each contest and could be one or two fights away from cleaning out the UFC 170-pound division.

But there was a time when St. Pierre was submitted by Matt Hughes and knocked out by Matt Serra just a few years later. Was the Canadian the far-and-away better fighter than “The Terror” at UFC 69? Of course, but this is what makes mixed martial arts so great.

A lot of people laud the sport for its unpredictability, but I disagree. Because of the nature of combat sports, I believe it is the margin for error — not random chance — that causes so many jaw-dropping upsets.

Randy Couture dodged an oncoming lunchbox in the second round of his fight against Brock Lesnar back at UFC 91 in November of 2008. Unfortunately the tail end of that punch clipped him on the fade-away and crumpled the elder statesman, forcing his heavyweight belt into the arms of the former WWE headliner.

Was it a bookie-busting upset? No, but it was a perfect example of how one small error can end a fight, especially in the new-look heavyweight division, where most of the upcoming fighters can bench-press a Volkswagen.

If I was asked to pick the best fighter currently competing at this present time, it would probably be Anderson Silva, for his amazing run over the past four years and the level of competition he’s faced.

Sure, he had that stinker against Thales Leites at UFC 97, but it’s difficult to fight someone who spends more time on their back than “The Huntington Beach Bad Girl.”

Now if I had to pick the best fighter of all time, my first pick has to be Fedor Emelianenko. Again, I won’t dispute that a fighter exists in the UFC that may have the tools to beat him, but I cannot ignore the body of work this fighter has compiled over the past nine years.

To go 31-1, including 27 straight, is an astounding achievement in the world of professional fighting. Is his record populated with the occasional can or overgrown freak show? Sure, but show me an elite fighter that hasn’t fought a pretender at some point in his career.

Matt Hughes, widely considered one of the most dominant welterweights of all time, crushed so many cans in his career they’ve named a wing after him at the office building of the Environmental Protection Agency.

You can’t excuse Georges St. Pierre and Anderson Silva for losing to lesser competition while simultaneously condemning Fedor Emelianenko for beating it.

After stopping Brett Rogers on November 7 under the Strikeforce banner, Emelianenko received heavy criticism for his performance during the fight — just as he did when he knocked out former UFC Heavyweight Champion Andrei Arlovski at Affliction: “Day of Reckoning.”

He could be the only fighter in history to be so widely panned for a winning performance. When Travis Lutter had Anderson Silva mounted at UFC 67 and began raining down punches, “Spider’s” eventual escape and submission win were heralded as an “amazing comeback.”

Yet when Fedor escaped the mount and ground-and-pound of Brett Rogers last Saturday night, he was “exposed.”

No concessions for “The Grim” outweighing him by fifty pounds, no free pass because it was his first fight inside a cage, just a lot of finger pointing.

Great achievement is the bearer of great expectation, I suppose.

Conversely, the loyal fans of Fedor can sometimes be just as irrational. I try to remain realistic with my belief that a fighter exists who can eventually end his impressive winning streak.

The position Brock Lesnar had against Frank Mir to end their fight at UFC 100 looked about as inescapable as any position I’ve seen. Lesnar has a very good chance of beating Emelianenko — but I don’t think he’s half the fighter that Fedor is.

How does that work?

Lesnar has five professional fights. One of them is to a Korean crab cake named Min Soo Kim, who’s continued to dazzle audiences with his impressive 3-6 record.

Another two have been against the hot-and-cold Frank Mir. One of those ended in a loss. In Lesnar’s defense, he did rebound with a victory over the barely-heavyweight Randy Couture, who cashes his UFC check on the same day of the month that he cashes his social security check.

Lesnar is big, powerful and talented. But in the world of MMA, he’s proven very little. How will he respond when he’s rocked by an A-level striker? Can he escape the submission attempts of a jiu-jitsu black belt?

The one chance he had to prove that he could was at UFC 81, and he failed.

I’ve seen Fedor get rocked and I’ve seen Fedor in submission trouble. I’ve also seen him cough up a round on separate occasions. Yet no matter how precarious the situation, Fedor always finds a way to come back and win.

I can’t say that he would beat any other heavyweight out there because I don’t know that for sure. What I do know is that since getting sliced open by Tsuyoshi Kosaka at Rings: “King of Kings” way back in 2000, Emelianenko has put together one of the greatest runs through any division in all of mixed martial arts.

Some performances were astonishing, some were barely enough to get by. In both instances, he found a way to win. That to me is what the legacy of Fedor Emelianenko is all about: A fighter at the top of his game who continues to win in a sport that allows only the tiniest margin for error.

There will always be individual greatness in the sport of mixed martial arts. It’s just unfortunate that sometimes it requires you to look past your promotional allegiance to see it.

Dan Henderson may still be negotiating a potential contract with the UFC and Strikeforce, but don’t expect hungry middleweight contender Nate Marquardt to wait around for him to make up his mind.

“The Great” is currently considering a 185-pound match-up opposite the surging Chael Sonnen for UFC 110, tentatively scheduled for the Acer Arena in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 21 according to Sportsnet.ca.

UFC 110 is expected to feature International superstars Wanderlei “The Axe Murderer” Silva and Yoshihiro “Sexyama” Akiyama in a hard-hitting 185-pound brawl that pits sexy vs. psycho. Free-falling heavyweight striker Mirko Cro Cop is also rumored as an opponent for former IFLer Ben Rothwell.

More on this upcoming bout in just a bit…

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