Chael Sonnen - still the world's greatest carny!

[Bix]

Anderson out-trolled Chael.

 

"Let's show Chael that all Brazillians have manners!"

[KrisZ]

Maybe now he can challenge Davey Richards in ROH

[jdw]

Maybe Vince can sign him. Would love to read Dave and other creaming for him in the WWE.

 

John

[KrisZ]

Boy what a firestorm today eh. There sure are a lot of fighters coming out in Jones' defense today which should make Dana even angrier.

[Eduardo]

There sure are a lot of fighters coming out in Jones' defense today which should make Dana even angrier.

Other than Benson Henderson, Josh Barnett, Jason High and non-Zuffa fighter Muhammed Lawal, who's come out siding with Jones, publicly? Fighter-wise, it seems most are either upset with Jones or are just bummed out the event was cancelled.

 

Media-wise, you see far more varied response that includes defending Jones, people offering criticism of Dana's reaction, etc.

[KrisZ]

Faber, Ken Stone, Jamie Varner, Nik Lentz. Mackens Semerzier, Diego Brandao were some of the others.

[Eduardo]

Must have missed them and just looked them up right now. Cool, thanks for pointing those out. But is Nik Lentz really defending him? Judging from his twitter, it doesn't appear that he's defending Jones. Seems like he's just sad for the undercard fighters, retweeting Joe Rogan tweets questioning Jones, and joking he would take a fight on 8 days notice against a guy under his weightclass.

 

Btw, the press release by Dana was pretty bad.

[KrisZ]

It's not as much as defending Jones but being on Dana for cancelling the card all together. It's like I posted on DVDVR the chickens have come to roost regarding UFC running too many damn shows since they have no kind of replacement main event.

[BruiserBrody]

Sonnen is training in case Vitor pulls out

[jdw]

After failing twice in title shots at MW, and without a single LHW fight after that to establish himself in the division, our new challenger for Bones is...

 

Chael Sonnen

 

I get the UFC having a sneaky suspicion that the non-contender Forest would be favorite to beat Chael and put Chael further down the line in challenging Bones. I also get business, and feeling the need to strike while the coals may be hot for not only the PPV but also to boost a TUF franchise that is dying a hard death on FX.

 

That doesn't mean I have to like it.

 

John

[Eduardo]

Griffin's looked really awful in the last three years, Griffin wouldn't beat Sonnen in this rematch or be favored in any serious way. Griffin's last fight with Ortiz had Griffin getting rocked and taken down by Ortiz, he still won but looked horrible in that fight.

[jdw]

I don't think Forest looked good against Tito either. But he's a big 205. Chael is a comfortable 185. I don't Chael taking Forest down. I don't see him winning a stand up.

 

Seriously, if UFC thought Chael was an easy favorite in the match, they would have kept it on UFC 155. They need a monster buyrate, and heavyweight title with a good "drawing" semi is a ticket. Chael then could go coach, and then have his match with Bones with even more wind at his back.

[Eduardo]

As you briefly mentioned, UFC wanting to get the ratings up from the abysmal TUF ratings is the obvious reason Sonnen is on TUF. Not because they are worried about Sonnen losing to Griffin, I mean, most in the media thought it was a mismatch as soon as Sonnen-Griffin was announced. If Chael were to fight in late December, he wouldn't be able to coach TUF as they start filming in 2 weeks, and the tapings would end in mid December. Agreed that they do need a good semi for that card to do a good buyrate.

[Dooley]

Noodles is right. Forrest needed a gift decision against a completely shot Tito Ortiz. Being worried about Chael losing to Forrest didn't enter the equation for Zuffa.

 

UFC 155 will do just fine with a heavyweight title fight and Griffin-Bonnar 3 as a co-main.

 

TUF will not only benefit from Chael, but from moving off of Fridays. Despite how tired the TUF format is, the Friday night timeslot was the biggest drain on its numbers.

 

EDIT - Apparently Bonnar turned down the fight and instead we're getting Phil Davis to take out FoGriff, but the point still stands.

[jdw]

If Chael were to fight in late December, he wouldn't be able to coach TUF as they start filming in 2 weeks, and the tapings would end in mid December.

Interesting, since it looks like they're moving up the The Spring TUF from the standard time frame:

 

The Ultimate Fighter 3: April 6, 2006 – June 24, 2006

The Ultimate Fighter 5: April 5, 2007 – June 23, 2007

The Ultimate Fighter: Rampage vs. Forrest: April 2, 2008 – June 21, 2008

The Ultimate Fighter: US vs. UK: April 1, 2009 – June 20, 2009

The Ultimate Fighter: Liddell vs. Ortiz: March 31, 2010 – June 19, 2010

The Ultimate Fighter: Lesnar vs. dos Santos: March 30, 2011 - June 4, 2011

The Ultimate Fighter: Live: March 9, 2012 - June 1, 2012

 

This one starts taping next week, and ends tapings in January.

 

My thought is that if they could have gone in the Live mode (which is a hell of a long time to keep Jones and Sonnen hanging around), Sonnen could have fought Griffin easily and be ready to hop in the house in March (or even Feb if they wanted to move it up a month). Even if they didn't want to go Live, they could have started taping in late January since Jones is ready to tape a month after his fight with Belfort. Start taping in late January... I don't know how they split the taping / editing, and how they re-edit earlier events based on knowledge of what happens later... but if they're less concerned about that and have a split team (people filming and people editing), they certainly could get stuff taped in late January onto the air by late Feb very easily. They did a reasonable job of quickly getting stuff onto the air each week during the Live season.

 

Of course this would have been a problem if Sonnen was announced as a coach and lost to Forest.

 

John

[Ditch]

Chael lost a 'lick my boot' challenge.

 

http://i.imgur.com/dA22vp5.jpg

 

(He said that if Machida beat Henderson, he'd lick Rashad Evans' shoe)

[J.Q. Murder]

Suprised he went through with it, I was sure he'd cut a promo about how Henderson didn't actually lose, was screwed over etc.

[Blehschmidt]

Chael just busted out the Superstar Billy Graham "Man of the hour, man with the power" bit after winning his fight!

[Death From Above]

Wanderlei gets into the act:

 

http://middleeasy.com/fighting/item/11753-..._medium=twitter

 

"I will make you swallow your teeth, you loser."

[kjh]

Chael Sonnen fails random drug test after burying Wanderlei Silva for running away from one: http://www.mmafighting.com/2014/6/10/5797578/chael-sonnen-fails-random-drug-test-pulled-from-vitor-belfort-fight

[Bix]

They tested him again a week later in Oregon. Not only did he test positive for HCG and anastrozole this time, but he also became the first fighter (I'm pretty sure this also includes boxing) to test positive for EPO and HGH. AND his statement indicates he's going to try to spin this as part of his transition off TRT, too.

Awesome.

[Ditch]

Chael is a bigger carny than anyone in pro wrestling today, by miles. The way he spun the initial test failure to try and emerge as a babyface was masterful. That said, I'm skeptical he can work HGH into the "I want to be a dad" narrative.

[KrisZ]

So damn hateable and not in a good way

[pantherwagner]

So damn hateable and not in a good way

 

Not saying that I am a fan, but I disagree. He comes off as a funny, charismatic and likeable guy. Like somebody who you'd like to have a few beers with. That's why he's been able to get away with so much for so long.

 

Even Dana White and Dave Meltzer completely bought into his previous spin, while they would have massacred Vitor, Bigfoot, Barnett or Overeem for exactly the same failure.

[kjh]

He's been able to get away with so much for so long because he's a draw and was a consummate company guy (he'd always be there to take a fight on short notice to save a show).

 

Actually I don't think Dave would have massacred other fighters who had been using TRT for testing positive for HCG and anastrozole, as he's been consistent from day one that quitting cold turkey would be dangerous for their health and they needed medical assistance to get their testosterone levels back to normal.

 

I just hope we can close the book now for anyone who ever doubted that Chael was a drugs cheat.