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I hate how they call them "rival coaches"
via mmajunkie
The ninth season of "The Ultimate Fighter," which premieres on April 1 on e TV, will feature a unique twist.
While the concept will continue to be two teams of fighters competing against each other while coached by a high-profile UFC fighter, producers made one significant change. This time, there are 16 fighters (eight welterweight and eight lightweight) representing the United Kingdom who are fighting against 16 from the U.S.
"In all the past seasons of the show, we had these little cliques form and everyone developed a strong team iden y," UFC President Dana White said. "But this season, it's crazy. With country versus country, the whole team thing goes crazy. It's wild."
Here is a look at the 32 cast members who will compete on the show. The survivors in each weight class will meet to be declared "The Ultimate Fighter" in the live finale June 20 in Las Vegas.
U.S. welterweights
1. Ryan Biglar (2-1): Biglar, 24, is a jiu-jitsu fighter originally from Guam who represents the Cobra Kai in Las Vegas.
2. Ray Elbe (20-11): A Muay Thai fighter, the 25-year-old Elbe has spent the last three years working on his game in Phuket, Thailand. The most notable man he's faced was Renato Verissimo, who knocked him out in 2003.
3. Christian Fulgium (6-2-1): A wrestler, Fulgium represents the Gladiator camp in Lafayette, La.
4. DaMarques Johnson (13-6): Johnson took up MMA training while in the military. Training out of Elite Performance in Salt Lake City, Johnson once faced former World Extreme Cagefighting welterweight champion Brock Larson, who submitted him in a 2005 bout.
5. Kevin Knabjian (10-3-1): A wrester from Eastern Illinois University, the same school that produced UFC star Matt Hughes, the one-time WEC fighter trains at Gilbert Grappling in Chicago.
6. Mark Miller (10-4): A Muay Thai fighter also based in Chicago, Miller trains at Dino Costeas MMA and Toro Muay Thai.
7. Jason Pierce (9-0): A one-time collegiate soccer player, Pierce trains with the vaunted Miletich Fighting Systems camp in Bettendorf, Iowa.
8. Kiel Reid (8-1): A native of Bettendorf, Reid also trains with Miletich, whose experience includes a 2004 fight against UFC veteran Luigi Fiorvanti.
U.S. lightweights
1. Paul Bird (4-1): A striker, Bird trains at Des Moines (Iowa) MMA. He has fought in the Midwest Cage Championships promotion.
2. Santino DeFranco (13-4): A wrestler and jiu-jitsu specialist, DeFranco has experienced fighting in the now-defunct International Fight League. He also helped coach Efrain Escudero, the TUF 8 winner.
3. Jason Dent (19-9): A submission specialist, Dent runs his own gym in Mentor, Ohio, at Griffon Brawl. He is a UFC veteran who has losses to Roger Huerta and Gleison Tibau.
4. Cameron Dollar (4-1): Dollar trains in Colorado Springs, Colo., and is a former teammate of TUF alums Cory Hill and Noah Thomas.
5. Tom Hayden (4-0): A submission fighter, Hayden is trained by popular UFC veteran Jorge Gurgel in West Chester, Ohio.
6. Waylon Lowe (5-2): Lowe, 28, also fights for Gurgel.
7. Josh Souder (7-2): A member of Team Prodigy, Souder has faced castmate Jason Dent in 2005, losing by TKO.
8. Richie Whitson (4-0): A native Alaskan who trains with Team Quest in Temecula, Calif., Whitson is a heavy-handed striker.
U.K. welterweights
1. Dean Amarasinghe (4-1): A grappler from Nottingham, England, Amarasinghe trains at Rough House Gym.
2. James Bateman (2-1): A striker, Bateman trains at Grimsby NHB in Grimsby, England.
3. David Faulkner (2-1): A member of the Wolfslair team that features U.K. coach Michael Bisping and UFC star Quinton Jackson, Faulkner is a submissions expert.
4. Tommy Maguire (5-2): The 20-year-old Maguire is a striker who works with the Tsunami Gym in Wisbech, England.
5. Che Mills (7-2): A tall welterweight at 6-foot-2, Mills works with ex-UFC fighter Mark Weir's Range Fighting Gym.
6. Nicholas Osipczak (3-0): Osipczak trains in London with Pancrase UK. He's finished all of his fights in the first round.
7. Alex Reid (10-9-1): Reid, 33, trains in London with the London Shoot Fighters. He's faced notable opponents such as Murilo Rua, Tony Fryklund, Dave Menne and Jorge Rivera.
8. James Wilks (5-2): Trained by veteran Eric Paulson in Orange County, Calif., the 30-year-old Wilks is a striker.
U.K. lightweights
1. James Bryan (3-1): A striker, Bryan, 25, is from Somerset, England.
2. Dan James (3-0): A striker from Swansea, Wales, he's finished two of his three pro bouts.
3. Gary Kelly (2-1): A striker, the 25-year-old Kelly trains alongside Bisping and Jackson at Wolfslair in Liverpool, England.
4. Jeff Lawson (13-2): A submission fighter with 12 finishes, Lawson trains with Team Bulldog in Dorset, England.
5. Ross Pearson (9-3): A striker, Pearson trains at Sunderland Jiu-Jitsu & MMA Club in Sunderland, England.
6. Martin Stapleton (5-1): A Muay Thai fighter, Stapleton is a product of Quannum Combat Arts.
7. A.J. Wenn (7-2): A well-rounded fighter from the Tsunami Gym, Wenn is from Cambs, England.
8. Andre Winner (9-2-1): Winner is a member of the Rough House team in London and is coming off a loss and a draw in his two fights prior to appearing on the show.
U.S. coach Dan Henderson: A two-time Olympic wrestler, Henderson is the only man to have simultaneously held two weight-class championships in PRIDE. He was the organization's light heavyweight and middleweight champion and is one of the top fighters in the UFC.
U.K. coach Michael Bisping: Bisping was the light heavyweight winner on Season 3 of "The Ultimate Fighter." He has gone on to become one of the world's top middleweights. His only loss was a disputed decision to current UFC light heavyweight champion Rashad Evans.
I hate how they call them "rival coaches"
Dan doesn't give a flying f*ck about Bisping
team usa...
team U.K.
wait...where is Jonie's brother...uh oh
ok I just read a bunch of crap that says what people think happened to him...its all so random and all of it could make sense.
hype
hype
hype
U.K. coach Michael Bisping: Bisping was the light heavyweight winner on Season 3 of "The Ultimate Fighter." [U]He has gone on to become one of the world's top middleweights. His only loss was a disputed decision to current UFC light heavyweight champion Rashad Evans[/U].
And the ass kicking Hamill gave him, followed by one of the worst decisions in UFC history..
I miss Ross.
Bring da pain!!!
Good article from Sherdog's Jake Rossen. I have to agree with it.
Enough ‘TUF’
Monday, March 30, 2009
by Jake Rossen ([email protected])
Schedule the ninth season premiere of e’s “Ultimate Fighter” franchise on April 1 -- April Fools’ Day -- and you’ve got me half-believing someone at that network is pretty self-aware.
Few dates could be more appropriate to unspool another cast of devolved tough guys with the collective maturity of a fraternity. Fans like to crow about MMA athletes being more educated than their boxing counterparts, the latter of whom frequently fight their way out of lower class or literal imprisonment with minimal book learnin’. And for the most part, that’s true. But you’d never know it by watching this series, which resembles a MENSA meeting only if there’s something enlightening about peeing in someone’s lunch that escapes my understanding.
I’ll watch, of course. It’s ultimate hypocrisy, and I’ll cop to it. If nothing else, the show -- which locks 16 men in a house with minimal distraction, not unlike some kind of sadistic ‘60s psychology experiment -- has proven itself to be a solid platform for discovering new talent. (Alums Rashad Evans, Michael Bisping and Forrest Griffin overcame early derision at being reality TV bums and went on to impressive UFC records.) And it’s only gotten tougher with age, making demands that fighters enter the house with pro records and/or win a bout before even stepping foot inside.
Unfortunately, that substance is frequently lost in the lurid conventions of reality exploitation, a genre of entertainment that has solidified my pessimism in humanity -- a leaning first explored by the incredible success of Adam Sandler movies. With little to do between fights and training (no books or television allowed), cast mates usually turn to alcohol poisoning and throwing lawn furniture into the pool as a means of unwinding. Vomiting seems to be a bonding experience.
I haven’t seen the newest crop of episodes, but I’m fairly confident we can look forward to the following:
Fighters will need less than 90 seconds to locate the stash of alcohol in the house.
Subsequently, fighters will need less than one hour to recreate key scenes from “Caligula.”
Eighteen seasons of “The Real World” will convince one or more athletes that the most expedient way to s om in the sport is to create an irrational, functionally psychotic persona that antagonizes both housemates and viewers. (See: Browning, Junie.)
Someone will urinate on someone else.
Someone will figure what the living room really needs is a hole in the drywall the size of a head.
Dana White will enter any room he’s in with the understanding he’s to audition for a Quentin Tarantino film.
I’m not sure what’s more troubling: that the juvenile hall antics sell the show, or that the show has yet to evolve beyond them. With several more seasons contracted, “TUF” risks a greater sin by simply becoming repe ive and stilted. Even the primal humor in “Jackass” grows stale after a few seasons. (You’ve seen one staple gun to the testicles, you’ve seen them all.)
Even more unsettling: to think that the real paradigm shift in this sport’s young history was the conceit of showing fighters one step from hurling feces at each other like monkeys -- that this perversion of sportsmanship is what it took for a mass audience to take notice of an otherwise complex and beautiful thing. MMA was apparently beyond anyone’s interest until its participants began peeing on pillows for basic cable.
Was this really the secret saving grace of combat sports? Does our culture really need actual, literal poo to fertilize a sprouting athletic event? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t recall any footage of Muhammad Ali taking a dump in an opponent’s toilet tank.
There was a time when I was puffed with pride at being a spectator of this sport. Watching “The Ultimate Fighter” is something I prefer to keep to myself.
For comments, e-mail [email protected]
Nice find Des and i don't disagree with most of that. I like TUF, i watch every season but the show doesn't do much to sway the haters of MMA over, when they see how some of these guys act in that house. Obviously the UFC knows full well what they are doing. Put these guys together, lock them up for 6 weeks, no TV, no Cell phone, no contact with anyone allowed. All they really have to get bye in that house is a pool table, a swimming pool and lots and lots of liquor.. Give them contact with the outside world and moree forms of entertainment you'll likely have a show, with little to no drama. Guys just getting their rest and going to train and fight everyday.. TUF has done a lot for the sport, in terms of growing it and big names have come off the show but it certainly has some bad that goes along with all the good it has done..
Im a gladiataa
Did you catch any of the season 3 marathon??
Ross was even worse than i remember as a fighter..
I saw that it was showing but I didnt get to watch. Yeah he was pretty bad.
I freaking love this show fo sho.
thats a cool twist. cant wait until it starts up again.
this will be the best TUF eva
TUF 9 Finale = Awesome
* Clay Guida vs. Diego Sanchez
* Lightweight finalist No. 1 vs. No. 2
* Welterweight finalist No. 1 vs. No. 2
* Nate Diaz vs. Joe Stevenson
* Matt Brown vs. Anthony Johnson
* Kevin Burns vs. Chris Lytle
* Brad Blackburn vs. Edgar Garcia
Ahh Damn they are sticking Lytle on the Undercard, i love that guy. A total warrior..
UK will get killed during this...not that I care too much about country vs country
and DAMN you Time Warner for not showing e in HD
Yeah I know its one of my few shows that I dvr that isnt on HD now. I want fx and e on HD and I think I got all my shows on HD.
Whats good on FX? I tend to forget that channel exists.
No ! I had to watch at 110" last night...non-HD doesn't look good at the full 132"
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