The main take away I received after watching my first live MMA show is that San Jose, CA loves their MMA.

And San Jose, CA is the place where Frank Shamrock calls home. The former Pancrease/UFC veteran, who at 34 years old is not a spring chicken by any means in today’s MMA scene, backed up his words and dismantled a very game Phil Baroni in the main event of the show.

Shamrock is a great marketer and in this case, he had use all his marketing savvy because the San Jose based Strikeforce promotion doesn’t have any television to promote their events. The Judgment Day show was a combined event with Strikeforce and EliteXC, which is co-owned by Showtime, enabling it to be on Pay-Per-View. Shamrock chose to fight Baroni with the intention that Phil could talk and they could create quite the buzz for the event. Phil did his part as both men threw a barrage of threats and taunts at each other, drawing nearly 10,000 fans for the fight.

With much pomp and circumstance, Shamrock and Baroni could’ve failed inside the cage and the show would’ve still been good, but that wasn’t the case. They had a fantastic fight. Baroni entered the cage dressed like Ric Flair in a sequined robe, except Baroni’s didn’t have any sleeves, allowing his ripped arms to be seen. And he didn’t just walk down the aisle. He came out with sunglasses and danced down to the cage and while this was Frank Shamrock’s house, no one could boo a man with that kind of ring entrance. Ring announcer Jimmy Lennon Jr. called Frank Shamrock, “The Legend”. And the legend arrived in a San Jose Sharks jersey to the sounds of the late Notorious BIG’s Hypnotize. The already loud crowd went crazy and was much louder than any other loud crowd I’ve ever heard in the building. I’ve watched basketball and hockey games at the “Shark Tank” and even watched Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock in the late 90’s when wrestling was at its peak, and nothing touched Frank Shamrock’s entrance from a crowd perspective.
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News and notes from around the MMA world …

- It looks like Ken Shamrock will not be Michael Bisping’s opponent at UFC 75. According to the UFC website, Bisping vs. Matt Hamill is set.

- Tonight’s Strikeforce show in San Jose, CA (in which I will be attending and will have a live report of over the weekend) received two major scares a couple of days ago but all has been resolved. Phil Baroni and Murilo Rua will be able to fight now as their medicals have been approved.

- According to Sherdog.com, rising light heavyweight star Sokoudjou has agreed to terms with EliteXC.

- CBS Sportsline has interviews with Jens Pulver on his upcoming battle with B.J. Penn Saturday night, Phil Baroni and Cung Le, both talking about their fights tonight in San Jose.

Talking Points

As I stated above, I will be attending tonight’s Strikeforce show in San Jose. I hope to have photos from the event and will have a live report up, possibly by this weekend. The main event is a grudge match between Phil Baroni and Frank Shamrock. Most people see the fight as heavily favored for Baroni in the early rounds with it swinging to Shamrock’s advantage midway through. Michael Coughlin of Figure4Online sees Frank Shamrock winning by TKO in the 3rd round. If I were to predict an ending, it’d probably be very similar, with Shamrock strategically making Baroni work hard for two rounds until he tires and then looking to take advantage of a tired Baroni to end it.

Here is the rest of the line-up for tonight’s card courtesy of Figure4Online.

Main Event

Strikeforce World Middleweight (185 pound limit) Championship Bout:
Frank Shamrock vs. “The New York Badass” Phil Baroni – 5 x 5 Rounds

EliteXC World Middleweight (185 pound limit) Championship Bout:
Joey “The Dream Smasher” Villasenor vs. Murilo “Ninja” Rua – 5 x 5 Rounds

Additional Pay Per View Bouts:

Cung Le vs. Tony “The Freak” Fryklund (185 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Carter “The Beast” Williams vs. Paul Buentello – (heavyweight limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Victor “Joe Boxer” Valenzuela vs. Edson Berto – (155 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds

Pay Per View “Swing” Bouts:

Josh “The Punk” Thomson vs. Nick “The Ghost” Gonzalez – (155 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Duane “Bang” Ludwig vs. Paul “Semtex” Daley – (170 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds

Preliminary Card – Live Broadcast on ProElite.com:

Rex Richards vs. Steve Jester – (superheavyweight – + 265 pounds) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Seth Kleinbeck vs. Sam Spengler – (185 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Anthony Figueroa vs. Chris Cariaso – (135 pound limit) – 3 x 3 Rounds
Jason “Live Wire” Von Flue vs. Luke Stewart – (175 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds
Aaron Wetherspoon vs. Mike “Quicksand” Pyle – (170 pound limit) – 3 x 5 Rounds

If tonight’s show wasn’t enough, UFC has their Ultimate Fighter: Ultimate Finale Live show tomorrow night. The main event of the show is a grudge match between B.J. Penn and Jens Pulver. Penn wants to avenge an earlier loss to Pulver in 2002 at UFC 35. Penn was the heavy favorite even though Jens was the lightweight champion at the time. On the SpikeTV special, Bad Blood: B.J. Penn vs. Jens Pulver, Joe Rogan and Randy Couture both said that they thought Penn would win, but Rogan said he wouldn’t put it past Pulver to pull it out. The show was a nice recap of their feud which was built up throughout season five of The Ultimate Fighter. SpikeTV has one more showing of the special at midnight tonight or you can watch it on UFC.com. I think Penn will win the fight as he looks to be in good shape, but the better story is if Pulver pulls it out.

The other big fight on that card is the finals of The Ultimate Fighter between Nate Diaz and Manny Gamburyan. Diaz has the long reach advantage over the shorter Gamburyan. He should be able to out box him as well as out work him on the ground. But Gamburyan has that pit bull instinct and he never stops working and moving forward. It’s a great mix of styles and both guys should get their chances in the lightweight division no matter the outcome of the fight. I have Diaz winning a unanimous decision. You can see the entire card here.

News and notes from around the MMA world …

- In an argument that we’re going to see probably until the end of time, ESPN.com goes 12 rounds with writers Tim Struby and Ryan Hockensmith. Someone please send Tim Struby a tape of Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar I or even the fight last weekend between Tyson Griffin and Clay Guida.

- Two days ago, The Fight Network’s Brian Knapp reported through Loretta Hunt that Ken Shamrock could possibly come out of retirement to face new young star Michael Bisping on the undercard of UFC 75. The scheduled main event for that card is a showdown between UFC Light Heavyweight champ Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Pride Middleweight and Welterweight champ Dan Henderson. However, just yesterday, Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer reported that while the match between Shamrock and Bisping has been discussed, the scheduled match at this time is still between Matt Hamill and Michael Bisping.

- Sports Illustrated’s Todd Martin has quotes from both Manny Gamburyan and Nate Diaz about their match-up Saturday night in the finals of the latest The Ultimate Fighter.

- Manny Gamburyan also chatted with Sam Caplan from CBS Sportsline about his experience on The Ultimate Fighter including what Gabe Ruediger was really like on the show.

Talking Points

There’s a lot of fan discussion about who really won the fight between Tyson Griffin and Clay Guida at last Saturday’s UFC show from Belfast, Ireland. I scored it for Griffin simply because I thought he scored more from being on the bottom than Guida did from being on the top in the third and deciding round. However, it seems that the majority of fans (including those in Belfast) thought Guida won, which is entirely possible. Those in the Guida camp believe that he not only won the second round (which I also had him winning), but that by being on top, he dominated the third round. I’m not sure it was robbery, though both Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez from Figure 4 Online thought Guida won definitively. I’m fine with the fight going either way, but I may have to watch it again to see how I’d score it a second time. It’s not like watching that great fight again would be a chore.

I will be attending Strike Force’s first Pay Per View event on Friday night in San Jose, CA. The fight between Frank Shamrock and Phil Baroni has been built up for many months and is sure to be a big ticket seller in the Bay Area. I will have a live report and hopefully some photos from the event. I’ll also have more on the fight and the event itself in the next couple of days.