Mixed martial artist Michael Kirkham, nicknamed “The Tree” due to his 6′9″ frame, died from brain-related injuries after debuing for an event in South Carolina. The news was carried by several different sources, including the Huffington Post:
The Aiken County coroner said Monday that 30-year-old Michael Kirkham died from bleeding inside the brain. Coroner Tim Carlton said Kirkham collapsed following Saturday night’s fight at the USC Aiken Convocation Center.
He added that Kirkham was taken to Aiken Regional Medical Center and never regained consciousness. Carlton said an autopsy will be done Tuesday.
The MMA News sends condolences and prayers for Kirkham’s family and friends. We’ll update this story as more information becomes available.
Take Krzysztof Soszynski’s shirt off and the man looks like a cold blooded killer, but put a microphone in front of the UFC light heavyweight fighter and he’s very respectful and knowledgable about mixed martial arts. Soszynski talks about mentally preparing to fight the same fighter twice, as he gets set to take on TUF 1 finalist Stephan Bonnar at UFC 116 this Saturday.
UFC 116 will feature a main event bout between giant heavyweights Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin and will also feature the return of Sexyama to the ring to take on Chris Leben. The MMA News will carry live complete pre and post coverage of UFC 116: Lesnar Vs. Carwin.
Tired of everyone else playing your copy of UFC Undisputed 2010? Having to go over to your friends place every time you want to play the game? Or maybe your mom got you UFC 2009 Undisputed instead of UFC Undisputed 2010 for your birthday?
Well here’s your chance to win your very own copy on us.
The MMA News will be giving away two copies of THQ’s UFC Undisputed 2010. We have one copy for the Xbox and one copy for the PS3 (which includes the coupon code to unlock TUF 10 fighters Roy “Big Country” Nelson, James McSweeney, Brendan “The Hybrid” Schaub and Marcus Jones).
Were also announcing our official partnership with MMAFans.net who will now host our official forums board.
MMAFans.net is a brand new forum board that provides MMA fans a chance to talk about the latest fights, fight news, as well as a wide range of other subjects.
So help us kick off our partnership with MMAFans.net with a bang by signing up and speaking out on the forum boards.
We’ll be giving away one copy of UFC Undisputed 2010 on our FaceBook page and the other on MMAFans.net. We’ll announce the winners on July 11th 18th.
To enter the draw on FaceBook, simply become a fan of The MMA News, post your favorite fighter and preference for gaming platform (Xbox or PS3) on our discussion board.
Contest notes for The MMA News Facebook page:
- We’ll handle the shipping costs for North America. If anyone wins living outside of NA, you’ll be contacted to discuss shipping and handling.
Contest notes for MMAFans.net:
- Sign up on the forum board and start posting.
- You’ll have to reach a minimum number of posts on the site to qualify and will include everyone who signs up between now and July 17th. They’ll be monitoring for anyone who is just spamming to make the number of posts.
That’s it, good luck everyone and we’ll be including a few extras for the winners which we’ll announce later.
UPDATE: Sorry folks the wrong date was posted as the 11th when it should have been the 18th!!!!
Tonight’s “Strikeforce and M-1 Global: Fedor vs. Werdum” event is already underway with the first preliminary bout of the night.
The show is taking place at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif. with the night’s main card airing on Showtime beginning at 10PM EST (7PM PST). Viewers on the West Coast will get to watch the show on tape delay.
If you don’t have Showtime (and your country isn’t blocked) fans can pay $24.99 and watch the show at home online. You can also catch a round-by-round account of the event, including all of the preliminary bouts, at Sherdog.com.
The event is headlined by a heavyweight bout between Fedor Emelianenko vs. Fabricio Werdum, while the co-main event features a women’s title bout between Women’s Strikeforce Featherweight champ Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos vs. challenger Jay Finney.
As always The MMA News will be keeping the spoilers off the main page, especially with the tape delay on the West Coast. To view the full “Live Quick Results” click
The full results for “Strikeforce and M-1 Global: Fedor vs. Werdum” is as follows:
Main card:
Heavyweight bout: Fabricio Werdum def. Fedor Emelianenko via submission (armbar) – R1, 1:09
Middleweight bout: Cung Le def. Scott Smith via TKO (strikes) – R2, 1:46
Women’s featherweight championship bout: Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos def. Jan Finney via TKO (strikes) – R2, 2:56
Lightweight bout: Josh Thomson def. Pat Healy via submission (rear-naked-choke) – R3, 4:27
Preliminary card:
Middleweight bout: Chris Cope def. Ron Keslar via TKO (punches) – R2, 4:32
Welterweight bout: Bret Bergmark def. Vagner Rocha via unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 30-26)
Middleweight bout: Yancy Medeiros def. Gareth Joseph via KO (punch) – R2, 1:19
Welterweight bout: Bobby Stack def. Derrick Burnsed via split decision (29-28, 29-28, 27-30)
Great video with lots of insight into the career of Fabricio Werdum and the family stuff shows what kind of character the ace Jiu-jitsu fighter has. Fabricio Werdum will take on his biggest challenge when he faces off against world number one heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko as the main event bout of the upcoming Strikeforce promotion June 26 Showtime fights. The MMA News can`t wait for this fight.
Strikeforce promotions heavyweight fighter Fabricio Werdum is ready to take his place as the best in the world as he prepares for his upcoming bout on June 26 against heavyweight legend Fedor Emelianenko. Whether you like Affliction or not, the stylish videos they produce certainly hype the fight well. Werdum looks ready, and The MMA News is ready to report it as it goes down.
Coming off a career revitilizing win at The Ultimate Fighter Finale 11 over Aaron Simpson and taking home KO of the night bonus honors, UFC middleweight Chris Leben is stepping into the gap left by the injured Wanderlei Silva and will fight Yoshihiro Akiyama at UFC 116. Leben will have basically two weeks to prepare, but should still be in fight condition for Akiyama who should be a solid test, though Leben doesn’t seem to think so. Leben recently talked to FiveKnuckles.com about his upcoming fight, and he doesn’t seem too worried:
“I don’t know a ton about Akiyama. My coach knows a bunch, but we haven’t even had a chance to talk much about our game plan. I saw him fight Alan Belcher and to be honest with you, I thought he lost that fight. He’s a good Judo guy, he’s got great Judo, fast kicks, maybe not the most power in the world. He’s a little bit shorter than me but he’s a good strong guy. I think that utilizing my skills, keeping it on the feet and clubbing him in the head with my left shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”
UFC 116 is set for July 3 and will feature a collossal heavyweight matchup between champions Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin. While the star power has dropped with the loss of The Axe Murderer the card still looks to be quite entertaining and The MMA News will carry complete coverage of UFC 116.
Strikeforce Heavyweight Champion Alistair Overeem has been the subject of many speculations, including drug use and whether he will fight top heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko. Regardless of any distractions, Overeem has shown that he is a top heavyweight fighter and that he will could easily be considered in the top five heavyweights in the world. Overeem looks to face Fedor if The Last Emperor can get past the jiu-jitsu ace which seems to be in the cards, according to Overeem himself in a recent interview with Fightline.com:
Werdum is a good fighter but stylistically Fedor will match up great against Werdum. I don’t see Fedor getting submitted by Werdum and in the striking department he will have the edge. So I think Fedor will win, but Fedor didn’t look that good in his last two fights so you never know, a fight is a fight.
In the interview Overeem also talks about Brock Lesnar and how Strikeforce’s heavyweight roster stacks up with the UFC. Well worth the read. Strikeforce: Fedor vs. Werdum takes place this Saturday night and The MMA News will carry complete pre and post coverage as well as live coverage of the event.
The extended preview of the UFC 116 certainly gets the point across, as if you didn’t know, that these two fighters are huge and ultra powerful. UFC 116 takes place on July 3rd, and The MMA News can’t wait to see these two duke it out.
UFC middleweight Wanderlei Silva has injured his ribs and will not be competing at UFC 116 where he was originally scheduled to take on Yoshihiro Akiyama. Instead Chris Leben has stepped in on extremely short notice and will look to continue to write his comback story which started at The Ultimate Finale 11 where he took out Aaron Simpson. Sexyama, however, is a very good test for any fighter let alone one who will be fighting again so soon.
Akiyama hasn’t fought since UFC 100 where he gained the decision victory over Alan Belcher, increasing his current win streak to 11. While Leben has agreed to fight, the official signing has not yet taken place. The MMA News will update this story as news comes out.
UFC 116 features a main event bout between heavyweight champions Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin which will truly be the battle of the big men, and will also feature a rematch between Stephan Bonna and Krzysztof Soszynski.
