MMA NEWS
**The UFC 252 prelims from this past Saturday night did 831,000 viewers on ESPN. They were #1 for the night on cable with adults 18-49 with a 0.29 in the demo. The UFC prelims were also #1 on cable with males 18-49, males 12-34, adults 25-54, and tied for second with adults 18-34. The prelims were headlined by Vinc Pichel vs. Jim Miller with ESPN’s prelim coverage beginning at 7 pm Eastern and running until 10 pm when the pay-per-view began. For comparison, the UFC 251 prelims last month did 809,000 viewers and a 0.31 in the 18-49 demo featuring Jiri Prochazka vs. Volkan Oezdemir.
**ESPN is reporting that former middleweight champion Anderson Silva is set to fight Uriah Hall on the Fight Night event scheduled for Saturday, October 31st. Hall had been scheduled to fight Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Yoel Romero this year with both fights canceled. The fight with Romero was set for August 22nd until Romero had to withdraw recently. Silva is 45 years old and has one win since lost the middleweight title to Chris Weidman in 2013. In 2019, Silva was defeated by Israel Adesanya by unanimous decision and was stopped by Jared Cannonier in May 2019, which was the last time he fought. Hall is 36 and has been with the UFC for seven years winning three of his last four fights. Hall’s last fight was a split decision win against Antonio Carlos Junior last September at UFC 242.
**After Tuesday’s Contender Series, Dana White said this upcoming fight for Silva would be his last one before retiring.
**Ariel Helwani of ESPN reports that Bellator is planning to run back-to-back nights at the Mohegan Sun Arena on Friday, September 11th and Saturday, September 12th. Helwani reports the first night will feature a rematch between Lyoto Machida and Phil Davis and Cat Zingano’s promotional debut against Gabby Holloway. The second night would feature Juan Archuleta vs. Patrick Mix for the bantamweight title, which Brett Okamoto reported first, as well as Jon Fitch vs. Neiman Gracie, Liz Carmouche vs. DeAnna Bennett, and Roger Huerta vs. Derek Campos.
**A featherweight fight between Brian Ortega and Chan Sung Jung is reportedly set for October 17th. The fight was first reported by Milenio.com and confirmed by Brett Okamoto of ESPN. Ortega (14-1, 1 NC) has not fought since December 2018 when he was stopped by then-featherweight champion Max Holloway in a brutal fight at UFC 231 that was stopped by the doctor. It was the first loss of Ortega’s career. Jung had a pair of TKO victories in 2019 against Renato Moicano and Frankie Edgar and would be primed for a title fight if he beats Ortega. The two were initially set to fight last December but Ortega sustained a knee injury and the fight was off.
**ESPN reported that Mauricio “Shogun” Rua and Paul Craig will have a rematch at UFC 255 on November 21st. The two fought to a split draw last November. Rua (27-11-1) has gone 5-1-1 since 2015 and is coming off a split decision win against Antonio Rogerio Nogueira in July. Craig (13-4-1) submitted Gadzhimurad Antigulov last month on the same card where Rua beat Nogueira.
**A heavyweight fight between Derrick Lewis and Curtis Blaydes will headline the UFC Fight Night event on November 28th. It is hard to predict what this fight will do for the winner given the uncertainty of the heavyweight division if you assume Jon Jones could be entering the division and potentially leapfrog several contenders. Lewis (24-7, 1 NC) has won his last three fights against Blagoy Ivanov, Ilir Latifi, and Aleksei Oleinik. Lewis had said he wanted to drop some weight following the win against Oleinik and was targeting a return for December when asked that night. For Blaydes (14-2, 1 NC), he has two losses to Francis Ngannou and therefore, would seem better positioned if Ngannou didn’t win the title. Since his second loss to Ngannou in November 2018, he’s won four straight against Justin Willis, Shamil Abdurakhimov, Junior dos Santos, and Alexander Volkov.
**The UFC has confirmed several more fights for the UFC 253 pay-per-view on September 26th and below is the current line-up of fights:
*Israel Adesanya vs. Paulo Costa for the UFC middleweight title
*Dominick Reyes vs. Jan Blachowicz for the vacant light heavyweight title
*Claudia Gadelha vs. Yan Xiaonan
*Diego Sanchez vs. Jake Matthews
*Randa Markos vs. Mackenzie Dern
*Shamil Abdurakhimov vs. Ciryl Gane
*Hakeem Dawodu vs. Zubaira Tukhugov
*Kai-Kara France vs. Brandon Royval
*Brad Riddell vs. Alex da Silva
*Shane Young vs. Nate Landwehr
*Jordan Espinosa vs. David Dvorak
*Casey Kenney vs. Heili Alateng
**Damon Martin at MMA Fighting has confirmed that Carlos Condit will fight Court McGee on October 3rd at the UFC Fight Night event, which is headlined by Holly Holm vs. Irene Aldana.
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BONUS SHOW 8/19/20: Renee Young-WWE, NXT Media Call, Raw Ratings
John Pollock and Wai Ting present a special bonus show going over the news of the day including Renee Young’s pending departure from WWE, Paul Levesque’s call with the media, the latest on Sonya Deville & this week’s Raw ratings.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/08/19/bonus-show-8-19-20-renee-young-wwe-nxt-media-call-raw-ratings/
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REWIND-A-WAI #68: WWF Royal Rumble 2001 (Patreon)
John Pollock and Wai Ting review WWF Royal Rumble 2001 featuring a 30-Man Royal Rumble, Kurt Angle vs. Triple H for the WWF title, and Chris Benoit vs. Chris Jericho in an IC title ladder match.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/40609329
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REWIND-A-RAW 8/17/20: HB-Kicked, WWE ThunderDome, Sonya Deville
John Pollock and Wai Ting discuss the go-home edition of WWE Raw leading into SummerSlam. Plus, the WWE ThunderDome, Jon Jones vacates the light heavyweight title, and lots of other news.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/08/18/rewind-a-raw-8-17-20-hb-kicked-wwe-thunderdome-sonya-deville/
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UFC 252 POST SHOW: Miocic vs. Cormier 3
John Pollock is joined by Phil Chertok to review UFC 252 from Las Vegas featuring Stipe Miocic retaining the UFC heavyweight title against Daniel Cormier.
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/08/16/ufc-252-post-show-stipe-miocic-vs-daniel-cormier-iii/
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TRMPS #20: “Ballers” Pilot (2015) w/ Stephen Gutteridge & MJ from NJ
This month on The Rocky Maivia Picture Show, Nate Milton welcomes first-time guests Stephen Gutteridge (Mid-South Moments) & MJ From NJ into the theater to review the 2015 pilot episode for HBO’s “Ballers”!
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/08/15/trmps-20-ballers-pilot-2015-w-stephen-gutteridge-mj-from-nj/
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REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN 8/14/20: Strowman’s Land, WWE at Amway Center
John Pollock and Wai Ting chat Friday Night SmackDown and WWE’s pending move to the Amway Center, AEW & NXT’s ratings from Wednesday, UFC 252 & your phone calls.
https://www.patreon.com/posts/40476275
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upNXT MOVIE REVIEW: Money Plane (2020)
Braden Herrington is joined by friend of the show John Siino to chat all about WWE’s Edge and Kelsey Grammer starring in a ridiculous new action movie: Money Plane!
https://www.postwrestling.com/2020/08/13/upnxt-movie-review-money-plane-2020-starring-edge-kelsey-grammer/
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