Nick Palmisciano, one of the founders of Ranger Up Clothing, has been kind enough to provide us with an inside look at what it’s like to be in the corner of a UFC fighter for the first time. Nick details his experiences cornering Dan Barrera at the TUF 6 Finale a couple of weeks back from pre-fight activities all the way to post-fight party. Nick’s retelling of some of the stories from that night are incredible and we can’t thank him enough for providing us with this piece. We know it’s something you’ll definitely enjoy…

A UFC Virgin No Longer

by Nick Palmisciano

You can hear the rumble from the crowd as we descend the multiple flights of stairs of the Palms Resort and Casino that lead directly to the ring. Ben Saunders and his boys from American Top Team are in front of us only a few paces away. Marty (SSG Martinez) is the buffer between their camp and ours as Jason and I follow closely behind Dan Barrera. We finally emerge from the staircase into a long narrow hallway where the final four fights are staged.The ground is shaking. Bruce Buffer’s voice is echoing in the background as he announces the beginning of the UFC TUF 6 Finale. We are fixated at the opening that leads to the Octagon. Suddenly Mac Danzig, soon to become The Ultimate Fighter, leaps from his waiting room to slap Dan on the back hard and get him fired up. Mac grabs Dan by the back of the head and tells him to go all out. Dan nods and smacks Mac on the shoulders.

Saunders is already in the ring. The UFC escort gives us the nod to go and we step forward into the lights…

Only one week ago, if you had asked me if I thought I would ever corner anyone in the UFC, I would have said absolutely not. Have I cornered guys before? Yes. Have I been involved in fighting since I was eleven? Yes. Am I one of the top thousand guys you’d think of when you were choosing your corner for the highest level of professional MMA? Not a chance. So when Dan Barrera called me and asked if I would join Jason “Blind Fury” Keaton, the Fort Knox Army Combatives Instructor and owner of Cyclone MMA, and SSG Aaron “Marty” Martinez as his corner, I was a little taken aback. I actually asked him if there was someone else that might be better for him. Dan replied that a lot of people wanted to corner him, but that he wanted the guys that really got him there to be with him when it all went down. I was really honored that he asked, and when it became clear that his mind was made up, I set about trying to live up to his expectations.

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Spike TV issued a press release on Tuesday afternoon to call attention to the ratings for Saturday’s telecast of the live season finale for the sixth season on The Ultimate Fighter.

And the ratings are solid.

The average rating for the three hour telecast was a 1.8 (1.7 million viewers) with a 2.7 rating (769,000) with males between the ages of 18-34, a 2.8 rating (471,00) with males between the ages of 25-34, and a 2.2 rating (1.2 million) with males between the ages of 18-49.

Spike is touting in the release that the telecast “delivered” a total of 2.5 million viewers.

It’s interesting to note that the telecast peaked at 11:30 p.m. ET during the main event between Roger Huerta and Clay Guida with a total of 2.9 million viewers.  That’s pretty impressive when you consider that the Floyd Mayweather vs. Ricky Hatton PPV had already started by that time and that there was stiff competition on basic cable at that time with A&E showing “The Matrix” and TNT airing “Gladiator.”

Based on these results, I don’t think the UFC will ever hesitate to go head-to-head with boxing no matter how big the main event is.

First things first, last night’s finale was simply awesome. The fights between Jon Koppenhaver vs. Jared Rollins and Clay Guida vs. Roger Huerta were so good they could have carried a show by themselves. But to get two matches like that on the same card is simply amazing. I hope Dana White is in the Christmas spirit and gives all four guys a $40,000 match of the night bonus.

Now, let’s break the show down from a overly-analytical perspective.

Is it just me or did last night’s telecast go longer than usual and contain even more commercials than normal?

The commercials nearly killed me. Really, I could not stop bitching about them. They had too many breaks that lasted too long. It’s like this for every live UFC telecast on Spike but I felt last night was especially bad. Maybe there’s no change and it just felt that way?

Or, because Spike is paying the UFC more for its content they have to squeeze more ads in to help offset costs?

Whatever the situation is, without awesome fights between Koppenhaver vs. Rollins and Guida vs. Huerta, the pacing of the show would have killed almost any enjoyment for me.

The pacing on pay-per-views is usually slower than a lot of shows but I’m okay with that. The pacing on Spike TV fight cards is usually a little better but it just seemed to take forever to go from match to match.

I kind of get the feeling that Spike and the UFC wanted to stretch the show out because they wanted to cut into the Floyd Mayweather vs. Ricky Hatton fight as much as possible. I’m not complaining, as I like seeing more matches and I think it’s smart business to show as many of the TUF guys officially fighting for the UFC as possible.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE REMAINDER OF SAM CAPLAN’S BREAKDOWN OF THE TUF 6 FINALE (INCLUDING HIS MATCH-BY-MATCH BREAKDOWN, WHETHER HE STILL FEELS ROGER HUERTA IS OVERRATED, THE LONG-TERM PROSPECTS OF EACH TUF CONTESTANT, HIS ANALYSIS OF KENNY FLORIAN’S DEBUT, AND MUCH MORE ON HIS PROELITE.COM BLOG

Is this sport fun to watch or what? This card delivered big time and showed why mixed martial artists are some of the best athletes in the world and why the sport itself is so fun to watch. The UFC couldn’t have asked for a more entertaining card on basic cable. The only thing that could have been better for them was if Mac Danzig and Tommy Speer would have fought a bit longer but I think that fight went as expected. The fight between Jon Koppenhaver and Jared Rollins and the main event involving Clay Guida and Roger Huerta were among some of the most entertaining fights this year. We even got to see six fights in their entirety. You’re lucky to get 5 on a pay per view sometimes. Props to the UFC for solid matchmaking and a very entertaining card.

The verdict is still out on Roger Huerta. I’m still not sold on him as the real deal or even a future champion at this point. He was able to finish Clay Guida, which is pretty impressive, but showed a lot of weaknesses in his game as well. Guida was able to take him down at will and keep him down and landed some great ground and pound throughout the first two rounds. Huerta looked pretty good on his feet but Guida held his own until the third round of the fight. I don’t think Huerta is ready for Sean Sherk, BJ Penn, Joe Stevenson, or even Frankie Edgar. His next fight, hopefully against Kenny Florian, should be another good gauge of Huerta’s ability. Did he finish Clay Guida? Yes, and in impressive fashion. Did he also get dominated for two rounds? Yes, he certainly did. Huerta is good, but let’s not start touting him as the best thing since Kimbo Slice’s bread.

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Roger Huerta def. Clay Guida via submission (rear naked choke), R3
Mac Danzig def. Tommy Speer via submission (rear naked choke), R1
Jon Koppenhaver def. Jared Rollins via TKO, R3
George Sotiropoulos def. Billy Miles via submission (rear naked choke), R1
Ben Saunders def. Dan Barrera via unanimous decision
Matt Arroyo def. John Kolosci via submission (armbar), R1
Troy Mandaloniz def. Richie Hightower via TKO, R1
Roman Mitichyan def. Dorian Price via submission (ankle lock), R1
Jonathan Goulet def. Paul Georgieff via submission (rear naked choke), R1

Here are the results:

MAIN CARD:

Roger Huerta (155 lbs.) vs. Clay Guida (155 lbs.)
Mac Danzig (168.5) vs. Tommy Speer (170)
Jared Rollins (169) vs. Jon Koppenhaver (170)
Billy Miles (170) vs. George Sotiropoulos (169)
Ben Saunders (169) vs. Dan Barrera (170)

UNDERCARD:

Matt Arroyo (169) vs. John Kolosci (170)
Troy Mandaloniz (170) vs. Richie Hightower (170)
Dorian Price (170) vs. Roman Mitichyan (170)
Paul Georgieff (170) vs. Jonathan Goulet (170)

The event is being hosted by The Palms Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. The televised portion of the card will air live beginning at 9pm ET tomorrow night on Spike TV. I will be sure to post the fight results tomorrow night upon the completion of the show.

The UFC Fantasy game is a quick and fun way to see how good you are at picking fights.

I was skeptical at first to see how the UFC would pull off the concept, but I’m pleasantly surprised. It’s not the most robust interface, but its an easy way to keep track of your fight picks vs the actual results. Plus it’s bragging rights against thousands of other MMA fans (I’m currently ranked 67 out of the 14,612 players).

The TUF 6 Finale card is fully is updated, and they also have the signed fights for 79, 80 and 81 up there too.

Click the thumbnail for Mr. Takedown’s picks of tomorrow’s card:

Also, if any one is interested in joining a Five Ounces of Pain league on UFC Fantasy, let me know.

Five Ounces of Pain was able to make it on the media conference call for the TUF 6 Finale. Those present on the call were: Matt Hughes, Roger Huerta, Clay Guida, Tommy Speer, and Mac Danzig.  Dana White did not make it to the press conference, so there were not any “juicy rumors” started today.  Here are some of the highlights of the discussion: 

- Roger Huerta, when asked about the death of Sam Vasquez, replied, “No, I have actually not heard of any MMA fighters dying.  I’m willing to die in there as well.  But no, I didn’t get anything on that at all.” (…not the most P.C. comment I’ve ever heard.)

- Mac Danzig mentioned that he has been training at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas for this bout to get training in with some great LW and WW fighters (namely Jay Hieron, Chris Horodecki, Mark Hominick, Gray Maynard, Tyson Griffin, Frank Trigg, and Kendall Grove).

- Matt Hughes was asked to break down the fight between Tommy Speer and Mac Danzig.  He said it was going to be “a great test for both fighters and an age old battle.”  Speer is going to value strength and size over technique, and Danzig will value technique over strength and size.  He’s not cornering anyone, he’s going to stay neutral and enjoy the fight.

- Huerta mentioned that he thinks he deserves the first fight with Sean Sherk after his suspension is up.  He believes he’s already done enough to earn the title shot.

- When asked to comment on opponent, Tommy Speer, Mac Danzig spoke nothing but kind words about his former teammate on the show.  He said he tough Speer was one of the tougher guys on the show, and that he’s a naturally tough guy.  He also went on to say that he saw the most growth skill-wise in Speer above the other contestants in the show.  Mac did mention that he has been working a lot on his wrestling.

- Speer was asked to compare his training before and after the show.  Speer said that he’s been training full-time in Illinois with Matt Hughes.  Before the show he trained around working on the farm, but this time he was able to just focus on fighting, instead of “milking the cows.”

- Huerta mentioned several times that he believes he is stronger than Clay Guida in every aspect of MMA.- Guida responded to Huerta’s words by stating that if all people think he’s good for is wrestling and good cardio, then they’re in for a “rude awakening.”

- When asked if he had anything to say to injured Matt Serra, Hughes said that he had “no words for Serra at all.”

- Over the course of several questions, Matt Hughes talked about the hardship of losing those six straight fights on the show, but he couldn’t be any happier about both of his guys being a part of the finale.  Hughes also mentioned that he really didn’t want to be on the show again.  He was able to hang out with Rich Franklin a lot off-camera, but this time he wouldn’t have anyone to hang out with because he wouldn’t be spending time with Matt Serra.  When Dana White told him that he could bring on his own assistant coaches, he eventually agreed. 

This should be an entertaining show on Saturday night.  There seems to be a solid amount of smack-talking and a confident swagger coming from Roger Huerta, but Clay Guida has maintained that Huerta will be surprised when they get into the cage together.  For the TV show finale bout, Danzig and Speer seem to be very respectable of each other but they have no problems fighting, despite being on the same team on the show.  This should be an interesting style match-up and has the potential to be pretty exciting.

On a video interview with TUF 6 semi-finalist George Sotiropoulous on UFC.com, the Australian states that he was unaware that he had 5 minutes to recover from the accidental poke in the eye he suffered from Tommy Speer.

Favoured to make it to the final and fight Mac Danzig, Sotiropoulous was instead knocked down and then pounded out in the first round of his semi final matchup. In the video interview conducted by UFC.com post fight the Team Serra fighter states how after he sufferred the poke in the eye he was seeing double vision.

He goes on to state how he tried to stop the double vision by closing his injured left eye, but at the same time he was met with a thunderous right hand from his opponent which dropped him to the mat, where he was eventually finished.

George Sotiropoulous is now scheduled to fight on the main card of the TUF 6 finale against Billy Miles who was submitted by John Kolosci in the first round of the Ultimate Fighter competition.

Read more on FiveOuncesOfPain.com

If you enjoy agreeing or disagreeing with any of Sam Cupitt’s opinions, feel free to check into TheSamBlog and let me know.

On this week’s episode, we’ve got the two semifinal fights to decide who goes onto the finals on Saturday. The first fight will be Matt Arroyo vs. Mac Danzig, the second fight will be Tommy Speer vs. George Sotiropolous.

At a Team Serra practice, Matt Arroyo and Richie Hightower spar and Richie lands on one of Matt’s ribs during a takedown attempt. Matt immediately knows something is wrong but continues to try to work it out and practice anyways. After rolling with Serra for a bit, Matt is seriously concerned with the injury.

Matt gets himself to the doctor where they confirm to him that he has a cracked rib and deep bruising. This now puts the fight to get him into the finals for a UFC contract in jeopardy. After much contemplation, Arroyo reveals to Serra that he’s having trouble breathing, it’s affecting his wrestling, and his jiu jitsu and that he doesn’t feel he can fight. He feels that if he’s not confident about his physical condition when he steps into the cage then he’s already beaten. He makes a good point.

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The Ultimate Fighter 6 Finale show takes place this Saturday night on Spike TV. The event will take place at The Palms Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. With the conclusion of the show having already taken place, the full card has materialized and been announced. MMAJunkie brought the news earlier this evening.

TUF 6 Live Season Finale

MAIN CARD:
Roger Huerta vs. Clay Guida
Mac Danzig vs. Tommy Speer (TUF 6 Final Bout)
Jared Rollins vs. Jon Koppenhaver
George Sotiropoulous vs. Billy Miles

UNDERCARD:
Ben Saunders vs. Dan Barrera
Matt Arroyo vs. Jon Kolosci
Troy Mandaloniz vs. Richie Hightower
Roman Mitichyan vs. Dorian Price
Paul Georgieff vs. Jonathan Goulet

Sources have confirmed to Five Ounces of Pain (www.FiveOuncesofPain.com) that Matt Arroyo has spent the past several weeks training for a fight against Ultimate Fighter 6 teammate, John Kolosci, at this Saturday’s Ultimate Fighter Finale in Las Vegas, NV. Arroyo pulled out of this week’s episode with a cracked rib and Kolosci stepped in to replace him in a fight against Mac Danzig. Now the Team Serra teammates will square off against one another inside the UFC Octagon.

So far, George Sotiropolous, Mac Danzig, and Matt Arroyo have all advanced to the semifinals. On this week’s show we have Tommy Speer taking on Ben Saunders for the fourth and final spot in the semifinals.

During a Team Hughes training session, everyone is worried about Tommy’s cut and the swelling on his face, specifically Mac Danzig. Danzig claims he wouldn’t even be training for three weeks with a cut like that because if it gets opened again it could be career threatening. Danzig may be right, but these guys didn’t come here to pussyfoot around.

Billy Miles thinks that if Tommy’s injuries are serious enough to where he can’t fight, then he will be the person that steps in for him. There’s a UFC contract at stake at the end of this thing and as long as Tommy is cleared by the athletic commission, there’s no way he’s missing this fight. I have to admit, though, Tommy’s face looks jacked up.

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Five Ounces of Pain (www.fiveouncesofpain.com) has learned from well-placed sources that Ben Saunders and Dan Barrera are scheduled to rematch at the The Ultimate Fighter 6 Finale next weekend in Las Vegas, NV and that the fight has a very good chance of being televised on the live broadcast.

Barrera and Saunders were involved in one of the best fights on the current season of TUF and the fight ended with a somewhat controversial decision in Saunders’ favor. Barrera will now get a chance to avenge his loss to Saunders in a three round fight as opposed to a two round fight as seen on TUF.

Check out more TUF 6 content HERE at FiveOuncesofPain.com

From UFC.com:

December 8th, 2007
Live from The Pearl in Las Vegas, Nevada

Main Event:

Lightweights: Roger Huerta vs. Clay Guida

Undercard:

Welterweights: Jared Rollins vs. John Koppenhaver
Welterweights: Troy Mandaloniz vs. Richie Hightower
Welterweights: Dorian Price vs. Roman Mitichyan
Welterweights: Jonathan Goulet vs. Paul Georgieff

As usual, we get the previous week’s fight recap. In one of the bloodiest fights in recent TUF memory, Tommy ground and pounded his way to a decision victory. Now that the preliminary bouts are over with, it’s Team Serra’s duty to pick the quarterfinal matchups.

Matt Serra is in favor or throwing Hughes’ two remaining fighters, Tommy Speer and Mac Danzig, against one another in their quarterfinal fight. This would be a real dick move, but it’s not surprising that Serra’s in favor of it. He wants to stick it to Hughes any way he can, so why not make his two remaining fighters square off against one another?

Serra’s team disapproves of the Tommy vs. Mac proposal because it guarantees Hughes at least one fighter in the semifinals. Also, I think most of them realize it would be a pretty shitty thing to do no matter how much Serra doesn’t like Hughes.

Matt Serra, Ray Longo, and Pete Sell go into the conference room to discuss matchups with Dana. All of the fighters come in one by one to discuss who they’d like to fight. Ben Saunders wants Tommy Speer. Troy Mandaloniz wants Richie Hightower. John Kolosci wants Mac Danzig. Wait. What? John wants Mac? John is a gamer, but I don’t think he stands a snowball’s chance in hell against Mac, but he seems insistent on it.

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I recently had the opportunity to catch up with one of this season’s TUF 6 contestants, Dan Barrera. We covered a myriad of topics, including his faith, various issues about this season of TUF, his hand injury, Matt Hughes as a coach, and of course, the now legendary “shadowboxing in the bathroom” incident. Dan was a great sport and I can’t thank him enough for taking the time out of his day to do an interview for us. Hope you enjoy!

Adam Morgan: A whole lot of people don’t know about how you got into MMA, so start out by telling us a little about your background and how you got involved with the sport.

Dan Barrera: Well, I started to wrestle when I was in junior high and it’s a pretty tough state where I was from. I’m from Idaho, so I grew up wrestling and then I got to state in wrestling. Then I got into the Air Force right after high school and I boxed for the Air Force team for a number of years and then I actually got to nationals a few times, got ranked, and then I started doing jiu jitsu once I got out here to Kentucky, so that’s how it all tied in.

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Not a whole lot going on in this week’s episode, but a great fight at the end.

As usual, we open with a recap of the last fight. George Sotiropolous dominated Jared Rollins for those who don’t know. Team Serra is up 6-1 on Team Hughes and only two fighters remain, so we already know the matchup for the this week.

Serra revels in the fact that he’s 6-1, saying Hughes might want to go get a “Coaching for Dummies” book.

The final quarterfinal matchup will be Tommy Speer versus John “War Machine” Koppenhaver. Dana White comments that Tommy’s a farm boy with little experience while Koppenhaver has had the luxury of training with the Lion’s Den and Phil Baroni.

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The show starts, as usual, with the recap of last week’s fight. Great fight, Ben Saunders and Dan Barerra really gave it their all with Saunders coming out on top to put Team Hughes down 5-1. Matt Hughes is not happy.

Back in the locker room he tears into Barerra for not following the gameplan and tells his two remaining fighters, Jared Rollins and Tommy Speer, that they better do what they say they’re going to do. Hughes is down in the dumps and sitting by the Octagon when Dana White comes in and gives him a pep talk. Many F bombs were dropped and Dana basically told Hughes he needs to beat the piss out of his fighters in order to whip them into shape.

Somehow I don’t think Hughes will have a problem with that, especially seeing as he’s done it all season long already.

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You all didn’t think I was done writing TUF recaps, did you? Due to extenuating circumstances I was unable to watch the show last week, therefore, no recap. I’m sure some of you wish I was done writing them, but here I am with a new week’s worth of TUF 6 knowledge to drop on the masses. Let’s get to it.

As usual the show starts with the recap of last week’s fight. Blake Bowman got his ass handed to him by Richie Hightower and tore his ACL in the process. Team Hughes is down 3-1 and Hughes is not happy. Neither is Mac Danzig. Come to find out, Mac’s not really happy with anything that’s going on in the house, especially not Blake Bowman.

Let me make a quick point here before I go into the details. I cannot stress this enough: the drama of this show is so overbearing it’s ridiculous. It’s become almost unwatchable. To be honest, the only reason I watch every week is to do this writeup and make fun of this terrible television. Most people I know or talk to record it and fast forward through most of it. It’s that bad and this year’s group of fighters might be the worst they’ve ever had. Anyways, enough of my bickering.

Back at the house, the fighters are all allowed to watch the TUF 5 Finale. Blake and Mac have made it clear that they don’t like one another and it just so happens that Mac’s boy, Andy “I Don’t Follow Instructions or a Gameplan” Wang, was taking on Blake’s boy, Cole Miller. Miller won the fight due to a head kick knockout and Mac complains of an early stoppage.

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