In response to the blog entry, FiveOuncesOfPain.com contacted Strikeforce Vice President of Communications Mike Afromowitz, who confirmed that Couture, the wife of former UFC light heavyweight and heavyweight champion Randy Couture, is indeed off the card.

An official reason for Couture dropping off the card is not currently available, although Tate is claiming that Couture is not fighting due to marital problems.

“So Kim ‘Sugar Free’ Couture is pulling out of the fight supposedly cuz [sic] her and Randy are getting a divorce… I’m so pissed right now… Sugar Free my ass!!,” wrote Tate.

It is uncertain whether Tate’s claims are valid, however, sources have informed Five Ounces of Pain in recent weeks that the Coutures have been living separately as of late.

In regards to Tate’s status for the May 15 show, no word is available regarding a potential replacement.

AOL’s MMA Fanhouse reported the news based upon statements made by Couture herself on HDNet’s Inside MMA. No opponent has been announced thus far.

Couture is 1-1 in her short career and is more known for helping run the Xtreme Couture empire rather than being a fighter. Her last fight took place during a November Strikeforce event against Lina Kvokov. It was clear from the start that Kvokov wanted nothing to do with Couture, as Couture won easily via first round TKO.

Couture lost her debut in June of 2008 on a Banner Promotions event in Las Vegas that featured both MMA and boxing on the same card. She was battered and bloodied by Kim Rose but was able to continue fighting despite having suffered a broken jaw.

Also scheduled for the Strikeforce event in May is a main event pitting two former EliteXC champions against each, as former middleweight champion Robbie Lawler takes on former welterweight champion Jake Shields.

Condit revealed the news during Saturday’s UWC show in Washington D.C.-area that was headlined by Pete Spratt’s decisive victory over Jason Von Flue in a welterweight clash.

Nicknamed the “Natural Born Killer,” Condit is undefeated in four career fights in the WEC and is 22-4 overall in his MMA career.

His most recent fight was a first round submission over Carlo Prater during the WEC’s February show in Albuquerque, N.M.

Condit, one of the most underrated 170 pound fighters in the world, holds career victories over the likes of Frank Trigg, Renato “Charuto” Verrisimo, Ross Ebanez, and John Alessio.

According to the USA Today report, Condit had just one fight remaining with the WEC before signing the extension.

I agree with Steve Cofield on a lot of things, but not everything.

I’m late to the party with this, as I believe Steve posted this last week, but I still think it is relevant as Kim Couture’s amateur Muay Thai match is slated to air on HDNet on Friday.

Steve, like many others, is questioning the amount of attention the UFC heavyweight champion’s wife is getting in regard to her debut:

Is anyone going to watch this Kim Couture fight? She speaks on HDNet’s InsideMMA along with Gina Carano.

Congrats to Randy’s wife, Kim, for trying her hand in the fight game. From a purity standpoint, aren’t there 100s of women who have legit accomplishments in the ring/cage who deserve the TV/online time? We assume she’s equipped to handle a real fight and it doesn’t go the way of Johnny Morton’s debut. Morton was only given a spot on an MMA card based on his name.

Cofield makes a valid point but I don’t begrudge Kim Couture. Nobody is holding a gun to HDNet’s head telling them they have to televise the Xtreme Couture smoker. Mark Cuban’s high-definition network has made it very clear they’d like to televise as much MMA as possible. Randy Couture’s wife making her fighting debut is noteworthy and if you’re able to televise it, why not?

There are a great many more women more deserving of the exposure, but has Kim Couture said anything to the contrary? And at the end of the day, is Kim Couture fighting not a great thing for female MMA? Female MMA has come a long way but it still has a lot of respect to earn in the minds of many MMA fans. The exposure and attention that a high-profile participant such as Kim Couture can bring to female fighters is not a bad thing.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE REMAINDER OF THIS ARTICLE ON SAM CAPLAN’S PROELITE.COM BLOG

But I just wanted to say that last night’s WEC show was perhaps the best MMA show I have ever seen on basic cable. If you did not enjoy last night’s show, I have to question whether you are a true MMA fan.

There weren’t any fight of the year candidates, however, all the matches provided great action. Even the Rob McCullough vs. Jamie Varner match, which started out slow, had its moments, especially the end, which I thought was insane. How many times did Varner have to nearly finish McCullough before he was declared the winner?

Manny Tapia vs. Antonio Banuelos was a great opener with back and forth action. Miguel Torres vs. Chase Beebe was short, but the ending sequence was thrilling and the announce team did a good job of selling the title change. Carlos Condit vs. Carlo Prater was a little disappointing in that I expected Prater to provide a stiffer test. But Condit’s win came off well on live television and made him look more of a star than he ever has before.

What I love about the WEC fights are that they are true MMA fights. They can go anywhere (standing or on the ground) at just about any time and the momentum changes are frequent. Just because a guy dominates the first two minutes doesn’t mean he’s going to be dominating the final seconds of the bout.

From a production standpoint, the show was nearly flawless. The pacing was not too fast, nor too slow. To me, Todd Harris has his best showing yet as a play-by-play announcer. He seemed to be more of a factor during the telecast and sounded more confident in his delivery. While I am a big fan of Frank Mir’s broadcast work, a more equitable split between the two as far as mic time is concerned as definitely an upgrade.

In regards to Mir, even his work was better than usual. One of my only complaints is that sometimes he can be a bit scattered when it comes to composing his thoughts. He really seemed to be focused and on point.

Overall, the way the show was presented is how every basic cable MMA show should be presented. We didn’t get killed with commercials and the broadcast came off as high-end, as there were no cheesy segments with interviewers having to interview half-interested movie stars about some soon-to-be box office bomb. The only in-show product placement we saw was from the WEC promoting its champions. Urijah Faber was used on the announce team and Doug Marshall got some mic time between fights to pump up his March fight vs. Brian Stann for the WEC light heavyweight title.

I also liked the pre-taped segment they did highlighting the fact that the WEC show was emanating from New Mexico, which has emerged as a hot bed for MMA. I would love to see more of those type of features.

The element of a larger crowd also added a lot of energy to the show. There’s nothing wrong with having a few “B” shows at the Palms or Hard Rock, but I’ll take the atmosphere of a big arena show as opposed to the “intimate” feel of a smaller show any day of the week. The WEC fighters came across as bigger stars last night.

The idea that both the UFC and WEC are produced by the same company is crazy to me because the WEC shows are so much better from a production standpoint. Some of the music the UFC uses is cheesy and their graphics are nothing special. The lighting, the sound, and the production effects are so much more crisp for the WEC. And I’m convinced the UFC is holding out on HD customers when it comes to their pay-per-views. I can’t think of a logical explanation, but last night’s WEC HD broadcast on Versus was way better than what I witnessed during UFC 81 several weeks back.

For me, if ESPN or HBO ever did an MMA show, the vision I have of it pretty much is what I saw on Versus last night. I don’t think I can give higher praise than that.

While the bout will mark Prater’s debut, it’s not the first time the two men have faced. In fact, in their previous meeting that took place in 2004, Prater defeated Condit.

Now, Condit is looking to avenge that loss in front of hometown fans. During the interview I asked Condit several questions pertaining to Prater, including what happened in their first encounter.

Q: You’re scheduled to defend the WEC welterweight title on Feb. 13 against Carlo Prater. You lost to Prater in a non-WEC fight that took place in 2004. For the benefit of people who might not have seen that fight, can you take us through it?

C.C.: We started out on our feet (and) I think he landed a front kick, or something. He initiated a clinch and took me down and we had a couple of grappling exchanges and he ended up sweeping me and taking my back and choking me. And that was pretty much the fight.

I also asked Condit whether any bad blood exists between the two.

Q: Is there any bad blood between the two of you on a personal level?

C.C.: No, not on a personal level but definitely on a professional level. He’s coming into my hometown and trying to take my cookie. That’s more on my mind than the past.

To read the entire interview, including whether Condit has any resentment towards Urijah Faber being promoted as the face of the WEC, just click here.

ProElite.com (SamCaplan.ProElite.com) learned late last week and has since verified that WEC officials are in the process of finalizing a title defense by Condit against Carlo Prater.

Furthermore, WEC officials are believed to be close to be formalizing an agreement for the show to take place on February 13 in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE REMINDER OF THIS ARTICLE ON SAM CAPLAN’S PROELITE.COM BLOG

With a longer layoff than originally expected between shows for the WEC, Condit is now slated to return in early February to defend his title as confirmed to MMAWeekly.com by sources close to the fighter.

It’s good to see Condit getting back into the cage. It’s been awhile since he last fought, August to be exact. He’s a highly underrated welterweight and an exciting fighter to watch. His fight against Jake Shields (Part 1, Part 2) is a classic. The report goes on to say that no opponent has yet been named for Condit.

Maybe some blame can be assessed to the WEC for not finding a better opponent for Paulo Filho, but if you want to find his equal then you’re going to have to bring in Dan Henderson, Matt Lindland, Rich Franklin, or Anderson Silva. That’s not going to happen and I think Joe Doerksen was a handpicked opponent to allow Filho to look dominant and help build up his name recognition in the States. 

If that was the goal, then mission accomplished. If you had never seen Filho fight before then I don’t know how you couldn’t have been impressed with him after last night’s performance.

I do think some people are getting carried away though as I’ve read some message forum posts proclaiming Filho a good striker now. While his punches looked pretty powerful, his technique was not refined. He works hard on his striking but he still has a long way to go before he can be labeled a good, technical striker. 

I was also disappointed by the quick outcome of the Larson vs. Condit match. I expected a war. But you can’t blame anyone because looking at it from a matchmaker’s perspective, there isn’t a bigger challenge to Condit currently on the roster than Larson. It was a great matchup that just didn’t go according to plan. 

I am thoroughly impressed by Condit each time I see him fight. He’s going to be big time and will definitely be fighting in the UFC within the next two years. The WEC will need to bolster their welterweight division though if they want to make things interesting until then. If he can get past Larson that quickly then there’s no one who will pose much of a threat. 

Jeff Curran vs. Stephen Ledbetter wasn’t anything special in my book but it was just good to see Curran in a televised match. It looks like there is a build towards a WEC featherweight title match between Urijah Faber and Curran. While I think Faber would win that match, it would still be pretty exciting. 

Jamie Varner looked great in a dominant performance over Sherron Leggett. Varner is now 13-2 and should get to fight the winner of WEC lightweight title match next month between Razor Rob and Rich Crunkilton. That’s not anything I’ve heard, just my opinion. 

Random Rants: 

• I’m usually a big fan of Frank Mir’s work as a commentator. I thought he did great during the first live show several months back but I thought his game was off a little last night. It seemed like he couldn’t get his timing down.

• To piggyback on a point made by Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer several months back, having Frank Mir do the post-fight interviews is just a bad idea. Mir towers over everyone and makes them look like midgets. Why not just pay some local Vegas sports reporter $2,000 per show to come in and do the interviews?

• Because of quick results to a lot of the fights they were able to show a lot of fighters in attendance. It makes the WEC seem a lot bigger. I also liked the interviews with Jens Pulver and Rob McCullough and how they promoted the next show. They did a much better job of future promotion this time than last but that’s likely because when they did the first Versus live show, there weren’t a lot of definitive details about the second show.

• Speaking of Pulver, if Mir is ever in a position where he can’t do a show because he’s training for a fight, Pulver would be an excellent substitute. He’s already done some broadcast work for the UFC and the IFL. If ESPN ever hired their own analysts for their coverage of MMA on ESPNews, Pulver would be a perfect for such a role.

• They should do an even better job with future promotion. Why is it that Joe Riggs is telling The Fight Network he’s fighting Jason Miller in October? Why do so many promotions get scooped on their own news? Maybe there wasn’t enough time, but it would have been cool if the report was addressed in some fashion.

• I am real curious to know the duration of the WEC’s contract with Versus. I just feel the product deserves a better distribution outlet. They have a lot of potential superstars in Condit, Filho, Larson, Urijah Faber, Jason Miller, Carlos Condit, “Razor” Rob McCullough, and Rich Crunkilton but I just don’t think Versus gives them enough exposure. I know a lot of people who still don’t get Versus and on systems that do carry it, it’s usually buried. I have DirecTV and it’s in between a tier of premium sports channels on channel 608. The non-premium sports channels (ESPN, ESPNews, NFL Network, etc.) are all in the 200’s. You can run all the promos of the fighters you want on Versus but what good is it if the only time people watch Versus is for the WEC? People really don’t even watch the NHL on Versus. Hell, there are already rumblings that the NHL could be going back to ESPN once their Versus deal is up.

• Prime channel positioning is important. My in-laws don’t even like MMA yet they knew exactly what the IFL was when they found out I was going to cover the show this past Thursday. They know what the IFL is because they watch it every Monday in spite of the fact they don’t like MMA. Why do they watch it? Probably because there is nothing but reruns of sitcoms or first run versions of scrub reality shows on network TV right now and the IFL is on channel 17 here in the Philly area. If you’re a channel flipper, you’re going to be passing the IFL. If you’re a channel flipper, odds are you aren’t going to find the WEC.

• If they aren’t looking into it already, Zuffa should be exploring other future television options for the WEC. I know it’s easier said than done, but I think the USA network would be great. The clearance is strong and the channel has prominent positioning on most cable systems. And of course, ESPN would be even better. You would think ESPN would have room for the WEC on ESPN II with WrekCage every Tuesday or Wednesday night along with a live monthly show.

• They should also do some kind of deal with YouTube that would put all the WrekCage shows on the Internet for free. They have a product that is very appealing to hardcores and it’s time to let everyone see it and get them all talking.

• The WEC champions are as follows: Chase Beebe at bantamweight (135 lbs.); Urijah Faber at featherweight (145 lbs.); “Razor” Rob McCullough at lightweight (155 lbs.); Carlos Condit at welterweight (170 lbs.); Paulo Filho at middleweight (185 lbs.); and Doug Marshall at light heavyweight (205 lbs.). That’s a pretty impressive lineup of champions. It could be a long time until McCullough, Faber, Condit, and Filho lose (if they ever lose in the WEC).

• Right now the only fighter currently on the WEC roster who poses even a small threat to Filho is Jason “Mayhem” Miller. If Filho gets past Miller, he’ll have smooth sailing until an inevitable debut in the UFC.

• There’s still a lot of talk that more additions will be made to the WEC roster consisting of a lot of the Japanese fighters from Pride. I still haven’t heard any names though. A non-Japanese fighter from Pride that I’d love to see is Zelg Galesic. Pride signed Galesic from Cage Rage and he debuted at Pride 34 and lost. However, the guy has a ton of potential and has earned the nickname of “Mini-Cro Cop.” He’s a prospect and would fit perfectly on the WEC roster.

• The WEC should have shown highlights of fights that took place on the preliminary portion of the card. Antonio Banuelos fought earlier on the show and has increased name recognition after being featured on TapouT. He could be a future title contender at 135 lbs. but there’s no promotion behind him coming from the WEC.

Through its official web site, the fight promotion has announced additional matches for the cad.  Bouts between Jeff Curran vs. Stephen Ledbetter (featherweights), Jamie Varner vs. Sherron Legget (lightweights), Hiromitsu Miura vs. Fernando Gonzalez (welterweights), and Antonio Banuelos vs. Justin Robbins (bantamweights) have all been officially added.

The main televised portion of the card will include Larson vs. Condit, Filho vs. Doerksen, Curran vs. Ledbetter, and Varner vs. Legget.

That’s a pretty sweet double main event and I expect the WEC’s rating to be much stronger next Sunday than it was for their first live telecast. During their first live show, they were competing against a lot of programs that appealed to the male 18-34 demographic. But with a lot of shows in reruns, I think the only real competition for them in their time slot next weekend will be ESPN Sunday Night Baseball.

Also rumored is a welterweight title defense by Carlos Condit against Brock Larson and matches between Jeff Curran vs. Stephen Ledbetter and Eric Schambari vs. Logan Clark.

According to MMAWeekly, Carlos Condit will defend his WEC welterweight title against Brock Larson (which was actually supposed to happen at the last WEC event) and Eric Schambari vs. Logan Clark.

Jeff Curran and Paulo Filho are also listed on the page in separate fights against unnamed opponents.

I would love to be able to get to see Filho against but seeing Larson vs. Condit would be even better.