THE PROPHET'S THURSDAY TAPOUT: BOBBY THE TEMP EDITION

by The Prophet, The Savage Science

Hi and welcome to The Prophet's Thursday Tapout. My name is Bobby the Temp and Jim had me sent over from the temp agency to help him get caught up on all of his work. One of the duties he's delegated to me is writing this week's Thursday Tapout. He said that the first thing I needed to do was to find some sort of picture of a hot chick, even if it didn't have anything to do with MMA. I didn't know where to look so I decided to shoot a picture of 'The Undisputed Triple Crown Champion of Fight Sport Journalism' working at his desk with my cellphone camera.

BUSY TIMES IN THE MMA WORLD:

There are people in the world who *think* they have difficult and dangerous jobs--brain surgeons, skyscraper window washers, demolition experts--but their responsibilities and the daily risk they put themselves at pales in comparison to the fight sport journalist. Jim wrote on this legal pad that here I need to say something about how none of you carnies would know anything about this, since you all work at 7-11 and AM/PM and the only danger you face is having to deal with pissed off customers when the Slurpee machine goes on defrost.

Since the gentleman that usually writes this column but has delegated the responsibility to me this week is the apex and the zenith of the fight sport journalism profession, its not a stretch to say that he has the most difficult job in America, if not the entire world. Last week, for example, he had to do live round by round coverage of the EliteXC debut show on CBS on Saturday night, and then do the live coverage of the WEC show on Versus *less than 24 hours later*. Most men couldn't handle this sort of challenge, but we're not talking about 'most men' here. This week, Jim will be doing the live round by round of UFC 85 from London and then *less than 12 hours later* be doing the live round by round of World Victory Road: Sengoku III from Japan. Its the sort of workload that would cause an entire team of lesser men to buckle under its weight.

I must admit that I don't know much about MMA, but I will do my best as I recount the notes that Jim has written on this legal pad.

ELITE XC DEBUTS ON CBS:

Perhaps the biggest news sport of the week was the EliteXC debut on CBS. It wasn't the 'state of the art' in terms of MMA competition but it did deliver some impressive ratings, particularly among young males. Of course since CBS primarily features shows by, about, and for geriatrics anything would be an improvement for the 'Geritol Network'.

Kimbo Slice had more trouble than he anticipated with PRIDE vet James Thompson, though managed to prevail with a 3rd round TKO. There are some that suggest that the fight was stopped prematurely, but Thompson was out on his feet and had absorbed about a half dozen haymakers from Mr. Slice. Oh yeah, his ear was damn near severed from the side of his head which sure didn't help him plead his case with the official that the fight shouldn't be stopped.

WEC FEATURES TWO 'MATCH OF THE YEAR' WORTHY BOUTS:

It didn't get the mainstream hype that EliteXC did, but Sunday's WEC show on Versus featured two 'match of the year' worthy contests. First, the main event between Urijah Faber and Jens Pulver was a unanimous decision victory for 'The California Kid' but that didn't tell the story of Jens Pulver's toughness and heart. Excitement from bell to bell in a fight that should finally propel Faber to superstar status. That fight was actually outdone by the semifinal matchup between Miguel Torres and Yoshiro Maeda which was unfortunately stopped after three rounds due to a Maeda eye injury. This fight is best compared to the classic boxing wars between Arturo Gatti and Mickey Ward, and round 2 of Torres/Maeda could very well be the best single round in MMA history. Versus will probably re-run this at some point in the next week or so and you should make sure to catch it.

DONALD TRUMP BUYS INTO AFFLICTION MMA:

The business side of the sport got even stranger this week as Donald Trump announced that he had purchased what was described as a 'substantial' equity stake in Affliction's MMA promotion. This culminated in a strange press conference today where 'The Donald' took a phone call from Andrei Arlovski midway through to announce that the former UFC champ had signed with the new promotion. Regardless of how much money Donald brings to the table, the guy is a shameless self promoter and a publicity generation machine. At least in the short term, it definitely can't hurt the viability of Affliction MMA. Also at the press conference it was announced that Arlovski will fight IFL vet Ben Rothwell at the promotion's 'Banned' show on July 19th.

THANKS FOR READING, VISIT THE SAVAGE SCIENCE NOW DAMMIT:

Thanks as always for reading the Tapout, and don't forget to visit us over at THE SAVAGE SCIENCE:

MMA, MAYHEM AND MORE AT THE SAVAGE SCIENCE

and check out our boxing counterparts at THE SWEET SCIENCE

THE BEST BOXING NEWS AND COMMENTARY AT THE SWEET SCIENCE

Don't forget that The Savage Science will have the best live commentary of UFC 85 and likely the *only* live English language play by play of World Victory Road: Sengoku 3 this weekend.

Thanks for reading this, and Jim will be back before you know it. Until then, this is Bobby the Temp signing off...