Recently, it was revealed that Stephen Thompson would follow up his impressive head kick KO win in his UFC debut by facing long-time UFC veteran Matt Brown at UFC 145. It was surprising news because, while not a world beater, Brown is talented, tough and versatile in a way that usually goes beyond what you'd put a blue chip prospect in the cage with.

Thompson is no combat neophyte though, having achieved high levels of success in kickboxing endeavors. But to Brown, Thompson's successes in situations such as the World Combat League simply don't matter.

Via MMA Weekly:

Middle Easy transcribed the quote:

Name me one guy that he fought. I can tell you the guys I train with [have fought] Saenchai, Malaipet, and Joe Schilling; guys that are well known in the kickboxing/Muay Thai world, on a world level… I’m not too concerned with this guy’s kickboxing. I can go 100-0 beating a bunch of idiots, but that’s not my style.

It's starting to sound like we may see a slightly more chippy version of Matt Brown than we're used to in the lead up to a fight.

More SBN UFC 145 coverage

Georges St. Pierre has not fought since his UFC 129 bout with Jake Shields due to a knee injury while training for a title defense. That defense was originally scheduled to be against Nick Diaz, but Diaz skipped press obligations and the UFC punished him by giving the title shot to Carlos Condit. Then GSP got injured and the Condit fight was postponed while Diaz ran through B.J. Penn so impressively that Dana White and the UFC brass decided to move Diaz back into the title shot.

GSP would then suffer a major injury to his ACL, shelving him until mid to late 2012. So when the UFC decided to put Carlos Condit and Nick Diaz against the cage from each other for the interim welterweight title, with the winner to face GSP upon his return, it's no surprise that Georges was cageside.

The UFC released video of Georges at the fight, and that can be seen here:

I'd be interested in seeing these videos continue for future title contender bouts.

SBN coverage of UFC 143: Diaz vs. Condit

Luke Thomas of MMAFighting.com and I recorded another installment of MMA Tete-A-Tete: Coarsening The Discourse yesterday before the official Nick Diaz news broke but we were able to address the rumors. Our main point is that the current testing regime for Marijuana is utterly pointless. The stated purpose of the commission is to prevent fighters from competing while high. Great. I hope we can all agree that's a worthy goal regardless of our stance on legalization.

More On Nick Diaz
Nick Diaz Is to Blame, But So Are Meaningless Commission Marijuana Tests | Nick Diaz' UFC 143 Drug Test Failure Was Inevitable | Dana White: 'I Am Beyond Disappointed | Nick Diaz Tests Positive For Marijuana | Fighters React to Nick Diaz's Positive Drug Test

The problem is that the testing regime involves urinalysis which doesn't tell you anything about the intoxication of the fighter during the fight, only whether or not metabolites from previous pot use are in the fighter's system. Luke and I emphatically agree that anything but an ideal way to keep athletes safe.

As Luke said over at MMA Fighting: "the urinalysis test regarding marijuana consumption used by athletic commissions (ostensibly) designed to protect the health and safety of fighters does neither and is little more than kabuki theater."

We also discuss:

• Carlos Condit, Greg Jackson & Point fighting: pro and con, Luke defends the aberrant practice, I demonstrate why it's a pox on the sport.
• UFC biz: 143 buyrates high, UFC on Fuel estimates at 300K top side with a sideline to rave about the quality of the UFC on Fuel 1 card.
• What's going on with UFC Japan? Is Dana White being a fan boy or playing Japanese money marks? Will the event accomplish anything as far as rebuilding the sport in its historic #1 world-wide market?
• UFC on Fox 3: the problem of Diaz vs. Miller as main event

Transcript of the relevant portion are after the jump.

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Judging and refereeing has always been near the center of combat sports controversy and discussions, recent UFC history is no different. UFC 143 saw a mildly controversial decision in the main event with Carlos Condit taking the win over Nick Diaz as well as odd refereeing in the Josh Koscheck vs. Mike Pierce and Alex Caceres vs. Edwin Figueroa bouts.

While Dana agreed that Condit had earned the win over Diaz, that didn't stop him from talking about the state of judging and reffing in the sport today:

Transcription (via MMA Mania):

I've said it many times. In the evolution of this sport right now, one of the big problems we're having right now is judging and reffing. It's one of the things that drives me crazy and attention needs to be paid to scoring and reffing. First of all, it affects guys careers as far as legacies go. Jon Jones? Jon Jones should be undefeated right now but he's not, he's got a loss on his record and there's tons of guys in the UFC that have those. There's guys who've absolutely, clearly won fights and lost on the judges' scorecards. Nobody's perfect. There's always gonna be problems. But the judging and the reffing is so bad in mixed martial arts, it drives me crazy. The fans hate it too and it hurts the sport. These athletic commissions really need to tighten up and start working on educating their refs and judges.

The UFC has released a new promo video for UFC 144 in Japan featuring a lightweight title fight between Frankie Edgar and Ben Henderson. The bout will be held at the Saitama Super Arena on Sunday, February 26th 10 a.m. local time but through the miracle of the international date line will air in the U.S. on pay-per-view on Saturday, February 25th at 10 p.m. ET.

There are reports that as many as 15,000 tickets have been sold for the event, which would make it a huge hit. It's also been reported that the Japanese ad agency Dentsu has booked this as a "sold show," meaning the UFC will not be shouldering the financial risk of this event.

Main Card:

Frankie Edgar (14-1) vs. Ben Henderson (15-2) [LW Title]

Quinton "Rampage" Jackson (32-9) vs. Ryan Bader (13-2)

Cheick Kongo (17-6-2) vs. Mark Hunt (7-7)

Yoshihiro Akiyama (13-4, 2 NC) vs. Jake Shields (26-6-1)

Joe Lauzon (21-6) vs. Anthony Pettis (14-2)

Full card after the jump.

SBN coverage of UFC 144

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This story was updated at 4:30 PM EST.

MMA Fighting's Ariel Helwani caught up with Dana White after UFC 143 for their customary chat, asking the boss what he thought about the night's proceedings and what could be next for his new interim welterweight champion. Helwani actually interviewed White twice, once for MMA Fighting and another time for Fuel TV.

Some highlights of the two interviews:

• How he scored Carlos Condit vs. Nick Diaz and his analysis of both men's game plans.
  
• Whether he feels Diaz's heart in still in MMA and if he thinks Diaz is truly retired.
• His opinion on whether Condit should wait to fight Georges St. Pierre or fight again before then.
• His love of Roy Nelson's chin and hatred of his mullet and beard.
• How he scored Mike Pierce vs. Josh Koscheck and making Koscheck vs. Diaz a reality.
• Whether Jake Ellenberger vs. Diego Sanchez is a No. 1 contender's fight.
• Koscheck wanting the big fights and what weight class makes the most sense for him.
• His surprise at a two point deduction in the Alex Caceres vs. Edwin Figueroa fight.
• His reaction at a shirtless Mike Goldberg running around backstage (yes, this happened).

SBN coverage of UFC 143: Diaz vs. Condit

For both videos, make the jump!

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Missed last night's UFC 143 event? Well, a couple of minutes may not be enough, but you can quickly get up to date with this Fox Sports video that covers the highlights and results for all of the main card bouts from last night's show.

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Bloody Elbow's Matt Roth was at the post post-fight press conference "scrum" where Dana White spoke to the assembled MMA media for a good 20 minutes. The first installment is above, parts 2 and 3 are after the jump.

Highlights include:

• Dana's response to fans and media complaining about Carlos Condit's game plan against Nick Diaz.
• Dana's assessment of Josh Koscheck's performance against Mike Pierce.
• The possibility of the UFC booking Koscheck vs. Jon Fitch now that Koscheck has left the American Kickboxing Academy.
• Dana's continuing wish that Roy Nelson would cut down to light heavyweight.
• Stephen Thompson's KO of the Night performance and Joe Rogan's excitement over Thompson as a prospect.
• Dana discusses the new The Ultimate Fighter format on FX with live fights.
• Dana talks about international expansion and indicates that India will likely be the next country to get its own version of The Ultimate Fighter.

SBN coverage of UFC 143: Diaz vs. Condit

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