MMA world gets a major shake-up

The last few days in the mixed martial arts world has been absolutely insane. A positive steroid test from Josh Barnett on Wednesday started a chain of events which can only be described as domino-like. In today’s post I’ll try to sum everything that went down for you:

Tito Ortiz - Image: Zuma Press

Tito Ortiz returning to the UFC: The great thing about Dana White as UFC president is that he gets so giddy he lets things slip all the time. While tweeting about an appearance on a radio show Friday evening, he added an “Oh yea and welcome back tito :)” to the end. On his radio appearance he played it more coy than that, but you can blame that on his attempt to save all the juicy news for a July 31st press conference. Chances of Tito coming back to the UFC? I’d say they’re higher than 90% now, with a 10% chance of talks breaking down as these two haggle over contract details.

Affliction is dead, long live Affliction: The days of the Affliction company throwing live events is over. On Friday morning, the company pulled the plug on their third event and by the evening news had come out that they were in talks to work with the UFC again. No terms were disclosed on the deal yet, but a joint press release came out early this morning confirming their ‘collaboration’ and the return of Affliction Clothing as a UFC sponsor.

What happens to Fedor: The biggest question is what happens to top fighter Fedor Emelianenko now that the UFC and Affliction are ‘collaborating’? Fedor has one fight left on his Affliction contract. Will the UFC pick that fight up and bring him into their promotion? Chances of that are low since the UFC has consistently refused to sign one fight deals with the Russian fighter, but this opportunity might be too good to pass up. Expect some statements from both Fedor’s camp and the UFC regarding his situation which should clarify where the best heavyweight in the world is going. I’m gonna let my inner fanboy get hopeful, but I wouldn’t recommend you hold your breath on this one.

MMA is a pretty crazy sport … I can’t think of another one where interesting stuff like this happens on a fairly regular basis. I’ll keep you informed of all the major developments right here at Everyjoe, so stick around and enjoy the ride!