Editor’s Note: Andrew Wallace is not your normal MMA fan. He’s not your normal human being. He’s quickly becoming MMA’s Hunter S. Thompson, for better or worse. We sent Andrew to Strikeforce because he is guaranteed to notice things others miss and he will definitely bring back something other than a stale list of who-beat-whom.

By Andrew Wallace

It’s funny where life can take you. First, you and some Army guy are fake-arguing about gay marriage on a green wrestling board, the next thing you know he’s making you go to semi-popular regional fighting promotions for his webpage. I guess that’s not that funny, it’s just regular. Regardless, after the success and popularity (with my mom and two or three of her bewildered and undoubtedly lying friends) of my last field report, I have been sent into the trenches again, afforded the sincere privilege to cover Strikeforce for you all.

As usual, Total-MMA’s prestigious credentials carry over into the real world with the most luxurious of treatment: the man at the door (”Wallie” his nametag informs me, sort of a cretinous name but certainly no fault of his own) has never heard of me, the website, and his papers do not confirm my existence. Fortunately, an Anne Frank-esque faith in humanity prevails and I am granted that most coveted of press access. Compelling coverage, I am aware. It gets better!

In the press room, I have a pretty decent salad and one dinner roll (AbSummer: Can’t stop, won’t stop.) I am cornered by a fast talking shucking and jiving snake oil salesman who tries to convince me to get Total-MMA affiliated with some FCC MMA program. If anyone is interested, I got his email! Networkin’ it up in San Jose on a Friday night.

Anywho, this rinkydink little slamjam is nowhere close to being ready and it occurs to me that I came up without any idea when the show starts so I am here a full 90 minutes ahead of schedule. That’s good, that’s why America is number one. Timeliness. Preemptive ferocity. BUT in an exciting turn of events, I have my name on a print out on a table! Total-MMA is a legit thing now, and with the arrival of the book (available soon from ECW Press!) I expect compensation. But for now I am happy.

As the fans filter in, I am reminded that MMA fans are a special breed. They sure are a bunch of bad dudes, here to watch some professional bad dudes get paid to be bad dudes. I get paid to be a calm and attentive dude and that is the ethos I basically try to project at all times. I guess maybe everyone here is paid to be bad dudes but me. Bummer. Before the fights and the lights so bright, one of the woman fighters is in the ring, feeling the fence with her hand, bouncing on the mat lightly. She seems excited to be here and I worry about her, about all the fighters really, but especially the women. Maybe it’s sexism, almost certainly it is, but I can’t warm up to the idea of ladies fighting. It’s such a stupid and barbaric sport and I know women are stupid and barbaric too but who still doesn’t ache for Eight Belles? Barbaro, fine, send him to the glue factory, but Eight Belles still pains me. But we’ll see, I’d just like to see Kim Couture part 2 avoided. (For the uninitiated, Kim Couture is the wife of world class champion and all around maybe solid dude Randy Couture and her jaw was snapped in two at the mental symphysis in what was undoubtedly an excruciating injury. I’d hate for it to happen to a trisomy-21 sufferer like Nick Diaz, let alone a seemingly intelligent and polite young lady. That is all I am saying! Okay? Okay.)

Anyway, the show is beginning.

Eric Jacob of a dynamic 1-3 record comes out to Machinehead by Bush which really is a pretty cool song and features advice for all fighters to remember: Breathe in, breathe OUT. I oft forget this when I indulge in the noble savagery of judo. His opponent is Alexander Trivino and if his music is to believed (and I am wont to think it isn’t probably) he will remain fly until his dying day. Trivino has pink Sakuraba trunks on. That is a thing. Herb Dean tells us we will have a clean fight and he is right as it is both clean and exceptionally quick with an armbar in 37 seconds. Remember my prior Strikeforce report where only one fight went to the judges and I got to leave early? That was nice. Will it happen again? No!

Jorge (pronounced “George”) Interiano practices the storied and feared Voodoo Style. He is soft in the middle which is a disappointment to all in this land who love abs, who thirst for abs. Travis Johnson boasts a more conventional but boringer style of BJJ and muay thai. Interiano has a long braided ponytail! Johnson does not! Voodoo! Not voodoo! So much is at stake here. First round is all punchy punchy with Johnson starting more aggressive but Madame Laveau’s protege fights back and wins post round 2 when a doctor stops it. Johnson had a gross cut under his eye and if there is anything doctor’s can’t abide it’s grossness so game over. Voodoo Style is impregnable.

Cyrillo Padhillo fights luta livre and comes out to Bob Marley. I always hate reggae but I cannot hate on it here. Jesse Jones is some guy! I like prelim fights because as soon as one ends, another begins. There is no wasted time. Some woman is extremely enthusiastic for Padhillo. In round 2, Padhillo is in Jones’ guard and responds by delivering some devastating knees to Jones’ butt. Which is hilarious. Padhillo’s woman’s triceps are a tad wobbly, I notice. Who knows what I want from women anymore; no fighting, tight brachial musculature. I am vast, I contain multitudes. Padhillo wins the decision and people, profoundly stupid people, boo the decision. Triceps Lady was either Padhillo’s wife or sister which is an important distinction to be sure but fortunately the burden to make it does not fall on my shoulders.

Besides me, Krissy of fightshop.tv meets a formerly faceless internet friend. My thoughts turn to abs. A late arriver from wrestlinginc.com arrives and sits next to me. He asks me how the prelims were and I tell him “Some guys fought each other.” He compliments my Vince McMahon shirt. I surreptitiously photograph a guy eating some nachos for some reason. Nachos are basically the anti-abs.

The show is starting! Bas Rutten is here, Melendez gives some interview about something, YO YO YO AND AWAY WE GO.

The first fight is billed as a “catchweight special attraction” but both guys weigh 140 pounds and apparently I don’t understand the definition of “catchweight.” Brian Caraway uses cowboy karate which is a fine made up style as far as made up styles go. Alvin Cacdac has a pretty fun name to say but fun names are no match for made up fighting arts and the grappling nuances of cowboy karate put Cacdac away quickly.

Bobby Stack comes out to some sort of punk rock leprechaun music. Of all the ethnic prides, all of which are retarded, Irish pride is the most odious. He has marred his otherwise spectacular abs with a tattoo of some thick green kudzu encircling some words. Blah blah. Jose Palacios is from Fremont, one of California’s terrible towns. He seems to have a tattoo of a winged Silver Surfer. There is some strange reverse backmount positioning in this match, beyond which nothing else is notable. Stack wins and his glorious heritage is honored.

Joe Riggs is out making excuses for something or other.

I miss Chris Cariaso’s entrance due to the fallibility of the human bladder but Anthony Figueroa comes out to TNT by AC/DC which excites the 5 older women sitting in front of me. My new favorite fight clothing line is Fighting & Fitness. I am not so much into fighting I guess at least not as a realistic option for myself but fitness? Sure, sign me up. Cariosa gets a pretty severe looking kimura but Figueroa rolls through it and that is fun. What else would you expect from such spectacularly be-abbed young men? Cariosa wins with a RNC and that was pretty fun I guess. One of Cariosa’s trainers tucks his floppy ears inside his hat which is a hilarious detail. When one’s ears are so floppy, they look even more stupid tucked inside a hat.

Jeremiah Metcalf is our second expert in Voodoo Style of the night and one would guess given his placement on the card probably the more honored practitioner. Voodoo Style is a curse ridden martial art in which equal parts brutality and mind control vis a vis tetradotoxin are mixed. He has a tattoo which says “Lover And A Fighter” and so from this we surmise Metcalf is a multifaceted man. This is an interesting one because Raymond Daniels is Chuck Norris’ prized student. We all know what they say about Chuck Norris (He is, legend tells, a bearded guy who has recently achieved internet notoriety for some reason!) and so we expect his protege to be equally fearsome. This is Daniels’ MMA debut, having accrued an impressive kickboxing record in his previous life. Metcalf’s abs are as magnificent as everything else about him is deplorable. Daniels’ abs are in a word superlative. We truly are blessed with abs before us, sweeter than the mellified man, more divine than the Monymusk Reliquary. Josh Rosenthal is such a cool referee: The tattoos, the pudginess, the constant foolish smile. He is so happy to impartially call a fight right down the middle. Mom, can we keep him? Metcalf gets Daniels down and one thinks that is where it’s gotta stay: A kickboxer is a foot oriented beast, and laying on top of one is basically the same as laying on top of a soccer player. Daniels actually works in a pretty tight guillotine but with no legs it’s not even a concern. Speaking of not a concern, the low low price of the impending Total MMA book on ECW Press won’t trouble your pocketbook! Round 2, second verse, same as the first. Metcalf sort of maybe works for a triangle from the top which is a sure sign that he has no respect for Daniels’ jits and with good reason as Daniels gives up his back and gets choked the hell out with blood dripping from his nose for good measure. The other day I woke up to blood dripping from my nose and I can assure you that it is an awe inspiring phenomenon. Krissy from fightstop.tv offers to share her nachos with me apparently unawares of my quest for abs. It’s a team effort, Krissy. Let’s work together.

Okay, women’s match. Well, we’ll see. Miesha Tate comes out to Linkin Park. She, like me, is one step closer to the edge and thusly she is about to break. I would be remiss if I neglected to layer compliments upon her abs. Michelangelo himself never sculpted such abs. Wars have been started over lesser abs. Elaina Maxwell is the girl I mentioned earlier who was in the ring. One can only dream of what abs may lay beneath her rash guard. For in that sleep of dreams, what abs may come. In round one, there is an argument to be made that Maxwell tapped off an armbar in that clearly everyone but the referee sees her deliberately tap Tate’s leg twice and with some vigor. But the buzzer goes off and Tate clearly mouths “I didn’t tap.” As my friend Brian once told some jiujitsu practitioner who was littering, “That’s not very martial arts of you” and it is true. But I am not the referee (I am a competent human being) and thus the fight continues in round 2. Foes of Maxwell’s poor sportsmanship can delight in the fact that I am pretty sure she pees her trunks here. Some truly audacious jiujitsu is being tossed around here. In round 3, Maxwell is gassed as all hell and there is no excuse for that. As my mans Rhadi Ferguson said, “If I lose, it’s not because I’m out of shape.” Anyway this fight was actually pretty good; neither of them broke each others faces and one of them had bladder failure. Every single woman they cut to in the crowd between rounds is dicking around on her cell phone. Women we be chattin’. And lest we forget, they fight like imprisoned panthers for a pantheon of hooting Neanderthals. Miesha Tate wins the decision and why not.

Anthony Ruiz is from Coarsegold which is a California town I have never heard of and I have heard of some STINKERS, believe me. His theme music is Down Wit Da Siccness and his record is 20-10 and he is chubby as hell around the middle and I am already pissed off at this idiot journeyman piece of crap. Bobby Southworth is his opponent and da current LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPEEN OF DA WORRRRLD, my friend from wrestlinginc.com tells me Southworth had a hard time making weight on The Ultimate Fighter, reality TV superseries. I must be a real TUF noob if I didn’t even know a fact from TUF. What kind of noob am I? Anyway, I infer that a guy who has a hard time weighing 205 pounds is probably a pretty crappy fighter who might be really lazy and just terrible. My prediction is right, round 1 is total snoozefest. The between round music is Zombie Nation which is one of the great trance anthems of our time. Some official walks by to tell me the official attendance (7,488 which I can type now without even going to my notes. The fact that that number sticks with me above the fight I am watching should really tell you something.) I will be intensely surprised if one of, if not both of, these guys don’t die before the end of the fight due to myocardial infarction. Surprised and disappointed. These guys are goddamn terrible. The guy next to me keeps asking me who I think won each round and I don’t know how to break it to him that I have thrown journalistic integrity out the window and I am trying to find the fattest audience members with the zoom on my camera. These fighters are terrible. Completely, objectively, unmitigatedly terrible. That this is on this card at this placement is a legit outrage. The fans agree. My fellow journalists, my diverse cast of MMA journalists; young and old, male and female, the many colors of this earth’s glorious rainbow, and we can all agree: Screw you Bobby Southworth and Anthony Ruiz. Southworth “wins” the fight and I am pissed and tired and no longer in the mood for fighting. Maybe ever. Absolutely among the worst fights ever and certainly worse than anything I could have imagined seeing from a hometown boy defending his championship. Shameful garbage and it falls on the promoters head because he knows better than anyone else what scrubs these guys are. All the technical prowess and physical conditioning of Kimbo Slice here mixed in with the sheer ferocity of a post-coital banana slug. George Bernard Shaw once said something very like “I don’t understand the appeal of horse racing. After all, who cares if one horse is faster than another?” This could be applied nicely to this fight albeit changed to “Who cares if one guy can lay on another guy for a longer stretch of time.

My new friend Krissy now writes for a webpage called combatlifestyle.com and I plug it specifically now because she is very nice and I think it has the potential to be hilarious: MMA afterparty pictures! Sort of a Cobrasnake for the Jocko Homo set and I applaud this new business venture.

I always wonder how the fighters get that vaseline off their face after the fights. Billy Evangelista’s theme music is Rage Against Thr Machine and Nam Phan’s is Stronger by Kanye and I wonder what I like: Lower end RATM or higher end Kanye? What wins in that battle? Who can say. Let the fighter’s decide. Phan comes to the ring in a gi and I am beginning to think maybe Ye is my man. Herb Dean is finally back and perhaps the officiating will get less retarded as a result. The first round is easily Evangelista but Southworth has taken his toll: Everyone is just utterly dried out, spent, beaten down, and cranky like colicky babies. Round 2 sees a gross cut open on the side of Evangelista’s head and it drips blood into Phan’s mouth. Say it with me now: Ewwww. Evangelista wins a split decision and the audience erupts in boos but I can see how that call had been made. A young boy, three rows in front of me, his glee buoys me. A child’s smile, a warm puppy, a summer day, a soft hand clasping your own, these are the things in life that I will treasure.

I truly question Josh Thomson’s punkness. I think I am easily more punk than everyone in this arena combined. Some girl gives Thomson dual thumbs down, then dances jauntily to his music. Thomson’s abs are fine indeed, let no one dispute that. Melendez comes out to Santana which is both as San Francisco AND as Latino as you can get. Some guy earlier nearby me said that Thomson’s shoulder is heavily compromised, he can’t win this fight, and he just took it to do what’s right for “the company.” We will see.

I should note in front of me, by himself, a very austere, well dressed middle aged man, somewhat Dr. Drew-esque, who sits with legs crossed and reacts not at all to any of the evening’s proceedings. He is an intriguing character and I photograph him, pretty overtly. There is kind of a bit of surprising bit of favoritism for Thomson given that he is a bit, how you say… *waggles hand back and forth.* You know what I am saying… He is handsome. Devastatingly so. Anyway, most of you probably saw this fight and you probably saw it as I did. Pretty good, nothing too special, Thomson was surprisingly dominant and he deserved to win.

One prelim fight is due to air but I am so tired and it is time to leave. In the bathroom, just as I think “Man, some idiots here are gonna be all testosteroned up and act fools” I turn around to some guy who says “Hey homie what’s with that beard?” and I laugh in his face and he says “I oughtta drop you right here, homie” and I tell him “No, you won’t do that” and I leave. I realy contemplate not leaving, letting this go where it goes, but I leave. It is not judo at all to crack some drunkard’s head into a urinal and besides, how would that benefit my abs?

In conclusion, keep checking the ECW Press website for the release date of Total MMA: The Book and if you ever see Bobby Southworth on the street, kick him in the balls for me.