Watch the first five minutes of Gina Carano?s movie ?Haywire,? does it matter her voice is altered?

Gina Carano's new film is due to hit theatres on Jan. 20. But before it hits the big screen, there's a little controversy over whether Carano's voice has been changed in the movie.

Check out this Hulu exclusive with the first five minutes of "Haywire" and see what you think.

Below is a conversation we had with her back in 2009. Clearly, she sounds different?  Will it take away from your enjoyment of the film? Obviously, non-MMA fans will have zero idea Carano's voice has been changed.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mma-cagewriter/first-five-minutes-gina-carano-movie-haywire-did-002854113.html

Cyril Abidi  Daniel Acacio Bernard Ackah  Terrance Aflague Yoshihiro Akiyama 

Kenny Florian?s back injury may be career-ending

The Boston Herald brings us sad news from UFC veteran Kenny Florian. A back injury suffered in December may be career-ending. Numbness and tingling in his legs have prevented Florian from training. From Florian:

"It's possible, unfortunately," Florian said of his career ending. "I've kind of been going back-and-forth with some of the doctors, so it's possible. I'm going to see. As of right now, obviously I can't compete and train like I was at all. I'm just kind of doing what I can and hoping that things heal up and get better. I'm just kind of in a holding pattern. That's why I decided to do this commentary for the time being and take this next six months to really heal up and try to make some money on the side. It sucks. The last couple of months I've just been figuring out what's going on and what I'm going to do."

Florian has been working on "UFC Tonight" for Fuel TV. Before that, he was an analyst for ESPN's "MMA Live" and has done fight commentary. He is a skilled broadcaster who can bring his years of experience as a fighter to viewers. There is no doubt that he has a future on television.

[Don't miss the action: Watch UFC 142 live on Y! Sports]

Unfortunately, Florian may find the future is here a bit earlier than he expected. His career has been impressive. Florian was on the first season of "The Ultimate Fighter," where he made it to the finals despite being undersized as a middleweight. There, he lost to Diego Sanchez. Since then, his only losses have been in title or title contender fights.

Other popular Y! Sports content:
? Weekend watch: Indiana Hoosiers go for Ohio State sweep
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Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mma-cagewriter/kenny-florian-back-injury-may-career-ending-224735967.html

Andre Amade  Dean Amasinger  Jimmy Ambriz Matt Andersen  Alex Andrade 

UFC 145 Card Filling Fast, With Miguel Torres-Michael McDonald Added to Event

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Atlanta's UFC 145 has rapidly taken shape over the last 24 hours, with most of the fights originally scheduled for Montreal shifted to the April 21 card.

But it also has some additions. Among the newest bouts signed is a bantamweight tilt with rising star Michael McDonald taking on former WEC champ Miguel Torres. The UFC confirmed the matchup on Friday afternoon.

Just 21 years, McDonald (14-1) is considered one of MMA's brightest lighter weight prospects, and he's won all three of his octagon bouts so far, most recently knocking out Alex Soto in just 56 seconds at UFC 139.

Torres (39-4) is coming off a unanimous decision victory over Nick Pace on the same card. Shortly thereafter, Torres was released from the UFC after making offensive comments on Twitter. Within three weeks, however, Torres had met with company president Dana White, who decided that Torres had shown remorse for his mistake and he was re-signed.

In addition to Torres-McDonald, eight bouts that were supposed to take place on the canceled Montreal show were moved over.

All told, 10 fights have been announced for the show, which is quite conspicuously missing a main event. With light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones recently telling UFC brass he's ready to step back into training, a Jones title defense is a distinct possibility, though the UFC has given no indication of that happening.

The full card as it currently stands is below.

Michael McDonald vs. Miguel Torres
Maximo Blanco vs. Marcus Brimage
Mark Hominick and Eddie Yagin
Rory McDonald vs. Che Mills
Brendan Schaub vs. Ben Rothwell
Mark Bocek vs. Matt Wiman
Travis Browne vs. Chad Griggs
John Makdessi vs. Anthony Njokuani
Mac Danzig vs. Efrain Escudero
Keith Wisniewski vs. Chris Clements

 

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Source: http://www.mmafighting.com/2012/01/20/ufc-145-card-filling-fast-with-miguel-torres-michael-mcdonald-a/

Thiago Alves  Andre Amade  Dean Amasinger  Jimmy Ambriz Matt Andersen 

UFC on FX Morning After: Anik, Florian Put on a Good First Show

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Kenny FlorianThe work done inside the Octagon at the first-ever UFC on FX event Friday night was good, but before I get to that I'd like to take a moment to praise the work done behind the microphone.

Jon Anik, doing live play-by-play in the UFC for the first time, was a breath of fresh air. And UFC fighter Kenny Florian was a solid color commentator alongside Anik. This is a pairing that should grow together (they already have chemistry from working together on ESPN's MMA Live) and provide an authoritative pair of voices on UFC broadcasts.

Anik, in particular, is worthy of praise. He's well-prepared, knowledgeable and informative. Anik is smoother and more direct in his delivery than Mike Goldberg, the UFC's longtime in-house play-by-play man, and he seemed better able to work background information about the fighters into the flow of the fight, whereas Goldberg sometimes comes across as though he's forcing it.

If Anik continues to grow as a play-by-play man, he's going to be an excellent addition to UFC broadcasts. He has a natural feel for the flow of a fight, a good voice, and an understanding of the sport and how to describe the action. On Day One as a UFC play-by-play man, I already prefer him to Goldberg.

In addition to play-by-play, Anik handled the post-fight interviews on Friday night, and there he seemed a little bit out of his element. At times in the post-fight interviews I thought Anik ventured too far out of the commentator role and into fan territory, with comments like telling Josh Neer, "Your chin is unreal, dude." Although Anik is a UFC employee, I believe he'll better serve the audience if he comes across as more of a straight shooter and less of a promoter.

As for Anik's on-air partner, Florian is at his best when he's telling viewers why a fighter is doing what he's doing. For instance, when Daniel Roberts had Charlie Brenneman in a guillotine choke on the ground, and Brenneman escaped by turning away from it, Florian did a good job of explaining what Brenneman was doing.




"Immediately you can see Brenneman countered that guillotine choke by going to the far side," Florian said. "Going to the opposite side of that arm, that is the way you want to counter."

Lots of fighters know enough Brazilian jiu jitsu to know that, but what makes Florian good on TV is that he's eloquent enough to explain it quickly and clearly while it's happening. I also liked Florian's work on Friday night because I never got the sense that he had friends or favorites among the fighters inside the cage, which isn't always the case with fighters who work as commentators.

Ultimately, we don't tune in to a UFC broadcast -- or any other sports broadcast -- because of the announcers. We tune in because of the athletes. But we hope the commentators will entertain and inform us while we're watching. Anik and Florian did that well.

UFC on FX Notes
-- This was a very good fight card, from top to bottom. There wasn't a bad fight on it, and there were some sensational finishes, including six in the first round.

-- The main event went pretty much how I thought it was going to go: Jim Miller is just too good on the ground, and Melvin Guillard is just too bad on the ground, for a ground exchange between them to end any way other than Guillard tapping out. Miller is now 21-3 in his MMA career, with 12 of his wins by submission. Guillard is 29-10-2, with nine of his losses by submission. It's a shame that Guillard has never developed much submission defense because other than that glaring hole in his game he has the talent to be a champion.

-- Jorge Rivera retired after his fight with Eric Schafer. Rivera, who will turn 40 next month, has had a long and honorable mixed martial arts career, and it's easy to see why he has decided that now is the time: He's been fighting professionally for more than a decade, and his time in the UFC goes all the way back to UFC 44, when he beat David Louiseau, and there's not a whole lot left for him to do inside the Octagon.

Most of the talk recently about UFC fighters' pay has focused on either the entry-level fighters making as little as $6,000 a fight, or on the stars who make millions. I'd like to hear more about how well mid-level veterans like Rivera are doing financially. I would hope that Rivera has made enough money in his 15-fight career to pay off a house, put some money away for retirement, set up his gym back home in Massachusetts and generally be financially comfortable, if not rich, now that he's done fighting. Eventually it would be great to see the UFC reach the point where vested veterans have pension plans.

UFC on FX Quotes
"I was so excited. Like, I was super excited. I didn't know what to do. I was just like, I'm going to go in there and go crazy." -- Daniel Pineda, who sounded as happy as a kid on Christmas morning after he earned a first-round submission win over Pat Schilling in his UFC debut.

"I know the whole world says my jiu jitsu coach is James Toney." -- Pat Barry, making a joke at his own expense by acknowledging that his ground skills have looked almost as rudimentary as Toney's in the past. Barry still has some work to do on his takedown defense, but he did a nice job of defending himself on the ground and getting back to his feet against Christian Morecraft before eventually knocking Morecraft out.

Good Call
Joe Silva made a great decision in signing Khabib Nurmagomedov, who looked tremendous in his third-round submission win over Kamal Shalorus, a win that improved his record to an amazing 17-0. This 23-year-old Russian has a great future ahead of him.

Bad Call
Referee Herb Dean was too quick to stand up the fight when Charlie Brenneman was inside Daniel Roberts' guard in both the second and third rounds. Brenneman and Roberts were both fighting and trying to improve their positions, and Dean should have let them work it out. Coming just six days after referee Dan Miragliotta was too quick to stand up Anthony Johnson and Vitor Belfort at UFC 142, it was disappointing to see another good referee with two more premature standups.

Stock Up
Nick Denis got things started with a sensational knockout of Joseph Sandoval, using four straight short elbows to put Sandoval down just 22 seconds into the first round. The 28-year-old Denis, who has previously fought for Sengoku in Japan as well as a few smaller American promotions, is a great addition to the UFC's bantamweight division.

Stock Down
Tommy Hayden was an undefeated prospect heading into Friday night, but he had built up his 8-0 record fighting unknowns on small cards, and he wasn't ready for a grizzled veteran like Fabricio Camoes, who schooled him on the ground and made him tap in the first round. Hayden probably needs a few more fights on smaller shows before he'll be ready to step back into the Octagon.

Fight I Want To See Next
I'd love to see a rematch between Jim Miller and Gray Maynard. When they fought in 2009, Maynard won by unanimous decision, but I believe Miller may have improved more than Maynard since then. That fight would be a fascinating battle between two of the lightweight division's best grapplers.

 

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Source: http://www.mmafighting.com/2012/01/21/ufc-on-fx-morning-after-anik-florian-put-on-a-good-first-show/

Dean Amasinger  Jimmy Ambriz Matt Andersen  Alex Andrade  Jermaine Andrè 

Poler Napsack Contest: What's In The Bag, Dad?

Our good friends at Poler came to us with a simple idea ? let?s give some stuff away.

We were like, ?Hell yeah, good friends at Poler. Let?s!?

So, once a week for a month, we?re going to give you a chance to win one of Poler?s hooded Napsacks, perfect for sleeping wherever you might find yourself sleeping ? a friend?s couch, the back of a pickup, side of the road, or inside a tent.

Source: http://theskateboardmag.com/blogs/kevin-wilkins/2011/12/16/poler-napsack-contest-whats-in-the-bag-dad/

Hiroyuki Abe Cyril Abidi  Daniel Acacio Bernard Ackah  Terrance Aflague