We here at OTM like Tara LaRosa.  We like her a lot.  We like her so much we named her our female competitor of the year for 2006.  Aside from being a total bad ass on the mat, Tara is a an incredible sweetheart off of the mat; down to earth, funny, a great representative of our sport and we genuinely like being around her.

We were incredibly saddened to here of the death of Adrian M Elizalde, Tara’s boyfriend who was KIA in Iraq on August 23, 2007.  Although we didn’t know Adrian, you could scarcely talk to Tara without her bringing him up as the love of her life.  She actually located from the east coast to the west coast to be closer to him when he was stationed in the Pacific Northwest.

Tara and Adrian will be in our thoughts and prayers here.  If there’s anything we can do you for you, please let us now.

Here is Tara’s post on MMA.tv 

“I have a great bf! He’s totally supportive, likes to train with me when he can, he’s 5′6 155 lber (walks at 170), wrestled since he was a kid, trains/fights MMA, and does NOT put up with my bs…LOL (which is huge!). The thing is, he’s military SF… so sometimes the only time we have together is at the gym, since he wakes up at 4:45/5am. So we both get to spend time together doing what we love. Down side is he’s in Iraq right now… 5 months down… 3 months to go. “

I had written this July 23rd. I talked to Adrian, my boyfriend, on Monday August 20th. He was giving me grief about not doing enough cardio, we talked about what we would do when he got home.  I told him my intenerary for the coming weeks.  I gave him shit for being short, he gave me shit for not being able to tap him in close to 2 years.  I told him I had been playing with playing with the rubber guard, and that I was working on adding the twister into my arsenal… to which he replied “that’s great, but you have to get me to the ground first.” …LOL he’s a really good wrestler, greco mainly.   He had to go, someone in the background needed help with something, he’d call again later in the week.

My boyfriend, SFC Adrian M Elizalde was killed when an IED hit his truck on Thursday August, 23rd.  He was 30 years old. 

I found out at 3:30pm PST on Friday, 24th.  I was in my hotel room in Vancouver, Bodog had brought me up to do some promo stuff and commentary for the season 6 shoot.  For those of you that were up there, this is why I had sunglasses on thoughout the fights, and why I would get up and leave periodically.  The only people that knew were Jessica Aguillar, who had been 3 doors down and found me in a heap on the floor of my hotel room, and the staff.   I didn’t want any of the fighters to know, I didn’t want anyone upset or distracted in any way before their fights.

Adrian was my hero in so many different ways.  I used to tell him he was “my superman.”  Adrian meant so much to me, I loved him so much.  He was everything I had ever wanted….. I had hoped we’d spend a lifetime together. 

-Tara LaRosa

Day 2 of the Mundials saw the Brown Belt Absolute Division saw some great action, and there were a full 8 pages of brackets leading up into the day.  For what ever reason (perhaps because the Absolute was before the regular division) there were a lot of no shows and resulting DQ’s.

Even with all of the drop outs, Bill “the Grill” Cooper managed to have all of his scheduled matches and he put on a performance like he never has before, tearing through six opponents to get to the final.  On the other side of the brackets, Octavio Souza put on a clinic submitting all of his opponents.  Keep in mind the Bill will compete in the lightweight, and Ocatvio in the middleweight divison tomorrow.  But for today were were set for a great finale, and at the start we were Octavio pulled Bill into an Omaplata ( a move he finished a few opponents earlier in the day with).  Cooper scrambled to escape, and nearly put Octavio in an Omaplata of his own (hard to describe, but makes total sense if you’ve ever seen Bill compete).  The action heads towards the edge of the mat, and the fighters come to the center for a restart.  As Bill bends down, the referee calls a halt and immediately DQ’s Bill, awarding the match to Octavio.  The reason.

Bill Cooper was not wearing any underwear underneath his pants.

The crowd (and Bill Cooper understandably) was obviously disappointed.

Coming back and looking at the official IBJJF website, apparently there is a rule on the books under disqualifications that a fighter must wear shorts underneath his pants:

D-) The fighter must wear shorts under the pants, keeping in mind the risk that the suit might get torn or unsowed, If this occurs, the athlete will be given a set time determined by the referee to find another pair of pants to wear. If the athlete can not change within the set time, he will be immediately disqualified.

It is unclear whether this should be interpreted as not wearing underwear should result in an immediate DQ however, or if Bill should have been permitted time to put on some underwear.  The crowd was certainly hostile to this call, and some have even called for throwing underwear on the mats tomorrow.  Octavio was very excited to win the brown belt absolute, as he should be, he worked hard to get to that point, but the finale between him and Bill was anything but decisive.  Octavio may well have finished Bill off from that position, but we’ll never know.  It was certainly a huge disappointment after an exciting day of action.

Should Bill have been disqualified?  I’m a friend of Bill’s as well as a fan, so I have to say I wish the match would have continued.  For Octavio’s sake as well, people are going to remember what should be the biggest win of his career to date as the underwear incident.

I’ve got to admit to a bit of MMA overload these days.  With so many different shows going on right now, it’s hard to find time to sit down and watch them all.  I know, I know, it’s my job in some ways, but then again my first love is grappling and jiu jitsu, there are PLENTY of other sites and internet experts these days covering MMA.  So between the UFC, IFL, Pride, Bodog and who knows what else my TIVO gets filled on a regular basis with MMA programming, and watching it before it gets automatically deleted is something of a task.  (Actually my TIVO has the capacity for 100 hours or so of programming, but literally half of it is filled with the Tyra Banks show and other programs my otherwise sane girlfriend refuses to delete.  And I HATE Tyra Banks.  I’m not entirely sure if this is because I find her personality and show grating, or because she is taking up precious TIVO space that could be filled up with say Shark Week, or a combination of both.)

Nowadays when I do watch free MMA programming on TV, it’s usually with my thumb on the fast forward button.  It’s not that I find MMA boring (although as I stated, my interest in it is secondary to Jiu Jitsu, and yes I know I’m in the minority), there’s just so much of it.  While what makes an exciting fight doesn’t necessarily  have any correlation to the skill of the participants, there may be a something of a shortage of talent with so much MMA going on.  That is, with so many shows to support (the above mentions, plus so many other locals shows and productions that seem to be popping up) and with MMA a relatively new (and fast growing sport) is there really enough true talent to support these shows?  I’m not sure.  Don’t get me wrong, there are lot of talented fighters out there who have dedicated YEARS to their craft who are now finally getting the recognition they deserve.

On the other hand, there seem to be a number of fighters who are undergoing “on the job training” so to speak, who are entering MMA with a minimal amount of experience.  On a local level, I am seeing a lot of people jump into the ring or the cage with less than a year training TOTAL, which blows my mind.  I personally never even entertained the thought of doing MMA until I got my black belt, and now that I got that, I have virtually no interest in doing MMA.  It takes a lot of skills to be a successful MMA fighter, and the very best always have a solid background in one of the core arts (be it Jiu Jitsu, kickboxing, wrestling, or something else).  So while two unskilled fighters “swinging for the fences” can make for an entertaining fight, I have virtually no personal interest in watching someone compete who I don’t feel has a future in this sport because they don’t have the skills to get to the next level.

I guess that may be one reason I prefer grappling to MMA.  At the highest levels of grappling you everyone involved has dedicated years of training, learning and hard work and while there are fast tracks to the top so to speak it is fair to say that everyone at that level has been involved for a long time in their chosen art.  That’s not necessarily the case with MMA right now, where as you can have the jack of all trades, master of none philosophy.

Please note that IO am not discounting the hard work anyone who competes in MMA puts in.  But time and base skills definitely makes a huge difference between the fighters who jump into it and the fighters who are going to be competitive in the long run.

Long sidetracking rant aside, I happened to be watching this weeks Bodog (I think it was this weeks) and came across a match that got me VERY excited:  Mario Rinaldi vs Roy Nelson.  These two men have made a name for themselves on the grappling circuit and I’m pretty familar with them.  Mario Rinaldi was the ADCC North American Trials winner and no less of a grappler than ATT teammate and training partner Jeff Monson was been very complimentary of Mario’s skill.  In pure grappling terms, I would rank him as a heavy underdog to Roy Nelson however, a man who actually holds a WIN over Jeff Monson in grappling (which puzzled me the announcers didn’t mention this, but did mention a victory over Jason Godsey).  In their weight category, I would consider Roy (who weighed in at 256 for this fight) among the very best in the world at grappling, and Mario Rinaldi (who weighed in at 265) among the best up and comers.  In short, it’s rare you get to see guys of this size, caliber, and pedigree go head to head on even the grappling circuit, much less seeing these guys (who going into the match are a combined 11-1) meet up in MMA.  A couple of fights down the road, and this match has the potential to headline a show, and here it is on free TV courtesy of Bodog.

I won’t spoil the fight for you for those of you who have yet to watch it, other than to say it was exciting and a bit unexpected.  BodogFight seems to repeat itself over and over again on Ion TV during the week (I’ve never heard of this network either), and the fights are replayed on Bodog Fight’s website.

In all fairness, Bodog has actually done an excellent job of finding and showcasing talent that for whatever reason has yet to make it to a mainstream audience and there are a lot of fighters getting a shot who have spent years honing their craft (although you rarely get a good head to head match up like this one).  It’s hardly surprising when you consider they have Jeff Osbourne as their commissioner (one of the most respected guys in the sport by insiders who has been a testament to quality matchmaking and showcasing talent for YEARS) and Miguel Itturate, who despite being the butt of a few jokes is very good at what he does as well.  I think Calvin Ayre comes off as more than a bit goofy in the promotions, but the fighters I’ve talked to said he’s a nice guy and he is paying them well, so who am I to complain?