Brock Lesnar's done it. CM Punk's done it ... but the guys from The New Day say there's NO DAMN WAY they'd ever considering moving from the WWE to the UFC. 

The tag team superstars -- who were just tapped to host WrestleMania 33 -- joined the guys on the "TMZ Sports" TV show (airs Monday night on FS1) ... and told us their feet are FIRMLY planted in the WWE.

So, why not give the UFC a shot? Big E put it best ...

"I gyrate for a living! I shake my hips for a living, that's what I do! You want to get punched in the face by Derrick Lewis?? NO THANK YOU!"

The guys also tell us how the other WWE superstars REALLY feel about Conor McGregor -- who's taken some major shots at pro wrestlers in the past.

The Superfight: it’s a term used so often these days that it’s become a novelty.

In theory, it identifies a bout that is designed to bring two fantastic fighters together in a clash that speaks to the best aspects of their relative skills and styles.

In boxing, it has often been used to identify bouts that could never happen: Muhammad Ali versus Mike Tyson, Sugar Ray Robinson versus Floyd Mayweather Jr., Roberto Duran versus Manny Pacquiao.

But in the sport of MMA, it is used to describe the dreamlike quality of fights that, while perhaps improbable, are not impossible: Jose Aldo versus Anthony Pettis, for instance.

Or the previously ballyhooed Georges St. Pierre versus Anderson Silva.                     

It’s the proverbial “White whale” of the sport, and no matter how many times such bouts are rumored, only to fail to be actualized, the term endures because there are always new fighters rising to the top; new fights that could answer the question: “Who would win if…”

As fighters fight to answer that question, fans and pundits ponder and posit in the absence of these rarest of occurrences. We question and debate who would win in a bout between two fighters that are so good that they remain nearly untouchable by anyone save perhaps another of their untouchable ilk.

No matter what criteria you favor, you know the fights in question, as we all do. While Anderson Silva may no longer have the title, much of the Superfight debate has been built upon his name and that honestly has not changed.

Even though he lost two in a row to Chris Weidman, he is still thought to be the best because great fighters are not the sum total of their defeats. Muhammad Ali lost to Leon Spinks, when the latter had just eight professional fights, yet even after their bout, no one doubted Ali would be remembered as the greater fighter.

So, we ponder the obvious inclusions, as we always have; this time, we include them all, in one place and at one time. In fact, we will also include one boxing bout—Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Pacquiao—simply because it has been debated at length in many MMA discussions, which is of no surprise; it is the gold standard for incredible fights that should have been made yet never were.

Last week, I followed TJ Dillashaw as he prepared for his UFC 173 bout against Renan Barao. He was one of the biggest underdogs ever to participate in a championship bout, and few gave him a chance of making it out of the first round, much less pulling off the historic upset.

In my time spent with Dillashaw, I saw a man completely unfazed by the task ahead of him, as though he had no idea what the fans and oddsmakers were saying.

He was relaxed, loose and absolutely confident that he’d be taking the title back to Sacramento. He spoke of all the things he’d need to get used to as bantamweight champion, such as spending fight weeks in the nicest hotel suites available instead of standard rooms.

Where did his confidence come from? How was he able to overlook the long odds he faced?

“Duane (Ludwig) always said he had the utmost confidence in me beating Barao. He isn’t going to blow smoke up my butt when he tells me what he believes. The way he went about it made me super confident getting in there,” Dillashaw says. “And then the rest of my team, Urijah, Joseph, Chad, they all tell me how good I am. Urijah really believed that I could beat Barao.



Dillashaw was on to something. He went in the Octagon and beat Barao from pillar to post before finishing him in the fifth round to become the new bantamweight champion.

He knocked Barao down in the first round, then used the same tactics to befuddle the champion and keep him off balance in the second. He knew then that he had a chance to win. After a dominant third, he realized he’d won the first three rounds going away. Barao had nothing to offer him.

“After that, I was like ‘I’ve got this guy’s number. I can put it on him,’ Dillashaw says. “After the third, I knew I had him.”

The historic underdog hadn’t just defied the odds; he’d trampled all over them and then kicked them out the door. He’d dominated one of the best pound-for-pound fighters in the world and turned in one of the single best performances in UFC history.

“History will be made tonight,” so sayeth our friends in the UFC, as Julianna Peña will face Jessica Rakoczy for the honor of becoming the first female to ever win The Ultimate Fighter. At the same time, Chris Holdsworth and David Grant will be fighting for the distinction of being this season’s male winner of TUF 18: Team Rousey vs. Team Tate, but we’re far more interested in seeing the talent in the women’s division expand with one of these great women stepping up and earning a shot at a long, successful career in the UFC.

Meanwhile, the main event features two ranked lightweights facing off for a chance to get back in the title hunt, as fifth-ranked Gray Maynard and eighth-ranked Nate Diaz will fight despite that whole, strange story about Diaz supposedly backing out for his high school reunion. He could still back out of the fight, of course, but I’m assuming that he’s going to fight since he weighed in and all.

The online preliminaries begin at 7:30 PM ET (it’s just one fight this time), but you can join us right here at 8 PM ET for the preliminaries on Fox Sports 1 and then at 10 PM ET for the main card on Fox Sports 1.

If it feels like you've waited forever to see Georges St-Pierre and Nick Diaz face off, well, you're not alone.

We've waited a long time for this fight. And there was a time, back when Diaz was suspended and retired and not coming back to the UFC, that I figured it was going to fall in that category of "dream fights that never came to fruition," right alongside Fedor Emelianenko vs. Randy Couture or Brock Lesnar.

Diaz came to his senses and decided to continue fighting, and St-Pierre elected to go with the biggest-money fight available to him in the welterweight division instead of facing Johny Hendricks or moving up in weight to face Anderson Silva. So even though the road was a long one, we're finally here: St-Pierre and Diaz will step in the Octagon on Saturday night in Montreal.

I'll be in Montreal all week providing you with the usual fight week news and nuggets. But for now, let's take a look at five questions surrounding various fighters on the card.

 There's very little question that Georges St-Pierre truly dislikes Nick Diaz. We've known that for quite some time now.

The question surrounding the fight is this: Will St-Pierre's hatred for everything Diaz represents result in GSP actually trying to finish a fight rather than score a wrestling-based decision?

I don't know that it will. I hope so, but we've seen instances of St-Pierre having plenty of dislike for his opponents in the past. Josh Koscheck, for example, got under the welterweight champion's skin for a long time leading up to their fight, and yet St-Pierre was content to keep Koscheck grounded for the majority of their UFC 124 fight.

I can't blame St-Pierre for going after a win in the best way he knows how. He's a rich man with a brand to protect, and much of the popularity of that brand comes from his long reign as champion. In his head, it probably makes more sense to score the win however he can, and if that means wrestling his opponent for five rounds, so be it.

But we've also spent a lot of time hearing St-Pierre discuss how he's not going to do that anymore, how he's going to go for the finish. And then, after each unanimous decision win, St-Pierre apologizes for not finishing his opponent.

It's time to stop apologizing and start taking a few risks. If St-Pierre wants to maintain his standing as one of the most popular fighters in the world, he'll need to show the fans that he's willing to do a little bit extra to thank them for paying their hard-earned dollars to watch him fight. And there's no better opponent with which to do that than Diaz.

This is a situation tailor-made for St-Pierre to put on an exciting fight, because he has a willing opponent that would love nothing more than to stand and trade punches. And on top of that, this is a real grudge match that has the potential to send his hometown Montreal crowd into raptures.

I would understand if he just wants the win, but I want to see GSP do more than just win. I want to see him excel.


Can Johny Hendricks make a statement and overcome his biggest test to date?

By all rights, Johny Hendricks should be competing against Georges St-Pierre in the main event of UFC 158. He's the rightful top contender and is riding a five-fight winning streak, with his last three wins coming over top-10 competition.

There's no reason to rehash the sordid story that left us with the first event to ever be canceled in UFC history. All we need to know is that when the full history of the UFC is written, there will be an asterisk next to UFC 151, noting that the event never took place.

All the fights on that ill-fated fight card have found a new home, which is a positive. The negative is that the main event between UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and former Pride and Strikeforce champion Dan Henderson is not going to take place, due to a knee injury Henderson suffered while training.  Instead, Jones will defend his title against Vitor Belfort in the main event of UFC 152.

The full lineup for the September 22 fight card, which will take place at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario, looks like this:

Jon Jones vs. Vitor Belfort

Joseph Benavidez vs. Demetrious Johnson

Michael Bisping vs. Brian Stann

Matt Hamill vs. Vladimir Matyushenko

Charles Oliveira vs. Cub Swanson

Vinny Magalhaes vs. Igor Pokraja

Evan Dunham vs. T.J. Grant

Lance Benoist vs. Sean Pierson

Marcus Brimage vs. Jim Hettes

Seth Baczynski vs. Simeon Thoresen

Mitch Gagnon vs. Walel Watson

Charlie Brenneman vs. Kyle Noke

What follows are questions we have heading into UFC 152.

There's a lot to admire about Stephan Bonnar. He's a competent television announcer and a good storyteller who helps fans understand what it takes to compete inside the cage. He was a pretty solid fighter, too, combining with Forrest Griffin in the finale of the first season of The Ultimate Fighter to let the world in on a little secret—MMA is awesome.

I've seen Bonnar described over and over again as "tough as nails." That captures his essence, for good or ill. He will never back down, that much is true. But unfortunately for the journeyman light heavyweight, it's mostly a nice way of saying Bonnar's good at getting punched in the face.


A fighter who all but announced his retirement after his last bout—that's what Bonnar is. What he isn't, however, is more germane to this discussion.

He isn't going to suddenly become a major player at the box office.

And he isn't worthy of a fight with the greatest of all time, middleweight champion Anderson Silva who will step up a weight class to take on Bonnar in Brazil.


This fight is a lose-lose proposition for the UFC. Despite the addition of Silva, I don't think this card will perform well on pay-per-view. At the box office, it's already a lost cause. Fans expect Silva to decimate Bonnar, which is likely what will happen.

It's not the worst thing that could happen if you're the UFC, though. There remains an even more devastating option.

Bonnar, who opened as a +5,500 underdog courtesy of comedians on Twitter (meaning you'd win $5,500 on a $100 Bonnar bet), could conceivably do the impossible. With four-ounce gloves, anything can happen in the Octagon.

What if Bonnar manages to clip  Silva? What if he slices him open the way fellow underdog Vitor Belfort once took the light heavyweight belt from Randy Couture on a fluke cut?

It's not likely, but the sport is designed for the unlikely to happen. A Silva loss would be nothing short of catastrophic for the UFC. The legacy he's built over the years? It won't disappear, but it will be tarnished if he loses to a never-was such as Bonnar.

Passing the torch to the next champion is one thing. Losing to a guy who never made it to the top of the sport? Ask Fedor Emelianenko how that works out for your place in history.

Supporting this awful main event is a light heavyweight fight between the relatively unknown Glover Teixeira (18-2) and Fabio Maldonado (18-5). Maldonado steps in for Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, who departed stage right due to an injury.

I love this fight in many ways. It should be a compelling scrap between two really tough guys. But Maldonado has actually lost his last two fights and sports a UFC record of just 1-2. Teixeira only has one fight in the UFC. One!

Well, it didn't take long for former UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar to get a meaningful fight at 145 pounds. Late Thursday night, John Morgan of MMAJunkie reported that "The Answer" would step in for an injured Erik Koch and fight Jose Aldo at UFC 153 in October. The nature of Koch's injury was not revealed.

**Update: Ariel Helwani of MMAFighting.com reports Koch suffered a knee injury.

After some epic battles with BJ Penn and Gray Maynard, Edgar has dropped his last two fights, both to Benson Henderson. Aldo, on the other hand, is undefeated under the Zuffa banner and has won 13 straight fights.

UFC 153 is scheduled for October 13 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Invicta FC will hold their second show in the same location as their first, Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kansas.

The 14-bout card will be streamed live and free on InvictaFC.com at 7 p.m. ET.

In the main event of the evening top prospect and Olympic silver medalist Sara McMann takes on her toughest foe to date, Shayna Baszler.

In the co-main, Strikeforce bantamweight Alexis Davis returns to action following her defeat to Sarah Kaufman in March to battle Hitomi Akano.


Main Card
Shayna Baszler (133.6) vs. Sara McMann (135.4)
Hitomi Akano (135.8) vs. Alexis Davis (134)
Kaitlin Young (135) vs. Liz Carmouche (135)
Lacey Schuckman (115.4) vs. Ayaka Hamasaki (114.6)
Raquel Pa'aluhi (134.4) vs. Amanda Nunes (135.4)
Vanessa Porto (133.6) vs. Sarah D'Alelio (136.2)*
Bethany Marshall (124) vs. Barb Honchak (124.2)
Elina Nilsson (144.6) vs. Julia Budd (145.2)

Preliminary Card
Carla Esparza (115.2) vs. Sarah Schneider (116)
Nicdali Rivera-Calanoc (105.2) vs. Angelica Chavez (105.4)
Sarah Moras (134.8) vs. Raquel Pennington (134.4)
Jessamyn Duke (135) vs. Suzie Montero (136)
Cheryl Chan (124.2) vs. Jocelyn Lybarger (124.8)
Jessica Philippus (107.2) vs. Liz McCarthy (104.2)*

*Sarah D'Alelio was able to weigh-in under 136-pounds on her second weigh-in. Jessica Philippus was unable to cut more weight. The fight will still proceed and she will be penalized 25% of her fight purse.
source