With only a month of training, the Montreal native prepped for a rubber match with Hughes, one of the top three athletes in the history of UFC and a certainty to become the fifth Hall of Famer in the league’s history. The oddity about this match was the way the French Canadian won it; he flat out wrestled the wrestler. The pre fight assessment was that if Hughes got the fight to the mat, he would win the interim title (more on that silliness later). If St. Pierre could remain on his feet, the consensus said that he’d walk away victorious. So much for consensus, eh? Though he only had 30 days to get ready, St. Pierre is never out of shape because of his training regimen and his concentration on the wrestling part of his game over the last few months (he considered qualifying for the Canadian Olympic wrestling team) was the tipping point in the third matchup. The short notice probably hurt Hughes more than St. Pierre because prepping for Serra and then having to strategize for Georges in a few weeks proved to be too daunting of a task for the best welterweight ever to grace the Octagon. Though there had been bitter feelings between the two after Hughes’ ringside celebration of Serra’s defeat of St. Pierre in Houston, the two sat side by side in the post game press conference and showed nothing but mutual respect for each other.

“The real champion is Matt Serra. I won’t wear the belt until I beat Serra,” St. Pierre rightfully remarked as he was presented the interim belt after submitting Hughes at 3:34 of the 2^nd round to close the card. The class and respect Georges showed both the real title and Serra shows why the UFC should be desperate to make this guy their marquee athlete. His good looks, his fighting style, his respect for the game and the dignified way he carries himself (always showing up for press conferences in tailored suits) is the mainstream type of look that potential major advertisers want to see. He has all the tools to become the crossover star Chuck Liddell and Randy Couture weren’t and couldn’t be and if Dana White and the Fertitta brothers want to chip in for an English language tutor to sharpen Georges speaking skills, the UFC just may have the star that would appeal to non-MMA watchers as well as those that jam the arenas.

With this loss, you’ve probably seen the last of Matt Hughes. He mounted no offense against St. Pierre and was baffled trying to figure him out. He came out southpaw, but it had no effect on his opponent and he looked like a mere mortal in this effort. Though he says he wants to fight Serra because of the animosity built up between the two during the current season of the Ultimate Fighter television show, that match won’t happen. The first factor is the timing of Matt Serra’s return; UFC would love to have St. Pierre recapture the title in Montreal in April but the nature of a herniated disk in the back could put Serra on the shelf for far longer. If Serra were to come back and win, something the UFC desperately doesn’t want and virtually all those close to the sport don’t envision; you’re looking at the summer being the earliest time for a Serra-Hughes matchup. Hughes will be deep into retirement at his Midwest farm by the time the sun is that high in the Illinois sky. For all his accomplishments in the sport, Hughes was never embraced by its fans that way Liddell or Couture were and he was never brash enough to polarize people like Tito Ortiz did. Did he have the respect of the fan base? Indeed, but respect ain’t love. Matt did affirm his appreciation for the UFC enriching his bank account and while not officially announcing it was his last match, there’s nothing more he can do to enhance his legacy. “I walk into a gym twice a day and work out with people I like. How can this be work? How can this be a career? A career is something you DON’T want to wake up to every day. The UFC is family to me. I will let every one know that I will not entertain offers from another other organization to fight,” Hughes conveyed in a statement that is a few clicks away from a retirement notice.

Lost in all this is the way Serra has been treated by the organization. He wasn’t present in Las Vegas for the matches and the creation of an interim title due to his injury shows a lack of respect for what he accomplished. He’s certainly not the type of personality or fighter that the UFC can leverage for further growth but can they at least wait until he loses the belt in the ring before they cast him aside? The guy did step in at 12-1 odds against and beat the next big thing in their league, an accomplishment that should be embellished not swept under the rug, which is exactly what White has done. While the back injury could be a career stopper given the physical demands of the sport, there’s no reason to minimize an upset that’s arguably the biggest in the history of the UFC.

HE’S BAAAACK….

If you saw Chuck Liddell’s August performance against Keith Jardine like we did, you would have said the Iceman melted into the sunset. Unenthused, sloppy and dull, the Liddell dropped a decision to Jardine and the continuation of his career was brought into question as a result. “I really don’t know, I have to go home and talk to my children and see what I want to do,” were Liddell’s words that the time and certainly not ones that should come out of the mouth of one of the most feared men in the sport. He needed something to invigorate him, a motivating factor that would get him focused and get him back in the gym to the sharpness he needed to compete at the highest level. Shortly after Labor Day, he got the tipping point in just two words, Wanderlei Silva.

Yes, they should have done this fight five years ago when both men were at their peak. I want a Porsche and I want to date one of Tom Brady’s ex’s but that’s not happening either. While Mike Goldberg and Joe Rogan were screaming (geez, can those two stop yelling for 3 minutes out of the 3 hours they’re on the PPV, it’s old and annoying) about how this was a fight for the ages, it wasn’t even the last match on the card. They didn’t throw from Round 1 to the last moment like Forest Griffin and Stephen Bonnar did at TUF 1. The reality was that Liddell, knowing he had the bout in hand with 3:00 left in the third round stepped back and looked at the clock three times before the bout ended because he was so gassed (though he didn’t admit it in the press conference.) But when they did engage, it was vintage Liddell but that’s not where he won the fight. He won it a little over 24 hours before he stepped in the Octagon. We knew Liddell was ready at the weigh-in; just after he stepped off the scale and the pose down with Silva. Chuck, in the true bad ass style his fans adore, flipped off the Brazilian star and for us, it was the sign that he was ready for a real fight, the impostor that faced Jardine was gone and Silva had best bring his “A” game to the cage.

Silva showed a great deal of heart in this fight but little more. Due to the disparity in height and reach, Silva could never get inside on Liddell to deliver the devastating knees that have finished many opponents and the amount of effective punches he landed could be counted on one hand. Truth be told, the first round of the match was fought as a boxing match, with a lot of jabbing, few connects and too much respect for the other. The second half of round two and the two opening minutes of round three WERE a war, however, with Liddell opening up cuts around the eyes where Silva has built up so much scar tissue built up over the years. Despite unloading on him with everything but the kitchen sink and although he wobbled Wanderlei, the pride of Silva would not allow the Iceman to floor his smaller opponent. “He’s a very tough guy, I hit him with everything and he just didn’t go down,” remarked Liddell, who didn’t seem surprised at Silva’s resilience. Chuck won every round on the judges’ scorecards save for one dissenting vote in the middle round, so while a few months ago many questioned if he’d ever return to the ring, this win will provide the motivation to Liddell to achieve the one goal he remains fighting for. “I want my belt back,” referring to the UFC light heavyweight championship held by his vanquisher, Quentin “Rampage” Jackson. Though one would think that this win gets him a Jackson rematch immediately, it’s not going to work that way. When we asked if he was ready for a title shot, Chuck said, “I’m ready for Rampage but it’s up to Dana,” and when we put it to White, the response was, “Forest Griffin is going to fight Rampage next.” Yes, Griffin deserved a shot at some point based on his win over Shogun (whoops, Pride guy, deduct a few style points please) in August but don’t you always want to play your ace? Isn’t Rampage-Chuck 3 a far bigger event and money maker?

AND NOW ANOTHER GREAT PRIDE FIGHTING MOMENT IN THE UFC…..

Or not. You know that White and the Fertittas are sick over the continuing failure of former Pride fighters in the UFC with every subsequent flop. They now realize that they never had to buy the league due in part to the fact that the fighters’ contracts weren’t part of the deal and wish they had never written that check. This evening’s buster was a cat called Sokoudjou, a nice looking light heavyweight specimen from Cameroon, dreadlocks and all; good personality and a huge MMA record of 4-1. 4-1? Hmm, maybe that pesky thing called experience got in the way of a win Saturday. The Cameroon cat did zip against Lyoto Machida, a Brazilian who is very quietly building a body of work that may land him in the top of the division soon with the right direction from management. Machida got the submission at 4:20 of the 2^nd round and White hinted that Lyoto could be an interesting and worthy opponent for Liddell although I’m not sure why Chuck would take that fight since there’s way too much downside and little upside as it regards his title pursuit. In addressing the most recent Pride flop, White came up with a reason (we’ll be nice and not call it an excuse) for the underperformance of those who’ve transitioned from the defunct league. “It’s the ‘UFC Jitters’. I was talking to Quentin Jackson about it. He said he had it before his first match and so did Dan Henderson. It’s the big stage,” White revealed.

Dana, come on. Something better than that, please. The Pride shows had 50,000 people attending routinely in Japan, so it can’t be fear of large crowds in these fighters’ heads that’s causing them to failure. How about crediting the skill of your home grown guys or maybe you overestimated the talent level in Pride? Did you think Mirko Cro Cop was looking that the size of the crowd in the UK when Gabe Gonzaga kicked him in the head? Hmm…maybe he was. With all the success in the recent years, it’s OK to admit you made a mistake, albeit a very expensive one.

REALLY NO LOVE

The match between Rick “No Love” Clementi and Melvin Guillard should have been billed “Bayou Bad Blood.” These two cats prowl around the same haunts in Louisiana and have a long and acrimonious history. Clementi submitted Guillard in 4:20 of the first round but that’s where the fun really started. As Melvin tapped, Clementi got up from the mat and crotch chopped his opponent in true WWE/DX style, not the most gracious of victory celebrations. To further dig at his beaten rival, his post fight interview with Rogan when something like this, “There’s nothing worse than a guy who talks shit and can’t back it up,” the guy who is known as No Love showed why he’s called that. With Guillard still in the cage, he rushed at Clementi and had to be forcibly removed from the arena and was not in attendance at the press conference. The victor kept going in the presser saying, “Melvin is a young kid who doesn’t know when to shut up. He said a lot of things he had no business saying. You don’t go out there and say, ‘this guy sucks’, it doesn’t show any respect. The best thing about this win is that for some reason I was the underdog and all my family and friends made a lot of money betting on me.”

THE AFTERMATH…..

Lots of juicy stuff in the press conference about the 2008 calendar for UFC. Dan Henderson will go down to 185 to fight Anderson Silva for the middleweight strap in March. Best move for Henderson, it’s his natural weight and with the 205 lb. division cluttered with talent, why not walk into a division with no serious talent except for the champ? If he can get past Silva, who’s been untouchable, Henderson could have a long run as champ.

Although there was a viewing party at Madison Square Garden in NYC Saturday night, 2008 will not see the debut of the UFC or any other MMA event this year in the Big Apple. White tipped his hand about where expansion will concentrate, New York and Mexico but in 2009. Where you won’t see UFC is Brazil and Japan, with White claiming that the production costs to do a Brazilian show are prohibitive and there are forces in Japan that won’t allow the UFC in the country, that nebulous answer smells of heavy politics taking hand in the land of the Rising Sun.

Keeping a light in the window for Randy? Just when you thought you’d had enough interim titles, White is curiously serving you up another when Gonzaga and Tim “Maniac” Sylvia compete for the interim heavyweight title shortly. Ugh, how about the “I got my ass kicked by Randy Couture” belt too? If Couture resigned from the league and is not honoring his contract why would it be for an INTERIM title…..unless……..maybe there’s some thawing of the ice on both sides. A Gonzaga-Sylvia matchup isn’t gonna have anyone pressing the “BUY” button for the PPV.

Injury update:  Nate Mohr suffered a possible ACL tear when submitting to Manvel Gamburyan, while James Irvin found a tough way to win by being kneed in the eye socket by Luis “Bana” Cane to earn a DQ win. Irvin went to Valley Hospital for an MRI for a probable concussion. An embarrassing moment came for some scrub reporter when he asked Dean Lister, who was mediocre on the undercard, how he felt when he got kneed in the head. Lister, who has a passing resemblance to Irvin, said, “that wasn’t me, dude.”

Though White rightfully bangs on boxing promoters for not reinvesting in the sport and leading it to its supposed demise (that’s been happening for 50 years, folks, it’s not happening), consider this little tidbit when comparing MMA and the UFC specifically on the fight landscape. Pound for pound boxing king Floyd Mayweather’s two PPV fights this year, against Oscar de la Hoya and Ricky Hatton, out grossed ALL of the 2007 UFC PPVs. So UFC hasn’t stolen all of boxing money and when White says, “we’re nowhere near mainstream,” he’s right. But when you see the publicly held Harley Davidson as the title sponsor of UFC 79, that’s a big win. The problem is with the lesser cards coming in January and February (BJ Penn and Joe Stevenson in Newcastle, England ain’t GSP-Hughes or Silva-Liddell), the uneven cards may keep major advertisers away from long term deals they may wait for the real stars to headline the bill. While on the Mayweather effect, let’s broach the Floyd to MMA chatter. We attended the Steele Cage promotion at the Riviera Friday night where my pal, Hall of Fame boxing announcer Al Bernstein manned the mike with MMA legend, Phil Baroni. At dinner afterwards, we chatted with Al, who’s called many of Floyd’s matches, about the Mayweather factor in MMA. The reality is if you watch any of Floyd’s fights for about one minute you’d know that Floyd hates to get hit with 8 oz gloves while standing up. What do you think his reaction would be if he was on his back getting hit with those half gloves? Tap, tap, tap. Additionally, for all his greatness, Mayweather is not a draw, he doesn’t sell tickets. He IS the perfect bad guy, the perfect foil in a match because of his greatness and what some call arrogance (but we don’t). The two biggest paychecks he got were because of the massive following of his opponents, de la Hoya and Hatton. If you don’t believe me, ask boxing promoter Dan Goossen who lost $ 6 million promoting a recent Mayweather title defense against Carlos Baldomir. So while Mayweather’s prospective business partner, billionaire Mark Cuban can lose $ 6 million day trading stocks, he can’t develop an MMA strategy around Floyd Mayweather; he’d be far better off dogging Couture with serious green and with Randy’s present state of mind. But White is right on the mark in stating that any additional investment and exposure for the sport can only help.