“That happened in the middle of the second round when I kicked him to the body,” Cote said. “I got on my back leg and I felt it pop right away, and I finished the second round on only one leg. In between the second and the third round, I said to my corner man, [Mark DellaGrotte], my knee is f--ked, and I can’t kick any more for sure. He told me just to use my hands and my speed.”
Entering round three, Cote held out hope his knee would withstand the action; it did not. After a fake teep, Cote put his weight on his right leg, and a grotesque bulge quickly popped out from the side of his right knee. As difficult as the injury was to watch on the replay, the French Canadian was glad it was shown.
“I was a little bit worried that maybe a lot of people thought it was a fake injury or something like that,” Cote said, “but if you watch the replay, you can see my knee pop out.”
Cote was fairly confident he suffered a torn meniscus that will require surgery. The procedure and recovery period, combined with Silva’s possible retirement, makes a rematch unlikely. Cote’s Brazilian jiu-jitsu coach, Fabio Holanda, said the middleweight contender plans to see a doctor on Monday, at which time more will be known about the extent of the injury.
Despite the unfortunate manner in which the bout ended, Cote was happy with the way the first two rounds went. He said his game plan was to keep his distance to avoid Silva’s kicks, stay out of his feared Muay Thai clinch and, if opportunity arose, take him down and inflict some ground-and-pound.
“I felt good and had a lot of fun in this bout,” Cote said. “I said before that I had the perfect style to beat this guy, and I was doing that before this thing happened. I think the fight was pretty close. He was a little bit lost by my game plan. My game plan was perfect for this fight.”
Holanda agrees.
“Everybody was disappointed with the injury, but he went there to fight and he wasn’t scared of Anderson,” he said. “He was chasing him for the whole fight, and I think he was doing great. He gave Anderson a fight that no one else did.”
Kang Beats Eastman in Calgary
Mixed martial arts fans in Calgary, Alberta, got a treat over the weekend, as Denis Kang stopped UFC veteran Marvin Eastman in 48 seconds on Saturday in the Raw Combat “Redemption” main event.
Kang admits the win was a little anti-climactic.
“Oh my God, it so is,” he said. “Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take any win as fast as I can get anytime, but after I stepped out, I’m like, ‘I broke more of a sweat in the warm-up, and I trained five weeks for this in Montreal getting my ass beat -- all for 48 seconds?”
Kang said Eastman started the fight exactly as his team predicted, but he was still daunted and had to show him respect.
“He did exactly what I expected, which is to come bowling forward,” Kang said. “He’s not the tallest guy in the world, but, man, he’s like a barrel. He’s so thick, and I could feel so much force in his momentum. A couple times he rushed me, and he did land one clean shot on me, which didn’t really hurt me or stun me, but [it] kept me on my toes a little bit.”
Once again a free agent, Kang now looks for a permanent place to hang his hat. Although still under non-exclusive contract with Korea’s Spirit MC promotion -- where he has a huge following -- he admitted that he’s negotiating with several parties in North America. Of course, fans want to know if the UFC is one of the interested parties, and Kang conceded he would welcome the opportunity to fight there.
“Yes, it is a possibility,” he said. “I would like to go there. The UFC is the UFC; it’s the Coca-Cola of MMA right now. I’ve been watching it from the beginning, and it would be nice to get that TV exposure.”
One factor that held back a relationship between the Las Vegas-based promotion and Kang was the UFC’s insistence on an exclusive contract, which would have prevented him from accepting lucrative fights in Korea. Kang said things have changed.
“It was a little bit of that a few years ago when I turned them down for ‘The Ultimate Fighter,’” Kang said, “but Spirit MC is very understanding of it, and they’re willing to release me from my contract obligations to let me go to the UFC.”
Now seems like the perfect time for Kang to enter the Octagon, as the UFC’s middleweight division needs a viable opponent for Silva.
“It’s definitely something I’d like to do,” Kang said, “but we’ll see.”
In other matches at Raw Combat “Redemption,” Bibiano Fernandes submitted Len Tam to win the Raw Combat featherweight title; Tim Hague outpointed Miodrag Petkovic in a rematch against the only man to defeat him; and Ryan Ford used explosive takedowns to defeat Nabil Khatib by unanimous decision.
Valimaki to fight in M-1 Challenge
Victor Valimaki, whose fight at Raw Combat “Redemption” fell through, has secured a match with Rodney Faverus at an M-1 Challenge stop Nov. 26 in Helsinki, Finland.
Valimaki’s manager, Bobby Karimi-Busheri, told Sherdog.com the show will feature two team competitions -- Finland vs. France and Spain vs. the World. The event will be televised in more than 80 countries worldwide and will be carried on HDNet in North America. Three M-1 bouts, including the Valimaki-Faverus match, will anchor the show.
“I'm pretty excited we got this to happen and so is Vic,” Karimi-Busheri said. “We worked hard for it, and I know it means a lot to Vic to fight in Finland, as his heritage is Finnish.”
Rice eyes TKO 36 return
Shane Rice has lived a dream the past few years as an instructor under the legendary Rickson Gracie at his International Jiu-Jitsu Center in Los Angeles. The Sackville, Nova Scotia, native received his black belt from the notoriously stingy Gracie in 2006 after training six hours a day for nine years. At one point, he lived in Gracie’s garage for almost a year.
Rice will return to the MMA scene at TKO 36 on Dec. 5 at the Bell Centre in Montreal. He told Sherdog.com he could not be happier with his life and believes immersing himself in BJJ was a necessary part of his growth.
“I’m very happy and very blessed,” Rice said. “I see all of these other black belts who come to our school and are drooling to see Rickson, and I’ve had all of this training with him and all of this time. I’m just living my dream. I’m waking up every day and doing my passion.”
Rice was 1-3 in 2005 when Gracie encouraged him to put his MMA career on hold until he got his black belt. Five months after he received it, he stepped back into competition and won three fights in a row before being derailed by injury.
“I was on fire,” Rice said. “I won all three fights in under two minutes … tapped everybody. Then last February, right after my [Total Fighting Alliance] fight, I broke a piece of cartilage in my knee, so I had to go right into knee surgery, and that put me out until about July.”
Once healed, he realized a cage fight might not be the best way to test his knee. Instead, he went into BJJ competition, taking third place at the no-gi world championships and winning gold in both gi and no-gi at U.S. nationals. Now, Rice prepares for his return to MMA in the TKO promotion, where he believes he has what it takes to win a title.
“I think that, after two or three fights, I should at least get a title shot, or maybe they’ll give it to me right away,” he said. “I definitely feel I have the credentials to get in there and fight for the title in my first fight on Dec. 5, if [TKO President] Stephane [Patry] will give it to me.”
Rice first wants to establish himself as a bantamweight. After that, he might look into moving up to 145 pounds for selected fights against Mark Hominick or TKO featherweight champion Hatsu Hioki. Longtime Canadian MMA fans might remember Rice’s two battles with Hominick, in which both me emerged with victories. He thinks people will want to see a rubber match.
“It’s funny because we now have the same management, but that doesn’t matter because I know that’s a fight that a lot of people want to see, especially in TKO,” Rice said. “That’s definitely something I want to do.”
Canadian calendar
Nov 8: XMMA 6 "House of Pain" - Colisée de Laval - Laval, Quebec
Nov 14: KOTC - Maharaji Hall - Edmonton, Alberta
Nov 14: RITC 32 - Lethbridge Exhibition Park, South Pavilion - Lethbridge, Alberta
Nov 15: X-Fights 2 - Quebec City, Quebec
Nov 22: Elite 1 "One Man Standing" - Moncton Coliseum – Moncton, New Brunswick
Nov 28: KOTC - Calgary, Alberta (Pending Commission approval)
Nov 28: Colloseo Championship Fighting - Edmonton Events Centre - Edmonton, Alberta
Nov 29: Phoenix Fight Promotions 5 – Dartmouth Sportsplex - Dartmouth, Nova Scotia
Nov 29: Unnamed Jason MacDonald Promoted event - Red Deer, Alberta
Dec 5: MFC 19 "Long Time Coming" – River Cree Resort and Casino - Edmonton, Alberta
Dec 5: TKO 36 – Bell Centre - Montreal, Quebec
Feb 20: MFC 20 - River Cree Resort and Casino - Edmonton, Alberta