By simply telling us folks how wonderful Pepsi tastes, or how great the products that he endorses are, Fortune and MSN Money individually listed Shaquille O'Neal as number 7 in their list of top ten endorsement superstars at $15 M a year. Never mind if you like him or not, he sure does stir awareness and influences positive response to the products or brands he endorses.

Like it or not, the UFC – or mixed martial arts in general – is still in its infancy stages when compared to NBA, NFL, or even boxing. How else would you explain the pay differences between an Arlovski or an Ortiz to a Mayweather or a Pacquiao? In case you don’t know, $1.5 million is the rumoured highest paycheck to an MMA gladiator. Compare this to Manny Pacquiao’s guaranteed purse of $11 Million for his fight against Oscar De la Hoya.

Now comes the Dr. Shaq, or Shaq Fu, or Superman (however you want to name this media magnet) practically telling everyone he intends to fight inside the octagon (perhaps a career change?) after he retires from NBA. Now, that’s directing the entire world’s attention to the world of mixed martial arts that’s still in the Mesozoic Era.

Never mind if you like him or not, but the guys sure knows how to stir a hornet’s nest. Whether he stars in Kazaam (voted by “Rotten Tomatoes” as “The Worst Movie of All Time”) or weave flop poetry through his rhymes, or by thrashing Kobe Bryant, Shaq sure knows how to create buzz.

When Shaquille O’Neal called out on Hong Man Choi, and kissed Chuck Liddell’s lips after he topples him – ok, it’s not Chuck, it’s his standee poster – the guys from UFC and everyone else in the world of mixed martial arts should consider saving $3 Million dollars on promotions (PepsiCo pays Shaq this amount annually).

Never mind if you like Shaq or not, but the 7’1” tall, 340 lbs “Shaqovic” (who have trained in MMA for several years already) clashing out with the 7’2” tall, 340 lbs MMA warrior from Korea is something we don’t wanna miss.

Heck, this could even be better than a stale Kobe-Shaq verbal tussle.

Unlike fellow WWE alumnus Brock Lesnar who skyrocketed to MMA stardom via UFC, Bobby Lashley wants to take the slower route.

When asked if he would be invited, would he want to fight for the UFC, the former WWE champ said no. What?!! Ain’t that a bit lame? Lashley said he needs to stay on the undercards or on smaller gigs before he considers moving up on the UFC. Oh, he respects UFC so much that he calls it the “pinnacle of the sport” that he won’t even consider being with the UFC now. We’d say it’s still lame.

We’d say that’s a major issue on the self-confidence department. Lashley tries to justify it by saying, “When I get to the UFC, I want to be a serious contender for the title.” Major confidence issue, indeed.

Last we’ve heard, the guy would rather be on the reality TV. With this letdown on the guy’s aggressiveness on going up, when “reality TV” was mentioned, we thought he meant “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” or “Supernanny.” Pardon the slip, he meant “The Ultimate Fighter.”

He’d house up with other MMA no-namers in a house outside of Las Vegas, show the world how he bitches up, er, we mean show the world how he trains and take down other wannabes. Yeah right, reality TV… as a means of moving up to UFC. That’s cool. We just can’t help feeling let down his “no” to the rhetorical question of “if offered a slot on the UFC.”

But then…

The guy starts to make sense when he said, “I don’t want to just be another guy going into the UFC because it’s a grand stage and build there. I don’t think that’s what I need to do.” Oh, yeah. The octagon could be a very unforgiving stage. To say the obvious, a premature exposure could break you more than it could build you.

Oh, yeah. We remember how that other WWE guy, Lesnar, was not spared from belittling remarks when he first set foot inside the octagon, “He’s a freakin’ wrestler!” We remember how Jason Guida “screwed with his head” during a pre-fight presser.

We remember how we wrote last week how “it is easier to work yourself upwards when everyone’s looking somewhere else, than having pot shots thrown at you while you fight your way up.”

So, okay. Good luck on your play safe mode, Lashley. We find it a bit lame. But then, you’ve got some wisdom there.

The days seem to roll slowly. Barely three weeks on the countdown and we’ll see how Anderson Silva’s trip to the Carnival paradise Rio de Janeiro turns out during the April 18 UFC 97 “Redemption” at the Bell Center in Montreal. Besides perhaps learning a couple of samba steps or looking for that Girl from Ipanema, or lounging at the Copacabana, “The Spider” actually hied off to Rio for an octane-fed top-level jiu-jitsu training with BJJ legends Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and Andre Galvao.

Galvao studied and tries to imitate Leites’ fight style and uses this during Silva’s fight trainings.

While Silva (23-4-0) is known for his primary skills of Muay Thai and Brazilial Jiu-jitsu, his top-level jiu-jitsu training in Brazil speaks a lot about what he thinks about his BJJ skilled opponent in Thales Leites (14-1-0). “Thales is a new kids who’s just starting out, but he’s already proven that he deserves this opportunity,” Silva declared. “He’s a dangerous opponent, just like all the others I’ve faced. He has this opportunity to fight for the title because he impressed the promoters enough to get this chance.”

The 27-year-old Leites (14-1) has never been finished in 15 career fights and has enjoyed a relatively stealth rise up the middleweight ladder.

Other fighters that makes us want to time-travel to April 18 are Cheick Kongo (13-4-1) who will clash against Dutch kickboxing hero Antoni Hardonk. Former World Extreme Cagefighting light heavyweight champion Steve Cantwell (7-1) also highlights this card with a showdown with world-ranked Luis Arthur Cane.

Here are more reasons for the excitement:

Chuck Liddel vs. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua

Brian Stann vs. Krzysztof Soszynski
Cheick Kongo vs. Antoni Hardonk
Luis Arthur Cane vs. Steve Cantwell
Denis Kang vs. Xavier Foupa-Pokam
Jason MacDonald vs. Nate Quarry
Ed Herman vs. David Loiseau
Eliot Marshall vs. Mike Ciesnolevicz
Mark Bocek vs. David Bielkheden
T.J. Grant vs. Ryo Chonan
Sam Stout vs. Matt Wiman

On a side note, we just can’t help but wonder how the so-called previously unrecognized regulations of Regie des Alcools, des courses et des jeux (RACJ), the government agency that oversees combat sports in Quebec, would affect the over-all outcome of the fights. This so-called previously unrecognized regulations for the sport is the prohibition of elbow and knee strikes. The RACJ regulations, which were actually intended for “mixed boxing” in the 1990’s also asked referees to intervene whenever a fighter is knocked down. We hope this will not result to a watered-down scuffle at the octagon.

More reason for us to shiver in anticipation.

By Joe B. Skotzou

Welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre comes in as one the three best pound-for-pound fighter in polls, next only to heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko and middleweight champion Anderson Silva. B.J. Penn, on the other hand is a great lightweight who entered the octagon a lot lighter at 20 lbs, and smaller than the formidable St. Pierre, who is comfortable at 187 against Penn’s forced 168 pounds.

The “Prodigy,” who has been eyeing the much lucrative welterweight (more bigger-named fighters and bigger purses) has been neglecting his advantage in the lightweight division. The devastation he suffered from St. Pierre must have brought him back to his senses: get back to where he is king – the lightweight division.

While it can be said that B.J. Penn worked harder and trained himself like he never did before anywhere during his entire career, it was not enough to realize his dream of being the first dual-titled mixed martial arts warrior.

St. Pierre came more mentally prepared with his game plan. The first round was to tire him down, and the game was stopped by ref Herb Dean, the ringside physician and by Penn’s corner at the end of the fourth round. The devastation was so…devastating that Penn has to be rushed to the hospital later.

A slight controversy threatened to mar St. Pierre’s win when one of his cornermen rubbed Vaseline to his body (which fight officials corrected by having the slippery substance towelled off St. Pierre’s body). While it was obvious that the Vaseline-rubbing did not have any bearing on St. Pierre’s win, Dana White maintained it was wrong and said the cornerman involved (Phil Nurse) shouldn’t be allowed to corner another fighter again.

St. Pierre did not only come to this fight bigger and heavier (not a guarantee to a win) but he also came with a better game plan, “My strategy was that he has small shoulders, which is good for hand speed, so I went to make him carry my weight and cause his shoulders to tire,” said St. Pierre. “You’ll notice I didn’t rush him right away going for the takedown (his style in his last few matches),” he added. “The idea was to cause him to have to hop on one leg and get tired, and push off, having to carry my weight in the clinch. That was the idea in the first round…… I knew I broke him mentally after the first round.”

St. Pierre, who earned $420,000 in this fight (excluding his share for the pay-per-view earnings), could boast of being a part of one of the biggest pay-per-view draws in mixed martial arts at more than 900,000. To give you a better perspective, the December 2008 Oscar de la Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao tiff drew 1.25 million PPVs (tied-in with the Mike Tyson vs. Razor Ruddock battle in 1991). UFC president Dana White must be ecstatic. Gate sales went as high as $4.3 million.

Thanks to his latest brush with the law, we at MMA Weekly News (and most of UFC and mixed martial arts fans) are awaiting with bated breath whether UFC will allow “The Dentist” to compete against Mac Danzig on February 7 this year at UFC Fight Night 17 in Tampa Florida.

Josh Neer was arrested and was placed behind bars for drunk driving, hit-and-run, and eluding arrest, among other traffic violations January 1 in Des Moines, Iowa.

Neer’s management company CEO Mickey Dubberly asked “everyone to reserve their judgement until all the facts are known in the court of law.” Saying that there are still a lot of unclear details on the incident, Dubberly said that they are backing Neer 100% in having the issue resolved the soonest, “and putting this matter behind us and moving forward.”

They have all the reason to get this issue done and over with ASAP because if we base it on what happened to other mixed martial arts warriors, Josh Neer would be pulled from the UFC Fight Night 17 card. MMA fighters who were arrested (except for Quinton “Rampage” Jackson) were not allowed to compete.

In an interview with the WHO-TV News (see video clip below), Neer apologized, "I just want to apologize to my friends, my family, and fans. I made some bad choices and I basically want to move on and put this behind me."

MMA Tap-out Josh Neer DUI Arrest

Whether UFC will pull him out of the February 7 card or totally end his mixed martial arts career with UFC remains an uncertainty. The UFC or Dana White has not commented about the case yet but the video clip below says UFC will determine Neer’s case within the week.

When asked about his fate, Neer said, “It’s all up to the UFC at this point. There's nothing I can really do so I just got to sit back and hopefully they'll let me fight and I'm gonna move on from this and no more troubles."

Dubberly, on the other hand, was quick to appease UFC by saying, “In no way do we ever want to bring any negativity towards the UFC as they have been nothing but great to Josh."

Let’s cross our fingers and hope for the best comes February 7, 2009.