twiztor

my comfort food wrestling is two-fold. for long periods, i will watch the Monday Night Wars documentary. i've watched that thing a ton and can basically repeat it word for word. lately, i keep watching the Last Battle of Atlanta. it gives me immense joy.

and their you have it

tough call. had to go with Gegard Mousasi, with four very nice wins in a row, including avenging his loss from 2015. it's crazy to think that he's only ranked #5 and that he still hasn't had a title shot in the UFC. i would love to see Jacare win the belt and then Mousasi get the first shot, closing out their trilogy. i guess we'll just have to see how this plays out. i see Angela Hill is getting a lot of support. i haven't seen enough Invicta for her to get my vote, but i like what i'm hearing from you guys. i definitely need to start getting caught up on that promotion. Cruz is a tough pick. He obviously came back and won the title in his return bout (against Dillashaw, who has looked fantastic). Then he beat up Urijah Faber again, which is no small feat. But then he had that upset loss to Garbrandt, which hurts him in my eyes. Just couldn't pick him. Khabib is a beast, and one of my favorite LW fighters. I don't really know how much of a comeback this really is, tho. I mean, yeah, he was off for two full years, but he was right back into kill mode when he got back. It really feels like he never left. maybe that's a sign that he had the best comeback of all.

i gotta be honest, i don't remember any of these fights. guess i'll sit this one out....

for me it is UFC 199, and it's not even close. this was, top-to-bottom, potentially the greatest UFC card of all time. for a card that looked quite lackluster, it delivered in spades. Topping it off with Michael Bisping KO'ing Luke Rockhold to win the MiddleWeight Title, in a fight that nobody gave him a chance in, is just icing on the cake. There wasn't a single bad fight all night (from what i can remember) and i was loving every minute of it.

not out of the realm of possibility, no, but quite a long shot i would imagine. HA! didn't see the Volkov pick. i was probably too held up on the Kurt Angle/gold medalist prediction. good luck on that one, AxB

i preordered the Switch and the LE of Zelda, but i'm probably going to cancel in a few days. i preordered to give myself time to mull it over (in case everywhere sold out immediately) but it just hasn't shown me that it's going to be up my alley. i'll give it a couple years and see what happens (or at least until Mario Odyssey comes out)

this is an interesting choice. i would be surprised if JDS even gets a #1 contender match this year.

I'm not doing picks, but i REALLY hope Mauro stays far away from the UFC. just not a fan of his.

i definitely agree. the heavyweight division is so flimsy that there's plenty of room at the top for everyone. If Ngannou had fought/beaten Arlovski in 2016, he would absolutely have been my pick. As it stands right now, he beat a bunch of no-namers in the weakest division. I could easily see him becoming champion and/or challenging for a title before Cirkunov, but to me it would ring a bit more hollow at this point. I see enormous possibilities for both men, and they were my first and second choices, but in a division that anybody can knock anybody else out at any time, there's always a question mark. I guess what i'm saying is that fighting at LHW makes it easier to gauge skill level than at HW, so i leaned that way.

some friends and i were trying to figure out the last BJ Penn fight that actually mattered. we decided that it was the two fights with Frankie Edgar (both from 2010). Unfortunately, they both mattered more for Edgar, who really launched his career from that moment, more than Penn. An addendum was made that the fight with Fitch (2011) may have mattered, had somebody actually won that fight. Unfortunately, that was SIX years ago. Can't see this going so well for BJ.

Kurt Angle?

i gotta give it to Cirkunov this year. i feel he's had the highest profile win of the bunch, in the Krylov fight, and he looked good doing it. I know he's ranked in the top 10, and i don't think anybody else listed is (maybe Ngannou?) I see the highest upside for him. Luque is definitely someone to keep an eye on, tho. and, apologies, but i am so far behind in my Invicta watching that i haven't seen Megan Anderson yet.

of those fights that i have seen, any other year they are all potential worst fight of the year. (Un?)fortunately for them, this year solely belongs to Kimbo vs DaDa. it is literally the worst fight i have ever seen, and i personally vote it worst fight of all time.

i feel like applying for a retroactive TUE, AFTER having been found using one illegally, probably won't end well. nor should it.

willing to bet both Bader and Larkin stay put in the UFC. i would hope the UFC wouldn't let them go easily anyway

well, that is fantastic news. i really hope to see him in the UFC.

my Marvel wish list for 2017 (and beyond!): The Human Torch (Jim Hammond, the Golden Age hero, not the F4 johnny storm version) becomes a major player and gets an ongoing solo series. MiracleMan finally gets going on being published again, including new issues from Gaiman & Buckingham. a bit off to the side, but the 1994 Spider-Man cartoon gets a proper DVD release.

my DC wish list for 2017 (and beyond!): Apache Chief and Birdman join the DC proper. pretty sure i just mentioned that a short while ago in this very thread, but oh well. Nightwing becomes an A-Lister. Batgirl goes back to pre-Burnside characterization and costume. this whole Watchmen thing is forgotten and nobody ever mentions it again.

i thought Moraes had already resigned. it had been reported that his last fight (in July i think) was the last on his WSOF contract. i just looked it up. he re-signed in October for a lengthy period. no fight/time limit was given but his (Moraes') quote was " It’s something like lifetime ". guess i won't get to see him vs. Barao any time soon.

The world has less hope.

the answer is a lot. as a retro game collector, SNES is on a big upswing

i've always found it odd that Madusa showed up, throwing the WWF Women's Title in the trash. Then they introduce the WCW Women's Title, which she never won. wcw had ONE female "star" that they refused to capitalize on. truly bizarre.

with the Hanna-Barbera crossovers happening now, i keep hoping for a JLI/Birdman story. Bonus points if it gets Apache Chief in there too. oh man, the Black Mirror is absolutely my favorite Snyder Bat story. can't believe you hadn't read it until now. Dick Grayson being my favorite comics character makes me wish he got to stay as Batman for much longer as well. So many interesting stories could have been told from there. Alas.

oh, i totally believe that they were all legit injuries, but i just find it odd that you would give an interview saying that you "never turn down fights" and will "fight anybody the ufc puts in front of you" if you are somebody who has a history of pulling out of fights due to injury. i am aware it's not a 1:1 comparison, but you have to see there's a correlation. Hell, Aldo took issue with Frankie Edgar calling him out for being injury prone. I'm a big fan of Jose Aldo. don't misunderstand this. i love watching him fight. but he clearly has an inflated sense of self. I believe that (to some extent) comes with the territory of being a top level athlete. But his blatant refusal to take responsibility of pulling out of fights says something about his character.