Monday, 02 February 2009 10:07
by Garv
Vaseline-gate is in full effect. For those who may have missed the controversy, it all started when someone noticed Phil Nurse rubbing GSP's back after applying Vaseline to his face. The person saw this as Nurse "greasing" GSP and told the commission. The commission then went to GSP's corner and made Nurse wipe off any Vaseline on GSP's back.
Penn's camp protested after the fight and even Dana White got involved.
Cage Potato quoted White after the fight:
"I saw the commission jump up there and flip out," said Dana White. "They said one of the guys was rubbing Vaseline on Georges' back in between rounds. It was one and two, I think."
"The guys from the athletic commission went up there and started screaming at them, knocked the Vaseline and kicked the Vaseline out of the Octagon."
White added that "some Vaseline on a guy's back didn't change the outcome of that fight, but you don't do it," and said the blame should fall on the cornerman responsible and not GSP.
"If a guy was intentionally putting Vaseline on a guy's back, he should never corner a mixed martial arts fight again."
As for what becomes of the complaint now, White said it's out of his hands.
"Who knows. That's up to the commission."
Then on Sunday, Greg Jackson, GSP's trainer, spoke to
MMAWeekly and explained that Nurse was not greasing GSP down, he was just performing a "witch doctor" ritual as devised by a member of GSP's team named Steve Friend.
Friend is a holistic healer who people call the Witch Doctor. Here's how Jackson explained Vaseline-gate to MMAWeekly:
“So in between rounds, (Friend) had this little drill that you do – and Phil Nurse is the one who knows how to do it – he showed Phil, and this is what Georges wanted, so we did that,” Jackson said. “But this is why we were doing it. He rubbed your back and tapped your chest; I don’t know exactly how it works. But anyways, what that’s supposed to do is get your energy in line, or motivated or whatever. So in between rounds, we had Phil Nurse do that.”
Jackson said St. Pierre has worked with Friend for years, since the French Canadian began training at Jackson’s academy in Albuquerque, N.M. Jackson says Friend has also worked with Matt Hughes and Randy Couture in preparation for their fights. Friend was featured in the sixth season of “The Ultimate Fighter” as a guest of Hughes.
“The controversy came because Phil Nurse also was putting Vaseline on Georges’ eyebrows,” Jackson elaborated. “In between rounds, you always want to put on Vaseline on (a fighter’s face). So Phil Nurse put all the Vaseline on his face, so his hands might have had a minuscule amount left over from that, when he went around the side and rubbed a little point on his back, and tapped on his chest.
“At that point, somebody in the audience thought we were greasing George down, and ran over and told the commission that we were greasing his body down. The commission came in and said ‘you can’t grease him down,’ which didn’t work. They said ‘you’re putting Vaseline on his back,’ and Phil’s like, ‘oh, there might be a little on my fingers, but it wasn’t intentional at all, and of course they wiped it right off and it was gone, so it wasn’t a factor in the fight at all.”
That's the official GSP explanation. I'm sure BJ Penn is not happy with it, but we need to let the commission do its job and decide if any rules were broken.
In the meantime, BJ may want to consider getting a voodoo doll of GSP and sticking some pins in it, just in case they ever fight again.

GSP cornerman.
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