Unfortunately, what should have been an exciting Bitetti Combat event turned out to be rather disappointing due to three fighters pulling out at the last minute. The night before the show, they lost participants in the main event (Paulo Filho), the co-main event (Jeff Monson), and a featured main-card bout (Fabio Maldonado).

The headliner was adjusted to feature former UFC fighter Thales Leites against Minnesota Fight Factory's Rico Washington, which is posted above.  After the jump, we have the replacement co-main event with Joaquim "Mamute" Ferreira, who accepted the fight less than 24 hours before the bell rang, against the underrated and dangerous Glover Teixeira.

Seemingly out of nowhere, ex-UFC heavyweight champ Tim Sylvia has apparently been booked to fight five-time "World's Strongest Man", Mariusz Pudzianowski, on April 23rd.  Wow.  Mr. Monte Cox, the most respected manager in the game and also Sylvia's agent, has obviously been a busy man.

Sylvia's name has been spattered across news sites recently, but for the difficulties in securing a rematch with Wes Sims; a pairing which was originally declined by the Ohio commission, but was stamped today with the approval of a Canadian IFC event.  Sylvia is also waiting to hear about an opponent for DREAM's March 22nd show after he and Cox declined to fight Josh Barnett, so Sylvia and company definitely have a few irons in the fire.

After former MFS fighter Ben Rothwell was forced out of his UFC 110 fight with Croatian striker Mirko CroCop, the pair were expected to rematch at UFC 115. A twist in the story has been presented by MMAScraps, who reports that Pat Barry, the co-host of the MMAScraps radio show, will instead face CroCop.

Lending credibility to this expectation is the announcement that Ben Rothwell has been pitted against Gilbert "The Hurricane" Yvel on the same card, which makes for a double-dose of slugfests featuring some of the most talented heavyweight kickboxers in the game. 

Although he's the only one of the four that doesn't descend directly from an all stand-up background, Ben Rothwell is more than comfortable letting his hands go, as TKO's account for more than half of his thirty MMA victories.  Finding an appropriate training partner who is a tall heavyweight with great striking will not be a problem for Rothwell, as he now trains alongside Pat Barry at Roufusport, a Wisconsin-based camp captained by world heavyweight kickboxing legend Duke Roufus.

The next offering of DREAM is coming up in Japan on March 22nd, and a few fights that will anchor the promotion's thirteenth event have been established, which will supplement the main attraction of Joachim Hansen's downshift to 145 pounds versus Bibiano Fernandes for the FW title.

The most compelling chunk of the announced line-up is a pair of solid lightweight match-ups, one of which will carry the now recurring theme of "Strikeforce vs. DREAM".  It looks like the Strikeforce debut for pro-boxer KJ Noons will take place in hostile territory, as the former EliteXC lightweight champion will jump across the pond as a representative of Strikeforce to face DREAM hometown favorite Andre "Dida" Amade.

Fists will obviously be flying at high velocity in this one.  Dida prefers to charge and hurl overhand fireballs in classic Chute Boxe fashion, and Noons has experienced mixed success in dealing with overwhelmingly aggressive strikers:  he dodged an onslaught of Nick Diaz' long punches and tactically dismantled the heavily favored Diaz with crisp boxing and ornery takedown defense, but fell asleep to the tune of a jackhammer delivered by Charles "Krazy Horse" Bennet when exchanging in the pocket.  Dida is always dangerous, but currently on a three-fight slide, dropping consecutive bouts to Gesias "JZ" Cavalcante, Eddie Alvarez, and Katsunori Kikuno, which are the first losses on his 6-3-1 track record.

Amateur MMA in North Jersey is being well represented by a new promotion called Evolution AMMA, run by Steve Katz, Jose Suarez and Francisco Arcibal. Their first event was a big success and now they're holding their second show, this time in Rahway, NJ, at the Union County Performing Arts Center.

The card is chock full of talent.  These are the guys who will be the future stars in the big promotions and I am excited to once again be hosting the show from inside the cage.

Make sure to check out the Evolution AMMA website and pick up tickets for the show!

It's time for another Asylum Fight League show!  On February 27th at the Trump Marina in Atlantic City, NJ, Asylum Fight League 26 will be taking place.  I will be in the cage as always, proudly ring announcing tomorrow's MMA stars as they fight their way into the pro ranks.

It's always great to watch these up and coming amatuers in action.  Asylum's promoter, Carl Mascarenhas always puts on a great show and makes some amazing matches.  I'll have more on this event later in the week.  For now, check out out the Asylum Fight League website.  These fights are insane!

Here's Tito Ortiz from UFC Brazil in 1998.  He talks about fighting in the UFC for free so he could maintain his amatuer wrestling status.