Thu Oct 08, 2009 4:10 pm EDT
Zak Jensen is Cagewriter's guest blogger during TUF 10
Let's start off with the obvious, the coaches rallying around Kimbo after he lost. This is the first time any of Team Rampage's coaches and even Quinton "Rampage" Jackson showed any concern for someone who lost. Rampage has Kimbo Slice's [expletive] in his mouth and so does Tiki Ghosn. When Rampage told Tiki they would still focus on Kimbo just in case someone got hurt, it was clear to me that it was all about Kimbo and no one else on our team.
Marcus Jones then broke into a sweat and got the shakes. He sweats more than anyone I've ever known. He'd have to change shirts at least twice a practice. He'd have a hydration kit during practice which consisted of two 32-ounce Pedialytes and about six 20-ounce bottles of water. Marcus would consume all that and still lose five-to-eight pounds of water each practice. In the house, he was just overheated and dehydrated. He drank some pedialyte and was fine.
Kimbo gets all excited and says, "Tag me in." Really? You want to get taken down again and pounded out again? Roy planned to crucifix him and he did exactly what he wanted If Kimbo thinks that he's ready for another fight when Rashad Evans still has a really good wrestler left to fight, he needs to think again. And if they give Kimbo another shot, it's all about ratings. Out of the three people eliminated to that point, Wes Shivers, who got screwed out of a third round, should get put back in.
Rashad had his team and coaches come into their locker room to discuss the best matchup for his guys. Justin Wren was told he was going to fight Scott Junk. He left the room and then Matt Mitrione came in. He was told he's going to fight Marcus. Justin returned and said he didn't want to fight Scott in the first round and that they're best friends and roommates. That's understandable, just like Rashad said about his teammate Keith Jardine.
With Justin, that was from the heart, not because he was scared to fight Scott. Matt on the other hand, went and told Scott about the whole fight plan of Team Rashad. Matt is a meat-head and an idiot. He said he wasn't thinking but I think he didn't want to fight Marcus. For once, James McSweeney was right in saying that Matt was afraid. Matt screwed over his whole team and he didn't understand that.
Rampage and Co. had a nice lunch before Rogers' fight
Before the fight picks, Rampage, Tiki and Tom went for a walk to discuss their strategy. Demico Rogers wanted to fight since we had our teams picked. He thought he could take Brendan standing or on the ground. The fight started with Demico taking a horrible shot and Brendan stuffing it. Demico finally got a double and took Brendan down. Demico didn't look like he knew what to do while in Brendan's guard. He did some ground and pound then finally advanced position to side mount and when he went for full mount, Brendan swept him. Somehow Demico bellied out and basically gave Brendan a choke.
The fight was over and we were down 0-4. Now that I have talked about another dismal and boring fight, let's talk about Team Rampage's coaches' behavior before and after this fight.
The coaches decided to go to lunch after we had our practice. Okay, it was two hours before the fight. I mean, go grab a sub or some fast food but don't go to a sitdown restaurant. It showed that they weren't thinking about Demico or his fight. They didn't get there until about a half hour before the fight started. We were all sitting in the locker room waiting with Demico and listening to Brandon get ready. It was extremely disheartening that our coaches were nowhere in sight. They finally get there and say sorry, the Thai place was packed, and that they should've left someone at the gym. It just showed where Rampage's head was.
Then after the fight, they just left Demico in the cage by himself. Rashad and Trevor Wittman went over to see if he was okay, to tell him that it was a good fight and he just got caught. Those were all things that Rampage and his coaching staff should've done. Team Rampage's coaches spoke to Brandon before they talked to Demico. It was ridiculous and showed Rampage has basically given up on his team. The coaches went to have a meeting and came back to the locker room.
That's when Rampage told Demico he gave up in the cage. You never say that to a fighter when his dream at being The Ultimate Fighter was just taken away. What kind of coaching style is that? Also the last thing Rampage said was that he had to go and read a part of the book he was carrying around for his acting class. I have an idea, why don't you start acting like a [expletive] coach!
Cagewriter is an MMA blog edited by Steve Cofield. Email him, and follow him on Twitter.

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80 Comments
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Why should Rampage be any different then any self centered athlete in America, or the world for that matter.
All his Real World camera exposes.
All his comments, jokes, and facial expressions.
WTH?
Try coaching these guys who came onto this show and thought they had a chance to win.
Try encouraging the fighters who have yet to fight instead of beating the dead Kimbo horse even more.
Enough with the stupid ass cocked hat too.
We get it.
You are looking to build street cred and love to jabber jaw with Evans to get it.
Take a note from Rashad.
As much as I never liked his attitude (or him) from his days on TUF all the way through his UFC career, last night he proved something in that way of class and sportsmanship.
All you did was call coaches meeting and call your fighter green and say that we cannot teach them too much
I think his loss to Machida showed Rashad that the cocky meter was registering a little high and he got humbled by it.
For you Rampage, all your loss of the title did was make you even more cocky.
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I really went into this season a big fan of Rampage and disliked Rashaad... now I'm the complete opposite.
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--JG
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I so want TUF to be must-see TV. But right now, I feel embarrassed for the UFC every time it is on. Dana White, if you're listening, go back to the formula that worked in the beginning. Hungry fighters. Good coaches. Coaches that can actually train fighters. How about having the heads of two of the most prominent camps in MMA coach each team. The rule being no fighter on the show can train with their own camp on the show. So you have one team coached by Team Quest and the other by Xtreme Couture (for example). For each win a gym gets $5k or something (I'm just throwing out a number). The gym winning the finale gets a $25k purse and the winning fighter gets a UFC contract. We would see good coaching, good fights, and the winner would have an idea about the top-level training required for the UFC. Heck, maybe even Big Country would move out of his basement and join a gym.
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Wes did get screwed, but he was tired about 2 minutes into the fight and nobody wants to see that again.
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He might have not recovered from losing to Forest, or losing his title for that matter.
He and Junie can get a group rate on Prozac.
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