Female Mixed Martial Arts Updates, 11-15-09

Several female MMA fighter updates.....

As you probably already know, Marloes Coenen dismantled Roxanne Modafferi in sixty five seconds at Strikeforce: Fedor vs. Rogers event on November 7th.
She submitted Roxanne with an armbar, avenging her loss to Roxanne back at K - GRACE 1 in May of 2007.
Now the Dutch mixed martial artist has her sites set on Strikeforce's 145-pound women’s champion Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos.
The word is that the title fight may go down as early as the January 30 Strikeforce event in Miami, Florida.

Now what about Santos and Coenen?
I say if Cris keeps her upright and pounds away, she'll win being the better striker and more powerful.
But if Marloes can take her down, she might have a chance at submission.

And speaking of The Cyborg, both she and her husband Evangelista are expected to fight at Strikeforce's December 19th show at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, California.
No...not against each other.

The upcoming video game, EA Sports MMA may or may not have female MMA stars in it.
The game is due out in 2010, and I'm thinking that if they had any female mixed martial artisits lined up, we'd know it by know.

And now the feud between TNA Knockout Tara (formerly WWE Diva Victoria, Lisa Marie Varon) and Kim Couture is really on?
I thought this had the look of a pro wrestling angle when I first heard about it, but after their run in at TNA's Bound for Glory PPV, I'm pretty sure we're getting a "work" here.
(Even though Kim and Tara both told MMA websites that it was a "shoot" and not planned.)
The bad thing about this is that no matter how much I love female pro wrestling, you should not mix it and female MMA.
In a female MMA match, we know that the person that wins...really wins.
In a scripted pro wrestling match, the winner is already determined.
MMA does not need the idea that any of its bouts are fixed. There needs to be a wide, clean line between MMA and wrestling.
Now some pro wrestling showman ship wouldn't hurt any, but leave it there.

Kim will be taking on Kerry Vera on November 20th at the Strikeforce Challengers card in Kansas City Kansas.
I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say Kerry will win.

And finally from the British TV show GMTV, here is an appearance by female MMA fighter Rosi Sexton...



posted to http://femalemixedmartialartists.blogspot.com/ on Nov 15th, 2009

Female MMA-Lisa Marie Varon

Lisa Marie back in the WWE. Foreshadowing?

There seems to a little (okay a lot) of buzz surrounding pro wrestler Lisa Marie Varon and female mma fighter Kim Couture.
As you may know, Lisa was known as Victoria in the WWE and now Tara in TNA.

This all seems to have started when Lisa started talking to a agents regarding MMA endorsements and one of the promoters approached her camp about fighting Kim Couture.
But to sum it up in her own words, here is a link to the blog where Lisa eplains what happened.
http://blogs.myspace.com/victoria_lisamarievaron

You'll see the pro wrestler coming out in her in one comment...
"So Kim, I have a tremendous amount of respect for the heart you showed in your first pro fight. Tremendous. And you may be a nice stepping stone for me if I choose to drop down to 135."
"Nice stepping stone" I love Lisa Marie.
I always have.

But of course things didn't stop there.....

Kim shot back with...
"She better get her feet wet first in this sport because it's real and there is no scripting going on inside that cage. It's the real deal."
http://fighthype.com/pages/content5549.html

And in one of her latest Tweets on Twitter Lisa said...
"Just took Kettle Bell class last night and it was fabulous. Watch out Kim Couture, I'm getting stronger. Check out my blog on myspace"

Lisa has been putting herself deeply into her BJJ training.
And I keep reading about how Lisa will learn her lesson when she gets into the cage with a real MMA fighter.
Is this the same lesson UFC Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar learned?
Or (4-0) Bobby Lashley?

Now I have said before I have no MMA experience.
But I do have 14 years of martial arts training.
And my instructors used to say that a person that could box, wrestle and knew martial arts was a hard person to beat in the street.

Lisa has a lot of experience in the squared circle. Shes been wrestling since 2000.
And even though the matches are scripted, the performers there take a real beating.
Kinda like stunt men.
Lisa's three older brothers became amateur wrestlers, and her oldest brother, Bobby Sole, won a gold medal at the 1983 Pan American Games.
And before wrestling or MMA, she was a fitness competitor, coming in first place at the Debbie Kruck Fitness Classic in 1999 (tall division), first place at the ESPN2 Fitness America Series in 1997, first place at the National Physique Committee's NPC Inland Empire in 1995 and she also competed in the 1998 Ironwoman Tri-Fitness.
So this lady is no stranger to physicality.
(Physicality? I sound like JR!)

So all I am saying is don't count Lisa Marie out just because she's a pro wrestler.
If anything, she may bring some missing showmanship to female MMA that it needs.
And no one will really know how good she is till after her first pro MMA fight will they?

Female MMA: What's next for Cyborg Santos?

Now that the dust has settled over the Carano vs. Cyborg fight, what's next for the newly crowned female MMA champ?
Will she appear on talk shows (with a translator) or start appearing in ads for MMA apparel?
Who knows?
But let's focus on the fighting side of her, which seems to be what Cris "Cyborg" Santos is all about.
Who's next in the Cyborgs sights?

Well I reported awhile back that Erin Toughill (10-2-1) would likely face the winner of the match.
But at Saturdays event, Erin was nowhere to be seen.
There are rumors that Erin and Strikeforce had a "break down in communication" and Erin wasn't there.

But Strikeforce's new acquisition was there, and ready to step in if anything had happened to Carano or Santos.
And that fighter is veteran Marloes Coenen (16-3).
Remember, Santos almost faced her back in February of 2009, but Santos pulled out because she signed with Strikeforce.
Now that would be a match.
The 5'9, 145 pound Marloes might not be bulled around the ring by Santos as easily as Carano was.
Although Marloes has lost to Erin, so would Erin still be the most logical choice?

Another fighter beigin mentioned is Roxanne Modafferi (who has beaten Marloes).
Roxanne is currently 13-4-0.
But Roxanne fights at 135, although that didn't stop her from beating Marloes.

Sarah Kaufman is another name I have heard mentioned.
I think Sarah has a pretty big base of loyal internet fans.
With wins over Miesha Tate and Shayna Baszler she would seem like a good choice.
And she does have a 10-0-0 record right now.
But wouldn't Sarah also have to put on some weight to get in this fight?

Of course there is the possibility of Gina Carano facing her in a rematch.
But I didn't hear Gina's people yelling "Rematch!" after the fight.

And now we come to my "Wildcard" pick.
Lisa Marie Varon.
If you read my blogs, it's no secret I'm a big fan of female wrestling.
Lisa Marie (Victoria in the WWE and Tara in TNA) might be the first female wrestler to follow in the footsteps of her male counterparts like Brock Lesnar and Bobby Lashley.
She is training for MMA, and could you imagine the hype of an ex-female pro wrestler going after the women's MMA champ?
Of course Lisa needs some checks in her win column before that ever happens.
But remember, Gina Carano only trained in Muay Thai for what, 4 months before her first fight?
Lisa is 5'8, 155 pounds and has about nine years of wrestling training to fall back on.

Female MMA got the hype Saturday, so lets see if the fights they pick can keep the interest going.