No More Questions, Only Answers.

UFC 118 took place this Saturday, during which Frankie "The Answer" Edgar stepped back into the octagon to defend his light weight belt for the first time. Not only was it Frankie's first title defense, but it was also against the man that he took the title from in April.. BJ Penn.

In the previous fight, Frankie ended up winning by decision; however, that's not how BJ Penn saw it. Penn believed that he was robbed, and that Frankie won purely because his corner men lifted him onto their shoulders at the end of the fight in order to "sell" his win to the judges. In my opinion it was clear that Frankie had won, BJ was just being his whiny self and had to give some excuse as to why he lost. BJ is no stranger to excuses, you may recall that he claimed GSP was "greased up" in between rounds which caused him to be slippery and thus making BJ unable to finish him. In both occasions BJ seems to forget about the constant punches that he was taking to the face while giving very few in return, or the numerous times he was taken down during the fight and then being held there for approximately 4/5 minutes in every round.

Joe Rogan brought up a good point about the differences between each fighters corner-men. On Frankie's side, he was getting good technical advice from his corner as well as some encouragement. However, BJ and the "yes men" that he had in his corner were giving him pure pep talks even though he was clearly losing badly. Between every round they would merely say "destroy this kid, your amazing BJ, your better then him, just go kick his ass"! Obviously, this "helpful" advice that BJ was given did absolutely nothing and he lost the decision to Frankie once again, this time not even winning a single round on any of the judges score cards.

It will be interesting to see what happens to both BJ and Frankie now. Frankie will surely move on to defend his title against Gray Maynard, who is the only man to ever beat Frankie in the octagon. If Frankie comes out the way he did against BJ then he will most likely leave with the belt around his waist once again. However, if he cannot out-muscle and out-wrestle The Bully, then he could fall down the light weight rankings fast. BJ, on the other hand, will have a lot more things to think about. BJ has never been known for his work ethic, and I can't see that changing anytime soon. I doubt that BJ will make any severe changes to his camp, or the people that he trains with simply because many of them are his family and he clearly loves to be surrounded by "yes men".

At the end of the day, Frankie "The Answer" Edgar had his best fight ever in the octagon and remains the UFC light weight champ. But BJ "The Prodigy" Penn seems to be quickly becoming the light weight chump.

We're Baaaaaaack!

After taking a brief Summer from the world of sports blogging, Autumn's Hattrick is back in action! Let's begin with a little hockey...

This will come as no surprise, but Canada continues to be a force at the national level. The U-18 team once again captured gold, marking the third gold in a row and sixth in the last seven years for the Canadian boys. Canada was lead by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins who posted 7 points in 5 games while playing in red and white, he also scored the eventual game winner in the gold medal game against the USA. Since the new year, the World Juniors, Olympics, and U-18 gold medal games have all been USA vs Canada. The States have really turned their hockey program around, even modeling it after Canada's program. The United States now holds camps months before they hold tryouts for their various national level teams, something that was only being done by Canada a couple of years ago. Congratulations team Canada!

Despite what most people thought would happen during the off season in regards to the Toronto Maple leafs, it seems as though the more things change the more they stay the same. Heading into the off season many people, including myself, believed that Kaberle would be traded by any means necessary. However, Kaberle will once again be suiting up with the blue and white this season as the team had no acceptable deals for the 32 year old D-man.

Now onto some football, the rumor mill is swirling once again concerning Brett Favre and his on-again off-again retirement battle. This time it appears that number 4 will be back in a Vikings uniform this season. This move doesn't overly surprise me, I mean, the guy couldn't possibly retire knowing that his last play in the NFL was throwing an interception.. could he?

Former Regina Rams standout Jordan Sisco has been sent back from the Indianapolis Colts, the team which he has been working out with for the majority of the Summer. Sisco is very lucky to have even had the chance to go down to the States and play pro ball. Andy Fantuz has been dying for the chance for scouts to give him a look, but no teams seem to be biting. Sisco will now join Fantuz on the Riders and will spend about 3 weeks learning and will then hopefully be thrown into the mix of an already stacked receiving core.

The world of MMA was up in arms for the first 23 minutes of the main event of UFC 117 which took place on August 7th. Anderson Silva was a mere two minutes away from losing his belt to the trash talking machine Chael Sonnen. Chael took Silva down within the first two minutes of every round and held him there, leaving Silva virtually powerless. The Spider was on his back but his long limbs allowed him to secure a triangle choke with 2 minutes left in the fifth round. Had Silva not secured the choke, he would surely have surrendered his belt to Sonnen, five rounds to none.

Since Silva once again found a way to win, a question remains.. who will take down the Spider? In my perfect world Georges St-Pierre would be the one to do it, however, that fight seems further away then ever these days. Georges recently stated that if he were to fight and beat Silva he would retire. On the one hand I could never blame GSP for retiring, it has always been my theory that you should retire on top, but because GSP brings in so much revenue for the UFC, I'm not sure that Dana White would fully support the fight knowing that he could lose his most popular fighter. Dana would also be against the GSP-Silva fight because no matter what one of his champions is considered beatable in a time where they seem to be virtually untouchable.

Now that my Summer is winding down, I will once again be doing frequent blogs mainly discussing hockey, football and MMA, with a special focus on Pats, Oilers, and UFC.