Midnight Mania! Dillashaw 2.0?

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Welcome to Midnight Mania!

Few have experienced as harsh a fall as TJ Dillashaw. After capturing and defending the Bantamweight title by stopping bitter rival Cody Garbrandt, Dillashaw pursued double champion status by dropping down to face Henry Cejudo. Instead, Cejudo promptly knocked him out in less than a minute. Dillashaw didn’t even have his Bantamweight strap to console him for long, as a positive drug test for EPO stripped him of the title and sentenced him to the sidelines for two years.

Could it really all be for the best?

Longtime Dillashaw team mate and upcoming Bellator Bantamweight title challenger, Juan Archuleta, is optimistic. He spoke with TMZ Sports about Dillashaw’s return, explaining why he believed the former champion would return better than ever.

“T.J.’s doing well, man,” Archuleta said (transcription via MMAJunkie). “He’s getting big, strong recovering from his double surgery, the shoulder surgeries, that he had. Of course, his suspension is coming to an end so we’re getting him ready so that when his suspension is lifted he’s gonna be ready to be in the title mix.

“I honestly think he’ll be a lot better,” he suggested. “You get that time off and you get to rest the brain, rest the body, and that guy’s always ‘pedal to the metal.’ So he gets to recover his whole body. People don’t know he was dealing with two shoulder surgeries going into that fight. Every other practice, I swear to you, man, we’d be wrestling or scrapping and his shoulder would just pop out!”

There’s little doubt that Dillashaw’s decade of competition resulted in some wear-and-tear, so perhaps those surgeries and time away will help him heal up. However, by the time Dillashaw is eligible to return in January of 2021, he’ll be just a few weeks shy of his 35th birthday.

Will he still be a title threat?

Insomnia

Diego Sanchez is using Michel Pereira’s recent success to defend his own performance, which … seems like a reach.

Yes, I would definitely watch this rematch. Both men have improved greatly since 2014!

Ricardo Lamas elaborates a bit more on his retirement:

So, about the UFC video game …

The MMA world is a more entertaining place with the Diaz brothers active.

Speaking of, Leon Edwards responded to Nate Diaz’s trash talk.

Valentina Shevchenko works on her spinning strikes:

Slips, rips, and KO clips

I do my best to highlight when my team mates do cool stuff, so here’s the baddest 115-pounder I’ve met picking up a DEEP title!

A really sweet armbar off what looks to be a failed takedown attempt.

A quick overhand catches Jun off-guard and puts him on the mat:

Random Land

Delivered to your door with care.

Midnight Music: Tonight, I listened to Townes Van Zandt’s second album, Our Mother The Mountain, which is wonderfully written like most of his work, but heavier on the ballads.

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.