Midnight Mania! Costa Vs. Cannonier, Till Vs. Brunson Booked For August

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Welcome to Midnight Mania!

The Middleweight division is about to gain a great deal of clarity! ESPN’s Brett Okamoto has reported that August will see a pair of main event Middleweight battles in Paulo Costa vs. Jared Cannonier and Darren Till vs. Derek Brunson.

Costa and Cannonier are set to collide on August 21. Paulo Costa enters the bout following a difficult loss to Israel Adesanya, but “Borrachinha” remains a highly-ranked Middleweight elite. Similarly, Cannonier was outdueled by Robert Whittaker in his last bout, but “Killa Gorilla” was riding a serious wave of momentum and closing in on a title shot prior to that loss.

Both men may be coming off defeats, but that does little to takeaway from the shine of this surefire slugfest.

Scheduled a week prior (August 14) to that barnburner is another intriguing Middleweight contest in Till vs. Brunson. Till is one fight removed from a competitive loss to Whittaker, more recently having broken his collarbone in preparation to fight Marvin Vettori. Brunson, meanwhile, has really turned his career around, showcasing a newfound composure to pick up four wins in a row over some highly touted prospects.

None of these bouts are necessarily title eliminators (not until Whittaker gets his shot at least), but the victors are definitely close to the top!

Insomnia

An urgent request to our readers: Please find this video.

So, uhhh, how about that Anthony Johnson news?

Nick Diaz sure seems like a man who wants to fight.

Dan Hooker is beefing on Twitter with a manager (or possibly Arman Tsarukyan and just maybe Rafael Fiziev).

Another artist series promo for UFC 262:

Glover Texeira is just built different.

I know I’m not the only one tired of marijuana regulations pointlessly delaying fights and punishing athletes.

Slips, rips, and KO clips

A piece of kickboxing history:

Beneil Dariush’s resurgence has been an absolute blast.

This clip should be in the dictionary next to “digging the low kick.”

Random Land

Some monkeys living their best lives!

Midnight Music: So, the reason that Midnight Mania failed to go up (for the first time in my two-year stretch as host) last night was a solid bout of food poisoning. On the bright side, I had a song choice in mind while feeling like crap.

Note: this track is best experienced highly compressed from a YouTubeToMP3 downloader and played loudly through the factory speakers of a 2002 Toyota Camry.

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