This week opens with the decision for Mitrione and reactions from Rashad, who is surprised that his fighter has powerful hands, and Mitrione’s housemates, who attribute Junk’s loss to his failure to fight to his potential. Rampage thinks the second round was a toss-up and the fight should have gone to three. “I was just disgusted” by the decision, he says, apparently justifying his destruction of a door on the set.
“There’s no future being a door here,” says Dana White, laughing. Rashad says it’s a punk move because Rampage doesn’t act like he cares about the team anyway and Rampage admits that he’s embarrassed. Sort of. “I wanted to apologize to the door but it was too late, it was gone,” he says.
Back at the house, Junk talks about his eyes being messed up and Mitrione alludes to having a concussion when Wes Sims goes into the closest pester him.
Back at Team Rampage practice we get sad music under a montage of Marcus Jones training and Rampage talking, Princess Leia-style, about how Marcus is his only hope. Back at the house, “Big Baby” gets spooked by a “scorpion-spider-levia-thon” crawling around on the carpet. Luckily Justin Wren comes to the rescue and smashes it with a UFC-branded pool cue and retrieves the carcass with toilet paper.
For the first time we hear about Mike Wessel’s wife’s cancer and the dude is torn up about being gone. He talks about leaving packages for her to open every day that he’s in Las Vegas. “This is the price you gotta pay if you wanna be great,” he says. Team Rashad’s gameplan is for Wessel to throw overhand rights, slip inside and keep the pressure on “Big Baby” and Wessel says that he’s 100% ready to go mentally.
Team Rampage entertains itself by teaching Jones new grappling techniques, which make the large man giggle like a good-natured ogre. One night at the house, Brendan Schaub & Co. draw some cartoons of Jones, to which some Beavis added “sucks balls.” It’s all fun and games until “Big Baby” gets his feelings hurt and he tears the pictures down, reminding his housemates that his family will be watching the show. “I’m a 35-year-old man with kids, I don’t play that shit no more,” he says.
Later that night Wessel admits to adding the comic coup de grace but won’t tell Marcus. It goes to show you how absurd life in the TUF house gets that A) someone writing “sucks balls” on a cartoon of another fighter is a major source of contention and B) the failure of that person to “man up” and admit to writing “sucks balls” is a serious talking point.
At the final weigh-in, Rampage and Schoonover make up for a minute until Rampage caresses Schoonover’s chest. Darrill gets in ‘Page’s face about it but guys pull him away. Rampage laughs and says, “I touched Titties’ titty and it wasn’t pretty.”
On fight day, both fighters talk about their motivations but all I can focus on is Jones’ bitchin’ muttonchops-to-mustache combo. Jones says it’s weird to go through life being kind and polite and then get in the cage and “put the thumps on somebody.”
Round 1: The fighters circle, engage, circle, and engage without doing any damage. Wessel gets inside but rather than throw punches from the pocket he tries a trip takedown, gets reversed and ends up underneath Jones. “Big Baby” in half guard, working a kimura. Wessel turns to his stomach, Jones has his back and one hook. Wessel pushes back and Jones locks his legs around Wessel’s body, looking for a rear naked choke. Wessel spins, Jones grabs his arm, pulls it through, and Wessel screams “tap tap tap!” Marcus Jones delivers Team Rampage’s only win of the first round.
Mike Wessel is distraught, having left his sick wife for six weeks only to lose in the first round. On the flipside, Jones is positively giddy. “I want to sit down and stand up at the same time, I want to talk, I want to shut up,” he says.
After the fight, Dana, Rampage, and Rashad call each fighter our to get their thoughts on the next match up. It seems like every guy on Team Rashad wants to fight Matt and Dana wants to fight Roy, who he says, “just rubs me the wrong way.”
Dana announces the picks: Wren vs. Nelson, Schaub vs. Madsen, McSweeney vs. Mitirone, Schoonover vs. Jones. “We let Rampage pick his fight. C’mon, we gotta throw him a bone, we gotta give him something,” Dana says, “He hasn’t had the best showing.” After the selections Rashad asks if any members of Team Rampage want to train with Team Rashad and it devolves into…meh, who cares.
After the gum flapping we get a teaser for next week which includes FIGHT! blogger Matt Mitrione struggling with a concussion and the first quarterfinal fight between Justin Wren and Roy Nelson.
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