TUF 7: Toughest Premier

The first episode of season seven of “The Ultimate Fighter” started fast and furiously right where the previous six seasons began: with UFC President Dana White machine-gunning a barrage of obscenity at a wide-eyed group of knuckleheads, gym rats, the emotionally unstable, and, lurking somewhere within the pack, your next TUF champions, perhaps future UFC world champions.

This season added the twist of doubling the field to 32 and matching wannabes to make the cut after just 48-hours in camp.

Eight middleweight fights were contested on Wednesday’s episode.

IFL vet Mike Dolce (3-4) earned the first bed with a first-round right hook knockout of Gurgel Academy fighter Prince McLean (4-5).

McLean confessed before the loss, “I don’t know what I’m going to do [if I don't make the cut].”  The Cincinnatian broke down in tears on his way back to the Queen City.

Season seven coach Forrest Griffin (15-4) warned that a wrestler was the worst match-up for his friend Cale Yarbrough (0-0), but the MMA amateur impressed versus wrestler John Clarke (6-2), who had to ditch 17 pounds to make weight for the fight.

Yarbrough wiggled out of two near armbar submissions before pummeling the exhausted Clarke to a TKO in the first round.

Another amateur, Amir Sadollah (0-0), also looked tough versus former Marine Steve Byrnes (6-1).

I kept waiting for Byrnes to remove his Davy Crocket cap, but apparently “coon tail” was the look he requested on his last barber shop visit.

After a scrap that didn’t make me feel so out of shape, Sadollah submitted Byrnes in an armbar in the second round.

Jeremy May (5-5) is an early contender for the inevitable “Douchebag I Can’t Wait to See Smashed” award after taunting season seven’s other coach, “Rampage” Quinton Jackson (29-6), after wrapping Jackson’s childhood friend David Roberts(5-7) in a leg triangle to earn a bed.

“I like making people scream like that,” May bragged after the “W”.

In highlights, CB Dollaway (6-0), Dante Rivera (10-2), Nick Klein (3-0), and Paul Bradley (5-0) earned beds in the TUF house.

White dogged relentlessly on the wrestler Bradley for a lay’n'pray decision victory.

The drafting of Jackson for coaching duties this season is already paying entertainment dividends.

He claimed it was Dolce’s B.O. that knocked out McLean in the first fight, saying, “The funk came in the punch!”

Is it just me, or is there an irony in center Octagon of the world’s most demanding athletic endeavor being papered by a fast-food sponsor?

Regardless, it was the fighters’ skills on display in the first episode, not their personalities; so, it’s hard to latch on to any of the first eight to earn their spot in the final field of 16.

Next week will feature the final eight qualifying matches before the coaches choose their teams for the big TUF tournament.