TUF 23 - Team Jedrzejczyk vs Team Gadelha

This kicks off in a couple of weeks, so I thought I'd fire up a thread to get things started.

Men's Light Heavyweight and Women's Strawweight are the divisions. 16 fighters in each, 8 go through to the house. The list of fighters taking part is rumoured to the be the below:

Men:

Phil Hawes (3-0)
Andrew Sanchez (7-2)
Khalil Rountree (4-0)
Elias Urbina (3-0)
Abdel Medjedoub (3-0)
Marcel Fortuna (8-1)
Jamelle Jones (6-2)
Cory Hendicks (3-0)
Norman Paraisy (15-4-2)
Myron Dennis (11-4)
Eric Spicely (8-0)
Mo De’Reese (5-0)
John Paul Elias (3-0)
Trevor Carlson (10-2)
Josh Stansbury (7-2)
Ken Bergh (2-0)

The standout name there would probably be Phil Hawes who is really highly rated out of Jackson-Wink, while Khalil Rountree is a training partner of Anderson Silva and infamously KO'd him in sparring with a kick last year. Norman Paraisy will be another familiar name to European's. He's been on the Bellator and Cage Warriors circuit in the past (drawing with Chris Fields in Dublin a few years ago) and failed to make it past the elimination fight in TUF 11 back in 2010.

Women:

Jodie Esquibel (5-1)
Ashley Cummins (3-3)
Ashley Yoder (4-1)
JJ Aldrich (2-1)
Amanda Bobby Cooper (1-1)
Tatiana Suarez (1-0)
Kristi Lopez (2-0)
Jamie Moyle (3-1)
Amy Montengro (7-2)
Helen Harper (4-1)
Kate Jackson (7-2-1)
Mellony Geujes (0-1)
Lanchana Green (0-1)
Alyssa Khran (3-1)
Chelsea Bailey (2-0)
Irene Cabello (6-2)

Interestingly, Kate Jackson fought Joanna before and Joanna completely messed her up. Amy Montengro was involved in a cracking fight with Jamie Moyle at Invicta 13 which is worth checking out if you haven't seen it. I'm not really too familiar with the others apart from Jodie Esquibel who fights out of Jackson-Wink and would have to be considered one of the favourites on paper, but I can't recall seeing her up to much over the last year or so.

Anyway, the season premieres on Wednesday April 20th with a 2 hour special featuring the fights to get into the house. Same story as usual from then on with regards to scheduling. It'll be broadcast on Fox on Wednesday nights in the States, and available for us to "acquire" by Thursday morning.

I'm really looking forward to the fight between Joanna and Claudia at the end of the season. I've watched the first fight back a number of times now and I struggle to see how Joanna won it in any way, shape or form. No doubt she has improved immensely since then so it's a serious challenge for Gadelha, but it'll be intriguing to see how it goes.

Dana said previously that both fighters came to blows at the end of the season, but unfortunately the cameras didn't capture it so we won't get to see it. This is what he said in relation to the fight:

"Joanna Jedrzejczyk and Claudia Gadelha, on the last day of filming when everything shut down, got into a full-blown fist fight," White said. "Head kicks. Nasty fight in The Ultimate Fighter gym."

White separated Jedrzejczyk and Gadelha on Friday at the press conference just like he did in the final square off of the TUF season. But White was not around when the two were nearly alone together after the show wrapped, he said.

"The show is over, the cameras were put away," White said. "The sad and scary part was very few people were left in the gym. The last day of The Ultimate Fighter is almost like the last day of school. Everybody is signing each other's stuff and all this other stuff."

White said the two had a volatile relationship all season. And during the final faceoff, Gadelha cut off whatever Jedrzejczyk was going to say. White said Gadelha told Jedrzejczyk, "Shut the f*ck up, bitch."

"[She said,] 'I'm so ****ing sick of listening to your mouth,'" White said. "And they started going at it and I pulled them apart."

The UFC boss said after the show finished up they were sitting on the benches and Jedrzejczyk threw a water bottle at Gadelha. Then, it erupted.

"You noticed when they were showing each other the water bottles [during the press conference]?" White said. "Joanna Jedrzejczyk hit her with a water bottle and that's how the fight started. Wait until you see this season of The Ultimate Fighter with these two. They hate each other and the staredown in the gym was even crazy before the fight happened."

At the "Unstoppable" press conference, Gadelha made a reference to the brawl.

"The bottle didn't hit me, but I kicked you, remember?" she said.

The actual fight will not be aired, because cameras didn't catch it. But White said the season was intense.

The finale, which is headlined by the above bout for the strawweight title, takes place on Friday July 8th. The UFC are going to do with UFC 200 week what they did with UFC 194 week - have 3 days of consecutive events. This finale will be sandwiched in-between an as of yet unannounced Fight Night and UFC 200.