Brackets set for FCF Women's Grand Prix

So the brackets have finally been set for this tournament that they're doing in Freestyle Championship Fighting. The first round will be at the FireLake Grand Casino in Shawnee, OK on Jan. 30. The semi finals will be in April and the final will be in June. Wait a minute. Isn't Jan. 30 the same night as the Strikeforce Miami show? No kidding. That means that it's very unlikely that HDNet will broadcast it live. So why are they doing this again? And how does it promote women's MMA if it's not broadcast live and it's the same night as a Strikeforce show? It doesn't but at least it's not the Strikeforce title tournament that Bob Cook wanted to farm out. The winner of this tournament gets a Stikeforce contract but the truth is Strikeforce could sign anyone they like. They had to promise FCF something. So it's a pointless timewaster. I understand that fans don't like that interpretation but it's not a knock on the fighters or FCF. It's a knock on Strikeforce for keeping Bob Cook around to screw around with women's MMA. They claim they haven't decided yet if they are going to do a 135lb women's tournament in 2010. Of course they haven't announced a 2010 schedule either. Meanwhile Sarah Kaufman has been sitting around since June. No wonder Meisha Tate is fighting next week in FCF. Strikeforce's indecisiveness is ridiculous. I don't know or care what their problem is but it's not acceptable.





Before I get into the brackets, I wanted to mention that Amanda Buckner was supposed to be in this tournament but had to pull out due to injury. It's very unfortunate as we haven't seen Amanda in a long time and I know she wanted to be in this tournament. The first fight will have AJ Jenkins vs Sarah Schneider. AJ is 16-2 and trains at Miletich Martial Arts in Honolulu. She has fought mostly in the Midwest and her last win was over Krista Stufflebeem at the Oct. 17 Extreme Challenge show in Iowa. This is a step up for her. Sarah trains at Cavewman Crew in Kansas. She's 4-3 and her lasr fight was a loss was to Sarah Kaufman at the Apr. 23 PCF show in California. She's had mixed success against top fighters. The second fight will have Jan Finney vs Liz Carreiro. Jan is from Ohio. Her record is 6-7 and her last fight was a win over Brighton Hutton at the Oct. 30 C3Fights show in Oklahoma. She hasn't done well against top fighters. Liz is a regular at FCF. Her record is 5-5 her last fight was a win over Malissa Sherwood  at the July 25 FCF show. She may be in over her head.






The third fight will have Kaitlin Young vs Jennifer Tate. Kaitlin trains at Minnesota Martial Arts Academy. Her record is 4-3 and her last fight was a loss to Shana Olsen at the Dec. 11 Ironman MMA show in Welch, MN. It should be pointed out that Shana missed weight. Kaitlin is known for her win at the 2007 Hook 'n' Shoot tournament and for her May 2008 loss to Gina Carano. She's a strong Muay Thai fighter but her ground game is unproven. Jennifer trains at Team Steve Heath in Stockton, CA. Her record is 5-1 and her last fight was a win over Sarah Schneider at the Nov. 1, 2008 Pure Combat show in Sacramento. Lately she's been working a lot of Muay Thai fights in Thailand. So I guess the winner is the one who gets the last punch. The fourth fight is Megumi Yabushita (pictured) vs Shayna Baszler. Megumi owns the Tomoegumi dojo in Tokyo. Her record is 18-15 and is a pioneer of women's MMA. Her last fight was a win was over Atsuko Emoto at the Sept. 13 JEWELS show. She also continues to work regularly as a pro wrestler as she has done both for her entire 12 year career. Her basic training is judo. She was an amateur judoka before Jaguar Yokota recruited her to pro wrestling. Shayna is from Sioux Falls, SD. Her record is 9-6 and her last fight was a loss to Sarah Kaufman on the June 19 Strikeforce show. She's known as a submission specialist. These two are known for their showmanship so I expect it to be the fight of the night. And maybe they can do some pro wrestling afterwards. Shayna would enjoy that. It's unfortunate that we probably won't get to see these fights because it should be a good show.