TUF10: Team Rampage Can't Catch a Break

If you are like me, you are following this season of The Ultimate Fighter after, well, not following it for quite a while. The concept lost its charm a while ago when they started stacking the seasons up with less-than-stellar fighters and a few standouts that were bound to be in the UFC, TUF or not. Rampage Jackson isn't really coaching material, nor is the perennial loser, Tiki, so there is no surprise for anybody that Team Rampage went into this week's show at a disadvantage. With Kimbo Slice gone, there was one man, one lone hope for Team Rampage, the man, the myth, the legend, the human genome project gone wrong, Wes Sims.

Help us Wes Sims, you are our only hope. Heavy.com's always awesome Kendall (known as Kerndall is some circles) Shields gives us the low-down.

Team Evans, on the strength of their much-discussed 4-0 record, retain control of the matchmaking, and they choose Greco-Roman wrestler and Travis Lutter Jiu-Jitsu student Justin Wren to take on Wes Sims. It is a bold move no doubt designed to capitalize on how Sims totally just stepped in jizz and probably hasn’t fully recovered. Consult “Terrain,” the tenth book of Master Sun’s great treatise. Somewhere along the way, Marcus Jones has managed to convince himself that Rashad Evans actually did give his word that Jones would be fighting this week (note: this did not happen) and Big Baby pouts with extreme prejudice. It’s awesome.

But not as awesome as Wes Sims. Fighting out of the legendarily one-dimensional Hammer House, Sims has someone managed to avoid competence in that one dimension. He can’t wrestle. He can’t really do anything else, either, but you’d think training for years with Mark Coleman and Kevin Randleman you’d at least pick that much up. A little. But Sims defies all reasoning. “The jungle, the alley, the cage. They’re all home. Make your peace with God, Justin, and be ready to scrap – because I am!” Oh man this Wes Sims.

I would remiss if I did not at least note in passing Justin Wren’s tiny pink manties, which steal the show at the weigh-in. And that’s saying something, because Sims is rocking a mighty banana hammock that would, under any other circumstance, be really funny underwear. Here, in comparison to Wren’s little number, they are only kind of funny underwear. But he plays to the crowd, showman that he is, and the assembled multitude finds all of this hilarious. Rampage is distraught.

Ten seconds into the fight, Wren has Sims pressed against the cage, and both men launch into a frenzied exchange of axe kicks! To the feet! That is to say, they are stomping at each other, which while kind of effective is also kind of lame. Wren doesn’t take Sims down so much as the two slump to the ground with Wren on top. One they’re there, Wren switches from side control to north-south and back again, sets up an arm triangle choke, and finishes by working his way across Sims’ body. Referee Herb Dean lifts Sims’ arm for signs of life, pro-wrestling sleeper hold style, finds none, and calls the fight. Rampage was expecting him to Hulk Hogan his way out of that thing, but alas.

Just like last week, Team Rampage is on the outside looking in while Team Rashad takes to the cage to console the losing fighter. Bad form, Team Rampage. Bad Form. “We can’t make ’em fight,” Rampage says by way of excusing his pretty horrible coaching. “We can’t fight for ’em,” echoes Assistant Coach Tiki, a man with an 0-4 UFC record.