MMA and pro wrestling legend Dan “The Best” Severn joined Lex and Ian on the latest edition of the PWB Podcast Hotline. In a captivating interview, Severn discussed several topics, including:

• His MMA and Law Enforcement training
• Winning the “Ultimate Ultimate 95″ tournament
• The evolution of MMA and various fighting styles
• The toll that MMA fights and wrestling matches take on the body
• His time in the WWF
• The “Brawl for All” tournament
• MMA fans’ perception of pro wrestlers
• His “retirement tour” and who he’d like to fight in 2009

For more on Dan “The Beast” Severn, please visit his official web site, the-beast.com.

Photo courtesy Fightbook.

Lex’s reminder: Don’t forget to check out the blog tonight for UFC 92 discussion.

Bobby Lashley says he wants to go to the UFC, but it looks like he’s got a long road ahead of him.

During a recent live chat on AOL Sports’ MMA Blog, a reader asked UFC President Dana White if Lashley would be coming to the UFC. White’s first response, apparently, was “who?” (more…)

From Sherdog.com:

Justin Eilers was shot and died shortly after on Friday morning in an apparent domestic disturbance at an acquaintance’s home in Canyon County, Idaho. Eilers was 30 years old.

Canyon County sheriffs arrived at the residence at 10:44 p.m. MST, where Eilers was found shot and wounded.

“Emergency medical staff took live-saving measures, but they were unsuccessful,” said Capt. Dana Maxfield.

Eilers was pronounced dead at the scene. An autopsy conducted Friday released the cause of death as a single gunshot wound to the chest. The bullet reportedly punctured Eilers’ lung before exiting his body, said Monte Cox, Eiler’s longtime manager.

Cox said Eilers had gathered with relatives for the holidays, but tensions escalated with an ex-girlfriend, also in attendance. Eilers was asked to leave the residence, but was said to have refused and began throwing dishes and other objects in protest. The home’s owner was then said to have pulled a gun on Eilers and shot him in the chest after a brief verbal confrontation.

Eilers’ ex-girlfriend, mother, and young son were said to have been in the room at the time of the shooting.

James Robert Malec, 48, was arrested and charged with second degree murder in relation with the shooting, said Capt. Maxfield. It is believed that Malec is Eilers’ mother’s boyfriend. Capt. Maxfield could not confirm this relationship or Eilers’ alleged interaction with the ex-girlfriend. Maxfield did confirm that numerous relatives were at the scene at the time of the shooting.

According to Wikipedia, Eilers had fought in several promotions, including the UFC and WEC. His most recent fight was a loss to Antonio Silva in a Heavyweight Championship match for EliteXC.

Eilers was a good friend of Jens Pulver and former middle linebacker at Iowa State University. Pulver urged Eilers to try mixed martial arts, and Eilers’ career eventually took off.

Eilers was planning on dropping down to 205 since his loss to Silva, according to the Sherdog article.

“He was really getting his fight career together,” his manger Cox told Sherdog.

Ian and I were lucky enough to get current Strikeforce Heavyweight Champion and Dream-contracted fighter Alistair Overeem on the latest edition of the PWB Podcast Hotline. Overeem is a candid guy, and he discussed several topics during the interview, including:

• His upcoming kickboxing match against Badr Hari on New Year’s Eve at the K1 Dynamite show
• How training for kickboxing is different than training for MMA
• His controversial fight against Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipović
• The war of words with “Cro Cop” since the fight, “Cro Cop’s” invitation to fight him in his “personal cage” in Croatia
• His future with Strikeforce and other American promotions like Dream

The best part of the interview is definately about the fallout from his fight against “Cro Cop.” For those of you who haven’t seen how the fight went down, here’s a video:

If you’re interested in seeing the knees in question, there’s a nice replay at about 5:30 of that video.

For more on Alistair Overeem, please visit his official web site, alistairovereem.com.

Also, I’m working on a new PWB podcast that should be out soon, so look out for that.

Bobby Lashley took only 41 seconds to vanquish his opponent, Joshua Franklin, at last night’s Mixed Fight Alliance MMA event in Miami, Florida. The fight was stopped after his opponent suffered a huge cut (see the video above).

MMA Junkie has the scoop on what was a quick fight:

Now training with the famed American Top Team, Lashley shot in immediately on his opponent. Once on the ground, a ferocious ground and pound assault opened a gash on his opponent’s face. Ringside doctors deemed the wounds too serious to allow Franklin to continue, and Lashley was awarded the TKO victory after just 41 seconds of work.

Following the bout, sources close to Lashley told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) that the heavyweight prospect was likely to return to action in an as-yet-unannounced card in February for the California-based Palace Fighting Championships.

Additionally, the sources indicated that Lashley was hoping to follow in fellow WWE veteran Brock Lesnar’s footsteps by leaping quickly into the UFC. A bout with Lesnar himself is said to be Lashley’s highest priority.

A bout with Lesnar is now his highest priority? What? Lashley wins one fight and we’re now talking about him facing Lesnar?

I thought Lashley was originally talking about doing several fights and building up slowly to the UFC. I can’t imagine that a victory over a no-name, first-time fighter would give him much sway with Dana White.

Lashley is no doubt a talented wrestler, but Brock Lesnar’s jump to the UFC has been meteoric–I just don’t see it being replicated.

Still, if Lashley gets a few quick wins under his belt, White and the rest of UFC management might be smart to bring Lashley in. They wouldn’t be able to just bring him in immeadietly to fight Lesnar, however. Lashley would need a few wins over credible opponents, in my opinion, especially if Lesnar beats the winner of Nogueira/Mir. I do think that a Lashley/Lesnar fight would break all PPV buy records for the UFC.

If you haven’t been watching this season of The Ultimate Fighter, you’ve been missing out. Featuring both the light heavyweight and lightweight divisions, it’s safe to say that this season has been explosive. It all comes to a head tonight when we get the finals of The Ultimate Fighter live on Spike TV at 9e/8c.

Here’s tonight’s televised card:

• Lightweight Final: Phillipe Nover vs. Efrain Escudero
• Light Heavyweight Final: Ryan Bader vs. Vinicius Magalhães
• Welterweight bout: Kevin Burns vs. Anthony Johnson
• Middleweight: Wilson Gouveia vs. Jason MacDonald
• Lightweight bout: Junie Browning vs. Dave Kaplan

Yes, you read correctly, the controversial Junie Browning IS on this card. Looks like being an ass on national TV paid off for him.

As for the finals, I’ll go with Nover in the lightweight and Magalhães in the light heavyweight. Nover is just amazing, and Magalhães has some serious jiu-jitsu going for him. I’m hoping Magalhães will win because Bader bored me to death with his turtle-style during his fights.

Also, don’t sleep on the Burns v. Johnson fight–this is a rematch of a controversial fight where Burns kept poking Johnson in the eye with his open-palmed strikes but actually ended up winning since Johnson couldn’t continue.

Many of the fighters from this season’s show are also featured on the preliminary card. Hopefully we’ll get to see some of those fights on tonight’s show:

• Light Heavyweight bout: Krzysztof Soszynski vs. Shane Primm
• Light Heavyweight bout: Eliot Marshall vs. Jules Bruchez
• Light Heavyweight bout: Kyle Kingsbury vs. Tom Lawlor
• Lightweight bout: Shane Nelson vs. George Roop
• Lightweight bout: Rolando Delgado vs. John Polakowski

Discuss TUF finale here.

I saw this list of PPV in 2008 this morning on PW Insider–it really magnifies the problems WWE is having with its PPV numbers. Check out the list:

Top 10 North American PPV buy rates, 2008

1. Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao, Dec. 6, 1,250,000
2. UFC: Brock Lesnar vs. Randy Couture, Nov. 15, 1,010,000
3. Wrestling: WrestleMania, Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Paul “Big Show” Wight, March 30, 670,000
4. UFC: Georges St. Pierre vs. Jon Fitch/Lesnar vs. Heath Herring, Aug. 9, 625,000
5. UFC: Lesnar vs. Frank Mir, Feb. 2, 600,000
6. UFC: Quinton Jackson vs. Forrest Griffin, July 5, 540,000
7. UFC: St. Pierre vs. Matt Serra, April 19, 530,000
8. Boxing: Felix Trinidad vs. Roy Jones Jr., Jan. 19, 500,000
9. UFC: Chuck Liddell vs. Rashad Evans, Sept. 6, 480,000
10. UFC: B.J. Penn vs. Sean Sherk/Tito Ortiz vs. Lyoto Machida, May 24, 475,000

Those are just insane numbers for the UFC right now. There’s a several different things that stand out on this list.

The first is that Brock Lesnar is paying off big for the UFC. All three of his fights propelled those UFC cards into the top five this year. He’s the perfect crossover star. It’s amazing that his fights outsold huge UFC bouts like Jackson/Griffin, St. Pierre/Serra, Liddell/Evans and Penn/Sherk, especially considering some of those were serious grudge matches.

The second thing that stands out is obviously that only one WWE PPV made it in to the top 10. If this isn’t evidence that the WWE puts on too many PPVs every year, I don’t know what is.

Finally, what’s really amazing about this is that a BOXING PPV came in at number one. I guess it just goes to show you that Oscar De La Hoya has some serious drawing power in the Hispanic community, despite the fact that he has no chance at pulling off a win over a big name fighter. As long as he draws those kind of numbers, they’ll keep doing PPV fights featuring him.