RRC Roundup: Couture Responds To Beard, WEC Card Finalized, Cote Surgery, More

I missed Affliction co-founder Todd Beard's comments toward Randy Couture which can be summed up like this: “Randy, if you’re listening right now, I hope (expletive) Lesnar kills you." Direct quote. Wow. You know Affliction puts out the Xtreme Couture line of clothing, right? With friends like this, who needs enemies?

Couture responded in an interview with MMAWeekly.com, saying that he won't wear his Affliction shirt in his 11/15 match with Brock Lesnar because Affliction is now a competitor to the UFC. When asked about the relationship, “It’s certainly going to be affected. The relationship’s already been affected by Todd Beard’s demeanor and some of the things he’s said, so that’s all up in the air." Check out the whole piece here which has additional quotes and more background.

-The Canadian Press is reporting that middleweight Patrick Cote will be out six-to-eight months following surgery to repair a torn meniscus suffered in his fight with Anderson Silva last Saturday. Cote's management team said he suffered the injury while preparing for a fight Drew McFedries in January and aggravated it while training for Silva.

-The Las Vegas Review-Journal quoted Dana White as saying Silva is upset at the criticism he is recieving from the Cote fight and wants to fight as soon as November 15th as part of the Randy Couture/Brock Lesnar undercard. The problem? Finding an opponent on short notice. Nice thought, but finding someone that is a quality opponent to go against the best pound-for-pound fighter in less than three weeks is a tall order for anyone, much less White. Public posturing by Silva or legit?

-Anyone else amazed at how much disrespect Team Mir is giving 'Minotauro' Nogueira on this season of The Ultimate Fighter? Seriously, he's a UFC Heavyweight Champion and someone that has been in the game longer than most of these guys have been fighting combined. I'll never understand that type of logic, especially when it's coming out of the mouth of guys like Shane Nelson.

-Next Wednesday's WEC card on Versus has been finalized: Featherweight Champion Urijah Faber defends his belt against Mike Brown, Middleweight Champion Paulo Filho defends against Chael Sonnen in a rematch, Jens Pulver fights Leonard Garcia, Jake Rosholt battles Nissen Osterneck and Rob McCullough fights Donald 'Cowboy' Cerrone. More on this card next week.

-Speaking of Affliction, Affliction Entertainment VP Tom Atencio confirmed to Five Ounces of Pain that the talks between UFC and Affliction in September did happen, but that Affliction never took the idea of shutting down their MMA operations seriously.

Josh Nason has written and maintained Ropes, Ring and Cage since 2007. He can be reached at [e-mail].