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Tim Sylvia wants back in the UFC so bad he’s “pretty much begging” at this point.

Yes, you read that right. That’s what he told MMA Junkie Radio today on a media campaign to get back in the UFC.

“I made a mistake. I was wrong. I’m sorry. I screwed up. But give me a second chance please. I’m pretty much begging… It was a stupid mistake I made (leaving the UFC for Affliction), especially with how it all worked out,” Sylvia today told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “But I know (UFC co-owners) Dana (White) and Lorenzo (Fertitta) and all those guys have given second chances – Tito Ortiz being one of them, B.J. Penn, Mark Coleman, the guys who did the rape jokes on Twitter and all that stuff. Even Nate Marquardt is getting a second chance with Strikeforce.”

If given a second chance, Sylvia promises he’ll beat any of the UFC’s heavyweights outside of the top five and he’s even willing to take an entry-level contract to prove it. Here’s Tim making that bold proclamation on The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani earlier today.

“Have me come in, put me against Stefan Struve, Cheick Kongo, (Matt) Mitrione,” Sylvia said. “I’ll fight anybody. I don’t care. And see if I can hang with them. If I can’t, I tell you what, it’s going to be a hell of a fight… Right now you have three studs: Alistair, Junior and Cain, and the rest are OK. There’s also Frank Mir and Shane Carwin, but besides the Top 5, if you put me in there I’ll beat them all.”

“If the UFC comes to me with an offer for $5,000 and $5,000 I would take it,” Sylvia said. “I know that’s very entry level money but I’d have an opportunity to win Knockout of the Night and make $50,000.”

This is all started when Sylvia posted a very heartfelt video on YouTube recently asking for fans to tweet Dana White and tell him that they wanted to see the big guy back in the Octagon. Surprisingly, Sylvia received a lot of overwhelming fan support but it wasn’t enough to convince Dana to give him a second chance. At least not yet. Perhaps Sylvia’s offer to fight on the cheap will, but that remains to be seen.

Image via Dave Mandel for Sherdog

Tom Atencio finally blew his lid last week and started pointing the finger at Josh Barnett for sinking Affliction’s third show. However, Barnett says nuh-uh, don’t blame me for your promotion going under. Take a look in the mirror, your numbers never added up.

Atencio told Inside MMA last week that “the bottom line is [that] Josh is to blame. How many times has he tested positive? Three times. This was his third time… I found out ten days before the event that he tested positive.

Confronted with Atencio’s comments on this week’s episode, Barnett laughed and said that the failed test was being used as an excuse to cover up failings on Affliction’s part. Barnett said bad money management is the real reason Affliction Entertainment went under.

“If they really want to find out why they didn’t run any more events, they should check into their accounting and everything else. They had a lot of counsel from people with experience – ‘wink wink’ – trying to help them set this thing up. Budgeting correctly, putting together proper contracts, proper connections – they didn’t listen, they spent way more then they earned,” Barnett said, apparently hinting that Affliction had been advised by unnamed but more established MMA industry operatives.

They’re both right actually. Bottom line is Josh Barnett was the gust of wind that blew over Tom Atencio’s house of cards.

Inside MMA airs tonight on HDNet at 9PM ET.

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Wanderlei Silva stopped by the Affliction training facility to get a little work in with his longtime coach Rafael Cordeiro and rough Tom Atencio up a bit.

Affliction has officially responded to the lawsuit M-1 Global and Fedor Emelianenko filed against them last week. They’ve filed a motion to dismiss essentially claiming M-1 has no grounds to sue them. Affliction’s Tom Atencio fired back with this money quote.

“Affliction landed a serious blow to the Fedor and M-1 lawsuit by filing a motion to dismiss in federal court in response to the Russians’ complaint only eight days after being served. . . . The counter by Affliction goes to show Affliction does not intend to rollover and be extorted by the Russian visitors and how frivolous and meritless Affliction considers the allegations of their complaint.”

It does however on the surface seem like M-1′s complaint has merit. M-1 contends Affliction breached their contract with Fedor by making a deal behind their backs with the UFC to escape the fight promotion business instead of securing a replacement opponent for Fedor.

But there’s a twist. Affliction says their contract with Fedor expired on March 31, 2009.

But then we come to Affliction’s motion to dismiss, which throws a monkey wrench into the entire substantive analysis. You see, Fedor argues that Affliction breached its contracts by cancelling Affliction: Trilogy and reaching agreement with UFC in July 2009.

Affliction’s motion to dismiss, however, points to the language of the contracts, which calls for termination of the agreements on either (i) March 31, 2009; or (ii) the conclusion of the third fight, with the contracts specifically stating that they terminate upon the earlier of the two dates. Since there was no third fight, the earlier date was March 31, 2009, and Affliction argues in its motion to dismiss that it cannot be alleged to have breached a contract in July 2009 that had expired four months earlier.

Boom! Affliction lands the knockout punch, right? Well, unfortunately it’s not that simple and this is the point where the dispute starts moving into gray territory. Payout explains it much better than my legally challenged mind can, so I recommend checking out their full report on this latest development.

Update: Bloody Elbow has more details on the motion to dismiss including information on what Affliction paid Fedor and M-1 for each of his fights, $300,000 and $1.2 million, respectively.

Affliction tearing it up with the promos in the afterlife.

Fabricio Werdum takes on Antonio Silva in a heavyweight contest this Saturday night on CBS at Strikeforce “Fedor vs. Rogers.”

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