Midnight Mania! Man attends MMA event as a fan, leaves with title belt and fiancee

Welcome to Midnight Mania!

It’s what practically every MMA fan has wished at one point in their life- that they were the one getting their hand raised in the cage, a shiny new belt around their waist. Luis Felipe Alvim, who had never competed in MMA, had that wish come true in the Brazilian promotion Juiz de Fora Fight; stepping in on less than an hour’s notice, he is now their professional welterweight champion. As if the night could get any better, he proposed to his girlfriend. (She said yes)

The story, as reported by Guilherme Cruz of MMAFighting.com, is a wild one. Alvim and his girlfriend had baked a pan of brownies to sell outside the hotel where the fights were being held, so they could afford tickets. When they arrived at the venue, no one was buying their brownies. Because MMA is life, they decided to spend some money they had been saving for bills, and bought tickets anyway.

Now, Luis Felipe Alvim had never fought a professional MMA bout, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t have any martial arts training. He is a Muay Thai black belt, and a blue belt in jiu-jitsu, with 16 Muay Thai bouts and tournament experience in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. He had some friends scheduled to compete that night, so he visited his coach, UFC lightweight Felipe Silva, backstage. That’s when he found out someone had pulled out from a welterweight title fight. He let his coach know he was ready to step in.

"I told Felipe Silva I’d fight, that I’d put on a show, but a new fight was already booked,” Alvim told MMA Fighting. “Forty minutes before the main event, this guy chickened out and they offered me the fight again.”

So, forty minutes ahead of the fight, young Alvim stepped up in front of 1,500 fans.

Initially, the fight didn’t go well. He got taken down and his opponent, Carlos Eduardo Rufino, began landing heavy ground and pound. They weren’t tame shots either; Alvim was taking a hellacious beating.

“He took me down and landed some heavy shots, and I though ‘oh sh*t, what the f*ck am I doing here?’" Alvim said. “When I locked the triangle I thought to myself, ‘sh*t, I’ll catch him.’ I asked God ‘please, don’t let this round end,’ and he tapped."

The young hero of the hour wasn’t about to let the moment go. He proposed to his girlfriend on the spot. How was she going to say no to that?

Alvim said he took his inspiration from the Greek hero Achilles, as depicted in the movie Troy.

"I showed my girlfriend — my fiancee now [laughs] — the trailer of the movie Troy yesterday,” he said, "in which this kid tells Achilles he’d never fight a giant like Achilles was about to do, and Achilles says 'that's why your name won’t be remembered.' That stuck in my mind.”

---

Insomnia

Tony Ferguson posted this. That’s all I have to say about it.

That is an awesome poster

It makes so much sense that Tito Ortiz would make his acting debut in “Madea Halloween”. Not only that... but he got the hashtag wrong.

I had never seen this version of the logo before.

This is a great skit; AJ and I discussed it on our podcast below. Maybe Nick was trying to get away from his “wife”...

Rico Verhoeven, who became the latest in a long line to knock out Bigfoot Silva this past weekend, sparring with a Wing Chun expert.

Owned.

Holistic recovery in preparation for a holistic beatdown.

Who, I wonder, is CM Punk fighting?

---

Slips, Rips, and KO Clips

This guy is must see TV

RIZIN!

Look at the timing on this shot

Eyes wide shut

Armbar win

---

Podcasts and Video

Check out episode 2 of my podcast, the MMA Outsiders. Today, AJ and I interviewed Glory reporter Whitney Miller on life, her own foray into boxing, and what “raising the consciousness of the world” means to her. The audio quality on the call is... a bit lacking... but we will do better with that moving forward.

The MMA Hour

The Monday Morning Analyst

The CME podcast

Carlos Condit’s new podcast

---

Good Reads and Quick Hits

• Does Amanda Nunes’ failure to draw as champion, despite two high-profile wins over Meisha Tate and Ronda Rousey, portend bad things for the UFC? Dave Meltzer examines.
• Is he the next Disney now? McGregor creates Mac Land for his son’s christening
• Rogan and Cormier are under fire for falling victim to the “Firekid” hype.

---

Stay woke, Maniacs!