Midnight Mania! Wanderlei Silva plans to run for Brazilian Congress, might retire after Rampage bout

Welcome to Midnight Mania!

Wanderlei Silva has a fourth bout with Rampage Jackson coming up, this time at Bellator on September 29, the co-main event on a card headlined by a legitimate superfight between Rory Macdonald and Gegard Mousasi.

But a mere 10 days after that? He’ll be hanging up his gloves- possibly for good- and hitting the campaign trail, as he plans on running for the Brazilian version of Congress. Via MMAJunkie.com:

“I’m not going to accept money from anybody,” he said. “I’m going to use the media to promote my name because I want to be there with my hands clean, to be different.”

“Maybe this is going to be my last fight, and after, I’ll go to the next step,” he said.

It’s admirable that he plans on not taking any money from the campaign, no doubt relying on his fame in his home country to make up for the donations. This isn’t the first time he has run for office; in 2014 he ran for Congress under the banner of the centrist Social Democracy party. At the time, he had this memorable quote:

I just opened a free, public MMA gym in Paraiba, so why can’t Curitiba or Sao Paulo have one? No money? Someone needs to do this. I’m tired of asking, so I’m going to do that on my own hands at the congress. No more corrupt politicians stealing from us. This generation needs to go to jail, retire or die. It’s the time for the good people, but we need to do something. It needs to be good for everybody. And if you think Romario is controversial, wait until I get there.”

Go to jail, retire, or die. That probably reflects how a lot of Americans think of our own political leaders as well.

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Insomnia

Tony Ferguson getting back in shape after his knee surgery

Vasyl Lomachenko knows how to wrestle, he’s got leg kicks... if there was one boxer I would wager would do very well in MMA, it’s him.

Same, Santiago Ponzinibbio. Same.

Pretty cool artwork for Derrick “the Black Beast” Lewis ahead of his UFC 226 bout with Francis Ngannou

GSP’s reaction in this old clip with Matt Huges is golden

I’m still waiting for someone to throw their opponent out of the cage like Tank Abbot tried to do.

A much younger Dana White

The UFC’s least-known champion, flyweight Nicco Montano, reflects on the challenges of the mixed martial arts life and the greater challenges her Native American ancestors faced, drawing on their legacy for motivation.

Rory Macdonald fighting Gegard Mousasi might just be the perfect deadpan fight. Only Gunnar Nelson has more zen calm about him.

This is equally as credible as that Zoolander dance-fighting scene.

Darren Till bought himself a very glitzy watch.

Suga Sean O’Malley preparing for his comeback

The other Suga, Rashad Evans, has retired and gotten congratulations from many in the MMA world for a long and successful career. That includes his old foe and Fox Sports cohost Michael Bisping, who also recently retired

This weekend in combat sports:

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Quick Hits

• Is 100 tequila shot consumed between two people in an evening possible? According to Mike Perry, that’s just what he and Jon Jones did.
• Jessica Andrade vs. Karolina Kowalkiewicz? Sign me up for that one. Karolina is a beast in the clinch and has the cardio to hang with Andrade, but can she stop the brute strength of the Brazilian?

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Random Land

Training to be Thor

Lionel Messi finally stepped up to get Argentina out of the group stage with this incredible goal

Ricardo Quaresma has been doing this trivela shot since like 2005 and it’s still awesome

Stay woke, Maniacs! Follow me on Twitter and Facebook @Vorpality