'The Ultimate Fighter 22' blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 7

James Jenkins

After Julian Erosa’s win over Mehdi Baghdad on episode No. 6, we were all in pretty good spirits as the cameras recorded episode No. 7.

It felt good to have control of the picks again, and we were almost done with the prelims. So it became a little tradition to do the NOS Energy Drink shower after a win, but this was the first time we did it while the Europeans were there with us.

I really didn’t like that idea. I know on the show it seems like a long time went by since the fight, but in reality, that was right when we got home from the fight. Mehdi fought a good tough fight. I really didn’t want it to seem like we were rubbing it in. But we decided to go through with it. I knew the Europeans weren’t going to like that. Artem Lobov didn’t sound too happy about it. He went on a bit and seemed to direct a lot of it toward Julian.

With control of the picks, Urijah Faber chose Thanh Le to fight Martin Svensson (“Big Swede”). I thought this fight would be a lock for us. Thanh has some great standup, and after watching Martin’s fight into the house, I didn’t think he would have any answers for that. Clearly this was going to be a striker vs. grappler fight. The one obvious advantage that Martin had was his size.

At this point of the contest, there were only three fights left. On our side, we had Johnny Nunez, Jason Gonzalez and myself. On the Europeans side, they had Abner Lloveras, Artem and David Teymur.

There was definitely some tension from that. I mean any of us could be fighting each other in a matter of a few days. Abner and David were both pretty quiet around me at the time. Artem was always pretty cool throughout the whole thing. He seems a little grouchy in his interviews, but around the house, he was a good guy.

I grew out of the idea of mean-mugging a guy if we were going to fight. I did once as an amateur, and I felt like it just took so much energy trying to look angry all the time. Now I just stay myself.

Everyone handles these things differently; some people need to hate the guy they are going to fight. One night was kind of odd. I was in the hot tub, and Frantz Slioa came by and started talking to me about his life in Sweden and other things. We were talking for a good 15-20 minutes, and I turned around, and across from me in the hot tub was David. The guy didn’t say a word. I said “what’s up?” and still not a word. Keep in mind this is the guy who was telling everyone he was going to “f-ck them” a few days ago.

Chris then got into a drinking game while playing pool with Julian. I wasn’t downstairs the night this all went down, so this was my first time seeing it. One thing I can tell you though is Julian was the pool shark of the house. I wouldn’t advise any of the Americans to get into betting shots against him. So Chris took a bit of a beating and got pretty drunk, but from the looks of it, everyone seemed pretty tipsy.

I don’t know why Julian wanted to tell Chris his fight was boring. I do think, thus far in the competition, Chris’ fight was the least exciting at this time, but why tell him that? There are still four more fights to go, and if he does get cut, that’s his problem. No real reason to rub that in. So some words got said, and some steak sauce got spilt, but in the end, they got over it and just chalked it up to too much alcohol.

There was a little fun this week before the fight. It was actually after Billy Quarantillo’s fight that we went to the thrift store. It was good just to get out of the house. We were all getting a good laugh dressing up; well, I think all of us except for Ryan Hall. Ryan really hated the idea, but some of the outfits were great. Tom Gallicchio looked like a used-car salesman. Johnny looked like Bruno Mars. We wanted to look like Conor McGregor, so we spent a lot of time looking through the women’s clothes (it’s the only way we could have found something tight enough).

For a while, they debated when we would put on our outfits, Faber wanted to film an open-workout session in the European’s locker room. But when all the Europeans came dressed up to Mehdi’s fight, that sealed it. If they could dress up, so could we. The night before the fight, Urijah and the guys went out in the suits, and someone actually thought Lance Palmer was Conor. So I guess the outfits were pretty spot on.

The day of the fight, Martin walked by me in the house drinking soda. Two hours before his fight, and the guy is having soda! But hell, the guy puts mayo on salad and hot dogs, so I guess it shouldn’t be that much of a surprise.

I didn’t know how Conor was going to react seeing us dressed up, but he laughed. It was good to see him have a good sense of humor about it. Some of the Europeans told me they liked my pants. I honestly think they were serious. Those guys are big fans of the skinny jeans.

Well, the fight kicks off, and Thanh looks light on his feet. He showed some good movement and feints, but Martin was able to get him to the ground off of a kick. Martin showed some good top control but didn’t really land any damage. Thanh was able to get back to his feet, and he cracked Martin with a hard shot and put him on his back.

Round 2 then follows. Martin shoots from far out, and Thanh makes a costly mistake. Rather than sprawl and keep it standing up, he tried to go for a kimura. The arm lock was pretty tight but just not enough. Martin was able to mount and take the back and was eventually able to lock up the choke.

It was a big let down/ I really thought Thanh was a sure thing on this one, but that’s the fight game: There are no sure things. Conor gets the pick, and he chooses Artem and me.

It was great to hear this. I’ve been waiting for three weeks to find out when I would be up, and now I would have my chance.

Also see:

• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 1
• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 2
• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 3
• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 4
• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 5
• ‘The Ultimate Fighter 22’ blog: James Jenkins on episode No. 6

James Jenkins (8-1), an American featherweight on “The Ultimate Fighter 22,” blogs about the season each week exclusively for MMAjunkie. Follow him on Twitter at @crzyjenks.