Nevada State Athletic Commission withholds half of Renato 'Babalu' Sobral's purse of $50,000 pending review of his UFC 74 bout with David Heath

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For those that don't know the story by now, last night at UFC 74, in a preliminary bout in the Light Heavyweight division, Renato "Babalu" Sobral defeated David Heath by Anaconda choke. That in and of itself was fine, but there is more to it than that. Sobral had busted Heath open with an elbow during the fight and Heath was bleeding pretty heavily to the point some in attendance thought it should've been stopped sooner.
The real issue though is that after Heath tapped to the choke, Sobral continued to hold it even while referee Steve Mazagatti tried to break his grip. In a post-fight interview, Sobral admitted to doing it to teach Heath a lesson for something that happened during the weigh-ins the day prior.
This turned the crowd on him in a big way and disgusted amny in attendance including several fighters.

According to Sam Caplan of 5 Ounces of Pain.com Sobral threw his hat in to the crowd and it was caught by Manny Gamburyan who promptly threw it back.

So the fallout according to Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports is that the NSAC is withholding half of Sobral's $50,000 purse, he got $25,000 for the fight and $25,000 for a win bonus. At a hearing to take place later more will be decided including possible further punishment. For Sobral, who this author thinks is one of the better Light Heavyweights in the UFC, this comes on the heels of a July 14 arrest down in Florida. This could jeopardize his future in the UFC and by jeopardize I mean completely oblidorate.

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