Sherdog.com’s Guide to TUF 5

During the Fight Night event that kicked off this season of The Ultimate Fighter, B.J. Penn (Pictures) was asked if he would be interested in coaching on the show again.

B.J. said no.

It's been four weeks since that answer and with the same amount of fighters missing from his team it's easy to see why he was peeved. Penn is fuming over the situation, disappointed by Rob Emerson's tough loss and frustrated with Andy Wang for not listening to his tutelage.

The Hawaiian lightweight said realizes he can't train his guys properly without having the power, like Jens has, to choose match-ups. Penn surveys his team's failings and asks, "Is this the Bad News Bears or what?"

While B.J. grapples with his team's direction, his coaching assistant Tony DeSouza (Pictures) decides he's had enough of Noah Thomas (Pictures)'s constant joking and clowning around during practice and decides to work him over like a bear on a fish. After a while it becomes obvious that Tony isn't going to let up and continues to fold Noah into various awful positions while he grimaces and grunts in pain.

Tony continues the anguish and digs his elbows into Noah's back then applies an assortment of chokes and cranks.

Noah is helpless as Tony continues to slap and bully him until finally letting him up after taking things probably a bit too far. Noah jumps up and storms off while Tony yells at him and chides him to stop talking so much shit during training.

Noah kicks a heavybag in anger and slumps down, furious that Tony would put him through all that since his joking wasn't meant to be taken so personally.

I think this is the first time anyone has been physically punished on this show and it was for the least of crimes.

You have to feel awful for the guy, committing a misdemeanor that ends in the hands of the Spanish Inquisition.

Gabe Ruediger (Pictures) takes a look the scale and at 176 pounds he's "concerned about it." But then back at the house he helps himself to a heaping helping of ice cream cake. The other fighters consider him to be "unprofessional" since he could be called out to fight next.

Sure enough, at this week's fight selection Jens instructs Corey Hill to call out Ruediger. This gives Corey the match-up he's been wanting since he first barked at Gabe in week one. Gabe calmly walks over and picks up a box to stand on so he can look Corey in the eyes.

Gabe states that when he looked in Corey's eyes he could see fear.

On the way back to the house Gabe tells his team that he thinks Corey will want to sprawl-and-brawl. Gray Maynard (Pictures) asks him what the plan is. Before Gabe can get too far into his battle intentions, Gray alters his question and asks Gabe about his plan for cutting the weight. Gabe says "Oh, well … go back to the house. Relax. Maybe eat a handful of spinach."

Joe Lauzon (Pictures) shoots the camera an incredulous look that writers of The Office would have been proud of.

Gabe's teammates immediately shun his plan and throw out more logical ideas, like getting to the gym or jogging. But Gabe would rather discuss the "fear" he saw in Corey's eyes.

Back at the house Gabe is in his room staring at notes of affirmation he's posted on his wall. "Successful people never give up" and "The only person that can stop me is myself." During Gabe's narration interview he theorizes that throughout history there has been "a warrior class" that walks among us and the he is part of that elite sect.

On the flip side during Corey's preparation, he notes that the guys surrounding him on the show are different. "These guys are protein shakes … healthy. I eat cheeseburgers with my kids." It's a sharp contrast to Gabe's warrior class talk. While Gabe might have donned the exclusive robe of the combat warrior through divine and historic birthright, Corey just got involved because he ran out of other sporting options.

With only 24 hours until the weigh-in, B.J. finds Gabe on the scale weighing a daunting 173.5 pounds. Ruediger climbs aboard the treadmill and starts out with some light work combined with breaks under a tent of towels. After a few hours Gabe gets off the treadmill and onto the scale and is sitting surprisingly pretty at 169 with 16 hours to go.

He's not the only one battling the bulge, as Corey isn't exactly light either, so he sits in the sauna pointing out that cutting weight is just part of the job: "something you signed up for."

Gabe checks his weight again and checks in at 162. Penn announces that with two hours left they have to go to the sauna quickly. Gabe is running out of time and with so much weight to lose Emerson gets in the sauna with him just in case he has to fight as an alternate.

B.J. asks if he'll have to do a "Bobby Southworth (Pictures)" to Ruediger and lock him in there. Later that question would be truly tested as Gabe begins to flop around after only 30 minutes of intermittent sauna time.

He's acting dead and weak … bear in mind he's only jogged/walked in a rubber suit before this and now he's lying limply on the floor, like a brat that doesn't want to leave Toys-R-Us.

With only an hour left Gabe can't seem to stand and refuses to move until the guys drag him back to the sauna and then instantly he is able to walk away and rip off his clothes. It was like Benny Hinn had reached out and healed him as was able to disrobe rather ably.

The scale shows 159 and Gabe decides that he's had enough of the heat. He's frustrated and opts to cool off by wading out into the house pool and strips off the remainder of his clothes lying face down, bare-ass up on the concrete.

I mean bare-ass.

Quick, someone run to his room and grab all those inspirational 3x5 cards and scrawl "There's always time for pants!" on one of them.

Gray gets him back in the sauna and once again Gabe falls off the bike and out of the sauna onto the floor. Now that they won't pull him back in Gabe begins to whimper for them to drag him back "just put me back in."

His teammates and coaches beg and plead with him to just get back in the sauna but Gabe lies there with tears streaming down his face repeating "just drag me in there." For perhaps the third time in five weeks, Ruediger begins to cry and it's nice and awkward, like when you tolerate your drunk emotional buddy's tears while quietly judging him.

Only this could be worse since he's using one last manipulative moment to make it seem like he's really willing to go all the way for this.

If only you'd drag me in there! It's akin to pretending you want to fight only when someone is holding you back. I'd have just stayed there and cried until I could fill a 10-pound bucket and been back in business.

Instead, EMS gets called to the house and Gabe leaves to get himself an IV and a cookie at the ER.

The entire house is disgusted with him since they and he knew all along that he didn't care about making weight for any fight. Brian Geraghty suggests that Gabe should hit up Celebrity Fit Club.

Gabe returns from the hospital to a lackluster reception. Gabe says that he had "no choice" and while getting called out by Geraghty for all his snacking he says, "I thought it wouldn't be an issue."

Geraghty smartly points out that it's strange that a guy who didn't think it was an issue thought it was enough of an issue to skip practice to get butt brownies removed from his ass oven.

Gabe decides that he indeed made a fool of himself and takes the time to apologize to Corey for not making the weight.

The next day they are scheduled to have a meeting with Dana White. While waiting, Gabe informs B.J. that all he had to do was "watch my diet more." No kidding. You mean all you had to do was do the one thing everyone in the house has been nagging you about? Golly.

Pulver had some of the most harsh criticism, saying "fatboy … fatkid … lazy guy, whatever … Ruediger. He came here to get some TV time. Well you got it. Hopefully you get some sponsorship for it. Burger Boy, Donut World … who knows?"

Dana comes in and stares in disgust and starts in on the same old story of having to ask guys if this is what they really want. He takes some time to call out Gabe publicly and informs him that he blew his chances and tells him to leave the show.

Gabe says, "that's terrific," and walks out the door. In his final interview, Gabe begins to weep again and says that fighting is his life.

Dana announces that with Gabe's departure it makes room for Rob Emerson to come back in. Team Penn gets penalized for not being on Gabe's ass enough to lose the weight -- something they have to be thrilled about -- and Dana gives Jens the power to pick not just one but two of the next fights.

Team Pulver decides that next week, Brian Geraghty will fight Joe Lauzon (Pictures) and Corey Miller will fight the newly re-added Rob Emerson.