Update on Rampage

With no serious damage done to his left leg, former UFC light heavyweight champion Quinton Jackson is expected back in the gym Monday. Jackson, who lost a hard-fought and in the eyes of many controversial five-round decision to Forrest Griffin at UFC 86 Saturday, had his leg examined today and was cleared to resume training next week. He will have to avoid any immediate direct contact to the still-tender lower part of the leg. "After the fight, he had a knot the size of a cantaloupe on his shin," Jackson's trainer, Juanito Ibarra, told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com). "I've never seen anything like it in all the years I've been in the fight game. It was ugly. The next day it went down. Today, there's no bump at all. The doctor said he's fine. It's a deep bone bruise now. He's totally fine. There's no damage. All we're waiting for now is the rematch." Jackson's shin, not the knee, absorbed most of the punishment from Griffin's kicks, according to Ibarra, who believes the rematch should happen right away. "Why shouldn't it?" he asked. "Forrest said after the fight he didn't want to do it again, but he had to, remember? He said that because he felt in his heart he didn't win that fight. Let the kids heal, and let's get it on." Three days after the back-and-forth battle, Ibarra is still steamed about the outcome and plans to follow through on protesting the decision with the Nevada State Athletic Commission. While he gives Griffin credit for employing a strong fight plan, Ibarra can't grasp the scoring of round one, calling the fact that two judges scored the round for Griffin "ludicrous." Judges Adalaide Byrd and Roy Silbert gave the first five minutes to Griffin by a 10-9 score, despite Jackson knocking Griffin down and appearing to control the action. "My grounds (for protest) are the first round how it was scored," Ibarra said. "I want them to prove to me how a round is to be scored, per the rules that the judges have to follow, and tell me how they came up with what they came up with. I thought the worst nightmare in the world could have been a draw, but a loss unanimously … I can't swallow it. I can't swallow it." Ibarra says his advice to Jackson in the rematch would be to mix it up with Griffin more by using a double jab and trying to get inside to throw more punches. That was something that became increasingly difficult to do Saturday night due to Griffin's effectiveness with the leg kicks. As for Ibarra's pre-fight promise to retire if Griffin pulled the upset, he had this to say: "I'm not going anywhere. I don't go against my word, but look at the video. Did it say I'm retiring from the fight game? No. You know what I'm retiring from? The waterfront. I've been a longshoreman for 28 years. I'm retiring from the waterfront." You'll find him in the gym.