War Machine -- Punished in Georgia

War Machine -- the controversial MMA fighter turned porn star -- is in big trouble in Georgia, after he backed out of an upcoming brawl ... through his Twitter page.

Machine (yes, that's his legal name) was scheduled to get in the ring at Wild Bill's Fight Night in Duluth, GA tomorrow night ... but claims he came down with a staph infection that will prevent him from kicking ass.

The fight promoter tells TMZ that instead of dealing with his situation "professionally" -- returning calls, emails, etc -- Machine simply posted a message on his Twitter page stating that he was out of the fight.

Now, the Georgia State Athletic and Entertainment Commission is coming down on Machine -- suspending the fighter indefinitely for breach of contract.

War Machine gave us a full statement about the ordeal. Check it out after the jump.

First of all I have an AGENT that deals with promoters. Promoters go through him to book me and negotiate contract terms. There is NO REASON for me to EVER speak directly to a promoter and I very rarely do so. The past week of training I felt horrible and didn't know why. I would be EXHAUSTED after just one round of training. At night I couldn't sleep and would sweat and toss and turn through the night. The week prior I felt great. That being said I finally decided to go to the Urgent Care and get checked out. The doctor was suspicious of a sore on my knee and thought it may be staff and then gave me a blood test. The results came back positive and I was given an antibiotic IV and a prescription and sent home. I informed my AGENT and he in turn informed the PROMOTER. After which the promoter began texting and calling me telling me they have doctors there and that staff is easy to fix and to come anyway. I never responded because, as I said earlier, there is NO REASON for ME PERSONALLY to speak with promoters. Later I released a statement via Twitter to my FANS and FRIENDS explaining that I have staff and can not fight. It is very unfortunate that this happened so close to the fight date but it was an unavoidable occurrence. I am very upset about it as well. I NEED to make money and missed out on an opportunity to do so.

This whole thing has been blown WAY out of proportion. Fighters are injured and pull out of fights all the time and there is never a fuss like this made about it. I myself have had 5 or 6 fights canceled on me last minute do to my opponents getting hurt last minute. These things happen in this sport. THE END.