Monday, July 9, 2007

Dana White Talks UFC Light-Heavies

There's been a lot going down recently with the UFC LHW division, so here's some of the latest 205-lb. news from UFC president Dana White.

- Dan Henderson will fight Quinton "Rampage" Jackson at UFC 75 in what will be a unification bout for the UFC and Pride belts. This is excellent news.

It was reported a while back that this fight would be non-title, and then it was supposedly for the UFC belt only, which seemed stupid, so I'm glad to see champion vs. champion for all the marmalade. Fittingly, UFC 75 has been officially titled "Champion vs. Champion."

And as I wrote earlier, even if Henderson loses his LHW belt to Jackson, he's still got the Pride middleweight strap. Henderson vs. Silva, to me at least, is infinitely more exciting than Silva-Franklin. But let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet...

- White says that former UFC light heavyweight champion Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell will "probably" make his return to the Octagon in September. No opponent has been cited. Wanderleisilvawayswhat...

- According to a Gainesville Sun article, White is claiming that Mauricio “Shogun” Rua is likely to make his UFC debut against Ryoto Machida at UFC 76. MMAWeekly reports that both Rua and Machida were scheduled to fight at UFC 76 against the dreaded TBA, so this match-up gives them each an opponent in one another. This could be an excellent showcase of Machida's polished mixed martial artistry and against Rua's furiously technical Chute Box style in a match-up between the Chute Boxe vs. Black House camps.

This fight excites me because 1) it's Shogun we're talking about here, folks, and 2) Machida is an excellent fighter who, in my opinion, has been largely overlooked by most MMA fans, partly because none of his UFC fights have been televised. The man is undefeated and holds wins over Rich Franklin and BJ Penn. Shogun, meanwhile, is widely regarded by many as the best 205-pounder on the planet, especially now that Wanderlei Silva and Chuck Liddell have both lost their belts.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

dan will beat rampage, chuck will lose to wanderlei if they fight, and shogun is not the best at 205. dan is #1. by the way, AWESOME pic of chuck and rampage!

Anonymous said...

Wow. The 205 division really is awesome. I almost forgot about Machida!!! I agree with the Liceman that Henderson is the top 205 pound guy. He moved up from 185 to KO Wanderlei big time, and I think that his wrestling is MUCH better than Liddell's, Rua's, Tito's, Rashad's or Jackson's. Until he loses, he's my #1 LHW pick also.