Rich Hansen's Take
HANSEN: UFC 146 Thoughts and Fights to Make Following the "Dos Santos vs. Mir" event
May 28, 2012 - 8:15:44 PM HANSEN: UFC 146 Thoughts and Fights to Make Following the "Dos Santos vs. Mir" event

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By Rich Hansen,. MMA Torch Columnist

UFC 146 provided everything a fan should want in a card. To wit, there was blood, finishes, and massive amounts of clubberin. What more do you need? Look, we all know there's more to the sport than blood and clubberin, but blood and clubberin is fun. And after endless months of PEDs and TRT and Mary Jane and bad ratings and contract impasses and culinary unions, I NEED ME SOME CLUBBERIN!

What's more fun? Listening to politicians fall prey to Rob Massey's attempts to connive convince the state of California to force the UFC to leave California, or Stipe Miocic's awesome second round comeback against Shane del Rosario?

How would you prefer to spend a Saturday night? Debating the impact of weed versus testosterone and the appropriateness of the suspensions handed down to users of each, or Cain Velasquez's attempt to remove all the blood out of Antonio Silva's body with only his elbows?

What's more memorable? The culinary union's attempt to intimidate a family whose past is steeped in gangster lore, or Junior dos Santos' ability to punch Frank Mir's stomach four times before Mir can even drop his hands to defend?

Sorry, Mr. Issues, but you can kiss my hairy yellow butt, because the fights are fun, issues suck, and I'm superficial enough to not give a flying damn today. UFC 146 was as entertaining as an event can expect to be, and I'm going to revel in it. From the top:

- Junior dos Santos is really good. I know, I know, this just in. The entire free world, and a few people in Madison, knew what was going to happen. Yet, despite the total and complete absence of drama and suspense, dos Santos' evisceration (good word, eh?) of Frank Mir was compelling theatre. There was just no way a 261 pound Frank Mir was going to be able to defend against the hand speed of Junior dos Santos. For those of you keeping score at home, dos Santos is 9-0 in the UFC. If that seems impressive, that's because it IS impressive. Here's the list of human beings who have ever been 9-0 in the UFC: Anderson Silva, Junior dos Santos. That's it.

- Cain Velasquez tore Antonio Silva apart in what fast became a vampire fetish film. There were two ways this was going to play out; either Velasquez was going to knock him out, or Velasquez was going to get the takedown and destroy him on the canvas. With Alistair Overeem on the sidelines for several months, hopefully now we can see the epic title fight injuries to dos Santos and Velasquez robbed the public of seeing on Fox in November 2011.

- In the category of, “Yeah, we knew that was coming, so what?” Stefan Struve pulled guard and submitted Lavar Johnson, and Roy Nelson landed a one punch KO on Dave Herman. Either Struve was going to trade bombs like a schmuck, or he was going to get the fight to the canvas faster than a virgin on prom night. He got the overhook, pulled guard, and that was it. We didn't learn much, but Struve at age 24 won his eighth fight in the UFC's heavyweight division. To put that in context, Frank Mir has 14, Andrei Arlovski has 10, Randy Couture has 10, Tim Sylvia has 9. That's exclusive company.

- In that same category, Roy Nelson found his range after 50 whole seconds of trying to find it, and his fight with Dave Herman was over at the 51 second mark. What did we learn? That Roy Nelson has big power in his right hand? Check. That, um, um, that beard and hair has to go? Double check.

- In the last main card fight, Stipe Miocic had what Joe Rogan didn't describe as, "The greatest comeback I've ever seen in my entire life since the last one and until the next one," in his impressive second round TKO over a very game Shane del Rosario. Del Rosario loses no luster in defeat, having looked very impressive in the first round. Miocic took about five minutes and one second to remember that he's a really good wrestler, and once he remembered that, it was all over for del Rosario.

So now that we've reviewed the main card of UFC 146, let's look ahead and see what might be next for Saturday night's combatants. This is a purely subjective look at what might be next, what I want to see, or what we're going to actually see next. I figure if I put enough modifiers in there I can claim victory for the fights that actually happen and brush off those that Joe Silva declines to make.

- Junior dos Santos vs. Cain Velasquez is a given. JDS is the champ, Cain is the #1 contender. Next.

- Frank Mir vs. Josh Barnett or Brock Lesnar Look, if Brock comes back, Zuffa isn't going to pay him 42 trillion dollars and 68 cents to fight Dave Herman or Stefan Struve. If he comes back (and don't hold your breath), it's going to be against Frank Mir. If he doesn't, I don't think my life will be complete until I get to see Barnett vs. Mir. This is a fight I've wanted to see for about three years now. The catch wrestler vs. the lumbering jiu-jitsu ace is a match made in heaven for me, even if it's unlikely to happen. Mir's not going to Strikeforce, and Barnett lost his leverage for a UFC invite having lost to Daniel Cormier.

- Antonio Silva vs. Shane Carwin makes all the sense in the world. Of course, we still don't know when Carwin is going to return to action, so it might not be feasible. But assuming Carwin can return between now and the fall, this is the fight to make for both men.

- Roy Nelson vs. Mark Hunt is just begging to be made. Mike Kogan went off on our own Jamie Penick the other night when Penick recommended making this fight, but it's just a ploy to get Nelson out of his restrictive TUF contract. But I'm not writing politics, I'm writing fights, and Nelson vs. Hunt is a perfect fight. Hunt has killshot power and an impenetrable chin. Conversely, Nelson has killshot power and an impenetrable chin. Of course, there's always the possibility of this turning into a fifteen minute suckfest if the chins outclass the KO power, but it's worth the risk.

- Stipe Miocic vs. Stefan Struve: Miocic is undefeated, Struve has eight UFC wins at the tender age of 24 years old. Both guys can survive a loss against one another, and neither guy yet is ready for contender status. Let's find out who's ready to wind up "in the mix" already.

- Dave Herman vs. Lavar Johnson: OK, this is lazy on my part, another fight where both guys were on the same card, but tell me this doesn't appeal to you a little. I don't know bout you, but I'm of the opinion that if Lavar Johnson lives his whole life he don't need to fight a grappler again. Herman's on the chopping block right now, but likely gets one more shot as a reward for stepping up to take the Nelson fight on short notice.

- Shane del Rosario vs. Brendan Schaub: Let's see what SDR can do against a full fledged striker who doesn't possess the takedowns of Stipe Miocic. This is a compelling matchup of boxer vs. kickboxer between two very evenly matched young guys, both of whom are desperate for a rebound.

- Glover Teixeira vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira: Keeping in mind that we don't know when Nogueira will be ready to return, Teixeira is 32 years old and doesn't need to be coddled. The guy hasn't lost a fight in seven years, and looked fantastic against Kyle Kingsbury. Nogueira would be a fight that makes sense for both guys, whereas a fight with someone like Rampage, Forrest, or Shogun would be illogical for any of those fighters. Nogueira's looking for a win over a dangerous guy to show Zuffa he can make one more run. Teixeira needs a high profile fight before his AARP membership kicks in.

- CB Dollaway vs. Patrick Cote: Cote needs to be brought back to the UFC. His release may have bee justified, having lost to Anderson Silva, Alan Belcher, and Tom Lawlor in succession, not that there's any shame in any of those losses. Cote has responded will, going 4-0 outside of the organization since his release. Cote's camp is campaigning for the Wanderlei Silva fight, and who can blame them. Name one middleweight outside the top 5 that wouldn't kill for a shot at Silva in a UFC PPV main event? But assuming logic reigns, and the Silva fight goes to anyone else, Dollaway vs. Cote is a good fight. Dollaway gets criticized for his over-reliance on top control, let's see him fight someone with fantastic takedown defense. If he can take Cote down and keep him there for fifteen minutes, then kudos to you sir. And if he can't get Cote down, then we get to see him in a standup fight against a striker with a fantastic chin. Works for me.

- Dan Hardy vs. Siyar Bahadurzada or Thiago Alves: They didn't invest in Dan Hardy after four straight losses just to stick him in the cage with a wrestler after he finally gets a long-awaited victory. Even if we are now looking at an improved Dan Hardy 2.0, let's not push him in against Ben Askren just yet, ya dig? I needs me some 170 pound clubberin!

- Edson Barboza vs. John Makdessi: Sometimes things don't go according to plan. Barboza was supposed to walk through Jamie Varner, then fight Anthony Pettis, and then be one fight away from a title shot. Whoops! Barboza is young enough to recover from an unexpected loss, and is exciting enough to be immediately forgiven by the public if he dcomes back in dominant fashion. John Makdessi is an undersized flashy striker, tailor made to be kicked into the 24th century by Edson Barboza. Life isn't always fair, Mr. Makdessi, but beat Barboza and you can take his spot, right?

- Jamie Varner vs. Paul Sass: Who in the holy hell thought we were going to be writing about Jamie Varner in 2012? Sure as hell not me, but I'm glad to be doing so. One of my least favorite side effects of the WEC-UFC merger was that it happened when Varner was in the midst of a four fight winless streak when the merger took place, and then lost his second post-Zuffa fight to unheralded Dakota Cochrane. But opportunity knocked and he took advantage. And not only did he get a win in the UFC, but it was in extremely impressive fashion against a fantastic opponent. Now, all that said, Varner's not going to be fighting for UFC gold, ever. He's a low to mid-level gatekeeper, and that is where Paul Sass comes in. Sass presents a completely different style from Varner, and Varner is a completely different challenge than Jacob Volkmann was for Sass.


Other fights to make

Darren Elkins vs. Bart Palaszewski

Diego Brandao vs. Maximo Blanco

Jacob Volkmann vs. Tony Ferguson

Kyle Kingsbury vs. Vinny Magalhães

Daniel Pineda vs. the loser of Jonathan Brookins vs. Charles Oliveira



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