Travis Lutter vs. Rich Franklin: Not Another Stepping Stone Matchup

There’s gotten to be alot more anticipation and anxiety over the matchups that we use to just see as glorified ass-whuppings, advancing the UFC’s top stars to the top. If nothing else, 2007 changed the way that we view the stepping stone matchup forever. We learned the hard way that sometimes stepping stones step back.

It’s not easy to say, simply, that this fight is going to go one way or the other. People will say that Franklin has a clear edge. He’s a multiple time UFC champion and a serious warrior in terms of his ability to stand and trade. There’s no dispute that Franklin is the favorite in this fight, but there’s something about this fight that makes it more than just a promising, starching knockout and the physical dominance that we have seen from Franklin in many of his highlight worthy performances.

Travis Lutter isn’t a stranger to the underdog position, he’s not new to being under touted and underestimated. Nobody expected him to stand a chance in his UFC debut against Marvin “The Beastman” Eastman, but he put Eastman to sleep with one of the greatest overhand right knockouts in UFC history. Nobody thought he would decimate Patrick Cote in the finale of The Ultimate Fighter four, but it took him lest than two minutes and twenty seconds to lock in the armbar on the Predator.

The Serial Killer isn’t respected for having the most devastating submission games in the sport, he’s not touted for his knockout power. In fact, it’s not really fair to him to say that he gets touted at all, since he doesn’t. He doesn’t sell Xience like Franklin, he doesn’t have the pretty boy appeal. He doesn’t have the belt mounted in his trophy case. In fact, it seems as though Lutter will be eternally remembered by oddsmakers as the man who couldn’t make weight against Anderson Silva, not as the first opponent to take Silva to the second round, not as the one man credited as having “exposed the chink in Anderson’s armor.” (obviously, that wasn’t true, but still got a great deal of credit for putting the Brazilian Wrecking Ball on his back)

Honestly, I’d be lying if I said that there wasn’t a single overriding statistic that attracted my attention in this fight:

In Franklin’s first fight with Silva, he lasted just under three minutes. Lutter went seven.

In Franklin’s fight with Silva, he had all of the aggression of a sick kitten. Lutter was the first man in the UFC to actually attack Anderson.

Honestly, their performances against Silva aren’t all defining, and I’m well aware that Lutter’s career in the UFC has been spotty, especially when it comes to trying to push himself into the top tier. Still, it’s too perfect a matchup for me to believe that this fight won’t hit the ground. While I respect Franklin’s wrestling, it’s also important to note that he really doesn’t have great grappling skills. He almost got submitted by Yushin Okami, who doesn’t have the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu background that Lutter does.

It seems like a bad omen that Franklin should be asked to fight a much more experienced grappler coming off of a devastating loss that basically bars him from title contention as long as Anderson is champion. I know that Franklin has beaten powerful submission fighters like Jason MacDonald and Okami, but I cannot help but feel that Lutter is just a little bit better on the ground than the Ultimate Fighter Killer and the Asian Sensation.

Honestly, this is little more than a feeling and an analysis of two fights (both fighters’ matchups against Silva), but I’m not going to count Lutter out of this one, because he has the tools to beat Franklin in the area where he is weakest, and I don’t think that Franklin’s wrestling game is as great as everyone else seems to believe it is. After all, the best takedowns Franklin has been confronted with came from the antique grappling game of Ken “The World’s Most Dangerous Senior Citizen” Shamrock.

If Franklin couldn’t work Silva to the ground and Lutter broke through the thai plum to put Anderson on his back, does anyone believe that this fight is going to stay standing for more than a few minutes unless Lutter wants it to? I don’t.

In case it’s not clear yet, I’m taking the big underdog of the night: Travis Lutter via mindblowing upset.