With UFC 100 In The Books We look Forward To August

UFC 100 certainly lived up to its hype. With three bouts that could have been main events you know it was a special event. Now it’s time to move forward and the month of August is certainly going to bring MMA fans a lot of excitement.

Afflictiion kicks off the month on August 1st with their third card entitled Affliction Trilogy The card is packed from top to bottom. We will see the US debut of Gegard Mousasi as he takes on Renato Sobral in a light heavyweight bout..

Vitor Belfort takes on Jorge Santiago in a middleweight bout that could see the winner signed by the UFC to face their middleweight champion Anderson Silva. Santiago is on a roll and had a few things to say concerning the bout in an interview I conducted with him recently.

Trilogy will also see the return to US soil of Takanori Gomi as he faces off against Rafaello Oliveria. Gomi was considered the top lightweight fighter in the world while fighting for the now defunct Pride organization. In a heavyweight attraction Gilbert Yvel will square off against former UFC contender Paul Buentello.

Rounding out the night’s main card will be a bout for the WAMMA heavyweight championship as #1 contender Josh Barnett takes on close friend and champion Fedor Emelianenko. Barnett offers up a stiff test for the man who has not tasted defeat since December of 2000. Keep in mind that loss was due to a cut and he gained revenge against his opponent later on. Emelianenko has defeated five former UFC heavyweight champions.

Say what you want to say about Afflcition and whether or not this will be their last card, but they do put together some fantastic match-ups. With Donald Trump and Oscar De La Hoya involved with the group I am hoping they can stick around for awhile.

August 8th will see the UFC on the east coast for the first time since November of 2007 when they presented UFC 78 from Newark, NJ. UFC 101 will come to Philadelphia and bring an action packed card to the city of Brotherly Love. The main card will feature five bouts headlined by a lightweight championship fight between champion B.J. Penn and #1 contender Kenny Florian.

Penn hasn’t fought since losing in his quest to become the first man in the UFC to hold two titles simultaneously. He was defeated handily by Georges St. Pierre at UFC 94 and fans will be anxious to see how he comes back from the beating he took in that fight. Florian has won his last fights and has great all around skills needed to compete with Penn.

Johny Hendricks will face off against Ultimate Fighter season eight winner Amir Sadollah. Hendricks is 5-0 in his young MMA career with two of those wins coming in the WEC. Sadollah has not fought since defeating C.B. Dolloway at the Ultimate Fighter finale due to a rash of injuries. That was the first and only fight of his pro MMA career. In a middleweight bout we will see Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu specialist Ricardo Almeida square off against season three Ultimate Fighter winner Kendall Grove. Almeida was actually looking to drop down to welterweight but accepted this fight before doing so.

Josn Neer will take on New Jersey native Kurt Pellegrino in a lightweight match-up. Both fighters have interesting nicknames as Neer is known as “The Dentist” and Pellegrino goes by “Batman”. Here we have two fighters with excellent submission skills which usually means they will slug it out on their feet.

Last but not least we will see the UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva move up to light heavyweight to take on fan favorite and former UFC light heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin. Silva is coming off two lackluster victories in which he was heavily criticized for not being aggressive enough. Griffin has been out of action since losing his title to Rashad Evans in December due to a hand injury. Will Silva go back to his dominating ways or will Griffin show how big his heart is once again and slay another dragon?

The next night the UFC’s sister promotion the WEC will host a card from The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas featuring a bout for the bantamweight championship. Champion and consensus top ten pound for pound fighter Miguel Angel Torres will defend against the undefeated Brian Bowles. Torres is an incredible 37-1 and hasn’t lost since 2003. He is as dynamic a fighter as you will see today. He combines world class striking skills along with unbelievable submissions. Bowles is 7-0 having finished all seven fights by either knockout or submission. He should offer up a true test for Torres.

The main card has three other bouts including Jeff Curran taking on Takeya Mizugaki. Mizugaki you may remember as the fighter who took a bout with Torres on short notice and gave the champion all he could handle going a full five rounds with him back in April. Curran has made noise lately in his quest to have a bout with Torres, let’s see him get by Mizugaki first. Danny Castillo will take on Ricardo Lamas in a lightweight bout. 13-1 Dominick Cruz will square off against the undefeated Joseph Benavidez in a featherweight bout.

Just six days later Strikeforce will present a card that will be sure to go down in history. Featuring a woman’s championship bout as the main event along with three other title fights, Strikeforce is certainly pulling no punches here. August 15th will be a great day for MMA fans. Airing live on Showtime only adds to the excitement.

Gina Carano will take on Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos in a bout that has been talked about for over a year. Carano is the face of women’s MMA and was featured on NBC’s American Gladiators as well as EliteXC’s prime time telecasts on CBS. What will prevail? Carano’s technical abilities or Cyborg’s brute strength? Will each fighter make weight as they have had issues in the past. All this remains to be seen come August 15th.

In a rematch for the lightweight championship interim champion Gilbert Melendez will take on the man who took his title Josh Thomson. In their first bout Thomson was able to neutralize and frustrate “El Nino” for the duration of their five round fight. Thomson is coming off a broken foot that caused their rematch to be postponed. He relies on speed to defeat his opponents so he better make sure he is fully recovered.

Heavyweight champion Alistair Overeem will defend the title he won back in November of 2007 and also gain a measure of revenge against Fabricio Werdum who defeated Overeem while the two were fighting for Pride back in May of 2006. Overeem is a different fighter since then and will look to overpower Werdum who is very slick with his submissions.

For the vacant welterweight title two old foes will meet again as Nick Diaz battles Joe Riggs. These two had an exciting fight back in February of 2006 at UFC 57. Riggs took home a unanimous decision victory. What happened after the bout is what really made this fight famous as the two squared off in an Las Vegas hospital emergency room. Diaz is on a roll having won his five bouts while Riggs has won his last two, let the fireworks begin!

Rounding out a great month will be UFC 102 from Portland, Oregon. Herewe have a battle for the ages as two warriors will meet for the first time. Former UFC and Pride heavyweight champion Antonio Rodrigo Noguiera will take on former UFC light heavyweight and heavyweight champion Randy Couture. This bout may have title implications as both men recently lost their hare of the heavyweight championship. Couture was defeated by current undisputed heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar and Noguira lost to Frank Mir. With Lesnar having defeated Mir at UFC 100 the winner of this bout may get another shot at the belt. Couture brings great game planning, dirty boxing and great wrestling skills against Noguiera’s submissions and huge heart. This is a fight for the ages.

Keith Jardine will take on Thiago Silva in a battle of two of the best light heavyweight’s gatekeepers. You never know what you will get with Jardine. He has the ability to defeat anyone on any given night as evidenced by his wins over Forrest Griffin and Chuck Liddell. He also has a tendency to lose fights he shouldn’t lose as is the case with Houston Alexander and Stephan Bonnar. Silva is coming off his first career loss to Lyoto Machida at UFC 94 and it will be interesting to see how he rebounds from that loss. Jardine has a very unorthodox style and frustrates his opponents with his leg kicks. Interesting bout to say the least.

Chris Leben makes his return to the octagon after serving a nine month suspension for using steroids as he faces UFC newcomer Jake Rosholt in a middleweight bout. Brandon Vera will look to make it two wins in a row as he faces Matt Hamill. Both fighters were victorious on the UFC 96 card that was held in March. Both of these match-ups don’t hold a lot of weight right now as far as title implications ar contender status is concerned but will be competitive bouts none the less.

Nate Marquardt will battle Jiu-Jitsu ace Demian Maia in a middleweight bout that may determine the number one contender to Anderson Silva’s throne. Marquardt has faced The Spider before coming up on the wrong end of a first round knockout back in July of 2007. Maia is 10-0 overall and 5-0 in the UFC with all of those wins coming by way of submission. Maia has earned himself four submission of the night bonuses in his two years with the UFC. Marquardt is no slouch on the ground though and has much better stand-up than Maia. Whomever wins deserves serious consideration for a title shot.

Well that’s it, I know that is a lot to digest all at once but for all of you serious MMA fans or even the casual ones we are in for a great month of August. Title fights, women’s bouts, legends fighting legends August has it all. I hope you have as good of a time as I do. I will be attending UFC 101 live as this will be my first live UFC event. I can not wait and I will share my experiences with all of you.