Just a few hours away from one of the most stacked cards of the year, it's prediction time. As big as this card is, I hope we don't get a night of boring decisions or quick dominant performances, except maybe in the main event. By the end of the night we will know who the next number 1 contender is for the Heavyweight title, potentially the next number 1 contender for the Welterweight title and whether or not we have a new shit-talking Middleweight champion. Off we go.
Anderson Silva vs Chael Sonnen - I can't remember the last night I was this pumped for a Middleweight title fight. So I guess Chael Sonnen has done a good job of getting me into this with all the trash he's talked. Come fight time though, will that talk have done him any good? I don't believe it will. His only path to victory is to get enough takedowns and do enough on the ground, without being submitted, to win on points. There is just no way I can see that happening. Anderson has too many ways to finish this fight and you know he's motivated. All I hope for is that he won't decide to do to Sonnen what he did to Maia. I don't think he will. Silva by TKO in Round 2.
Jon Fitch vs Thiago Alves - The rematch that the UFC has been trying to put together for a long time now is finally going to go down. If you watched the first fight then you can expect the same thing to happen here. There is no question about it that Alves is a much better striker than Fitch but I highly doubt much of the fight will be contested there. Both fighters have gotten much better since the initial meeting but I'm prone to think that Fitch will do what he always does and grind his way to another decision win. Will Dana hold his word regarding the winner getting a title shot? That's another story. Fitch by Unanimous Decision.
Matt Hughes vs Ricardo Almeida - I'm not sure this fight will be nearly as good as the names that are involved in it. Hughes is getting older and the game has clearly passed him by, at least by my estimation. He can still wrestle but he's never been a feared boxer and his submission game is nowhere near the level of a guy like Almeida. As far as I'm concerned this is Hughes swan song. Almeida should dominate the fight and the inevitable questions will come up regarding how much Hughes has left. He has professed to only wanting interesting fights but with this loss there won't be any left. Almeida by submission in Round 2.
Clay Guida vs Rafael dos Anjos - We know that Guida pushes a relentless pace and he has some impressive wins in the 155lb division but can he avoid the slick submission game that dos Anjos brings to the table? He's an average wrestler who tends to rely on the fact that he just never stops coming at you and his opponents eventually succumb to the relentless pressure but I don't believe Rafael will be that guy. I'm thinking we could see a really sweet submission out of nowhere from the bottom. I'll go with the semi-upset here. Rafael dos Anjos by submission in Round 3.
Roy Nelson vs Junior dos Santos - As I've stated before I fully believe that this fight represents Dana White's attempt at throwing Nelson to the wolf that is JDS. He has a few different ways to win this fight, at least I think so, but I just do not see it happening. If he makes the mistake of standing and trading with dos Santos then he will meet the same fate as every other man that has gone up against JDS in the UFC. The question becomes then, can Roy drag him to the mat and work his very able jiu-jitsu game? We'll see but I'll go with dos Santos and eagerly await his title shot later on. Junior dos Santos by KO in Round 1.