Preview and Predictions for UFC on Fuel: Franklin vs. Le

Rich Franklin vs. Cung Le UFC on Fuel TV: Franklin vs. Le (also known as UFC: Macao) will be the first Ultimate Fighting Championship event ever held in China. It will make a lot of money (or Chinese yen) and have no bearing whatsoever on the rankings for championship contenders no matter who wins.  Of course, you could say that winning a fight is now irrelevant since the UFC gives title shots to whoever the best trash-talker is but that is a discussion for another day. Rich Franklin vs. Cung LeA former math teacher and all-American Jim Carrey look-a-like, Franklin was the UFC’s poster boy for a long time and they were as pleased as punch to have him as their champion.  But then Anderson Silva came along and smashed Franklin’s face twice in back-to-back thrashings.  Now Franklin has been relegated to fight other former champions who are never going to wear the belt again but still bring in big ticket sales.Both Franklin and Le are promising that they will put on a show and fans will get their money’s worth. That’s nice, I suppose but to me it is one more sign that the UFC is going down the route of pro-wrestling where athletes are concerned with being entertaining more than anything else.Who will win?  Franklin.  Why?  Well, he’s a ton more experienced with a record of 28-6-0 against Le’s 8-2.  Plus he’s much bigger than Le, younger than Le and he has fought a who’s who of top-shelf opponents, while Le has only gone 1-1 in the UFC losing to Wanderlei Silva who Franklin has beaten twice, by unanimous decision.  Honestly, Le’s only chance is that Franklin tries to show off and put on a show because otherwise he will grind out a win by pushing Le into the cage for three rounds of wall-and-stall. Thiago Silva vs. Stanislav NedkovAs is now the case with UFC events, after the main event the show has a huge drop in name recognition.  Sure, we all know who Thiago Silva is.  He’s the guy who tested positive for steroids and was banned from competing for a year and then came back to lose to Alexander Gustafsson in Sweden this year.  But who the heck is Nedkov?  Oh, right.  He’s the guy who TKO’d Luiz Cane in Rio last year.  I’m not sure why, but I have a feeling that the UFC is hoping Nedkov will make a stepping stone out of Silva, whose marketability is going downhill. Dong Hyun Kim vs. Paulo ThiagoStatistically, about 89% if people in Korea have “Kim” as their last name.  There is greater variety in Brazil where all the men are named either “Paulo”, “Thiago”, “Rodrigo” or “Eduardo”.  Both fighters are coming off freak losses, as Kim lost to Demian Maia by a rib injury he suffered in a takedown and Thiago lost by KO in 42-seconds to his last opponent.  Who wins?  Who knows and who cares.  The welterweight division is so stacked with challengers for GSP these guys may as well be competing to see who is in sixteenth spot.  My Bet: Kim by decision. Takanori Gomi vs. Mac DanzigThe Japanese might have a leg up on the rest of the world when it comes to the construction of reliable cars and the design of quality electronics, but they are in the stone age when it comes to sport science and Gomi is a prime example of it.  While other fighters cut weight and rest before a big fight, Japanese fighters are standing in a freezing waterfall the night before their big match, throwing karate reverse punches until they can’t lift their arms anymore.  OK, fine that is a bit of an exaggeration but it’s still in the ballpark of correct, as it isn’t uncommon for a Japanese fighter to push themselves to exhaustion the night before a match.  In the UFC, Gomi has gone 2-3 with one win being a fluke KO of Tyson Griffin and the other being a win over another Japanese fighter who probably was as spent as Gomi was going into the fight, having spent the previous night in a graveyard praying to the spirits of his forefathers to fight with honor. My Bet: Danzig by TKO.