UFC on Fox 4: Mauricio Rua Will Take Down Brandon Vera

Brandon Vera's nickname might be "The Truth," but after UFC on Fox 4 concludes, he'll need to deal with the harsh truth that Mauricio Rua defeated him on national television.

This isn't the first time Vera was scheduled to main event a UFC cable program; he was initially scheduled to fight Thiago Silva at the UFC on FX 3 event, but he was unable to due to injury.

Even though Rua has been up and down in his past five UFC bouts, Vera having an injury just six months ago leads one to question how healthy he is feeling.

Rua is four years younger than his veteran opponent, and while both have been in the sport since 2002, Rua has more matches over his career as well as more knockouts.

In fact, Rua's 17 career knockouts are 10 more than Vera's total and are just one shy from equaling Vera's career wins.

The man known as "Shogun" realizes that you should never underestimate your opponent, however, telling John Morgan from MMA Junkie:

"

I have a lot of respect for Brandon Vera...The guy has a great background in the business of MMA. I think he deserves [to be in the main event], just like many other guys who have been on the road for a long time.

"

Rua owns victories over MMA legend Chuck Liddell, Lyoto Machida and Forest Griffin over his past six matches. He realizes that a dominant performance against Vera on Fox would vastly help his chances of obtaining a title shot.

Vera is a formidable opponent who will be looking to erase people's memory of his inability to fight at UFC on FX 3 with a win over Rua, but Shogun simply has too much talent to lose this bout.

The fight has the potential to be a close one, but all it could take is some deadly combinations or one tight-locked submission for Shogun to take Vera down early in this one.