UFC 113: "Someone's Getting Knocked The *Bleep* Out"

The headline should pretty much be a straightforward way of expressing my opinion of how I think three, if not all the main card fights are going to go on May 8 at UFC 113: Machida Vs Shogun II, especially after watching the Countdown. Kimbo Vs. Meathead, Kos Vs. Semtex, Shogun Vs. The Dragon Part II.

All three have their own reason to be explosive come next Saturday, but we'll get to that soon enough.

For those who don't know or who have forgotten, this event will not only feature Sam Stout Vs. Jeremy Stephens, but this event in Montreal will feature the return of The Predator, Canada's own Patrick Cote, as he faces Alan Belcher.

Those two fights should make for a rather interesting night of fights. Then again, so will the other three main card fights, which brings me to the reason behind the headline.

Plain and simple, in the three big fights: someone's getting knocked out. If even Stout's fight goes the distance, I will be surprised.

Last time Sam Stout fought, it was against Joe Lauzon, a UD WIN for Stout in a hotly contested bout. That fight went to the judges.

Kimbo's UFC debut against Houston Alexander, a fight in which some people were less than impressed with Kimbo Slice's performance, showed that Kimbo could do more than knuckle up.

I thought Houston was done after one of the sicker takedowns Kimbo executed on Houston. Even still, that too went to the judges.

Lyoto Machida endured the pain of Shogun's kicks, but held on tight and won the fight, retaining the belt. Keep in mind a few things:

1. Machida was 15-0 coming into the fight. Before the fight with Rashad Evans, he only had wins over the likes of Tito Ortiz, Rich Franklin, Sokodjou, BJ Penn (at a sort of catchweight bout), Thiago Silva and Stephan Bonnar.

2. If you saw the Countdown on Spike, you may not have seen it, but Machida did hold Shogun against the cage for a portion of the first fight. Some judges call that "Octagon control" even if some fans don't.

3. This fight, too, went to the judges, but most people will tell you Shogun should be the UFC Light Heavyweight Champ right now -- and that Machida should be at 15-1 as an MMA Fighter.

I'm not getting into too much detail about that or about backing either man fully, because I went for Machida in the first fight, I thought Shogun won after I saw the damage to Machida, and had to see the fight again to understand what the judges saw Machida do that I didn't.

If you think Shogun should be the Champ now, cool. If you think the judges made the right call about Machida winning, cool. I don't know who I want to win, personally, because I could see the fight going both ways, but I did back Lyoto in the first fight.

What I do know is that anybody watching this fight card can rest assured that these two are going to really go at it in what I'm going to predict is going to be a stand-up war.

This fight isn't one that I think will go to the ground, although if either man does, it could make things quite intriguing.

My Take On Machida-Rua II

Regardless of who wins, it's easy to tell that neither Mauricio nor Lyoto wants this fight to go the full five-round distance. Shogun wants to knock out Machida before the fifth round, and Machida wants to finish Shogun before the fifth round.

If the fight has to go to the fifth round, then it will come down to whoever is able to complete their game plan first.

Either Shogun completes the smart game plan he executed in the first fight and takes out Machida's legs, or Machida uses his trademark evasive style and comes in hard and heavy with his hands whenever he sees Rua's chin exposed, which could also happen (though we must also keep in mind, Shogun has a loss in the KO column due to a broken arm, but he has NEVER been knocked out in a pro fight.)

Either way, this fight isn't seeing the judge's scorecard this time. I'll back Machida on fight night in all likelihood, but I could also see Machida handing Machida a loss worth remembering.

If Machida can find his way towards a successful submission, great for him, but I think someone's getting knocked out, regardless of whether we get a new UFC Light Heavyweight Champion or not.

Kos Vs. Daley: Winner Gets St. Pierre, Loser Just Gets Knocked The *bleep* Out

Josh Koscheck is something of a veteran at this point. He's been around since the first season of the Ultimate Fighter; he was one of the original Middleweight hopefuls, but dropped down to welterweight after the TUF 1 Finale and after a few fights, became responsible for the first loss of Diego Sanchez's career.

Some say he's one of the best welterweight fighters to have never gotten a title shot against GSP (although they did fight once, before Rush won the belt back from Serra), and some would think now is Koscheck's time. If you haven't seen Kos in action, you're really missing out.

Sure, a loss to Paulo Thiago set him back, but he bounced back in true fighter fashion by knocking out Frank Trigg and then submitting Anthony "Rumble" Johnson.

However, the fight he's in on May 8 could be the most insane fight he's ever been in. In order to step to the head of the line to fight Georges St. Pierre, Josh Koscheck's world-class wrestling, knockout power, and quick movement will have to contend with a man who most people ought to give a chance to right now: a UK-bred striking sensation from Team Rough House named Paul "Semtex" Daley.

I never thought Paul Daley would be capable of talking trash until I saw the Countdown Thursday night. That guy can talk some major trash, let me tell you.

Maybe it's true that not even Paulo Thiago has hit Josh Koscheck as hard as Paul Daley can hit, so maybe Daley has something of a point in saying that Koscheck's never been hit like Daley is going to hit him, but saying that Koscheck is a wrestler and not a fighter? I'd have to take that with a grain of salt.

Kos can fight and take people down, as well as submit them, whereas people lately have only seen Paul Daley knock people out. Maybe Daley is underestimating Koscheck's knockout ability a bit; I highly doubt that a camp with Dan Hardy and Ross Pearson in it would take a guy like Josh Koscheck lightly when seeing the speed at which Kos can swing at a fighter. A guy like that isn't the type of guy that anyone should take lightly at all.

What this boils down to is the question of whether or not Koscheck can take Paul Daley down, as I'm certain that Josh will be a few inches shorter than his May 8 foe. The shorter the amount of time spent on the feet, the better Koscheck's chances will be, but it's going to be tough to take Paul Daley down.

If the fight stays standing for the most part, Daley could claim another victim in Koscheck and send a strong, vengeful message to GSP, declaring his intent to avenge Dan Hardy's UFC 111 loss while taking St. Pierre's belt in the process.

It seems to me like Josh Koscheck might be serious when he says that we're going to see the best and most aggressive Josh Koscheck ever on May 8.

If he had been the big trash-talker in this pre-fight period, I might want to see Daley score the knockout just to shut Josh up, but then again, I do appreciate the game that a wrestler brings to the table, especially when that wrestler can knock people out without warning.

I believe that Daley could be the man to beat GSP for the belt, but I'm not going to put anything past Koscheck.

Georges St. Pierre's next opponent will have no trouble convincing the people he is worthy of the shot. If anyone should be doubtful of Josh Koscheck or Paul Daley winning in this fight, know that the outcome could be decided by a choke, or it could be decided by an excruciating submission on one of the extremities, but with the war of words that has spilled before this bout, it's conceivable that the next contender to the welterweight crown will make it official with the landing of one solid shot to the face.

Kimbo Slice-Matt Mitrione: A Major League Slugfest

Talk about a fight that may be least likely to hit the ground -- unless teeing off on your opponent's face counts as "ground game."

Kevin Ferguson, the man everybody knows as Kimbo Slice, and Matt Mitrione, the man who some know as "Meathead", while others know him as "that one guy who beat that other guy."

Just so we're clear, "that other guy" refers to Marcus Jones.

As sick as that knockout of Jones was, that's really all I've seen out of Matt Mitrione since Season 10 of The Ultimate Fighter ended.

Kimbo went three rounds with a guy that has knocked out guys like Keith Jardine in a "less-than-stellar", but yet a former Linebacker gets a more memorable win at the finale.

Not to take anything away from Roy Nelson, but compared to Kimbo's performance, Mitrione's performance was an impressive performance.

Kimbo's abilities with his fists don't need much verbal description. If you really haven't seen Kimbo fight yet, I'm sure some of his street fighting clips are still on YouTube. That should give one an indication that Kimbo can rock people and knock them out cold.

That hasn't changed too much since Kimbo has gotten into the MMA scene, and his efforts to enhance his game, while not really evident to some in his last fight, could show when he fights Matt Mitrione.

Needless to say, Mitrione is probably on the same level as Slice. I say probably because I can't say how much Mitrione has improved on takedowns, submissions, grappling, boxing, defense, or anything of that nature.

I don't know how much those aspects of Matt's game have changed since the end of last season, and for that matter I don't know how much the aspects of Kimbo's game have increased or decreased in that same time frame.

Countdowns are interesting to watch just to get hyped up, but they aren't really too much of a solid basis for an argument for a fighter; the Countdowns, at their most, let the fans believe that a fight is going to be intense when the fight occurs.

On paper, these two are good fighters but you still wouldn't call them Mixed Martial artists in any respect...at least not yet, because although they're under contract as fighters representing the world's most notable MMA organization, they're both still developing their mix of martial arts.

This is the one fight, out of the three main card fights that I think will end by some form of knockout, that I'm almost certain has no bad blood or any heat behind it.

I know Mitrione has wanted to fight Kimbo since the show ended, but I haven't heard any heated words from Meathead to Kimbo or vice versa (unless Kimbo's questionable "meat" humor counts. Really Kimbo, Fillet Mignon jokes, and you can't even pronounce the words "Fillet Mignon"?)

Anywho, I think these two developing fighters may slug it out for a good portion of the fight, though I could see Kimbo weighing in at a lighter weight than Mitrione, thus making it slightly less of a struggle to take Kimbo down.

If Mitrione's game on the ground is as good as he's said, he may get a submission out of Kimbo or a TKO.

Likewise, if Kimbo can take down Mitrione, and if Kimbo can work some legit ground game, his possible results could also be a submission or a TKO (and by submission, I'm not talking about a tap out due to a choke or extremity hold) not yet anyway.

I'm talking submission by strikes. Either way, whether the winner gets the W in the submission column or the KO column, my take on this fight is about the same as my past two predictions: the strikes will end the fight.

I welcome anyone who thinks that any of these fights will go the distance or anyone who thinks that the strikes won't end the fight in any of the three that I've covered to comment on this.

To anyone wondering why I haven't elaborated on Stout-Stephens or Cote-Belcher, it's because I haven't seen Cote fight in a while, nor have I seen Stephens fight in a while, so I couldn't say much of those two fights, other than I think they're going to excite and delight.

Thanks to all who read this, and hope you enjoy UFC 113. I know I will, because I have a feeling that before the night is over, someone's getting knocked out.