Quinton "Rampage" Jackson Vs Rashad Evans: It's (About) Time

I saw last season's Ultimate Fighter with Rashad Evans and Quinton Jackson—the one Kimbo was on? The one Roy Nelson won? Yeah, we can remember season 10 for one of those two reasons.

Or we can remember it for the heated feud that everyone saw nearly unfold on TV between "Suga" and "Rampage".

I certainly do.

Before the finale, I was waiting for one of two things: Either Kimbo was going to shut up everyone that said he couldn't hang with the best in the UFC, or Rashad was going to come to blows with Rampage in front of Dana White.

I think by the end of UFC 114 in a few weeks, we'll have seen the latter happen, and in a manner that makes Lesnar's heat with Mir seem like it really was a storyline in WWE.

Anyway, I believe we were all set for UFC 107's big double-upper: Penn was set to defend against Sanchez, but the fight we're all going to see with Evans and Jackson was supposed to co-main event the December card before Quinton committed to the A-Team movie and thus postponed the fight. (I think the A-Team movie comes out in June, by the way.)

Anyways, what happened, happened. At least the fight will go down at the end of this month.

If you ask me, though, it's still about time this thing happened, and I don't say that because of the whole "Rampage/A-Team Movie" thing.

If you only started following MMA at about the time that TUF 10 hit Spike TV airwaves, you missed the way that this feud jumped off.

At first it was just about the UFC Light Heavyweight Belt. UFC 96 pitted Rampage against Keith Jardine—training partner of then-champ Rashad Evans—and basically the stipulation behind the fight was that if Rampage beat Jardine, he'd be next in line for Rashad, but if Jardine beat Rampage, Lyoto Machida would get the shot at Evans next.

This is before UFC 111, keep in mind, so I don't think Dana was tired of teammates not wanting to fight teammates at that point.

With me so far?

Fast forward through the main event of UFC 96 itself, Rampage got a unanimous decision, won the shot against Evans, and engaged in what I think was the most captivating trash-talk exchange since the Ortiz-Liddell II encounter

We would have seen it happen, probably at UFC 98, if injuries hadn't gotten to Rampage, so, lo and behold, we got Evans vs. Machida anyways.

Not that I'm complaining. I loved that fight.

What I will be sour about is that a beef this hot, a feud this intense—a feud involving Rampage that may only be rivaled by his feud with Wanderlei Silva—has been bottled up for so long. Ever since Evans was still the champ, one of the quickest topics for discussion was "When will Rampage fight Rashad Evans?" Due to the A-Team commitment on Rampage's part, we almost lost all hope of getting that answer.

Good thing Rashad called out Rampage after he got the unanimous decision over Thiago Silva at UFC 108.

You can look at this fight anyway you'd like. Who has the better stand-up? Who might want to go for the submissions? Who's gonna have the more dangerous knockout power, and remember we ARE dealing with two guys who have knocked out Chuck Liddell (Rampage snapped Chuck's last LHW Title streak; Rashad's KO of Liddell is the basic reason why Forrest fought Rashad at UFC 92).

Break that down as you'd wish. Both guys are dangerous, and really the only differences of note are age (Rampage by two years) and experience (Rashad is 19-1-1, I think, although it could be possible that two of his fights from his amateur career are recognized as part of his pro career. I really don't know.)

Regardless of how you break down the keys to victory, the strengths/weaknesses, the needs/need-not-to's, you must think in the back of your mind that this fight will be one of the most exciting fights promoted by the UFC.

Bruce Buffer is known for saying before the main events, "IT'S TIME!"

I say, in the case of UFC 114's Rampage vs. Evans main event, It's about time.

We've waited too long. Let the two of them fight already.