UFC 116 Preview: Brock Lesnar Vs. Shane Carwin

While the UFC 116 card does not boost that many big names, it should still provide a pretty entertaining card.

This card underwent quite a few problems up to this point; six fights had to be rescheduled, altered, or cancelled for various reasons.

The most disappointing changes in the card involved Roy Nelson vs. Cheick Kongo and Wanderlei Silva against Yoshihiro Akiyama.

Kongo had to pull out due to a back injury, and no new opponent was able to be found for Nelson on such short notice.

However, Nelson is expected to square off against Junior dos Santos at UFC 116.

As far as Silva goes, it is hard to criticize the man for canceling on this occasion, as he recently suffered three broken ribs and an injured right knee during training.

His replacement is Chris Leben, who some may recall from his stint on the first season of The Ultimate Fighter.

With all this being said, let us take a look at three of the most intriguing fights on this card.

Seth Petruzelli vs. Ricardo Romero

This is another match that had to be modified, as Romero originally planned to meet Steve Cantwell.

Cantwell suffers from an undisclosed medical condition, but his medical ban from the octagon was recently lifted.

Nevertheless, Cantwell was removed from the card for unknown reasons.

While this is certainly a puzzling situation, the end result leaves us with an entertaining matchup to look forward to.

Many recall Petruzelli as the man who gave Kimbo Slice his first professional fighting loss, within the confines of the EliteXC organization.

No one in their right mind expected Slice’s first loss to come at the hands of a guy with pink highlights in his hair.

This turned into a huge controversy, especially after Petruzelli made some ambiguous comments after the fight, which some construed as the fighter indicating that Kimbo threw the fight.

For those of you who missed it, it lasted all of 14 seconds and Petruzelli was a relative unknown at the time.

The bottom line though is that the fight was officially ruled to be a clean fight, even after undergoing an investigation by the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.

Controversy aside, let it be known that Petruzelli is a competent fighter that can trade punches with just about anybody.

Some readers may be surprised to learn that Petruzelli owns a unanimous decision victory over Dan Severn while the two were competing in the Southern California Federation King of the Cage.

Petruzelli was just 24 years old at the time.

Furthermore, while “The Silverback” is known for his karate and kickboxing skills (10 of his 12 wins have come by knockout), he has also proven to be a capable wrestler as well.

Petruzelli has only been forced to go the distance twice in his professional career, so opponents that can last until the third round may be able to defeat him with their superior stamina.

Ricardo Romero should be a formidable opponent for "The Silverback," as he has only one professional loss in which he essentially beat himself.

Romero was disqualified for an illegal soccer kick during a match against Glen Sandull for the vacant Ring of Combat Light Heavyweight Championship.

Romero exhibits a very balanced attack.

Out of his 10 wins, four have come by knockout and five by submission (one decision).

Like Petruzelli, Romero often makes short work of his opponents, only seeing round three in one fight thus far.

For this reason, the longer this fight goes on, the more intriguing it gets.

Another couple of fun facts are that this is Romero’s UFC debut, as well as the first time he has had a professional fight outside of Atlantic City, New Jersey (UFC 116 is being held at the MGM Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada).

I am personally expecting a hard-hitting, scrappy fight with Petruzelli coming out victorious with a second round KO.

Yoshihiro Akiyama vs. Chris Leben

The circumstances pertaining to this fight were already detailed, so let us just take a look at what to expect from these two competitors.

The majority of Akiyama’s fighting career took place in the Japan-based K1 organization.

This is where Akiyama suffered his sole career loss to date. However, it is hard to expect a guy to win when his opponent outweighs him by approximately 70 pounds.

“Sexyama," as his fans affectionately call him, is a black belt in Judo and Shotokan karate, giving him a nice balance between takedowns and strikes.

He has earned five wins by knockout, seven by submission and one by decision.

That decision victory came during his UFC debut about one year ago at UFC 100, where he defeated Alan Belcher as was awarded Fight of the Night.

Time will tell if a year layoff will be substantial enough to hinder Akiyama in this contest.

Chris Leben is one of the most seasoned veterans on this card, despite being relatively young at 29 years old.

UFC will mark professional fight number 27 for “The Crippler."

Fighting since 2002, Leben has a very respectable 20-6 record coming into this one.

Leben does favor Brazilian jiu-jitsu and wrestling, but opponents should still be wearing of his heavy hands.

Leben has earned 11 victories via knockout in his career, which can at least partially be attributed to his southpaw boxing stance.

Leben has also proven to have an iron jaw, getting knocked out only once in his career in an embarrassing loss to Anderson Silva.

Otherwise, Leben has proven to be a very tough opponent to go toe to toe with.

Also worth mentioning is the fact that Leben has been in a slump ever since losing to Michael Bisping and testing positive for the steroid Stanozolol.

Including that loss, Leben has only gone 2-2 in his most recent UFC outings.

My prediction is that we are in store for a cerebral battle, with each fighter being weary of the others submission ability.

In the end, I expect Leben to get his career back on track with a big decision victory here.

Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin: UFC Heavyweight Title Unification Match

While the main event is obviously always the biggest fight on the card, there are plenty of fans tuning in on Saturday solely for this fight.

Lesnar, like Akiyama, has not had a fight since UFC 100.

The reason being is that Lesnar was suffering from a rare and serious stomach disease called diverticulitis.

The required surgery caused Lesnar reportedly to lose over 30 pounds when the ordeal was said and done.

This illness certainly did not affect Lesnar’s confidence though, as he has welcomed all challengers once he was able to resume training a few months ago.

At UFC 111 in March, Frank Mir, a fighter who is 1-1 against Lesnar, was knocked out in the first round by Shane Carwin.

This match up was for the interim heavyweight title.

Lesnar came into the ring after the fight to congratulate Carwin, but went on to say that “It was a good fight, but he’s wearing a belt that’s a make believe belt, I’ve got the real championship belt.”

Surely, this is a fight were both fighters are going to leave everything on the mat.

The interim champ, Shane Carwin, has been incredibly impressive during his fighting career.

He is 12-0, with every victory coming by a first round KO or submission.

Carwin is well-versed in what many would consider the basics of modern day mixed martial arts: boxing, wrestling, and Brazilian jui-jitsu.

Carwin is a one-time NCAA Division II champion in wrestling, as well as a two-time runner-up during his tenure at the Colorado School of Mines.

Carwin has really yet to be tested by any other heavyweight, with Frank Mir being the only fighter he has faced with any sort of credible resume.

Lesnar, once known as “The Next Big Thing” during his time with the WWE, has truly lived up to that nickname within the confines of the UFC.

Brock won the heavyweight title from MMA legend Randy “The Natural” Couture in just his fourth professional fight.

While many will argue that Couture was o his last legs at that point is his career, there is no doubt that Lesnar simply dominated the fight.

Lesnar presently has a record of 4-1, with his sole loss against Frank Mir already being avenged with a KO victory during Brock’s most recent outing.

While Lesnar has not had many fights, at no point has he appeared to be on the defensive, even in the loss against Mir, he had the upper hand until he got caught with a kneebar.

One of the reasons Brock is so difficult to compete against is his tremendous size: the heavyweight stands at 6’3'' and weighs in at the division weight limit of 265.

And as anyone who has seen Lesnar can tell you, that is 265 pounds of solid muscle—a rare sight to see.

The champ ’s preferred fight style is wrestling; one should expect nothing less from a former NCAA Division I Heavyweight champion and two-time NCAA All-American, among other accolades.

Lesnar also graduated college with an unheard of 106-5 wrestling record.

The point here is that Lesnar’s takedowns are both lightning quick and high impact, making them very difficult to counter or defend.

Brock has also shown noticeable improvement in his ground game since his debut, showing that he has been working on his jiu-jitsu game.

 Despite what Brock brings to the table, Carwin is by far his toughest challenge yet, and a year layoff can negatively impact any fighter, even someone as talented as Lesnar.

This is a tough prediction, but I am going to say Brock takes this one by decision.

I have no question that Lesnar can make it past the first round, and Carwin will not be as dangerous as he normally is once he enters unfamiliar territory.

Lesnar is also known to be a training and conditioning freak, so I would expect him to have the advantage in the stamina department—something vital in an opponent such as Carwin.

That concludes my thoughts on UFC 116, hope all readers get to enjoy the event this Saturday!