Saturday night has the potential to be the beginning of the end for Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. If he loses to Ryan Bader at UFC 144, his career will be on a downswing that he may never recover from.
Then again, Bader himself is facing that same reality in his and Jackson’s light heavyweight bout. If Bader loses to Rampage, he will have lost three of his last four bouts, a recent track record that will push him pretty far down in the light heavyweight pecking order.
Rampage is the heavy favorite, but the good news for Bader is that he has the tactical advantage in this bout. His takedown abilities will be a good counter for Rampage’s brawling style. The more Bader can slow this bout down and keep Rampage on his toes, the better. Rampage is going to try to knock Bader out, and he will if Bader makes the mistake of fighting this fight on Rampage’s terms.
It helps that Bader has above-average strike defense, avoiding roughly 76 percent of all attempts to knock his block off. Between that and Bader’s takedown abilities, Rampage is going to be going up against a guy who is a tough nut to crack.
However, strategy and tactics only count for so much against Rampage. By his own admission (see UFC’s event preview on YouTube), Rampage is a street fighter. There is a method to his madness, more than he gets credit for, but generally speaking Rampage fights with his heart. Or at least, a twisted sense of menace where his heart should be.
No, Bader has never been knocked out (not in UFC, anyway), so Rampage will be trying to succeed where everyone else has failed. Either that, or he’s going to have to take this one the distance and hope to score a decision victory. That could be exceedingly difficult given Bader’s ability to dictate the tempo of this fight.
So there are, admittedly, not that many solid reasons to pick Rampage to win this fight. Picking him requires something else. A leap of faith, as it were.
For me, that “something else” is the fact that this fight is going to be a long overdue homecoming for Rampage. He is very much loved in Japan, but this will be his first fight in land of the rising sun in six years. A return to where it all began will energize Rampage, you can take that much to the bank.
We know this in part because of Jackson’s role in all this, but we also know it because his homecoming will be a shot in the arm for Japanese MMA fans. The mixed martial arts scene in Japan has declined, which is one of the main reasons UFC has decided to put on a show there.
“People all over the world watch all of our fights. But people in Japan are going to see that we put on a different show when it’s live and it’s fun,” said Dana White, according to the USA Today.
When it’s Jackson’s turn to fight, Japanese fans are going to be treated to nothing they haven’t seen before. And that will be the beauty of it. When Rampage beats Bader, it will be just like old times.
(A Very Bold) Prediction: Rampage by KO in the second.
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