Author: Adam Wells

UFC 131 Fight Card Features Kenny Florian Moving Down To Featherweight, Is A Title Shot In His Future?

Kenny Florian makes his featherweight debut at UFC 131 against Diego Nunes. He has been a successful lightweight for years, but this move provides his best chance to get into title contention. In fact, one win could very well set him up for a fight with Jose Aldo later on this year.

From Sherdog.com:

“I think if you look at what I’ve done at 155 and what I’ve done in my career, bringing the skills and the experience that I have … beating a guy in the top five in the world, yeah, I think that puts me in line for a shot right away,” Florian said recently during an interview on the Sherdog Radio Network’s “Beatdown” show. “Who knows? We’ll see. I think it definitely does.”

Must Read: Results, Reaction and Coverage For UFC 131

Florian has an advantage that a lot of fighters don’t have. Since he has been fighting for UFC for years, the organization is familiar with him as a fighter. This means that he won’t have to work as hard to impress the management in order to vault up to championship contender.

The lightweight division is so crowded with contenders right now that this move is the smartest thing that Florian could do. He is 35, which means he doesn’t have a lot of time left to compete at a high level.

If Florian is fortunate enough to come away from UFC 131, and he could thanks to terrific submission skills, he will be in the mix with Chad Mendes for a championship fight.

Given all that he has accomplished as a lightweight, there is no reason to think that he can’t win the featherweight championship if the opportunity should arise in the near future.

UFC 131 Will Be Diego Nunes’ Moment To Show That He Deserves A Featherweight Title Fight

Diego Nunes is the great unknown on this UFC 131 card. He has a career record of 16-1, including a 5-1 mark between UFC and WEC. He will challenge Kenny Florian, the lightweight star who is moving down to 145-pounds for the first time. Can he get into featherweight title contention with a win?

From MMAFighting.com:

Talk about an under-the-radar contender. Nunes is hardly known by most fans despite a 16-1 record, including wins over top featherweights like Raphael Assuncao and Mike Brown.

The former WEC champion Brown was a fairly big-name opponent for Nunes, but he pales in name recognition to longtime UFC star Kenny Florian. If Nunes can beat Florian on Saturday, he vaults himself forward in a hurry. Everyone likes new contenders, and Nunes would clearly announce himself as such with a definitive win.

Must Read: Results, Reaction and Coverage For UFC 131

Nunes hasn’t had the most exciting fights recently, though, he has been successful the last three times that he has fought. He is going against one of the top-ranked lightweight fighters in the world. All of this is a recipe for a breakout performance.

With no clear contender for Jose Aldo in the featherweight division, Nunes has everything right there for the taking.  This fight is the biggest opportunity that he has had in his professional career. If he wins, he will have earned a fight against the champion.

I would like to see him show a little more than he did in his first UFC fight against Mike Brown at UFC 125, at least something that would make me believe he could defeat Aldo. But with a win, it will be hard to keep him down any longer.

UFC President Dana White Says All Non-Title Main Events Will Be Five Rounds, Why That Is Good For Business

Two months ago prior to UFC 129, UFC president Dana White said that UFC was strongly considering making the company’s main event fights five-round contests. The idea was to eliminate some of the draws, as well as making the main events seem more special, even if they aren’t championship bouts.

At yesterday’s UFC 131 press conference, White made the official announcement that all future main events that are signed will be five-round fights.

From MMAFighting.com:

“From this day forward, any fight that is signed after right now today will be a five-round fight,” White said.

–snip—

Of course, “from this day forward” also means, ‘excluding main events where three-round bout agreements have already been signed,’ such as the impending bout between Phil Davis and Rashad Evans that is scheduled for UFC 133. White explained that he didn’t want to force fighters who had already agreed to three-rounders to suddenly prepare for five, but going forward, any fighter in a main event should expect to be signed up for a 25-minute tilt, he said.

Must Read: Results, Reaction and Coverage For UFC 131

This is a significant change, and one that will benefit the company and the fighters in the long-term. It will be more difficult for a fighter with little stamina to be able to make it through an entire main event fight without actually doing anything.

Plus, it will really help eliminate the potential for fights to end in a draw. At UFC 127, for example, if Jon Fitch had another two rounds to work with, he would have gotten a victory over B.J. Penn instead of fighting to a draw.

It makes every main fell like a bigger deal, which can help draw more interest in the fight. We will have to wait until at least UFC 134 to see the change take place, but it’s a step in the right direction to take some work away from the judges.

UFC 131 Fight Card Features A Styles Clash Between Demian Maia and Mark Munoz

Demian Maia’s mixed martial arts career was at a crossroads following an embarrassing loss to Anderson Silva at UFC 112. He is one of the best submission fighters in the history of the sport, but he had lost two of his previous three fights following that loss. He knows that his style has to evolve if he wants to get back into championship contention.

From Ben Fowlkes (via MMAFighting.com):

“When I see wrestlers fight, they train a lot of boxing because they don’t want to end up on bottom,” Maia said. “I don’t have this issue. I know he’s very powerful when he’s on top, but I’m okay with that. I don’t think it’s going to be just a stand-up fight.”

Even if it is, however, Maia wouldn’t necessarily run from that. Earlier in his career he rushed to get opponents to the mat because, as Maia put it, he was “really afraid” of standing and trading punches. Now he’s more comfortable on the feet, even if his decision to contest more fights there has led to fewer submission wins lately.

“Now I’m more relaxed, so I think sometimes I don’t put enough on the ground to submit [them]. I think it’s just, I’m changing my style and it will come back,” he said.

Must Read: The 25 Most Lopsided Beatdowns In UFC History

Maia is still not a great striker, and he probably never will be, but if he can reach a point where his stand-up game isn’t a weakness, he will be very dangerous.

He is sacrificing some elements of his Brazilian Jiu Jitsu skills by trying to become more adept at the stand-up, but when you suffer a loss like he did against Silva you are going to try anything.

Munoz presents an interesting challenge because despite his solid wrestling background, he is more comfortable standing and trading with opponents.

If Maia wanted the perfect fight to test his stand-up skills, this is it. I look for him to stand and trade with Munoz for a round to see how far his skills have come. If he looks good, he will continue to do it. If he doesn’t, or if he finds himself falling behind in points, he will use his BJJ to grind out a victory.

Either way, I see Maia winning this fight via decision in a very close fight.