Battle of the Bulge: Big Country Nelson vs. Daniel Cormier a Go for UFC 166


(How fucked up is it that *this* is the #1 search result when you type “Roy Nelson clean shaven” into Google? Photo via Getty.) 

In the weeks leading up to his scrap with Stipe Miocic at UFC 161, it appeared as if Roy Nelson would be headed for the greener pastures of an MMA promotion that wasn’t run by a guy who hates his fat ass. In the days following Nelson’s three round trouncing at the hands of Miocic, it was the general consensus that Bellator was a CHICK’N Crisp sandwich away from luring in one of MMA’s top heavyweights at a steal of a price. So how does Nelson now find himself in line to fight Daniel Cormier, a former Strikeforce champion who is coming off a (tepid) win over Frank Mir in his UFC debut?

Perhaps we should step back for a second. You see, prior to UFC 161, Nelson had strung together a nice little three-fight win streak (all via KO) and was looking to break himself off a piece of that Daniel Cormier hype. Imploring the classic UFC strategy of declaring that the fight “wouldn’t make sense,” then trying to turn it into a #1 contender fight for another division’s title, then bringing race into the equation, Nelson was able to successfully troll his way into a fight with Cormier despite coming off a loss. Huzzah! The likelihood of this fight coming to fruition is all dependent, of course, on how Nelson’s contract negotiations with the UFC go, according to Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports.

Then again, you could argue that Nelson was more impressive in defeat than Cormier was in victory based purely on the amount of shots he was able to absorb without being knocked out. It would be an insane argument to make, but hey, Tim Sylvia would probably have your back. In either case, the pair is tentatively set to throw down at UFC 166, which goes down on October 19th in Houston, Texas.

In other fight booking news…


(How fucked up is it that *this* is the #1 search result when you type “Roy Nelson clean shaven” into Google? Photo via Getty.) 

In the weeks leading up to his scrap with Stipe Miocic at UFC 161, it appeared as if Roy Nelson would be headed for the greener pastures of an MMA promotion that wasn’t run by a guy who hates his fat ass. In the days following Nelson’s three round trouncing at the hands of Miocic, it was the general consensus that Bellator was a CHICK’N Crisp sandwich away from luring in one of MMA’s top heavyweights at a steal of a price. So how does Nelson now find himself in line to fight Daniel Cormier, a former Strikeforce champion who is coming off a (tepid) win over Frank Mir in his UFC debut?

Perhaps we should step back for a second. You see, prior to UFC 161, Nelson had strung together a nice little three-fight win streak (all via KO) and was looking to break himself off a piece of that Daniel Cormier hype. Imploring the classic UFC strategy of declaring that the fight “wouldn’t make sense,” then trying to turn it into a #1 contender fight for another division’s title, then bringing race into the equation, Nelson was able to successfully troll his way into a fight with Cormier despite coming off a loss. Huzzah! The likelihood of this fight coming to fruition is all dependent, of course, on how Nelson’s contract negotiations with the UFC go, according to Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports.

Then again, you could argue that Nelson was more impressive in defeat than Cormier was in victory based purely on the amount of shots he was able to absorb without being knocked out. It would be an insane argument to make, but hey, Tim Sylvia would probably have your back. In either case, the pair is tentatively set to throw down at UFC 166, which goes down on October 19th in Houston, Texas.

In other fight booking news…

Fresh off a first round submission of fellow TUF 17 castmember Adam Cella at UFC on FUEL 9, Tor Troeng has been booked to take on Rafael Natal at UFC on FOX Sports 1:3. Since getting KTFO by Andrew Craig at UFC on FUEL 4, Natal has scored back-to-back wins over a couple of UFC newbies at UFC on FOX 6 and UFC on FX 8. When aliens are trying to piece together human history after it has been wiped off the face of the earth, do you think they’ll wonder why we insisted on making our UFC events as indistinguishable from one another as possible? COMING SOON, UFC on FOFX 1: 00101101 — Velasquez vs. Dos Santos IV (part II). Prelims to be broadcast on FUELbook.

–J. Jones