Matthew 7:7 states, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” The MMA career of Tim Kennedy, however, states, “Ask and all will be taken away from you and maybe replaced with something inferior.” Indeed, the extent to which Kennedy has been continuously screwed out of opportunities to fight upper level opponents is nothing short of bewildering. If it wasn’t his active military status nullifying his ability to secure a fight, it was Strikeforce’s inept matchmaking department or all the scared little bitches that made up their middleweight roster. And even when Kennedy was able to book a fight, his opponents were usually traded in and out like sex slaves at an Albanian brothel.
Most recently, Kennedy was finally given a shot at the big time when he was booked to welcome Lyoto Machida to the middleweight division in the main event of Fight For the Troops 3. That was until Michael Bisping injured his eye and was replaced by Machida against Mark Munoz. So what did Kennedy do in response? Call out every fighter in the middleweight division, the light heavyweight and heavyweight divisions, the women’s division, and various members of the MMA media via Twitter, of course.
Fortunately for Kennedy, the UFC was finally able to meet his “terrorist demands” and book him an opponent for the November card. Unfortunately for Kennedy, it’s the only guy he neglected call out on Twitter (Ed note: Nevermind, turns out he called out Natal as well). Kennedy will now face Rafael “Sapo” Natal in what has to be the least intriguing main event matchup since Arlovski vs. Eilers at UFC 53. Hip hip hooray?
To be fair, Natal is currently riding a three-fight win streak including a Fight of the Night-earning defeat of Tor Troeng in an absolute slugfest at Fight Night: Teixeira vs. Bader, so maybe this fight won’t be as terrible as we initially thought. To be completely unfair, Natal is a guy who couldn’t be picked out of a random lineup of Brazilian fighters by most casual MMA fans. We’ll give him credit for stepping up, though.
Kennedy, on the other hand, is coming off a tepid unanimous decision victory over Roger Gracie at UFC 162 in his promotional debut. If he’s hoping to book a big name (or any name, really) in the near future, one would think that he will be looking to finish his short-notice opponent impressively come November 6th.
Who you like for this one, Potato Nation?