UFC 143 is this Saturday night, if you can believe it, and the stakes could not be any higher for Nick Diaz and “The Natural Born Killer” Carlos Condit. The pair will do battle for the UFC interim welterweight title, which will then be unified with the real welterweight belt in a bout opposite the UFC’s current 170-pound titleholder and consensus No. 2 pound-for-pound fighter in the world, Georges “Rush” St-Pierre.
The former Strikeforce welterweight champion Condit’s long-anticipated bout against St-Pierre was to have taken place this Saturday night, 24 hours before a Super Bowl XLVI collision between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots, but a knee injury forced GSP to withdraw for the second time, thus opening a door for the former WEC welterweight champion to draw Diaz and capitalize on the momentum of a recent UFC 132 win over Dong Hyun Kim.
However, Diaz is also coming off a win of his own, namely the unanimous decision win he scored against BJ Penn, so both men are laying it all on the line as they look to pencil in their own date against the champion St-Pierre, who defeated Matt Serra for the belt at UFC 82 and has not lost a fight since.
On top of a card opening with Ed “Short Fuse” Herman vs. newcomer Clifford Starks, featuring a UFC bantamweight tilt with Scott “Young Guns” Jorgensen against 27-1-0 (1 NC) prospect Renan Barão, as well as a potential breakout fight for Mike Pierce opposite perennial bad boy Josh Koscheck, and co-headlined by the return of “The Emelianenko Hunter” Fabricio Werdum against TUF 10 winner and IFL veteran “Big Country” Roy Nelson, Diaz vs. Condit will wrap up a fight night with the capability of stealing the weekend for sports fans of all calibers.
The main questions left to be asked now are who takes home the Knockout of the Night, Submission of the Night and Fight of the Night bonuses on Super Bowl weekend? Let’s take a look at the likely candidates.