The UFC will travel to Omaha, Nebraska for the second time in the history of the promotion when they present UFC on Fuel 1 from the Omaha Civic Auditorium on Wednesday, February 15. The two headlining bouts will be Diego Sanchez vs. Jake Ellenberger and Stefan Struve vs. Dave Herman. Below you will find predictions for those fights.
Diego Sanchez vs. Jake Ellenberger: First things first, I will be totally shocked if we see anything but an all out stand up battle in this one, but then again I expected the same from Nick Diaz and Carlos Condit and we all know how that turned out. The key for Ellenberger will be the pace of Sanchez. If Ellenberger allows Sanchez to set and control the pace he may find himself on the losing end in this one. What could be Sanchez’s downfall in this bout is his willingness to stand and brawl. He’s always shown that he can take a punch, but at some point that ability turns into a liability and this may very well be the fight where Sanchez suffers his first “true” KO or TKO loss. Ellenberger has 17 KO wins in his career, I’m going to go out on a limb on this one and predict he makes it 18 on Wednesday. Ellenberger by second round TKO.
Stefan Struve vs. Dave Herman: Dave Herman made his UFC debut at UFC 131 ending John-Olav Einemo’s night via a second round TKO, earning “Fight of the Night” Honors in the process. Struve also took home a Fight Night bonus in his last bout stopping Pat Barry via triangle choke. Struve has been a slow starter in many of his bouts and Herman must take advantage of that. Watch for Herman to force Struve into a brawl early on exploiting that weakness and ending the fight early. Herman by first round TKO.