UFC 146 is going to be the night of the heavyweights as the entire main card will feature bouts pitting men from the largest division in the UFC against one another. Headlined by Junior dos Santos defending his title against Alistair Overeem, this card has the potential to help reestablish the weight class that has always captivated fans of combat sports. However, looking at the card there is a lightweight battle that deserves its own place in the spotlight, and is an early candidate to steal the show.
Edson Barboza versus Evan Dunham is a lightweight matchup that deserves to have all eyes glued to the television when they step into the cage. Both competitors are fringe contenders with the potential to make runs towards a 2013 title confrontation if they stay on their current paths. Many people believe that the lightweight division is the deepest in mixed martial arts, but at the same time new contenders are struggling to get to the top of the ladder due to the rematch logjam at the top. Barboza versus Dunham is one of many important lightweight tilts ready to come forth in 2012.
Unfortunately this fight has been pushed down to the preliminaries in favor of focusing on the heavyweights for UFC 146. I see the risk that the UFC is taking by asking fight fans to pay their hard-earned money to purchase a Pay per View built around the heavyweight division and do not agree where this bout is placed. Matchmakers are potentially banking on the fact that heavyweights garner much more mainstream attention, and that will lead to more overall buys. Fans will be expecting the highlight reel knockouts from the big men that many people want from every MMA bout they watch. Still, outside the main and co-main event on this card, I do not see any other bout that has the overall talent level of Barboza versus Dunham, nor two fighters with the abilities to bring the best out of each other, as they will.
Dunham and Barboza have both given us past evidence that proves they should be featured on the main card of this Pay per View. Who can forget how Dunham fought back from a brutal first round against Sean Sherk while blood was streaming from his head? A simple Google search of Barboza will lead you to the spinning wheel kick that he used to put down Terry Etim while fighting in Brazil. Not much more evidence than that is needed to see why many individuals are looking forward to this fight just as much as the main event of the evening. If matchmakers are looking for a fight that will get fans off their feet, have the media clamoring about the fight, or even help convert more people into hardcore viewers, this is the fight to expect to deliver on the UFC 146 card.
The counterpoint to my question could be that featuring Dunham versus Barboza on the undercard can potentially sway those who watch the free fights into digging into their pockets for the Pay per View telecast to follow. A worthy point to consider, but you won’t be able to convince many people that this bout is not more important than the Gabriel Gonzaga and Shane del Rosario bout. Dunham and Barboza are on the cusp of making a run towards the lightweight title, much closer than either Gonzaga or del Rosario are to even being mentioned in the discussion for heavyweight title shots. This fight should be relegated to the preliminary card, and Dunham versus Barboza should be moved up as the opening bout of the event.
It’s understood that it may be “easier” to create a superstar from the bigger individuals that fight in the cage. Even though the lighter weight classes often give us the more exciting, faster paced bouts, fans have consistently flocked to the fights that feature heavyweights since the start of mainstream combat sports. Popularity aside, Evan Dunham and Edson Barboza both deserve to shine on Pay per View when they face off, as their past bodies of work show that expecting an action-packed battle that fans will love isn’t going overboard for either one of them.
