Spike TV announced that they will air the “UFC Prelims” special with next month’s UFC 128 event. The event will be on March 19, it will proceed into the night’s pay-per-view UFC 128 event, the Prelims will feature light heavyweights Luiz Cane (10-3) vs. Karlos Vemola (8-1) and lightweight strikers Edson Barboza (7-0) vs. Anthony Njokuani (13-4).
The main event of UFC 128 will be a fight between light heavyweight champion Mauricio “Shogun” Rua and Jon “Bones”. Jones will be fighting right outside of his own backyard of New York at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J so expect him to come ready for this fight.
Karlos Vemola turned around a terrible UFC debut with his most recent performance as he railroaded Seth Petruzelli at UFC 122 in 2010. His debut loss to Jon Madsen at UFC 116 was the only time he failed to execute his game plan of “Blitzing” (a fast bull rush approach which leads to ground and pound) that he employed to finish his first seven opponents within the first round.
Vemola’s opponent however, Luiz Cane, is a very heavy-handed lightheavy who’s looking to get back on track after his last two outings were terrible. It started over a year ago when he proved his was ready to face a step up in competition against Antonio Rogerio Nogueira and was knocked out inside two minutes at UFC 106. Then at UFC 114, it only took 17 seconds longer but his next bout ended the same way when Cyrille Diabate finished him. The losses killed any of the hype built from his previous three-fight win streak that included victories over decent fighters in Jason Lambert, Rameau Thierry Sokodjou and Steve Cantwell.
Vemola should be able to bully Cane around quite easily and win with his ground and pound, but if they stand and trade both Vemola and Cane could go down with the first power shot given both of them hit harder than many 205 pound fighters. The ground game could work to Cane’s advantage if he’s able to manage the takedown and control Vemola. Vemola seems to powerful for that to happen but Cane has the ground skills to submit Vemola.
With the lightweights Edson Barboza returns. For anyone who has never seen Edson Barboza fight it is sheer beauty to watch as every strike is almost perfect. Barboza quickly burst on to the UFC scene at UFC 123 in 2010. The 24-year-old “buzzsaw” used a devastating(A word I cant emphasize enough) arsenal of leg kicks on Mike Lullo literally chopping him down like a tree and getting the TKO stoppage from the leg kicks. The win was Barboza’s seventh straight victory to start his career, and all seven wins have come via stoppage.
Anthony Njokuani is a familar fighter to those who followed the WEC, he makes his first appearance in the UFC’s Octagon after fighting seven times for the promotion’s recently merged sister organization (WEC). An excellent striker in his own right, Njokuani earned four wins in the WEC, and all four wins came via TKO. Njokuani last fought at WEC 52, where he earned a second-round TKO win over Edward Faaloloto with a vicious standing elbow.
Altough this is a Prelim fight, this is a must see as Barboza and Njokuani will be putting on a dazzling striking display with a series of boxing and kickboxing attacks. Barboza should win this fight in impressive fashion as it’s been quite hard to ever go against him, he is the real deal and an absolute technician. Njokuani is an excellent striker himself but he doesn’t hold the power that Barboza holds in his leg kicks which should be the deciding factor of the fight.
UFC 128 Prelims should be a pair of excellent bouts which should attract a few more average fight fans or even boxing fans as all four of these fighters will NOT disappoint.
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