This week in the mixed martial arts world, there were a number of big fight announcements that kept the media active with speculation and anticipation. Looking across the last seven days, here are some of the bigger fights that were made for MMA cards coming in 2013.
The best place to start is with a title bout that contains perhaps the greatest MMA athlete the sport has seen at this point. Anderson Silva has finally agreed to defend his middleweight title against New York native Chris Weidman at UFC 162 during the UFC’s annual Fourth of July weekend show. After months of speculation as to whether or not “The Spider” would get his super fight against Georges St. Pierre or face Jon Jones; it’s now clear that the 9-0 Weidman is his next opponent. Weidman has been calling out Silva for months on end and now he’s gotten his wish.
The injury bug has created a heavyweight bout that will get people excited to watch UFC 160. With Alistair Overeem pulling out of his planned matchup with Junior dos Santos, Mark Hunt will step in to take on the former champion.
Hunt is riding a four fight win streak that recently saw him knock out Stefan Struve and break his jaw at UFC on Fuel TV 8. Dos Santos is coming off of his defeat to Cain Velasquez at UFC 155 where he dropped the title.
Welterweights Jake Shields and Tyron Woodley will also compete during the UFC 161 event. Woodley is coming off of his 36 second knockout victory over Jay Hieron at UFC 156 while Shields’s most recent win against Ed Herman was ruled a no contest when the former Strikeforce champion tested positive for a banned substance.
Joseph Benavidez is looking to make another run towards the flyweight title as he is set to face Darren Uyenoyama at UFC on Fox 7 this coming April.
Outside of the UFC the World Series of Fighting has taken advantage of the recent release of big name fighters and picked up Jon Fitch and Jacob Volkmann.
The former welterweight challenger is reported to be facing Gerald Harris on June 14th. Volkmann was another one of the controversial cuts that were removed from the Octagon recently. “Christmas” fought as both a welterweight and lightweight while in the UFC and most of his success came at 155 where brought down a 6-2 record during that time.
As the winter slowly passes some major fights are being created in the MMA community. Not only the UFC but the World Series of Fighting promotion also has some big events on the horizon.
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