While Dana White may hope to give former middleweight champion Rich Franklin an edge by allowing him to take his rematch against current champion Anderson Silva in Cincinatti, Silva vs. Franklin (the only title fight on the card) doesn't look to be the most promising fight.
There are two matchups that I'm going to be watching a little bit more closely, as they seem more exciting and will have a huge impact in their divisions.
The first is the heavyweight matchup between undefeated up-and-comer Brandon "The Truth" Vera, who will be taking on former heavyweight champion Tim "The Maine-iac" Sylvia. Sylvia is coming off of surgery and a hard loss of his title to Randy Couture. Though it will be the giant from Maine's first fight since losing his belt to Couture, we can only hope that he will turn in a top notch performance.
When Tim Sylvia was coming up in the sport, he destroyed everyone laid in front of him, and we can only hope that his return will re-ignite the hard training Miletich Fighting Systems has to offer. If it does, he will give Vera a very tough fight, but if he doesn't, Vera is looking to put on a devastating display of his world class muay Thai.
The second is the 185 pound matchup between Yushin Okami and Jason "The Athlete" MacDonald. Both are coming off of hard losses to Rich Franklin, and though they lost in different ways (Okami took the fight the distance while MacDonald was TKO'd) the matchup between the two is interesting.
Okami is a groundnpounder, typical, but exciting. His wrestling is solid and I expect him to put MacDonald on his back right away, but that may not be bad news for MacDonald, who has one of the most exotic submissions, as he displayed in his fight with Ed Herman.
Even with Okami in what looks like a ominant position, MacDonald has the power to finish the fight, and it should be exciting from a technical point, as well as provide either a cool submission from MacDonald or a brutal TKO from Okami.
The rest of the card is pretty much barren, but the UFC's big battle in the midwest will be a big draw, with the heavy fanbase of Rich Franklin cheering him on and those interested in the next display of Anderson Silva tuning in to watch.
However the main fight goes, the main card will provide some solid entertainment and it should be an alright show.
Stay tuned for follow up announcements on UFC 77 and the upcoming bit on UFC 78, with the return of UFC 185 pounder David "The Soul Assassin" Terrell, the debuts of Akihiro Gono and Ryo Chonan and the rematch between Tito Ortiz and Rashad Evans.
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