UFC 108 should offer some New Year’s fireworks

UFC 108, the card that just won’t die, is a couple of days away. And given that expectations for the cursed event – there have been no fewer than eight bout changes due to illness and injury, including the loss of Anderson Silva vs. Vitor Belfort, Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin and Cain Velasquez vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira – are lower than for a Gladiator Challenge undercard, there’s actually a decent chance this thing will be surprisingly entertaining, especially when you have stylistic and skill-level mismatches like submission monkey Dustin Hazelett vs. knockout gorilla Paul Daley, past-his-prime psycho Gilbert Yvel vs. up-and-comer Junior dos Santos and scrappy kickboxer Sam Stout vs. scrappy grappler Joe Lauzon.

And of course, there’s always the headliner between light heavyweights Rashad Evans and Thiago Silva, each of whom have one loss on their records to champ Lyoto Machida. So sure, that fight is an important rung in the ladder back into title contention, but with Machida out of action until May, when he rematches Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Evans-Silva seems barely relevant to anyone but Evans and Silva. And for the record, I’m calling Silva by decision – he’s got solid, tight dirty boxing, which will beat Evans’ looping blows to the punch and his jiu-jitsu is under-rated.

So my suggestion for getting the most out of UFC 108? Continue the New Year’s festivities with drink and friends, hope for some fireworks, and wake up the next morning promising things will be different next year.