Category — WEC

World Extreme Cagefighting has set a date for a lightweight title unification bout between champ Jamie Varner and interim champ Ben Henderson. It’ll headline WEC 46 on January 10.

Varner has been out of action with injuries he suffered in his split-decision victory over Donald Cerrone last January while Bendo is coming off a fight-of-the-year-caliber decision victory over Cerrone at WEC 43 last month. Also on the card is a featherweight showdown between Urijah Faber and Raphael Assuncao.

Speaking of Urijah Faber (22-3 MMA; 7-2 WEC), the former WEC featherweight champion is finally set for his return to the cage after recovering from a severely broken hand suffered in a loss to 145-pound champ Mike Brown at WEC 41. Faber will face Raphael Assuncao (14-1 MMA; 2-0 WEC) at WEC 46 on January 11. That card is also rumoured – and I do mean rumoured – to be c0-headlined by a lightweight title unification bout between champ Jamie Varner and interim champ Benson Henderson.

Anybody notice anything strange or unusual about this poster for WEC 45? Like that there are three fights/six fighters listed but only five fighters’ photos. Where the heck is Chris Horodecki? If they knew his name in time to put that on the poster there should have been time to Photoshop in an image, too. It just looks bizarre to only see five fighters. Maybe the baby-faced IFL vet just didn’t look menacing enough. Horodecki (13-1) was scheduled to face Dan Lauzon at Affliction: Trilogy until the promotion closed up shop and he now faces Anthony Njokuani (11-2 MMA; 2-1 WEC).

That said, this is a good card for a WEC card. The headliner between Greg Jackson student and Muay Thai striker Donald Cerrone (10-2 MMA, 3-2 WEC) and karate fighter Ed Ratcliff (7-1 MMA, 3-1 WEC) has barnburner potential, although I wouldn’t expect anything close to the fight-of-the-year-level five-round battle Cerrone fought with Ben “Bendo” Henderson at WEC 43. And with Cerrone walking away from that bout without the interim lightweight title he’ll be hungry to get back on track with a win. (As a side note, it’s strange to refer to an MMA fighter as a karate fighter or karate stylist; we can thank Lyoto Machida for making the art cool again.)

Also on the card is a bantamweight bout between DREAM vet and Urijah Faber training partner Joseph Benavidez (10-1 MMA, 2-1 WEC) and K-1 Hero’s vet and ADCC sub wrestling champion Rani Yahya (15-4 MMA, 4-1 WEC).

Brazilian jiu-jitsu ace Wagnney Fabiano’s loss to Mackens Semerzier by triangle choke at WEC 43: Cerrone vs. Henderson is one of the biggest upsets of the year. Now, of course, the excuses start emerging. As Fabiano tells Tatame, he had suffered a cracked rib about ten days before the fight that prevented him from escaping the finishing choke:

“My mistake was to fight. I was passing by problems, I didn’t want to say, to don’t keep giving excuses, my mistake. He got me on the triangle and I don’t know when was the last time that someone got me on that position in jiu-jitsu and submissions career, even in training. Nobody ever caught me on this position because I stand up fast. Because of a little injury, my rib cracked when I was going to stand up and I came back. My mistake was to fight, but he did his work and I congratulate him.”

Ben Henderson definitely made good on his Rocky Balboa promise. Last night’s WEC interim lightweight title bout may not have been the most technical display of mixed martial artistry but it was easily the most-exciting back-and-forth, end-any-second, go-either-way battle not featuring Clay Guida this year. Definitely a Fight of the Year candidate.

Henderson, a 3-1 underdog, survived multiple submission attempts – guillotines, triangles, D’arce chokes, armbars, omo platas, kimuras, the kitchen sink – to earn the five-round unanimous decision victory over Donald Cerrone.

“Survived” is the operative word as Henderson appeared on the verge of being choked out or having his arm separated from his shoulder on several occasions – at one point he spent an uncomfortable, mesmerizing minute locked into a deep arm-triangle choke that had me holding my breath, while a fifth-round kimura mangled his arm into such a horrifying position that there was an audible gasp from the audience when he was able to give the ref the thumbs up before escaping and popping to his feet as fresh as a daisy. I’m sure Henderson – henceforth and forever to be known as Bendo – requires no oxygen and that when he went to the hospital after the fight for x-rays they came back negative because he has no bones.

Of course, Bendo didn’t earn the unanimous decision – one that many believe should have gone in Cerrone’s favour but that was at worst a split decision for Henderson – based on his ability to take a licking and keep on ticking.

The pair traded blows standing throughout, with neither having a clear advantage, while the second and third rounds saw Bendo stand comfortably in Cerrone’s open guard and drop bombs onto his face and chest while only suffering the occasional glancing upkick. Bendo was also able to shoot in and land takedown after takedown after takedown that would have impressed Georges St. Pierre and clearly frustrated the Greg Jackson-trained Cerrone.

The judges all came back with the same score, 48-47, in Bendo’s favour and Cerrone agreed, acknowledging at the post-event press conference, “Some people will say it might have gone the other way, but he definitely won the fight.”

With the win, Henderson moves to 10-1 overall and 3-0 in the WEC. Cerrone drops to 10-2 (3-2 WEC). The win also sets up a WEC lightweight title unification bout with champ Jamie Varner, who’s been sidelined by injuries since he beat Cerrone at WEC 38 but expects to be back as early as December. No word yet on whether Bendo will be ready by then, although I expect not after the beating he took.

Now, I’m not going to go through the remainder of the card fight by fight, but I will discuss a few notables, starting with the featherweight match-up between 4-1 favourite Wagnney Fabiano and WEC newcomer Mackens Semerzier, who took the fight on just two weeks notice.

A preliminary card bout that made the TV broadcast, the fight was the first of the evening to plant my jaw on the floor as the Brazilian jiu-jitsu ace Fabiano tapped out to a triangle choke at 2:14 of round one against the BJJ purple belt. Fabiano was the IFL’s 145-pound champ and was riding an eight-fight winning streak coming into the night. As my BJJ buddy Gabe pointed out, it was kind of like watching Matt Serra knock out Georges St. Pierre, that’s how stunning an upset it was.

Wrestler and WEC newcomer Dave Jensen earned a unanimous decision over WEC vet Richard Crunkilton in a “Weebles wobble” sort of back-and-forth battle that was the most entertaining fight of the night until the main event. At one point, Jensen survived a near-disastrous arm-triangle choke and then nearly ended it himself with a kimura attempt a few moments later in the third round, and both fighters took punishment that had them dazed on their feet at various times.

And all the David Loiseau-esque spinning back kicks in the world couldn’t help Montreal’s Yves Jabouin get past top-10 featherweight Raphael Assuncao. Assuncao earned a split decision over the flashy WEC first-timer, who displayed an electric stand-up game, with strikes from all angles. But Assuncao was able to stand and trade blows as well as work a smart ground game that included a nearly successful guillotine choke late in the second round.

Here are the full results:

Benson Henderson def. Donald Cerrone via unanimous decision

Dave Jansen def. Rich Crunkilton via unanimous decision

Raphael Assuncao def. Yves Jabouin via split decision

Damacio Page def. Will Campuzano via submission (rear-naked choke) – round 1

Anthony Njokuani def. Muhsin Corbbrey via TKO (strikes) – round 2

Scott Jorgensen def. Noah Thomas via TKO (strikes) – round 1

Mackens Semerzier def. Wagnney Fabiano via submission (triangle choke) – round 1

Eddie Wineland def. Manny Tapia via unanimous decision

Charlie Valencia def. Coty Wheeler via unanimous decision

Deividas Taurosevicius def. Javier Vazquez via split decision

The main event at tonight’s WEC 43 featuring striker Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone (10-1) versus grappler Ben Henderson (9-1) for the interim lightweight title should be an exiting fight. That’s not hyperbole. These two fighters were punched out of a mold at the rock ‘em sock ‘em factory. They both run on Energizers and can take a punch and belly up for more.

Cerrone is a former Muay Thai champion and professional bullrider who trains with Greg Jackson, and he’s actually pretty comfortable off his back, having earned nine of his wins by submission (five of them by triangle). And he’s made no secret that he’s already looking ahead to a rematch with champ Jamie Varner. Varner’s been sidelined with injuries since their battle at WEC 38 that saw Henderson lose a technical decision (split) after landing an illegal knee to Varner’s temple in the fifth round that prevented him from continuing. Cerrone and Varner hate each other. The question is whether Cerrone’s fueling his animosity toward Varner at the expense of treating Henderson too lightly.

Henderson, meanwhile, hasn’t lost since his second fight back in 2006 and has six wins by submission and three by knockout or TKO. I love what he says to expect from the fight:

“I want a Rocky Balboa fight where I get the crap beat out of me for four rounds, and I come back to win in the fifth round. I want a highlight reel, knockdown, drag ‘em out 25-minute war. That’s what I want. The true champions, the guys who really want it, they show their heart, they show their mettle, they show what they have inside their soul. I want that every time I defend the belt. I want every challenger to push me so hard that I come out barely squeaking at the end. It’s good to be Anderson Silva and knock everybody out in 30 seconds, and not get hit and all that, but that’s too pretty. I want the wars.”

Another reason to pay attention to Saturday’s WEC 43. Yves Jabouin, who trains alongside Georges St. Pierre at Montreal’s Tristar Gym, will make his WEC debut in a bout with top-10 featherweight Raphael Assuncao (13-1). Jabouin is 14-4 with 11 wins by knockout or TKO.

Donald Cerrone and Ben Henderson will square off in the main event to decide the interim lightweight championship. I’m also very curious to see how IFL vet and undercard fighter Wagnney Fabiano (12-1) handles Mackens Semerzier (5-0).

Jake Rossen over at Sherdog has a good piece on where the WEC fits into the MMA landscape. Like the UFC, it’s owned by Zuffa, and Rossen digs into whether it should continue as its own promotion or should be swallowed by the UFC and have the lighter weight classes added to the UFC stable. I’m including a couple of excerpts below, but if you’re a WEC fan – and you really should be – or want to figure out the WEC a bit better, check out the entire story here.

If the UFC devours it, the benefits for talent are obvious: 135- and 145-pound fighters can benefit from the UFC’s lucrative bonus system and pay scale. Their marketability from Spike appearances will boost sponsorship dollars. Some, like Faber and Torres, could conceivably see a pay-per-view percentage take, which would be nominal even if they draw flies. (The UFC brand is good for a minimum amount of business, regardless of the card.) And the lighter weights would clearly help boost Spike’s aging “Ultimate Fighter,” now planning an 11th season and incapable of milking Kimbo Slice indefinitely. With this season’s batch of sluggish heavyweights, the action of 16 determined featherweights would be an adrenaline shot.

The argument for the current structure: With some fighters making as little as $2,000 a bout, they’re probably poor enough to qualify for Medicaid.

If you enjoy fights, you can’t argue in favor of the evaporation of the WEC. There’s enough depth to the lighter weight classes to warrant their own subculture. What’s needed is a balance between their limited profit potential and the need for their freelancers to pay a mortgage. Pay-per-view events for major title bouts should be a reasonable $10 or $15, a number pushed hard to consumers. This ignores the psychology of viewers thinking something that costs more is therefore more valuable, and it probably wouldn’t work for a start-up — but people know what they’re getting with the event. And rather than get pissy they’re being asked to fork over dough, they’d probably appreciate the discount.

Fighters making $2,000 and another $2,000 to win aren’t going to move into another tax bracket anytime soon, but bonuses should increase substantially, a cost hopefully offset by the pay-television revenue. There’s no reason to keep champions off of the UFC’s product: Interviewing Faber, Torres or Brown for a countdown show and getting their faces circulating is risk-free; and with more 125-pound talent popping up, it would be wise to dissolve the 155-pound weight class and let those athletes drift toward the Octagon. The WEC lightweight title compared to BJ Penn’s is a waste of leather.

A slight lineup shift for October 10’s WEC 43: Cerrone vs. Henderson: jiu-jitsu phenom Wagnney Fabiano (12-1) will now face WEC newcomer and Miguel Torres prodigy Mackens Semerzier (3-0), who replaces an injured Erik Koch.

Fabiano, who used to live and train in Toronto, is currently enjoying a five-fight winning streak, including two straight under the WEC banner against Akitoshi Tamura (submission) and Fredson Paixao (decision). During his days as the IFL featherweight champ, he notched notable wins over John Gunderson and LC Davis (both by submission), as well as scored a highlight-reel knockout over Bao Quach earlier in his career. The lone loss on the Brazilian’s record came by split decision at the hands of Jeff Curran back in October 2006.

Fabiano’s an exciting dynamic fighter who is maneuvering toward a title shot so I find it strange that his fight is being relegated to the preliminary card. He definitely should be on the main card that will feature an interim lightweight title fight between Greg Jackson camper Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone and Ben Henderson in the main event.