The UFC finally announced what was already expected by the MMA community: Randy Couture is back in the UFC.

The only difference was, he was still the heavyweight champion AND the announcement that the fight between Randy Couture and Brock Lesnar, something that we have spoken about, will be for the heavyweight championship. This is a great opportunity for Brock who, in only his 4th professional fight will be fighting for arguably the most prestigious title in the business, The UFC Heavyweight championship. But where does this leave Interim champion Minotauro Noguiera? What about Frank Mir? The man who gave Lesnar his very first loss in his first UFC fight?

According to Dana White, the winner of the Randy vs Brock fight will then take on the winner of the Big Nog vs Frank Mir fight in a title unification fight. This is similar to a tournament for the title, the only difference being that there are two fighters holding belts who should ideally be fighting each other. Unfortunately, since the interim champion is unavailable due to his involvement with The Ultimate Fighter Season 8, the format of the goings on will be as mentioned above.

So, how does all this affect the parties involved? Let’s take a quick look:

1. Randy Couture: This is the natural’s third return to the UFC and as always, there were a few compromises. His fight with Fedor is still uncertain, although, the possibilities towards it happening seem higher now. He does not even get to fight Noguiera immediately. He has to return to action and face a monster in Brock Lesnar, who is a really good wrestler, plays the same game as Randy and is bigger and younger. Beating Lesnar, of course, would mean that the need for a Fedor fight would reach a crescendo and would be the ultimate heavyweight fight in MMA!
2. Antonio “Minotauro” Noguiera: Big Nog has to be really confused right now. He should be the ideal choice to fight Randy but was put into the TUFs latest season. He now has to wait and fight Frank Mir to be able to prove to the world that he is the true world champion, should he get past Frank Mir. He also has to live with the fact that the UFC is almost giving signals towards the fact that they are still not very comfortable having him as their champion since his appeal in the US is limited to hardcore MMA fans – the smaller segment of the core audience.



3. Brock Lesnar: Definitely the biggest winner in the whole situation. Lesnar’s impressive win over Herring catapulted him to top contender status in a division with very little options. With two out of three contenders for Couture’s title engaged in the latest season of TUF and Cheick Kongo out of action for a good amount of time, Lesnar gets the goose and the golden egg and gets to fight the world champion. Lesnar has a really good chance against Couture, especially since his game plan is virtually a mirror of Randy’s favorite gameplan – use strikes to get the opponent to the ground, control him with ground and pound and get the TKO or decision victory. Add to that the fact that he is younger, faster and stronger than Couture, this opportunity seems like something he can take to the sky.
4. Frank Mir: How would you feel if the guy you beat suddenly gets a shot at the real world champion according to your boss and you get a shot at the interim (read not real) one? After having defeated Lesnar to get a go at one of the best in the business, you now are told that you have to win against Noguiera and then go ahead and fight once more to get to the glory and fame that you want must surely suck. However, this gives Frank a good opportunity to focus on his immediate goals and gives him something to motivate himself for: a fight for the title.
5. Fedor Emelianenko: Fedor is probably the only person waiting to see this go down as much as all the fans around the world. If Noguiera comes out of this as the winner, he has already beaten Nog twice and has nothing to prove. If either Randy comes out of this the winner, there is the possibility of a dream fight to take place and a lot of money to make. If Lesnar is the champ, the debate is rekindled and there is something left to prove for which Fedor will surely be amped up. Should Mir win, he might not be that intrigued simply because beating another BJJ whiz is not something he has done before.

Regardless of what anyone thinks, the return of the Natural does bring a breath of fresh air into the UFC heavyweight division and I am sure will mean a lot more interesting matches will be forthcoming in the near future in a rather lacklustre division.

The biggest winners in this situation is of course, the UFC and Dana White!

Back to the UFC?

Sources close to the UFC report that the UFC will be holding a press conference tomorrow to announce the return of “The Natural” Randy Couture. This will posisbly be the end of all legal disputes and will have stipulations which include a possible fight against Fedor Emelianenko in an event that will have the UFC co-promoting with M-1 Global as reported earlier.

The conference is also supposed to going to be the platform to announce a possible fight pitting Brock Lesnar against the former champion, Couture, possibly scheduled for UFC 91 in Portland, OR.

As a followup to the story posted a couple of days ago, Randy Couture is reportedly gearing up to fight Brock Lesnar in the UFC as opposed to Noguiera. Sources close to the xtreme couture camp say that this will be a brand new contract and will be signed as a way to drop the ongoing litigations.

Will it happen?

Sources also say that the deal might contain a stipulation that allows Randy and Fedor to fight in an event co-promoted by the UFC and M-1 in a non-US location since Fedor is signed to1 a US only exclusive contract with Affliction.

This allows Couture to not only solve his legal issues but also match up against two of the bigger names in the heavyweight division in Lesnar and Fedor. The third possible fight in his contract of course is up for grabs with many websites guessing it could be a fight against Gonzaga or a rematch against Chuck Liddel.

UFC’s latest Heavyweight superstar Brock Lesnar, who is coming off an impressive and dominant victory against Heath Herring is rumoured to be ready to fight again in November. His opponent? Cheick Kongo? We don’t know yet.

Lesnar who has expressed his desire to fight for the title already is already among the top 10 heavyweights in the UFC and with a win over Kongo could immediately move into title contention or atleast into the top 5 in the organization’s sparsely populated heavyweight division. What will be interesting to see would be if Lesnar will be able to take the huge Kongo out of his game and dominate him like he did Herring – should the fight actually take place.

The only other likely opponent seems to be – Antoni Hardonk …