Marcus Jones v. Matt Mitrione

Jones was the most surprising fighter on The Ultimate Fighter this year. At the beginning, people wondered if he was anything more than a big athletic guy who would smother people. Instead, he showed pretty decent take downs, and some great jiu-jitsu for a guy his size. While he is an older fighter, and thus has a short time to make an impact, he is probably the third best fighter this season, and will get some pretty decent fights right away.

Mitrione really doesn’t do much well. He’s got heavy hands, and we saw that plenty of times throughout the show. However, he lacks any kind of ground game, and when he does get taken down by Jones, he won’t be getting back up.

Prediction: Jones via submission

Frankie Edgar v. Matt Veach

Edgar is a top-five lightweight who is getting the shaft by even taking this fight. He was supposed to fight Kurt Pellegrino who would have actually been a decent fight, but when “Batman” got hurt, Veach jumped in. Edgar is a fantastic wrestler, with improving striking, and one of the best athletes in the division.

Veach is a relative unknown. He’s a wrestler from Matt Hughes’ HIT Squad camp, which means that I’m sure that he is boring and annoying. He defeated Matt Grice via TKO, so he does have some power. The question is will Edgar overlook a guy who only has one UFC fight?

Nope.

Prediction: Edgar via Unanimous Decision

Kimbo Slice v. Houston Alexander

Slice is the youtube sensation that is going to drive a lot of non-MMA fans to watch this card. He’s got heavy hands, but as we saw on the show, he isn’t an MMA fighter. He’s a brawler. When Roy Nelson put him in a crucifix on the show, he didn’t have any idea how to get out. He didn’t move his hips once. It was sad.

The question coming into this fight is what Kimbo is going to be as a fighter. He never trained full-time before TUF 10, and now he trains twice a day with American Top Team, one of the best teams in the country. He has said that the guys there spend a ton of time working on wrestling and BJJ with him, but his bread and butter will remain his hands.

The good news for Kimbo Slice is that he is fighting another guy who has no ground game in Houston Alexander. Alexander made his name by knocking out Keith Jardine and Alessio Sakara before losing three in a row and being bounced from the UFC. Now, he’s back as a handpicked opponent for Slice. He has good power, but not a whole lot of anything else.

The first guy to land a big punch will win this fight.

Prediction: Alexander via TKO

Roy Nelson v. Brandon Schaub

Nelson was the favorite coming into TUF because he has a resume that is just light years beyond what everyone else had. The problem with Roy is two-fold. He’s never in shape, as seen with his huge belly that he’s used as a weapon in the fights on TUF. The other is that he just isn’t an exciting fighter. He has boring fights that make Dana White and the fans crazy.

Another thing about him is this: When you look at his record, every time he fights a quality opponent he loses. Look at it: Jeff Monson, Andrei Arlovski, and Ben Rothwell are great examples.

Schaub is an athletic former NFL fullback who trains at Greg Jackson’s camp in New Mexico. That’s a huge advantage right there. He has all the tools that you need to win fights. His gameplan in this one will be to keep it on the feet, but if it goes to the ground, he has the skills to get back to his feet.

I like Schaub to keep it standing.

Prediction: Schaub via TKO

Matt Hammil v. Jon Jones

Hamill is a TUF 3 alumni who is famous for overcoming the fact that he is deaf. He became Tito Ortiz’s protege on the show but had to pull out due to injury. Since he’s taken the UFC by storm, going 6-2. One of those losses was to Michael Bisping when Hamill dominated the fight, but Bisping got the hometown decision because they were in England. His bread and butter is his wrestling, but he showed good power and even a head kick that knocked out Mark Munoz.

As for Jones, Man Crush. I love me some Jon Jones. Jones is an incredibly athletic light heavyweight that comes from a family where his two brothers are NFL-quality defensive linemen. He uses good muay thai, and has some of the best greco-roman wrestling this side of Dan Henderson. He’s undefeated in the UFC with wins over Stephen Bonnar and Jake O’Brien to his credit.

The big change for Jones between this fight and last fight is the team he trains with. He went from relatively unknown team Bomb Squad, to training with the best team in MMA at Greg Jackson’s. He’s got some great guys to train with, but really what I’m looking forward to is Jones closing the holes in his game. Jones is famous for fighting with Urijah Faber like reckless abandon, throwing spinning elbows and other kinds of crazy stuff. We all saw how that worked out for Urijah Faber. Now, in all Jones in his interviews he’s talking about becoming more conventional. That’s music to my ears.

Jones is just too good of a fighter for Hamill, and is just scratching the surface. Scary.

Prediction: Jones via unanimous decision