The UFC will wrap up 2012 tomorrow night at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas with UFC 155, which will be headlined by Junior dos Santos making his second title defense as he take on Cain Velasquez.
This will be a rematch of their 2011 bout at UFC on FOX 1, which Dos Santos only needed 64 seconds to knockout Velasquez and become the 14th UFC heavyweight champion.
Dos Santos (15-1) will look to become only the fourth UFC heavyweight champion to successfully defend the title in two straight title defenses. The only other heavyweight champions to do this are Randy Couture, Tim Sylvia and Brock Lesnar.
Both fighters entered the first fight with injuries, but neither fighter wanted the injuries to be an excuse for what happened. Velasquez had a knee injury, which a video recently surfaced online that showed the injury before the fight. During yesterday’s press conference, he stated that he was not happy the video became public and the injury was not an excuse on why he lost to Dos Santos on that night.
Even though the first fight only lasted 64 seconds, there are things to take away from the fight. Before he was knocked down, Velasquez was attacking the lead leg of Dos Santos with low kicks and he will likely have the same game plan tomorrow night. He did have an official takedown attempt, which was stopped.
Velasquez will look to take the fight to the ground, which every one of Dos Santos opponents has that game plan. During his nine fights in the UFC, Dos Santos has only been taken down three times and has immediately got back to his feet.
Dos Santos is known for his boxing, but the champion would like to prove at some time that he has the ability to win a fight by submission. This is unlikely to happen in this fight as the winner of this fight will likely win by knockout.
The longer the fight goes, the better chances that Velasquez has. One of his biggest strengths besides his wrestling is his cardio. This fight will likely last more than the first fight, but may not last longer than the second round.
Velasquez has to take the fight to the ground and keep Dos Santos on his back to give himself the best shot to become a two time UFC heavyweight champion or Dos Santos will walk away from UFC 155 as still the UFC heavyweight champion.