Consequences for Fighters That Lose at UFC 102

Of the five fights on the main card for UFC 102, only two of which have fighters that are not coming directly off of losses. In this economy fighters have to be extremely careful of how the win and how they lose because it only takes one bad showing for a UFC fighter for him to be kicked from the promotion.

Randy Couture and Antonio Nogueira are both coming off of really bad losses. Randy was most recently beaten by Goliath Brock Lesnar, who made defeating the former champion look like stealing candy from a baby whereas Nogueira took a severe boxing beating from Frank Mir in a fight that looked to show to the world that Nogueira shouldn’t be fighting anymore. Both men have had long illustrious careers in MMA and both are legends in their own right but a loss for either man at this point in their career could not just end in expulsion from the UFC promotion, but retirement from the sport as a whole. As far as Randy Couture goes, his retirement could come at the end of the fight win or lose and no one is quite so sure if Randy would want to stay with the UFC after the fight anyway. His contract antics have been well documented in the recent years, to give a brief summary of what happened:

Randy had signed a certain number of fights contract with the UFC, but as time grew on Randy became more and more dissatisfied with the UFC as a whole and made it clear that he had no intention of staying with the promotion once his contract was over. This can be seen in his blatant disregard for UFC “codes of conduct” by allowing companies such as Electronic Arts use his image in one of their video games. Randy would attempt to retire with two fights left on his contract but the UFC would literally force him back into action to fulfill his last two fights. Randy’s contract was designed so that his contract would either be over after a certain amount of fights of after a certain amount of time. Seemingly playing hardball the UFC would wait till the last moment to schedule another fight for the aging champion. It would be over a year before he would get another fight, he would be thrown to the lions in a fight against Brock Lesnar, a man who easily outweighed Randy by 50/60 lbs come the night of the fight. Needless to say, he lost the fight and now his fight against Antonio is his last contractual fight.

Keith Jardine and Thiago Silva are both dangerously close to falling off of the UFC roster forever. Jardine has looked terrible in his last three fights, which include a brutal knockout loss to Wanderlei Silva, a boring and dull but close decision win over Brandon Vera and a one sided beating decision loss to Quinton Jackson. While Silva hasn’t been as unimpressive as Jardine as of late, it could be argued that he is in a worse condition that Keith at this moment in time. Jardine has established himself as a UFC veteran since 2005 and has a huge fan base behind him stateside, whereas Silva has struggled to gain any sort of exposure since he has entered the UFC. Despite his four big knockout wins over reasonable opposition, the fans have yet to take a liking to the Brazilian striker as he struggles to find his place in the division. He literally went from fighting low/mid level fights such as Houston Alexander to fighting arguably the best fighting in the division, Lyoto Machida, who knocked him out in the first round. Whichever man loses this fight will undoubtedly need to find a new place to fight.

While the consequences for the above four fighters do look rather dire should they lose the fight, but this next fight doesn’t look in such a shakey position for either fighter. Chris Leben and Jake Rosholt both need a win but a loss wouldn’t be the end of their careers. Leben is coming off of a really bad loss to Michael Bisping, who picked him apart with his jab all night and turned Leben’s face into a beef patty, things got much worse when it came out that Leben tested positive for steroids. Things weren’t quite so rosy for Rosholt either, who lost his last fight via guillotine choke to mid level fighter Dan Miller. If Rosholt is to lose his second consecutive fight in the UFC, there is no doubt that he won’t be fighting there anymore but he has another home waiting for him. Rosholt is a hot prospect who arguably could have been moved up in opposition too fast, so he could go back to where he was fighting before with the WEC until he has fully matured as a fighter. On the other hand if Leben is to lose the fight he could easily have a couple more fights in the UFC as he is fan favorite and is always ready to put on a show.