ESPN Mixed Martial Arts

On Monday, Jon Jones put out his first statement since being arrested this weekend on suspicion of driving under the influence. He did this on Facebook. On the same day, Chael Sonnen filed for a therapeutic use exemption with the Nevada State Athletic Commission for the testosterone that put so many unflattering asterisks next to his name.

That went well. He got it. And he was even asked to become advisor on the subject, a kind of spokesman on the remedies of fleeting youth.

Also on Monday? Nick Diaz fidgeted before the NSAC and he and his lawyers tried to bridge a language barrier between marijuana and its metabolites. This didn’t go as well. Diaz was suspended a year and docked $60,000.

There were doctors called in both cases. Dr. Trainor (in Sonnen’s), and Dr. Sample (in Diaz’s). These weren’t pseudonyms. These were actual human beings. It has all the quality of fiction, but it’s happening.

It’s real. As real as it gets.

That’s why when Dana White’s “It’s Fiiiigggght Weeeeek!” tweet went out, it showed up like a plea to forget for a second about legal issues and hearings and keep the thing we’re all here for in focus.

UFC 146 is on deck -- the long-awaited, all-heavyweight card.

Only, the sad thing is even this couldn’t serve as a distraction. UFC 146 is the card that was drastically altered when heavyweight contender Alistair Overeem was popped for high testosterone levels. Now the UFC 146 we’re getting is entirely different from the original mock-up.

Needless to say, the UFC is going through a rough patch. In fact, at this point it requires imagination to not see the problems going on in MMA. Dana White may be prone to hyperbole, but you have to believe him when he says “bad s--- happens to me before my first foot hits the floor getting out of bed.”

The biggest concern before a fight used to be if all participants would make weight. In 2012, the year of globalization and network television, it’s a lot trickier. There are drug tests. There are loose cannon Twitter feeds to consider, breathalyzers, quack doctors and last-minute injuries.

As for after? There are a million experts who forecast the end of times when the television ratings and/or buy rates get reported. This past week the “Ultimate Fighter” produced a record-low rating on a spicy episode where Urijah Faber was to learn his next opponent. Right before that, the UFC on Fuel card that hosted a fight-of-the-year candidate between Chan Sung Jung and Dustin Poirier also registered a weak rating.

Gentlemen, ignite your doom.

And then there’s this thing about the UFC watering itself down with too many cards. Too many free ones, too many pay-per-views, too many cards that appear on channels that barely exist. The negatives are always magnified. A fight card on a Tuesday? Blasphemy.

The problem with being Dana White in 2012 is that there are thousands of people telling Dana White how to be Dana White. Audaciousness has a way of feeding on itself.

The bigger problem is that propriety isn’t something so easily introduced to a company that has been mightily successful doing things their way.

But the UFC realizes some things will have to change internally to clean up the number of fiascos going on. In fact, Dana White recently told the LA Times that Zuffa will begin testing fighters for PEDs themselves to, among other things, “save the sport.”

“Yes, we’re going to do our own testing, order these guys into [a lab]; we’re sorting it out now,” he said. “You have to do this to save the sport. You can’t have these guys fighting on this stuff.”

That’s a step, at least. At some point there will likely be other changes, things like social media protocols and consistency in punishment for offenders. In short, there will something like definitive rules. After all, the word “professional” can easily stand in for a word like “conformity.” To uphold one, there will be degrees of the other.

And that’s a delicate balance. The fight game is sort of lunatic by nature, and that’s what happily separates it from other sports. The UFC has always done a great job of this. Yet chaos is better contained in the cage. It’s too hard to push enthusiasm for a global brand forward while putting out so many fires backstage.

Yet if we can bear with the smoke a little bit, then shout it out -- it's fight week!

It took 15 months and some monumental forks in the road to arrive at the end point of the Strikeforce heavyweight grand prix. No, it didn’t go the way people thought it would, nor the way many hoped. There isn’t going to be Fedor Emelianenko versus Josh Barnett. That fight, for its entire luster, never could come to terms with fate. Not in Pride, not in Affliction, not in Strikeforce.

However, of the eight-man field that was rolled out in January 2011 as the greatest stock of heavyweights ever assembled, Barnett was the steady. He was supposed to be in the final, and he is. He got there by competing in the quarterfinal (a submission of Brett Rogers) and the semis (a submission of Sergei Kharitonov). Isn’t it strange that the man with the most asterisks coming into the tournament was in the end the only one who could stick to the script?

On the other hand, Daniel Cormier’s course was improbable. He was an alternate to this tournament. A deep alternate. He was the 11th man in an eight-man field. Yet he worked over Jeff Monson on the same night Barnett clubbed Rogers in something called a “reserve bout.” Then Cormier found his entry when Alistair Overeem was unceremoniously removed. What did Cormier do? He obliterated heavy favorite Antonio Silva on the feet with speed and power.

And that’s how we arrive at the moment. The old “War Master” Barnett, against the opportunistic, understudy-turned-contender Cormier. The 1-seed versus the 11. Just how crazy has the 15-month journey been to San Jose? Crazy enough that sports books have these guys at even money heading into Saturday night.

Here are five things to watch for at Strikeforce this weekend.

Cormier’s lack of experience

Daniel Cormier is a nerves-of-steel guy. He is always relaxed. Right before his fight with Bigfoot Silva, he wore and expression that said, “I wouldn’t mind a nap” more than “I’m about to lay waste to somebody.” Needless to say, Cormier keeps himself cool under pressure.

This can be attributed to his wrestling days at Oklahoma State and later as a part of the 2004 U.S. Olympic wrestling team. Cormier has competed his whole life. You really believe that fighting -- for all its literal brutality -- is just another competition for him. He believes in his ability and knows he has deceptive explosiveness and speed. In short, his confidence shows in that calm expression.

Yet with only nine professional MMA bouts, and realistically only one of those against a top-10 opponent, how will he handle a submission specialist like Barnett? Even when training with the likes of Mike Kyle and Cain Velasquez, it’s hard to duplicate the strength and slickness of Barnett, who has been at this a long, long time (since he was 19 years old, to be exact). Cormier will very likely find himself in fixes he hasn’t been in before in the cage. How will he handle himself?

Barnett’s comfort zone

Everybody knows what Barnett likes to do. He likes to muscle you to the ground, straighten you out, and work for submissions from that top position. He’s not afraid to punch a hole in your head, either. Just ask Pedro Rizzo and Gilbert Yvel. But Barnett's most effective way of finishing a guy is to put him on his back and then fish for limbs to manipulate.

Dating back to 2006, Barnett has finished foes via toeholds, heel hooks, kimuras and arm triangle chokes. He does these things more with brute force than textbook jiu-jitsu. In Cormier, Barnett gets a guy who has never been made to fight off his back and has never had his shoulder joint pressured into a panic situation.

But the bigger questions are these: Can Barnett get Cormier to the ground? And if so, can he keep him there?

Melendez’s motivation
Trilogies are usually pretty personal grudge matches. In the case of Gilbert Melendez and Josh Thomson, it feels more like a necessary evil. At least to Melendez, who will be asked to duplicate what he did in 2009 when he smoked Thomson in the rematch to unify the interim and meaningful belts. That fight was so definitive that most thought he was done with Thomson for good.

Well, circumstance has made that impossible. Thomson gets a chance to strip Melendez of his belt a second time because the “Punk” was the best option available on Strikeforce’s depleted roster. It’s a rubber match that benefits Thomson a thousand times more than Melendez, because third chances rarely come along.

Which begs the same question that has fallen to Melendez for the past year: How motivated will he be to again prove himself against Thomson? Knowing the work ethic of “El Nino,” it’s easy to expect to see him in vintage form. But complacency is a hard-to-detect virus that usually gets discovered after it’s too late. Will Melendez suffer from this?

(Probably not, but you never know ...)

Thomson’s attitude

The first time Thomson fought Melendez in 2008, it was as if Thomson was showing up for a day of capers and fun. He was smiling the whole time. He was loose. There were moments when it almost felt like he was messing with his younger brother, just fooling around. Every so often he would do something to remind Melendez that, when serious, he could dictate things how he wanted.

But the key to that fight was that Thomson was first. He was quick with the leg kicks. He was effective with his combinations. He would shoot now and again for a takedown and keep Melendez off balance. Thomson thwarted Melendez’s wrestling. And by being the aggressor, he disrupted Melendez’s timing and flow. Can he do that again?

Remember, Thomson had broken (and rebroken) his fibula before that rematch with Melendez in 2009, and he was carrying some ring rust after 15 months on the shelf. Chances are we'll see a combination of those two fights with one similarity: that it goes the full five rounds.

Feijao returns

Though it’s getting very little fanfare, former 205-pound champion Rafael “Feijao” Cavalcante returns to the cage on Saturday night against Mike Kyle. Remember, Cavalcante is the guy who beat Muhammad Lawal to win the Strikeforce belt not all that long ago. And, in his title defense against Dan Henderson, there was a moment where it looked like Cavalcante had Hendo in trouble.

It’s been eight months since Feijao beat Cuban freestyle wrestler Yoel Romero, a fight that Cavalcante finished even with a broken arm. He’s still one of the best 205ers in the world, and a win over a tough Kyle might make Feijao a tempting property for the UFC to bring over and fortify its own light heavyweight division. After all, the list of contenders for Jon Jones has shrunk down to Henderson and change.

Training camps have become their own game of roulette, and Dominick Cruz -- who trains fiendishly year round -- is the latest casualty.

Cruz tore his anterior cruciate ligament Thursday while prepping for his July 7 title fight with Urijah Faber, and now 2012 will pass by without the UFC bantamweight champion ever stepping into the octagon.

Bummer.

When 10 top contenders can’t beat you, ACL’s are around to remind us that there is such a thing as destructibility. Look at Georges St. Pierre, who suffered the exact same fate. It’s all eggshells before fight night, because injuries remain stubbornly indiscriminate (and prefight drug screenings have a way of coming back hot).

The big difference between Cruz and St. Pierre? St. Pierre’s injury took Carlos Condit with him.

In Faber’s case, he’ll still be dealt a fresh new face, likely in the form of Brazilian Renan Barao or the 21-year old Michael McDonald. Neither one of them provide a gussied-up, trilogy-fight storyline, but both stand a fantastic chance of dialing Faber’s mystique back for good -- which is to say, both have the power to derail Faber’s trilogy fight with Cruz forever.

In a game centered on hype, situations change at far greater speeds than belts. Very likely, whoever wins the rejiggered UFC 148 bout will have the placeholder belt and will wait out Cruz’s timetable for recovery to unify things.

And this is where things fall into a familiar sludge.

How many titlists and top contenders can be on the shelf at once? How many actual and theoretical belts can we introduce without it becoming charades? Whatever the case, matchmakers Joe Silva and Sean Shelby are becoming fluent in the laws of attrition. Taking a look at the tops of the UFC’s weight classes right now -- with all the conditions, exceptions, suspensions and voluntary sabbaticals -- most are a total mess.

St. Pierre will fight only once this year (hopefully), and Anderson Silva possibly the same (but hopefully not). Junior dos Santos is fighting in his first title defense in a few weeks (knock on wood), yet the top contender he was supposed to face -- Alistair Overeem -- is suspended. Likewise, Nick Diaz is suspended at welterweight.

Circumstantially, the latest contenders are putting themselves on hiatus, too. Nate Diaz says he’ll wait out Frankie Edgar/Benson Henderson, a fight that’ll likely take place in September. That means the earliest we see No. 1 contender Diaz again is in December. It’s even rockier for Johny Hendricks at welterweight. If he waits out the tentative November showdown between Condit and St. Pierre, he won’t surface again this year.

Title fights in 2012 are becoming scarce. Out of eight weight classes, we’ve had three in five months, and are on pace for maybe 14. Even the flyweight coronation was postponed due to a bumbled math job in Australia. Big fights are being made, and big fights are falling through. It’s the nature of the fight game to roll with the punches, but what a collision course of rotten luck.

What can you do? To use the most common refrain in MMA right now, it is what it is. The UFC can’t issue a memorandum that says, “tread light before the fight.” With Cruz out for the next nine months, it means opportunity for either Barao or McDonald. And the UFC has always been very good at branding optimism and opportunism above all else.

As for this year they have to, because that's what's for sale.

Hey, remember when Jon Jones beat Rashad Evans?

In case the mega-fight slipped your mind already, which isn't altogether implausible thanks to mixed martial arts' wacky news cycle, that happened Saturday.

For instance: On Tuesday, three major pieces of information were revealed.
Anderson Silva would not defend his UFC middleweight belt in his home country of Brazil against Chael Sonnen. Instead, it was announced, the pound-for-pound king will return to sweltering Las Vegas for a mid-summer bout against the self-proclaimed king.

Heavyweight Alistair Overeem was denied licensure to fight in the state of Nevada, meaning he's yet another casualty on MMA's growing PED hit list.

And Bellator champion Hector Lombard is relinquishing that title for a chance to compete in the UFC and shut up his doubters.

Here are some quick thoughts on what went down.

Silva-Sonnen 2 heads to Las Vegas

Rather than promoting one of the most intriguing stadium shows in combat sports history, UFC president Dana White confirmed in Rio on Tuesday morning that it was going to be impossible to promote the bout as promised.

A suitable venue couldn't be locked down, even if the promoter openingly salivated not long about the possibility of his middleweights fighting in front of 80,000 fans. Hotel space was a real issue as well, with the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, a massive undertaking, was taking place at the same time.

Good news: we still get to see the fight.

Some winners and losers in all of this:

WINNERS

Zuffa

That's right. Even though they failed to deliver on the promise of a mega UFC championship fight in Brazil, the promotion comes out ahead since it won't have to cope with the logistic nightmare of competing with the Rio+20 conference. More important, a stateside Silva-Sonnen 2 fight will garner heavier media attention and potentially boost pay-per-view numbers for a card that's already stacked.

Nevada

Las Vegas needed major fights, and they just landed a marlin. UFC 148 was already stacking up as a solid offering and the addition of Silva and Sonnen to an event that featured Dominick Cruz defending his title against Urijah Faber and Tito Ortiz in a retirement bout against Forrest Griffin guarantees fans will flock to the sun-scorched city.

Sonnen

How could he not be? The challenger goes from needing to negotiate treacherous waters to remaining in the U.S., away from hostile Brazilian fans. The only stumbling block could be Sonnen's attempt to gain a therapeutic use exemption for his testosterone replacement therapy, but Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director Keith Kizer is already on record saying he doesn't believe there will be any hiccups to the licensing process.

LOSERS

Brazilian fans

This was setting up to be a mega-event for Silva's countrymen, many of whom are now understandably upset. How could they not be? They lost the chance to watch arguably the best mixed martial artist of all time fight in a packed soccer stadium against the closest thing he has to an arch rival. By extension: Any MMA fan wanted to witness this spectacle.

Silva

It won't impact his performance in the fight, but, presuming he wins, moving the bout from Rio to Vegas certainly does dampen Silva's burgeoning stardom in Brazil. This was an unprecedented opportunity to shine in front of a nation that will soon host the Olympics and World Cup.

Nevada denies Overeem

The layers run thick but it boils down to this:

Alistair Overeem visited a doctor he claimed to know nothing about, allowed himself to be injected with something he claimed ignorance of, and subsequently tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone.

There is no one to blame but himself. Go ahead and point fingers at Dallas-based Dr. Hector Oscar Molina if you want. He is not above reproach here, obviously, but he also didn't force himself on Overeem.

For losing out on a UFC title fight against Junior dos Santos next month. For seeking treatment from Dallas-based Dr. Molina, who admitted to mixing a water-based testosterone cocktail for the Greek statue of a heavyweight he claimed was designed to treat a rib injury. For taking one injection. And then another. For such willful ignorance, especially when he owed Nevada two tests at a time and place of their choosing.

In a way, don't you hope Overeem attempted to cheat the system? I mean, at this stage of the game, it's basically expected and would at least provide an explanation for this mess. Otherwise, the alternative is to believe Overeem is oblivious and stupid.

Lombard leaves, Bellator show's hand

Put up or shut up time for Hector Lombard.

Finally.

After Bjorn Rebney and his partners decided against matching an offer sheet from the UFC for the Cuban's services, the now-former Bellator middleweight champion will get every chance he deserves to prove he's the world's best middleweight.

I have my doubts he'll make much of a dent against the type of competition he's soon to face. Is Lombard (31-2-1) better than Rousimar Palhares or Alan Belcher, who fight May 5 on FOX? I don't think so. But this is the great part: We don't have to "think" about it anymore; let the speculation end.

Bellator's choice is worth dissecting because it says something about the way they're conducting business, and could foretell Eddie Alvarez's chances of remaining with the promotion four months from now.

Bellator essentially would have been forced into the pay-per-view business had they matched the UFC's offer for Lombard. That's a huge advantage Zuffa owns over its potential competitors, because no one other than the Las Vegas-based juggernaut can seemingly compel consumers to buy a fight. Bellator hasn't even tried, though they may at some point.

If not, Zuffa will just poach away fighters they want, like Alvarez, and there's not much Rebney will be able to do about it.

UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones has confirmed that, under normal circumstances, he would have been happy to step up and fight the heavyweight champion at UFC 146, but not if that champion is Junior Dos Santos. More »

Dana White’s twitter account says Frank Mir will still be fighting Cain Velasquez on May 26. Just about everything else, though, suggests otherwise.

In a response to a fan on the social networking site Friday, the UFC president wrote, “Cain vs. Mir will happen,” referencing the UFC 146 co-main event scheduled for next month.

Many interpreted White’s statement as the end of speculation that Mir would be the one to replace Alistair Overeem in the night’s main event, should he fail to receive a license from the commission after recently failing a random drug test in Las Vegas.

As much fun as it’s been for fans to rally behind Mark Hunt or fantasize about the sight of a certain Russian in the Octagon, once May 26 rolls around, chances are we’ll be right back where the speculation started -- meaning, with Mir.

Am I calling White a liar? Not exactly. What, then, did that tweet mean exactly?

Remember for a second how White found out that Overeem, a man who’s faced accusations of steroid use in the past and was barely licensed for his UFC debut against Brock Lesnar, tested hot.

It was right before he was scheduled to hop on a conference call with members of the Canadian media. So, you’ve got the UFC president finding out one of his major summer fights is in jeopardy moments before entering a setting where anything he says becomes very public.

The situation led to a few very candid responses from White on how he felt about the news. He was admittedly “beyond p---ed.” He implied Overeem to be “an absolute moron,” and even hinted the promotion might cut him.

Nothing wrong with those statements -- except that Overeem isn’t quite cooked yet. The UFC is committed to seeing what happens when he applies for a license on April 24 before it moves on.

Even though the likelihood of Overeem getting a license is downright awful, it certainly doesn’t help his small chances if the president of the promotion basically acknowledges his guilt before the hearing.

Clearly, White is not in the wrong for saying what he did. Seems like a rather large majority agrees with him. It does the UFC no good, though, at this time. Watch. It’s unlikely White, or any other UFC spokesman, says anything negative regarding Overeem until after the hearing.

So, it’s possible that by saying, “No, the most obvious choice to replace Overeem -- Mir -- isn’t being considered,” is actually an attempt to say, “Well, hopefully no replacement will be necessary at all.”

The reason everyone pegged Mir as Plan B is because he’s the only viable option -- from a competitive standpoint, marketing standpoint, common sense standpoint.

Until the UFC announces “Dos Santos vs. Mir,” nothing is certain. If you’re Mir, of course, continue training with Velasquez in mind -- but don’t be afraid to schedule a boxing session, too. Just in case.

As he prepares to take on Alexander Gustafsson on Saturday at the UFC’s first-ever show in Sweden, Thiago Silva finds himself at an interesting time to return from a drug suspension.

Or -- in the interest of accuracy, I guess -- a drug-related suspension.

After all, Silva didn’t get handed a one year ban from competition for shooting an illicit substance into his spine prior to UFC 125 so much as what he did to try to cover it up. Instead of taking the rap for the injectable itself, Silva opted for what is probably the most hilarious way to fail a commission administered drug test: Submitting a sample that ultimately proved “inconsistent with human urine.”

If you know you’re going down, might as well go down in flames, right?

At the time, we all had a good laugh. Fast forward a little more than 12 months, however, and Silva is about to step back into an MMA landscape riddled with high-profile steroid scandals. After Quinton Jackson voluntarily confessed to hormone replacement therapy, Cristiane Santos got pinched for using an old school bodybuilding drug and Alistair Overeem submitted a urine sample consistent with a human who is totally jacked out of his mind on testosterone, fight fans could conceivably be in a fairly unforgiving mood these days.

There is no telling how this second tour of duty might go for Silva. With a record of 14-2 (now with one no contest), his only previous losses came against former 205-pound champions Rashad Evans and Lyoto Machida but he also hasn’t exactly defeated a “who’s who” of top talent during his UFC career.

Prior to his suspension, Silva had bounced around the outskirts of the light heavyweight top-10, but after spending a year forcibly removed from the action, his most notable Octagon wins over the likes of Keith Jardine, Houston Alexander and James Irvin suddenly don’t seem overly extraordinary anymore. Most recently, he’d also been slowed by the back injury he eventually blamed for his drug use.

Silva remains something of an interesting talent, but the lack of big wins, the injury trouble and the drug suspension all make it difficult to nail down what kind of future he might have.

Luckily for him, his employer appears ready to forgive past transgressions, accepting his time served and inserting him directly into a nationally televised main event bout against Gustafsson in his first fight back. Even if it is one where Silva enters as close to a 2-to-1 underdog against a hometown hero who some observers expect to mature into a future foe for champion Jon Jones, it’s probably a better assignment than Silva might’ve expected, or deserved.

Perhaps such surprising post-suspension treatment can be chalked up to good behavior. Fact is, Siva was actually refreshingly honest about his drug snafu, at least once it became clear that officials had him dead to rights.

“I used a urine adulterant when giving a sample following my fight with Brandon Vera,” Silva said last year via a prepared statement. “I did so in an attempt to alter the results of the test and knowingly broke the rules of the Nevada [State] Athletic Commission. This was a terrible decision on my part for which I will be punished. I am prepared to accept this punishment, learn from it and move on. I apologize to the commission, the UFC, Brandon Vera and the MMA fans.”

For an MMA drug test mea culpa, that’s about as good as it gets. In light of it, perhaps fans and promoters alike will be willing to give Silva a second chance.

Make that a last chance, as he prepares to reenter a culture that by now should be about one steroid scandal away from its breaking point.

Alistair Overeem hasn't spoken publicly since news broke Wednesday that he tested positive for an increased testosterone-to-epitestosterone ratio. He probably doesn't have to for Josh Barnett to understand what the 31-year-old Dutch heavyweight is feeling right now.

Barnett, of course, paid a heavy price when he failed a prefight drug test in California almost three years ago. Lost was a huge payday against Fedor Emelianenko, then ranked No. 1 in the division and widely considered among the best competitors in mixed martial arts. The loss of the fight was also the impetus for Affliction Entertainment going under, a situation that rattled the business, fostered the growth and subsequent decline of Strikeforce, and eventually led to Zuffa's move to consolidate the industry.

It's unclear what penalties Overeem will suffer, but similar to Barnett (32-5) he could easily surrender a huge payday as well as the most important fight of his career -- a UFC title tilt against Junior dos Santos. Hey, at least he doesn't have to worry about bringing down a promotion, though he might not be around to partake in UFC's continuing prosperity.

Still, with dark clouds currently hanging over his head, Overeem should take solace in the notion of Barnett's return the UFC for the first time in a decade -- the message being: No matter how badly someone messes up, Zuffa is prone to forgive under the right circumstances.

Barnett's new lease on a UFC life is incumbent on defeating Daniel Cormier on May 19 to cap off the Strikeforce heavyweight grand prix tournament. If that happens, UFC president Dana White has suggested that the 34-year-old American could enter the Octagon for the first time since stopping Randy Couture in 2002 to claim the promotional title.

How would he fare against the men ranked above him (which for the time being continues to include Overeem)?

Frank Mir

At stake would be the title of best submission grappler in the heavyweight division. Mir, 32, may have usurped that title by breaking off a piece of Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, and you know Barnett would love the opportunity to make a point against the former UFC heavyweight champion.

On the floor it's essentially an even fight, though Barnett is much better when he fights from the top. Mir's strength comes in attacking arms. Barnett can do that too; he just prefers the leg techniques born out of catch-wrestling. I can't help but think a grappling-heavy fight between the two would be incredibly appealing.

Both have shown the ability to hurt opponents while standing, but Mir (16-5) owns a slight edge here based on recent results.

If they fought 10 times ... they'd split.

Cain Velasquez

Barnett would carry a significant experience advantage over Velasquez (9-1) and he wouldn't get pushed around by a mid-sized heavyweight.

Barnett utilizes his size and athleticism to squash other grapplers, and if Velasquez winds up on his back he may not stand up or get a reversal. You do not want to face a situation where Barnett establishes top control. He is much more dangerous from the top than Brock Lesnar ever was because he'll string together submissions, is very adept at guard-passing, and is happy to grind away at someone's facial features with his elbows.

Barnett cedes ground in this matchup when it comes to speed, striking technique, and pure wrestling. Velasquez, 29, would have to keep moving against Barnett, never let the bigger man tie him up in the clinch, especially along the fence, and stay off bottom. That's obviously the key.

If they fought 10 times ... Velasquez wins 6 of 10.

Alistair Overeem

Filling a column full of "ifs," Overeem's status remains the largest. So in this scenario, the reprieve Barnett could receive from Dana White extends to Overeem.

Now to the matchup. Overeem is a different class of striker, and while Barnett might be tempted to engage the Dutch fighter's strength it would be a mistake. Getting Overeem (36-11) to the floor isn't easy. Toying around in the clinch, which Barnett does not mind doing, might result in a rocket of a knee puncturing his midsection. Barnett does not react well to body shots, as proven by Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic, so that could be a major factor.

Barnett has to put the fight on the floor and push the pace against Overeem, whose stamina can be a question mark.

This is a violent matchup, one that surely wouldn't last the distance.

If they fought 10 times ... Barnett wins 6 of 10.

Junior dos Santos

The current UFC heavyweight champion is all about speed, movement and anvil-like punches. He's as tall as Barnett with about 25 less pounds to move around.

Barnett would lose if he stood with dos Santos, simple as that. The question is, can he take the 27-year-old Brazilian champion down without absorbing too much damage?

Barnett would be best served by roughing up dos Santos (14-1) against the fence, fighting for takedowns (just not from the outside so dos Santos can counter with knees or sprawl on the American's head), and establishing top control. Presuming he can do those things, he can win. Otherwise chances are good he'd be rendered unconscious.

If they fought 10 times ... dos Santos wins 7 of 10.

Another day, another hot urine test, another busted main event ... and, alas, another (potential) domino sequence. So continues life in the mixed martial arts.

This time it’s Alistair Overeem who raised the red flag, the very same Overeem who eluded such conflict ahead of UFC 141 by simply skipping a mandatory drug test. If nothing else, this is a man who knows how to poke at the chest of scrutiny. Overeem showed up March 27 for the UFC 146 hype conference in Las Vegas apparently unaware that this could be a perfect moment for the Nevada State Athletic Commission to spring a “random” test on him (part of the deal from the Brock Lesnar fight fallout). Out of six heavyweights tested, only Overeem’s came back positive. His testesterone/epitestosterone registered a 14:1 ratio, more than double the particularly generous threshold in Nevada of 6:1.

So much for the biggest fight of his career. And all that promotional material the UFC was creating, the big pay day, the belt he could have added to his collection? Moot.

As Dana White said upon hearing the news, he doesn’t have a plan B. Meaning, at least at the time of this writing, waiting out Overeem’s “B” sample becomes the plan B by default. Problem is, those results could take a couple of weeks to get back, and “B” samples rarely contradict “A” samples anyway. But the show must go on. White has said that dos Santos will defend his title at UFC 146 whether it’s against Overeem or somebody else.

In other words, it’s time to speculate into these somebody else’s, and -- just for theatrical value -- assess their chances in carefully considered odds.

Frank Mir

The NSAC’s Keith Kizer sent out the mass email at 4:40 p.m. ET with the results of the UFC 146 news conference tests. Twitter went wild. At 6:15 ET, Mir released a statement via email saying, “I would be excited if given the opportunity to compete for the UFC’s heavyweight title at UFC 146 if the reports released earlier today regarding Alistair Overeem failing his "A" sample drug test are true.” Mir went on to say it’s a dream of his to be the first three-time champion. He swooped in quicker on a dangling title shot than he did on Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira’s ill-placed limb.

His case: How many times have we heard Dana White say he admires it when guys step up? That’s what Mir’s doing. A no-hesitation lobby job, knowing that out of the full panoramic spectrum of heavies he has the best credentials to get the shot, having won three in a row. He also snapped dos Santos’ friend Big Nog’s arm, which makes him a sort of dark cloud gathering over the champion.

Chances of him getting it: 2-1

Cain Velasquez

Velasquez had the belt for 13 months, but lost it in the 64th second of his first title defense against dos Santos. How’s that for anticlimax? Though a rematch between Velasquez and dos Santos might appear sort of uninspired, the fact is, there were conditions.

His case: Velasquez was dealing with a bum knee that night in November, but couldn’t back out of a fight that was hyped as the biggest thing since Frazier/Ali across FOX platforms. It was a red carpet affair, the long-stemmed aperitif to the seven-year network deal, the bonus bout meant to tempt the semi-curious masses into peeping. Whether coaxed or not, he went through with it, and lost. Everybody knows we didn’t see the best Cain Velasquez that night, just as everybody knows we probably would this time through.

Chances of getting it: 3-1

Mark Hunt

It seems ridiculous to even type Mark Hunt in this space, but Hunt is a fan favorite and a surprisingly popular choice for the gig. Have people lost their marbles in wanting to see a resurrected 38-year old New Zealander step in there with the champion? Is this not a meritocracy? The answer is no: This is a pinch. And so long as Hunt is a nice guy, a long-shot Cinderella and a bad basher to boot, he’ll get the sentimentalist’s vote. We’re a nation of softies.

His case: Hunt was a liability to the UFC when he came over, a barnacle on the Pride purchase. Hunt lost to Sean stinking McCorkle in his Octagon debut, further exacerbating the situation. Then the unthinkable started happening. Hunt knocked out Chris Tuchscherer, decisioned Ben Rothwell, and then flattened Cheick Kongo. Talk about resuscitation! And here we thought we had lost him.

Chances of getting it: 15-1

Dan Henderson

Henderson as a candidate sort of slowly dawned on people. It went like this -- “Henderson? LOL!” to “isn’t he waiting for Jon Jones-Rashad Evans to play out?” to “you know something, that dude’s batty enough to do it” to “Hendo would plant JDS into the soft earth!” The truth is, Henderson has flirted with the idea of fighting at heavyweight -- which he’s done before, most recently against Fedor Emelianenko in Strikeforce -- and he doesn’t concern himself with the usual neuroses of modern day fighters (short notice, size discrepancies, JDS’s mangling hooks). Why? You tell Henderson he can’t do something, he gets defiant. It’s his most admirable trait. And he likes money, which is his more cliché one.

His case: Besides willingness? He wouldn’t have to cut weight. He could still feasibly keep his spot in line at light heavyweight regardless of outcome with the relative meshing of schedules and the dearth of viable contenders behind him. Remember that he fought Quinton Jackson (205) and Anderson Silva (185) in back-to-back title challenges in 2007-2008.

Chances of getting it: 12-1

Fedor Emelianenko

This is more of a fan’s choice than a UFC one. Dana White reluctantly gave into the idea of signing Emelianenko a couple of years ago, offered him wheelbarrows of cash that would turn other comparable fighters faces purple with rage, and was rebuffed. White’s assessment then -- that Fedor's people were crazy and crooked -- is probably his assessment now. Negotiations between M-1 and the UFC ride along the Cold War divide. But given that White’s running refrain has always been to give the people the fights they want to see, you can’t just accept it as impossible. Fedor still has his legions. He still sells.

His case: What, beating Jeff Monson over the course of three rounds doesn’t say it all? Flattening Satoshi Ishii doesn’t carry the right momentum? The “Last Emperor” and a million loyalists care what you think. And besides, the idea of Fedor against Junior dos Santos has something beyond novelty appeal. In the spirit of a fight, it has actual curiosity.

Chances of getting it: About the same as the Ukraine opening up Chernobyl as a tourist attraction next week.

As of Thursday morning, fans, regulatory officials and MMA media were still waiting to hear from Alistair Overeem.

A lot of people seem eager to know what the hulking Dutch striker has to say for himself after a recent round of surprise drug tests reportedly caught him with a T/E ratio befitting an in-his-prime Ultimate Warrior.

Not me, though. To tell you the truth, I’m over this nonsense.

Somewhere between Cris Santos asking us to believe that an anonymous teammate secretly slipped her steroids and Quinton Jackson shouting to the world about how good he feels now that he’s on testosterone replacement therapy, I realized I just don’t care to hear the excuses anymore.

I suppose we have to allow for the slim possibility that “The Reem” has some heretofore unused and thoroughly compelling reason for why his urine is essentially pure testosterone, but I wouldn’t bet on it. Unless the Nevada State Athletic Commission suddenly completely retracts the report of his positive test, I’m afraid the giant, freakishly muscular cat is out of the bag for Overeem, and it’s probably never going back in.

For the man whose latest alias -- “Ubereem” -- now seems fairly unseemly, a positive steroid test is perhaps more damaging than for any other fighter in MMA. When you make the transition from so-so, waif-thin light heavyweight fewer than 10 years ago to enormous heavyweight juggernaut with the body of Greek god and an 11 fight win streak, that’s just the price you pay.

Over the years, we’ve seen certain guys rehabilitate their images after drug testing irregularities: Chris Leben did it; Nate Marquardt is in the process of doing it; maybe Thiago Silva has a chance. Unfortunately, that option might not exist for Overeem.

Certainly, unless something substantial changes about this story soon, the UFC can’t put him back in the cage. Not ever. Not after this turn of events appears to confirm years of suspicion.

At this point, the fight company might be best served to just release Overeem outright, replace him with Frank Mir in his upcoming title fight against Junior dos Santos and let us all go on with our lives.

This is the right move because the implications of Overeem’s positive test go far beyond this one incident. This single violation actually casts significant doubt on the entire last half decade of his career. It also raises important questions about fighter safety when a guy that big, that strong and that dangerous is found to be enhanced.

Can you imagine the field day the mainstream media would have if an MMA fighter was injured or (God forbid) killed in a high-profile bout and his opponent was determined to be on steroids? That’s a chance the UFC absolutely cannot take and that’s just one reason why it can’t let Overeem fight again.

In addition, this positive test sheds unflattering light on the two and a half years he spent padding his record overseas after beating Paul Buentello for the Strikeforce heavyweight title in 2007. It makes the “misunderstanding” regarding drug testing for his UFC debut in December look awfully shady. It even raises questions about the legitimacy of his win over Brock Lesnar at UFC 141, when he fought in Nevada under a “conditional license” pending further testing.

After years of rumor and innuendo, after a bunch of tough talk about how “they can test me all they want ... I will prove everyone wrong,” failing a drug test is pretty much Overeem’s Waterloo.

It’s pretty much DefCon One.

It’s the thing that can’t be undone.

How can Overeem possibly explain all of it away? What could he say that we haven’t already heard? What can he do now to legitimize his massive weight gain, to undermine the countless cracks about horse meat we’ll no doubt read in the coming days and to undo public perception that he cheated his way to the No. 2 heavyweight ranking in the world?

My guess: Nothing, and perhaps he should save himself the indignity of even trying.

On March 27, following a news conference in Las Vegas hyping UFC 146, half a dozen fighters were subjected to unannounced tests for drugs of abuse and, more to the point, the performance-enhancing variety.

Five of the six -- UFC champion Junior dos Santos, former titleholders Cain Velasquez and Frank Mir, as well as Antonio Silva and Roy Nelson -- came back as they should: clean.

Alistair Overeem, long the subject of speculation in regards to performance-enhancing drug use, did not.

According to the Nevada State Athletic Commission, Overeem rendered a smoking gun of a testosterone-to-epitestosterone ratio.

(The NSAC allows for a 6:1 ratio, 50 percent higher than the World Anti-Doping Agency standard. Overeem’s elevated T/E ratio was 14:1, according to the commission.)

Ironically, the last person who should have been caught off guard by the randomness of the commission's request is Overeem. The Dutch heavyweight was well aware that prior to June he owed the NSAC two urine tests at times and places of their choosing.

You remember why?

Overeem, 31, took a month to provide a suitable urine sample following a request by the NSAC leading up to his fight versus Brock Lesnar on Dec. 30. The muscular heavyweight had 48 hours from the date of the request, Nov. 17, to get himself to an accredited facility. He did not do so until Dec. 14.

A murky story led the NSAC to issue Overeem a conditional one-year license. Commissioners, right to be wary, decreed that Overeem submit himself to further testing. He was clean the rest of the way leading up to his destruction of Lesnar, earning a title shot against dos Santos that brought him back to Las Vegas just over a week ago.

Overeem, who hasn't addressed the NSAC's allegations of an elevated T/E ratio, had to consider the possibility that he would get tested.

Right?

Overeem claimed on multiple occasions that he never used performance-enhancing drugs. His massive build, the “Ubereem” effect, was a product of eating well and lifting weights.

Yet, after all that posturing, he’s seemingly dirty.

So what happened? Why the positive result? One of the worst bets in Vegas history? Was Overeem too arrogant to consider the possibility of a positive test? A false positive? What?

Overeem deserves an opportunity to respond. But will a commission that already felt toyed with remain open to whatever he has to tell them? I tend to think not. Presuming Overeem doesn’t have an unbelievably convincing argument, he’ll lose that conditional license, and perhaps even his place in the UFC. Oh yes, he’ll have to answer to his promoter too, which just unveiled its marketing campaign for UFC 146 as tickets went on sale Friday.

UFC president Dana White learned of the news while speaking on a conference call with Canadian media and was understandably apoplectic.

How could this happen? Fighters have to be so stupid to use, he said.

After being around Overeem over the years, I'm comfortable saying he doesn't come across as a stupid man. Flying into Nevada, owing the commission two tests the way he did, odds were good they’d come calling.

Overeem's test had to be the least surprising pop quiz in history.

Yet he failed.

The thing is, one could argue that UFC’s mixed-messaging on PEDs is partly to blame. At a minimum it’s become a source of growing and legitimate criticism leveled at the organization.

Take Brazilian Thiago Silva, for example. Not only did he use steroids, he attempted to deliver fake urine to Nevada officials to cover it up. And yet next week, in his first bout back, he's headlining UFC's debut event in Sweden.

If Overeem is indeed guilty of what's been accused, the UFC should do to him what they needed to do to Silva and others of this ilk. Use is rampant and the only thing that will shake fighters out of feeling like a.) it's OK to do or b.) they have to in order to compete, is alter the perception that taking this stuff is how business is done.

You do that by shaking the earth, rattling the status quo.

And isn't that exactly how White and Lorenzo Fertitta have operated the UFC for the last decade? Yet White said recently it's "impossible" to keep tabs on the drug-enhancing proclivities of some 375 fighters he has under contract. The man who wants to make MMA the biggest sport in the world claimed something was "impossible," which I didn't think was possible.

Let's give White the benefit of the doubt. Maybe it is logistically impossible and fiscally impractical to monitor everyone all the time. Maybe White is also correct when he says the matter of testing fighters belongs in the hands of the regulatory bodies, not promoters. But isn't there something Zuffa, in its role as the sport's dominant institution, could do?

Common sense -- i.e. use, get caught, bye bye -- would be a much better option and deterrent than anything currently in place -- i.e. use, get caught, come back following suspension and receive a rich fight. Repeating the latter accomplishes nothing except fulfilling some people's definition of insanity. It could be argued all this actually serves as a deterrent to preventing this sort of stuff.

Absent that, expect this garbage to persist until, eventually, something not so trivial as losing a chance to crown the UFC heavyweight titleholder as MMA's linear heavyweight king for the first time in years (a pending reality when Overeem was set to meet dos Santos) is lost. Nothing is guaranteed, of course, but it sure seems headed that way.

A couple of months from now, the UFC will go high concept.

Or at least, heavy concept.

Last week’s confirmation that a bout between Stefan Struve and Mark Hunt will open the main card of UFC 146 on May 26 means that the show will be an all-heavyweight affair. For the first time in the company’s modern history, it will put nothing but 265-pound fights on the pay-per-view portion of a broadcast.

It’s the kind of thing that’ll look great on a poster -- Five Exciting Heavyweight Fights! -- and the cherry on top will be Junior dos Santos defending his UFC title for the first time against the mountainous Alistair Overeem.

The public’s fascination with heavyweights is well-documented, so this particular promotional gambit can’t possibly hurt in the lead-up to UFC 146. Whether or not it significantly moves the needle while a slew of equally promotable, but lighter fighters are left on the undercard, though, remains to be seen.

Either way, it could be fairly instructive for the future.

Here’s the problem, though: Our preoccupation with heavyweights, aside from the sheer spectacle of it all, is rooted in boxing, where conventional wisdom dictates that the bigger the dude, the better the chance of fireworks. In MMA however, this doesn’t always translate. Sure, heavyweights can produce crowd-pleasing knockouts, but with four-ounce gloves, so too can flyweights. For the practical application of this, see: Benavidez, Joseph.

Though certainly in the running for most popular, MMA’s heavyweight division is also arguably the one most likely to let you down. Heavyweights get tired. Heavyweights are often inexperienced. Heavyweight bouts can be over before you know it, or they can slog to 15-minute decisions that seem to take an hour. In other words, in this sport, 265-pound fights are typically either great or terrible, with very little gray area in between.

That makes UFC 146 a fairly significant risk for those who shell out the dough to watch it.

The heavyweight division has produced some marvelous entertainment in recent months -- stunning comeback wins from Cheick Kongo and Frank Mir both come to mind -- but those stellar outcomes feel more like the exception than the rule.

More often than not, heavyweight MMA fights go one of two ways: They become a boat race to see who can be first to stick one in the other guy’s ear, ala dos Santos’ 64 second title victory over Cain Velasquez last November, or then they run the risk of becoming tepid and exasperating letdowns like Overeem’s decision win over Fabricio Werdum in the opening round of the Strikeforce grand prix last June.

When they're great, they're great. Worst case scenario? Well, when a heavyweight fight goes bad, there's nothing worse in all of MMA.

They can be so dreadful that fights like Gabriel Gonzaga’s epic staring contest with Kevin Jordan still haunt our dreams, even though it happened at UFC 56, a little more than six years ago. That bout was so painful that not even Gonzaga’s third round knockout victory via Superman punch could save it ... and that’s bad.

Perhaps the best testament to the reliably unreliable nature of the heavyweight division is the overall history of the UFC 265-pound title, where inconsistency, short championship reigns and freak accidents have always been the natural order of things. Stays at the top are fleeting, and they are just as likely to end with a whimper as a bang.

It’s likely there will be some great heavyweight fights at UFC 146. There is also a good chance some of the fights end up limping to the finish line. Those are the breaks when it comes to the heavies.

Personally, give me a card full of welterweights (and lighter) any day. They might not look quite as good on the poster, but they typically bring more action from bell to bell.

The biggest heavyweight fight in UFC history between Junior dos Santos and Cain Velasquez lasted a minute and four seconds. It was so brief that the coveted casual fan that tuned in to FOX that night was left with these four lonely words -- wait, so that’s it?

On the other hand, the biggest heavyweight grand prix in history has stretched on for 15 long, meandering months. When it started, Strikeforce was still a rival of the UFC’s. Fedor Emelianenko was still formidable. Antonio Silva was constructed from body parts unknown. Fabricio Werdum was still a castoff, and Brett Rogers was free of legal isues. Josh Barnett had single handedly shut down Affliction, and Andrei Arlovski was still believable in fangs. You might remember that The Reem wasn’t yet viral, and Sergei Kharitonov was still unspellable.

It was a different era when the tournament started. In fact, Daniel Cormier, who is in the grand prix final against Barnett, was the eleventh man in the field of eight. How, exactly, did we get here?

Just about all the elite Zuffa heavyweights (and Roy Nelson) will be making appearances in a seven-day span in May. The roads to spring 2012 have been very different, but between May 19-26, everybody will finally get on the same page. Schedules will sync up for matchmaking, guys who have been cordoned off from each other will be at liberty to poke their fingers in whoever’s chest they please, and the division will become one massive melting pot.

It starts with Strikeforce’s heavyweight swan song in San Jose, Calif.; and ends with the UFC’s big man extravaganza in Las Vegas. On May 19, Cormier-Barnett goes down at long, long last, before one or both head to the UFC. On May 26, Frank Mir against Velasquez, Nelson versus Antonio Silva, Alistair Overeem in a title fight with Junior dos Santos. Seven of those names belong in ESPN.com’s top 10 Power Rankings.

That’s a lot of firepower. Forget about the biggest fight or biggest grand prix in heavyweight history -- this will be the biggest single week of consolidating big men we’ve ever seen. And a week after that, we’ll be in a state of musical opponents, matching up winners with winners and losers with losers, and pitting re-emerging bodies like Shane Carwin and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira with each other.

What does it really mean, though? That we’ll finally have a division that captivates the imagination like the others, with a little more matchmaking wiggle room and a lot more overall possibility. It’s a relaunch of something, only this time something whole. Now the best heavyweights in the world are gathering under one roof. And as everybody knows, heavyweights have always carried a little extra clout in the minds of fight fans. The bigger the man, the more likely people are to stop what they’re doing to watch. It’s what happens when guys like Alistair Overeem walk around weighing two Ian McCall’s.

And Zuffa is smart to roll out this broadened division en masse like this.

If you’re going to reimagine something, do it big.

The UFC’s flyweight division was exactly one fight old when things went haywire at the top.

That’s so 2012 in the UFC. When title belts are in play, all paths look more like construction zones with detours.

This time, Ian McCall appeared as if he’d won a back-and-forth fight to advance in the shudder-speed flyweight tournament. Then the scorecards were read and it was actually Demetrious Johnson who won a majority decision, turning "Uncle Creepy’s" maestro swagger off as fast as it came on.

His depression didn’t last long.

To the chagrin of flyweight matchmaker Sean Shelby, who was in Columbus for Strikeforce some 10,000 miles away, the Australian athletic commission miscalculated the scorecards on McCall/Johnson. The result should have been a majority draw, and somewhere in the bowels of Allphones Arena in Sydney they informed Dana White, whose only response could be the obligatory tirade of profanity. They weren’t. And the disheartening thing for the UFC was that this was an eventuality it had prepared for by introducing a sudden victory round -- à la "The Ultimate Fighter" format -- to resolve any draws at the end.

But there’s no accounting for human error, and nothing much can be done in that situation except adopt the common shoulder-shrugger’s refrain: it is what it is.

Now Joseph Benavidez -- who TKO’d Yasuhiro Urushitani -- will wait for a rematch that most will be stoked to see and yet shouldn’t have to see. Flies in the Vaseline, they are. Sadly, the UFC’s newest division adds to the already algebraic complications going on with the UFC’s title pictures.

Go back a week and start there. Benson Henderson defeated Frankie Edgar at UFC 144 in a close fight to take home the lightweight strap. Seeing that it was a close fight, one that could be interpreted either way, Edgar asked for an immediate rematch. Problem is that Anthony Pettis, who knocked out Joe Lauzon the same night, wants his shot at the belt, too. He was the last man to defeat Henderson, and was at one point the solid No. 1 contender (a position he fancies himself in again). Jim Miller and Nate Diaz are operating with the understanding (delusion?) that their May 5 fight in New Jersey is a title eliminator.

It’s complicated.

Of everyone, Edgar is the unignorable here. The UFC wants him to challenge Jose Aldo for the featherweight belt, but Edgar doesn’t want to. He rematched B.J. Penn and Gray Maynard without quibbling, and he wants some return love. It’s hard to argue. Before his fight with Henderson, the UFC romanticized Edgar as a Rocky-esque figure in the hype process. Yet not even Rocky was Rocky coming off of wins. He was Rocky because of how he responded to losses. First with Apollo Creed, then with Clubber Lang. And later, after losing the vainglorious Creed to a killing machine from Russia, against Ivan Drago.

How can the UFC draw upon a man’s heart and not give him the chance to show its full dimensions? Having lost to the bigger, stronger Henderson sets the table for a truer representation of his nonfictional Rocky story.

As an extension of the uncertainty at 155 pounds and Edgar, the featherweight division is in limbo. What next for Aldo? Then you glance at the welterweight title picture, and that's way out of focus. Georges St. Pierre is recovering from ACL surgery, and is either way ahead of schedule or possibly right on schedule or something else. He is tentatively looking at a November return. Interim titleholder Carlos Condit is waiting to see something definitive in that timetable before deciding what to do next. Jake Ellenberger is waiting to see what Condit does, and now so is Martin Kampmann (the last man to defeat Condit). It’s possible we don’t see an “actual” title defense at 170 pounds this year.

By slotting Dominick Cruz against Urijah Faber as the coaches on "The Ultimate Fighter" Season 15, that means Cruz won’t defend his bantamweight belt until the summer. And that means any challengers beyond Faber -- guys like super-sensation Renan Barao -- are out of luck until winter.

As for middleweights, Anderson Silva is finally going to fight again in June after recovering from bursitis in his shoulder. There’s a chance we see just one middleweight title fight in 2012.

With eight weight divisions, and a conservative average of two fights per year, there should be in the neighborhood of 16 title fights. That won’t be the case in 2012. There might be 10, if we're lucky.

Can you imagine if Jon Jones had made good on his request to take a few months off? Light heavyweight is the closest the UFC has to a normally functioning division right now. And it looks like Junior dos Santos is ready to go, if Alistair Overeem can avoid injuries and conflicts beforehand.

Otherwise, title fights are scarce to come by this year. Which means we’ll be watching a lot more PFC (Penultimate Fighting Championship) than UFC (the Ultimate variety).

If it’s hard to gauge exactly where supporting characters like Stefan Struve and Dave "Pee Wee" Herman currently stand in the UFC heavyweight division, it’s because -- even by its own chaotic standards -- the entire weight class has experienced an unprecedented amount of flux lately.

Long the fight company’s most problematic problem child -- for years typified by injury, a mélange of delays and a revolving door of champions -- it’s almost as if someone decided to hit the reboot button on the entire 265-pound class during the last few months.

When Struve and Herman meet on Wednesday in the co-main event of the UFC on Fuel, it’ll be amid a heavyweight division that has arguably never been more interesting or more vibrant.

Or, frankly, more foggy.

Cain Velasquez had been hailed among the UFC’s new vanguard of “dominant champions” until Junior dos Santos toppled him last November, within one minute, four seconds of Velasquez's first title defense. In addition, the division saw the sudden departure of its biggest draw when Alistair Overeem sent Brock Lesnar backpedaling into retirement at UFC 141 a bit more than a month later.

Add to that the arrival of other Strikeforce big men like Fabricio Werdum, Antonio Silva and Chad Griggs (not to mention the likes of Lavar Johnson and Shane del Rosario) as well as the impending emergence of the smaller organization’s grand prix winner (Josh Barnett or Daniel Cormier) and the immediate future of this predictably unpredictable division starts to look even more volatile than normal.

We know matchmakers are hoping dos Santos and Overeem will meet at UFC 146 in May, in a heavyweight title match that couldn’t have been much more than a fantasy as recently as a year ago. Divisional stalwart Frank Mir will reportedly welcome Velasquez back from injury this summer, but after that (to quote one of MMA’s most tired axioms) anything can happen.

While all of that makes it hard to define the stakes this week between guys like Struve and Herman, it also perhaps affords them an unusual opportunity. If the 265-pound class is truly as wide open as we think it is right now, then that presents a unique opportunity for mid-carders like these two to vault up the ranks.

Struve is still just 23 years old; amazing when you consider that his nine previous Octagon appearances give him more UFC experience than anyone on Wednesday’s card besides Diego Sanchez. The 6-foot-11 striker has been plagued by inconsistency throughout his stay in the big leagues, but now 3-1 in his last four fights, Struve could certainly crack the top 10 this year if he can keep the ball rolling. His never-say-die style makes him exactly the kind of fighter UFC brass likes to promote, so it’s not impossible to imagine him becoming a contender with a few more wins.

Herman, meanwhile, saw a proposed bout at UFC 136 scuttled last year when he tested positive for marijuana long before testing positive for marijuana became the rage. He arrived in the UFC with a 20-2 record and fair amount of buzz in mid-2011, but after a fairly lackluster performance during a win over John Olav Einemo in his Octagon debut at UFC 131 (and then the weed thing), Herman is still looking for some much-needed traction in the division.

Naturally, nothing is going to happen for either of these two overnight. The winner of Struve-Herman will assumedly come out of their fight with a little momentum and the possibility of a future bout with someone a little further ahead in the pecking order. That’s about all they can hope for in this world.

If we’ve learned anything from the recent history of the division, though, it’s that forecasting where the heavyweight class will be a year, or even six months from now, is a fool’s errand.

Given its penchant for tectonic shifts, there’s just no telling where a couple of nice-looking wins might leave a young, up-and-coming fighter at this point.