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Heading into UFC 159, figuring out ways that Chael Sonnen could compete with Jon Jones required an active imagination. The leading idea on how to get it done was for Sonnen to put his chin down, stick the crown of his head into Jones’ chest and drive him through the cage floor. Once there, things would become adventurous for all parties.

It didn’t get there.

In fact, Jones turned the tables on Sonnen and shot in for a takedown of his own just a few seconds into the fight. It was Sonnen staring up at the lights, fending off oncoming elbows. He was able to get up, but Jones, out of a sense of pride and civic duty, became the kind of insistent wrestler who only Sonnen could appreciate. With half a minute to go in the first round, Sonnen’s face battered and wits scattered, Jones was pried off of the "West Linn Gangsta" in what was ultimately the most predictable stoppage in the history of ground and pound.

But in a bizarre night where Ovince St. Preux won an abrupt technical decision with an eye poke of Gian Villante, Michael Bisping won a technical decision for an eye poke of the one man whose phobia is eye pokes, Alan Belcher, and Yancy Medeiros’ thumb was rearranged into something from Picasso’s brush, it was par for the course that Jones broke his toe somewhere along the way. By the end of the night, appendages at odd angles were all but the norm.

Now we can focus on “what does it all mean,” which is one of MMA’s favorite pastimes. Let’s try to sort it out.

QUESTIONS ANSWERED

How does Sonnen compete?
Turns out our hunches were right -- he doesn’t, not when fighting a stylistic nightmare who has the wingspan of a Cessna and a chip on his shoulder.

Last time we see Jones at 205?
Because he only tied Tito Ortiz’s record of five title defenses, here’s guessing no. Lyoto Machida has been promised a rematch, and Alexander Gustafsson still has a modicum of appeal on his way up. And if Jones fights Daniel Cormier, the likeliest scenario is it happens at light heavyweight.

Can Phil Davis break through?
Davis showed improved stand-up ability from that awkward version of himself a couple of years ago. But this was a one-sided beatdown of Vinny Magalhaes, a static fighter whose own stand-up won’t swell the orchestra. Davis might be ready for a step up in competition, but he still seems light years away from challenging Jon Jones.

Is Cheick Kongo showing his 37 years?
Kongo is a dapper gentle giant outside the cage, and in his fight with Roy Nelson, he became one inside the cage, too. We didn’t see any urgency or head-hunting or even any of that rare joie de vivre. What we did see was Roy Nelson go into his windup, as if from the pitcher’s mound, and deliver a heater of an overhand right that dropped Kongo like a curtain sliding off the rod. In other words, yes, Kongo’s days appear numbered.

NEW QUESTIONS

Does Sonnen retire?
Through the last three-year odyssey in which Sonnen has captivated the world of MMA and fought for the belt three times, he made it plain that winning a championship was his singular motivation. Does he want to stick around in a grudge-match capacity to fight the Vitor Belforts and Wanderlei Silvas of the world? (Answer: Hope so. Too many delicious vendettas lingering out there for Sonnen to just walk away.)

Is Pat Healy a top-10 lightweight?
If you subscribe to the theory that divisions are essentially a Netflix queue, where you can drag a title up from the bottom and replace something already in line near the top, then yes (and I know that speaks to more than half a dozen of you). Beating Jim Miller in Miller’s native New Jersey was enough of a feat, but Healy’s pressure game is starting to look scary. At nearly 30 years old, and with 46 professional fights, Healy is just now really coming into his own.

Is Nelson a heavyweight contender?
His right hand says "yes." His surprising agility to climb the fence and do the two-handed Buddha belly rub after victories says "yes." His popularity among fans and mullet connoisseurs says "yes." And realistically, yes. Now everybody is imagining Nelson against Mark Hunt, and Nelson against Daniel Cormier, and Nelson against Alistair Overeem, and that’s a good thing.

What’s next for Michael Bisping?
In hockey patois, Bisping was clutching his stick a little tight early against Belcher, but he began to get into a groove with his striking early in the second round. It was a victory that staves off ugly circumstances and gets him rolling toward something again. Bisping has mentioned fighting in October in Manchester, and here’s thinking Cung Le would be a big draw.

THE FUTURE

For Sara McMann -- Right now it’s wide open, with the Armageddon she brought on Sheila Gaff. We know about the Olympic wrestling, but there’s something about the delight she took in the elbows she was dropping from the crucifix position that has you wondering about how she’d fare against Ronda Rousey (and that’s where McMann’s headed -- but she’ll have to stay busy with another fight or two).

For Jim Miller -- Technically, getting put to sleep isn’t a submission so much as a loss of consciousness, but losing a second time in New Jersey (the first to Nate Diaz) hurts Miller. Though he’s flirted with the idea of moving up to 170 pounds in the past, he might consider a move down to 145. Pastures are always greener in other divisions after losses like the one to Healy.

For Jon Jones -- He needs to get that toe better, but when that’s all said and done, he can officially break Tito Ortiz’s record of five light heavyweight title defenses. The dust has to settle, but the forerunners to become his next victim appear to be down to Alexander Gustafsson or Lyoto Machida (particularly if they fight each other while Jones heals to form a super-definitive, no-questions-asked No. 1 contender).

For Chael Sonnen -- The television booth, at first. But eventually Wanderlei. And Belfort. And the whole block of peeved Brazilians who are smashing their fists in their hands waiting by their phones for Joe Silva to call.

For Roy Nelson -- Daniel Cormier and great balls of fire!

Matches to make

Jon Jones versus Alexander Gustafsson -- If you're an all-or-nothing fan, Jones should heal up and wait on Anderson Silva. But more realistically, dial up the Swede.

Chael Sonnen versus Wanderlei Silva -- Sonnen's already dropping the subliminal tracks toward this fight.

Michael Bisping versus Cung Le -- The two greatest verbs in MMA are "Cung Le."

Alan Belcher versus Hector Lombard -- If 170 is too condensed for the Cuban, a run-in with Belcher at 185 might be fun.

Roy Nelson versus Daniel Cormier -- Twitter wants it. Twitter is all that matters in matchmaking.

STOCK UP/STOCK DOWN

Up
Bryan Caraway -- Only seven weeks removed from his split decision loss to Takeya Mizugaki, Caraway took out Johnny Bedford on a week’s notice with poise and strength.

Phil Davis -- He made it through the rebound portion of his career (the Wagner Prado series and now Vinny Magalhaes), and it’s right back into the kitchen fire of light heavyweight elites.

Cody McKenzie -- Hey, kudos to McKenzie for not engaging Leonard Garcia in a “Leonard Garcia” fight. His restraint was admirable.

Steven Siler -- This would have been fight of the night had Healy/Miller not turned things into Grappler’s Quest Gone Wild. Siler was too much for Kurt Holobaugh, and he weathered a big second-round storm to get the job done.

Down
Leonard Garcia -- Five losses in a row, the latest coming against a fighter who was tailor-made for getting off the schneid? Not good.

Vinny Magalhaes -- Here’s yet another lesson of “be careful what you wish for.” It was Magalhaes who called out Davis, but he had nothing for him.

Alan Belcher -- The eye poke was scary, particularly after having surgery on that same eye not all that long ago. But when you’re likely down 2-0 on the scorecards and you come out in the third with smiles instead of flurries? Not the way his corner drew it up.

NEWARK, N.J. -- In a night of strange happenings, perhaps the strangest was saved for last.

As most thought he would, Jon Jones (18-1) defended his light heavyweight title against Chael Sonnen at UFC 159 at Newark's Prudential Center, yet he did it in a prideful way -- by outwrestling the wrestler. Coming into the fight, the one bit of intrigue for the heavy favorite Jones was how he would respond to Sonnen’s constant pressure.

Instead, the 25-year old Jones took Sonnen down in the first 10 seconds of the fight, and repeated the process a couple more times before finishing him via TKO with 27 seconds left.

It was a dominant performance by the champion, who tied Tito Ortiz’s record for most 205-pound title defenses at five.

Then the revelation: In his post-fight interview with UFC commentator Joe Rogan, Jones made a gruesome discovery -- his toe appeared broken.

Jones’ left foot was shown on the arean's Jumbotron and it dawned on him and the crowd at the same time that he had a mangled toe. It seemed that Jones broke the toe while pushing off the mat on a takedown attempt.

“I felt it pop,” he told ESPN.com afterward. “But I didn’t let it slow me down.”

Just how long he’ll be out, and what this means for the 205-pound division, remains to be seen. Coming into the fight, UFC president Dana White had mentioned that heavyweight contender Daniel Cormier might be a possibility for an automatic title shot in the lower weight class. And then there was Lyoto Machida, who was in attendance on Saturday night. Machida has also been pinky sworn by White to get a rematch against Jones. But with the injury, everything goes back up in the air.

And as far as Jones is concerned, Cormier isn’t on his mind yet.

“I don’t want to give Daniel Cormier any hype right now,” he said during a postfight interview with MMA Live. “That guy ... I won’t even make a comment.”

As for Sonnen, who coached opposite Jones on "The Ultimate Fighter" and took a lot of flak for not having the credentials to get the shot to begin with, he was gracious in defeat.

“He’s an excellent fighter, I have no problem with the stoppage,” he said. “[Jones] is very powerful. When he went for the kill, he never stopped. I thought I was all right, but he is the better fighter.”

Sonnen intimated that he may contemplate retiring now that it appeared that he had his last shot at winning a title. But he wasn’t definitive on that. Coming in, the thought was that Sonnen’s only chance against Jones was to use his wrestling to put Jones on his back, like he did with middleweight champion Anderson Silva at UFC 117.

Instead, Jones turned the tables out of defiance.

“[Coach] Greg Jackson, he always teaches me to have a philosophy of ‘screw them,’” Jones said. “If people want to say you can’t do something, you say, ‘screw them.’ That’s the way I looked at the critics. Screw you guys.

“My wrestling coach told me that that they’re going to be watching, they want to see who’s the better wrestler, and everyone thinks that you can’t wrestle. I said, screw them. Let me show you guys I can wrestle. I take wrestling very seriously.”

On a night where two bouts ended in technical decisions for accidental eye-pokes, and another ended when Yancy Medeiros dislocated his thumb against Rustam Khabilov, Jones’ injury felt par for the course. It was yet another “what if” for Sonnen. Though the Jones fight was the polar opposite of Sonnen’s first fight with Anderson Silva, he once again came close to becoming the champion.

Had Sonnen survived the first round, it’s possible that Jones wouldn’t have been able to continue with the injury to his foot. In that case, Sonnen would have backed his way into a title. That would have been different from the Silva fight -- which he dominated for 4½ rounds before getting caught in a triangle/armbar with under two minutes left -- even if the nearness to the gold was the same.

For as close as that might have seemed, it was a million miles away. Jones was his usual dominant self, and he showed he can beat opponents at their own game. UFC 159’s main event was never in doubt. The only thing that is in doubt becomes what exactly happens next.

“We’ll see what happens with Jones’ [injury], and we’ll go from there,” Dana White said. But, before letting it go at that, he also dropped a bomb in the post-fight news conference. He said that Anderson Silva called -- and was asking for a fight. Was he calling out Jon Jones?

White left it for everyone to speculate, but added that it doesn't really matter right now, with Silva slated to fight Chris Weidman at UFC 162.

How’s that for timing?

All the UFC 159 promos can't do away with the most basic question: How did we get here?

The first time Chael Sonnen fought Anderson Silva, the original novelty was his utter disregard for Silva's legacy. To that point people had only been reverent of the middleweight champion -- even if Dana White was still fuming that Abu Dhabi had been turned into a stage for bad performance art by him and Demian Maia.

Along came the stock contender Sonnen, a journeyman who was proud of his singlet, the flag and his real estate license. He'd just taken the pestle to top contenders Yushin Okami and Nate Marquardt, so he had the credentials. And what a platform it was. Within days of that last victory, he became the game's most infatuating wisenheimer. It was hard to gauge his sincerity, though; did he truly believe he would walk through Silva, the mythological Brazilian who, in Sonnen's active imagination, could speak the King's English?

Turns out he did. And turns out he backed it up for nine-tenths of a five-round fight in Oakland. The other one-tenth, as you now know, is the marker that defines his career.

After the loss, the asterisks piled up as the rematch lolled on the horizon. By the time he made his way back from his suspension for elevated testosterone levels, and made it through mobile obstacles (Brian Stann and Michael Bisping), we were talking about Sonnen-Silva II as the biggest fight in MMA history. It was Ali-Frazier there for a minute. It was Silva's first real rival. It was all kinds of bandstands, bunting and pageantry.

Yet Sonnen lost the rematch, too, this time less spectacularly. He lost his footing throwing a spinning backfist.

But losing your footing is nothing when you've mastered the art of falling forward. Sonnen now faces Jon Jones for the light heavyweight belt on Saturday night. For six months we've debated the matchmaking, with pro wrestling fans calling the protectors of pecking orders anything from "naïve" to "idiots." Either way, the moment has arrived to see what's what.

And unlike in either of the Silva bouts, this time Sonnen feels like a formality between Jones and bright new ventures, things like "heavyweight" and "superfights." Jones just wants to break Tito Ortiz's record for most title defenses at light heavyweight. That number is five; Jones' magic number to tie him is one.

Sonnen is the one.

And so here we are. Sonnen gets the "third time's the charm" treatment for UFC gold. Jones gets a chance to make Sonnen a footnote in history.

FIVE STORYLINES

Bisping in vulnerable spot

In his five-year quest to fight Anderson Silva, Bisping has gotten close three times. Yet in three eliminators, he's ended up being the one eliminated three times. Should he lose to Alan Belcher to make it three losses in four fights, his middleweight title shot may go away for good. It's not a must-win for Bisping in the roster sense, but it is in the gold-plated accessory sense.

Resurgence of Roy Nelson

As one of the more popular heavyweights, Roy Nelson's mullet beefs with Dana White won't keep him from contention. A win over thunder-fisted Frenchman Cheick Kongo would make it three in a row. If he knocks out Kongo in the first round? That would be three emphatic wins in a row. At that point the jokes about Nelson's belt size will be off the hook.

Jones and history

Everything Jones does in this young sport seems to stack neatly into something historic. Now he can pad his legacy by tying Ortiz's record for 205-pound title defenses against Sonnen. He makes it all seem so perfunctory that you forget the guy is only 25 years old.

Careful what you wish for

That Vinny Magalhaes called out Phil Davis is shrouded in mystery for those of us in the fight trade. Yes he's strong and has mad grappling skills, but isn't "Mr. Wonderful" an uber-athlete whose "wrestle first" attitude is meant to nullify limb hunters? (Reading between the lines: Vinny's sense of susceptibility is stronger than our sense of conventional wisdom).

Eye on Sara McMann

Before Cat Zingano came barging into the women's bantamweight title picture from left field (read: the flatirons of Colorado), the big up-and-coming prospect to watch was Sara McMann. Why not? McMann was a silver medalist in wrestling at the 2004 summer Olympics, and is 6-0 as a pro mixed martial artist. She makes her debut against Germany's Sheila Gaff, and a win keeps the contender cupboard stocked for the winner of Rousey-Zingano.

FIVE QUESTIONS

How does Sonnen compete?

Sonnen is giving up 11 inches in reach. Sure, he can wrestle, but in 16 takedown attempts, Jones has been taken down exactly zero times. There might be an existential crisis awaiting for Sonnen in Newark. How does he compete? Can Sonnen be the maelstrom that overpowers Jones? Or, the "Chaelstrom?" Hey, you know what? The gangster from West Lynn will take off his shoes and give it a go.

Last time we see Jones at 205?

Should Jones defeat Sonnen, the question will become: What now? There aren't a lot of desirable title fights to make at 205 right now (given that a Lyoto Machida redux is the best option, and Daniel Cormier underwhelmed last weekend). Could Jones sit back and watch the Chris Weidman-Anderson Silva bout in July, with designs on a "superfight" to commemorate the UFC's 20th anniversary? Or might he bolt for the heavyweight division?

What becomes of Bisping and Belcher?

Between Belcher (12 UFC fights) and Bisping (13), that's a lot of experience in the Octagon. The winner of this bout will again cycle back towards title contention, but will either ever get over the hump? Career stakes are on the line here.

Can Davis break through?

When Davis was charging up the 205-pound ranks, he looked so raw that we kept imagining him with a couple of more years of experience. But after he got worked by Rashad Evans, our minds were no longer as blown. Of course, he spent the last year in the forgettable Wagner Prado series, but here we are a couple of years removed from those halcyon days of catching Tim Boetsch in a "Philmura." Will the Davis we see Saturday night be the one we projected we'd see a couple of years ago at this point?

Is Kongo showing his 37 years?

The answer is, no, not really. Kongo keeps chipping away, and aside from getting knocked out by Mark Hunt he hasn't lost a fight since 2009 (though it still feels like Pat Barry knocked him out before that Hail Mary heave in Pittsburgh). How good would a knockout of Nelson look? Probably enough to get him into the cage with a guy like Alistair Overeem.

WHO'S ON THE HOT SEAT

Steven Siler – Losing to Darren Elkins is one thing, but following that up with a loss to UFC newcomer Kurt Holobaugh is another. It's the way things are during a roster trim -- all deep prelimists have to get used to life on the bubble.

Nick Catone – Tough draw for Catone against James Head in a must-win fight. Yes he's back on his native Jersey soil, but his last big win was against Costa Philippou back in spring 2011. Should he lose his third in a row? Close the drapes.

Cody McKenzie – When he lets his hair down, he looks like he should be shouting "Figaro!" When he lets his hands down, he turns into a punching back (refer to the Chad Mendes fight). A loss against Leonard Garcia would make it four of five, which is short for being "made redundant."

Leonard Garcia – If you were to lift up the cushions to Garcia's couch, you'd find a lot of loose game plans that have fallen through the cracks over the years. We expect him to jettison all that hooey he learned in training when the bell rings, but problem is he keeps getting his bell rung because of it. Dana White loves himself some Garcia, but it's hard to keep around a fun-loving brawler on a five-fight losing streak.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE

Because "Bones" Jones has out-landed his opponents 330-99 in significant strikes in title fights … because Sonnen is the latest contestant to familiarize himself with the discrepancy … because Bones throws elbows from the pitcher's mound … because Sonnen will move forward until he can't … because Bisping might feel the tattoo of Johnny Cash's face squeezing his trachea ... because it'll be a drinking game challenge to tell Jim Miller and Pat Healy apart…because Magalhaes doesn't see a muscular athlete in Davis, but a dozen miles of workable limbs and neck ... because Garcia's neck is on the line against McKenzie (and in general) ... because Nelson and Kongo have no need for judges' scorecards ... because Jones is "Angry Johnny" capable of animal's grace ... yet he can do it with precision, or he can do it with gourmet taste.

The tournament format that Bellator uses isn’t for everyone. But it is for current featherweight champion Pat Curran, who navigated fields in two separate weight classes en route to becoming Bellator’s 145-pound division champion.

Curran is the prototype for what Bellator is after with its bracketology -- a standout fighter who survived the “toughest tournament in sports” in making a name for himself. He is, by default of the model, the king of attrition. And as he gets set to defend his 145-pound belt for the second time Thursday night against Shahbulat Shamhalaev in Atlantic City, Curran has become the face of the promotion.

“I don’t mind being the face of Bellator at all,” Curran told ESPN.com. “I’m the product of their format. I went through two tournaments, and I’m a big believer in that Bellator tournament format. It’s a great way for a fighter to jump levels in his game, become better and make it to a big stage and make a name for himself. That’s what I did, and that’s what [Michael] Chandler did, and we both capitalized on it.”

“

I consider myself to be a counter-striker, too. So it's a very interesting match-up in a way, but we're eventually going to have to engage and I feel like my technical inside game is going to outstrike his.

” -- Pat Curran on his upcoming fight with Shahbulat Shamhalaev at Bellator 95.

Chandler and Curran -- along with welterweight champion Ben Askren and former lightweight champion/free agent Eddie Alvarez -- begin to carry something more than titles for the promotion. They carry value. People begin to speculate as to how each would fare against the UFC elite. One way to compete with the UFC is to have fighters at the top who look like threats to the UFC champions. Could Askren beat Georges St-Pierre? Who knows, but it’s a talking point. Parallels are drawn.

That’s the rarefied space that the 25-year-old Curran finds himself in today. People begin to wonder how he’d stack up against not just Shamhalaev (of which we’ll soon find out), but Jose Aldo (inevitably on the other side of the ledger). Being linked to fantasy matchups against one of the game’s pound-for-pound bests can’t hurt. It means things are on the upswing.

Curran says he respects that, but he’s not hearing it.

“I’m really not thinking too much about that,” he says. “I made a dedication to Bellator, I re-signed my contract and I know I’m going to be there a while and be part of everything they’re doing. Being with Spike is a huge part of that as well. I know Bellator is doing great things where it’s still very early in the Bellator stage, and it’s going to get better from here on out.”

Curran recently renegotiated his contract to earn more money per fight, and he’s signed on to be with Bellator for the next “two or three years.” He won’t be facing Aldo or anybody under the UFC banner for a long time.

Instead the Crystal Lake, Ill., native will help grow and perpetuate the Bellator model. Only, he’ll come at it from the pinnacle of that model. After climbing toward Alvarez’s belt in the Season 2 lightweight tournament (and losing in the title fight), and then climbing anew in the 2011 Summer Series featherweight tournament (and capturing the title over Joe Warren via brutal TKO), he’s adjusting to life as the destination. From now on, he’ll be asked to beat back the survivors of tournaments specifically constructed to take his belt.

In essence, it’s Curran’s job to present himself as a dead-end street for featherweight traffic. To make whatever momentum comes charging at him from the tournament completely moot.

And that continues with Shamhalaev, the hard-hitting Dagestan fighter who knocked out Rad Martinez in February to earn his chance. It’ll be Curran’s second defense of the year after eking out a split-decision victory over Patricio Freire in January.

“You have to respect [Shamhalaev’s] power,” he says. “His last three fights have all been by knockout. You’ve got to respect his power in his right hand and his left hand. It’s a very interesting style -- he’s a counterstriker, but he waits, and he puts 100 percent of his energy into those punches, and he’s able to find those openings.”

“I consider myself to be a counterstriker, too. So it’s a very interesting matchup in a way, but we’re eventually going to have to engage and I feel like my technical inside game is going to outstrike his.”

We’ll find out Thursday, in a fight that is basically a cymbal crash for everything Bellator is about.

Should Dominick Cruz be stripped of his UFC bantamweight title?

It's been nearly 18 months since he won a decision victory over Demetrious Johnson. Since that fight, Johnson has fought four times and captured the inaugural flyweight belt.

Johnson has been -- to use fight game vernacular -- "circulating." That's the preferred method for UFC titlists. Keep that belt dangling over the whole clumsy gang of lunging, outstretched arms.

As for Cruz, he has gone through one rehabilitation stint to repair his blown out ACL and is halfway through another. He explained in excruciating detail the spiral of events on "UFC Tonight." There was the cadaver tendon that didn't take the first time (costing him a year), and now the second procedure, where part of his own patella tendon has become his ACL. That has sidelined him for that extended period of horizonless time we've come to call indefinitely.

It's hard not to feel for Cruz. Though he's swiftly making a name for himself as one of the best television analysts going, the date Oct. 1, 2011 keeps getting smaller and smaller in his rear-view window. That was the last time he stepped in the Octagon. In MMA, that feels like a lifetime ago -- for Cruz certainly, but particularly for the promotion.

Forget vague notions of ring rust, we're now breaking into concepts of urgency. It might be Oct. 2013 before we see Cruz again. It might be later. As much as we like to delude ourselves otherwise, life goes on without us. All of us. Even top 10 pound-for-pound fighters. The UFC, as an event-based promotion with its strongest moorings in the pay-per-view business, has to move on. To be vital, things have to be current. Things have to stay active.

That's why there's such a thing as interim titles in the first place -- though they are make-believe, they function well enough as winking placeholders. They keep things rolling, and the idea of the belt stays intact. But everybody knows that interim titles are only half-satisfying. Even when the UFC wraps a symbolic belt around somebody, we can't keep from nudging each other.

Why? It's not quite real. It's a mirage.

And after a while, that belt has to mean something. If Renan Barao, the interim bantamweight champion, is headlining a pay-per-view card in June -- which he is, UFC 161 in Winnipeg against Eddie Wineland -- wouldn't it be better to knock the adjective from the equation? Instead of "interim champion Renan Barao" -- with the interim label a constant reminder that he's a dynamic, hard-striking stopgap but not really number one -- shouldn't it be simply: bantamweight champion Renan Barao?

That sort of takes the surrogacy from things and raises the pitch to makes things seem bigger and more dire and marquee worthy. An actual champion makes it more legit. Cruz's shadow won't sell that PPV.

Which brings back the question: Should he be stripped of his title? At this point, probably, but we're dealing in asterisks either way.

It's not a Randy Couture situation where contracts are in dispute. Couture retained his belt through the whole money/Fedor Emelianenko fallout anyway. There isn't any acrimony here. Cruz's situation is closer to the Frank Mir case back in 2004. Mir, after winning the UFC's heavyweight title against Tim Sylvia at UFC 48, was in a motorcycle accident that sidelined him for 14 months. When Andrei Arlovski won the interim title against Sylvia at UFC 51, the idea was to marry up the belts in a fight with Arlovski and Mir. Same as with Barao and Cruz.

Only, Mir (knee, leg) wasn't ready when the time came. As a result, he was stripped of his title to keep the heavyweight belt in play. Not the less meaningful placeholder title, but the newly made legitimate real McCoy.

Heavyweight is a lot more glamorous than bantamweight -- particularly at that time, back when there were only a few divisions -- but the situations are similar. It wasn't Mir's fault that he couldn't recover in a timely fashion, and it's not Cruz's either. But if Barao is going to headline a PPV, he can't be masquerading as a champion. He should be one.

So what happens next?

In London a few weeks back, after Barao's first interim title defense against Michael McDonald, Dana White said he'd have a meeting with Cruz to discuss all this. White told ESPN.com on Thursday that he hasn't yet had a chance to have that meeting.

That day is coming, though, and relatively soon. When that discussion happens it will likely center on this: Barao has defended the interim title once, and Cruz isn't quite ready. Make Barao the champion ahead of his next title defense, and let Cruz work his way back towards him. After all, once Cruz finally does make his way back, how fair would it be to stick him in there right away to defend against Barao?

That's a tall order for a guy coming off a lengthy rehab with so many affiliated question marks. Might be better to cede now, and take back what's rightfully his when momentums have had a chance to align.

Jon Fitch wasn’t good enough for the UFC, but he’s (apparently) worthy of an automatic title bid in the World Series of Fighting.

In MMA, perception is everything. Not that Josh Burkman, who knocked out Aaron Simpson at WSOF 2 on Saturday to “earn” his own shot, is a fan of the idea.

Burkman thinks Fitch needs to beat somebody within the promotion before he can barge into the place and think about titles. Fitch, who was 14-3-1 in the UFC and will debut in June, has the greatest credentials never to be taken seriously. He has never known the red carpet treatment, either, so why should he now? Remember when he was about to fly off to join the cast of the original “Ultimate Fighter,” only to be told -- while sitting on the tarmac -- that he didn’t make the cut?

Life hasn’t always been pretty for Fitch. This is why he’s always gnashing his teeth.

Of course, Burkman may be forecasting here. He may be thinking about the task of trying to get up from under Fitch’s onslaught of elbows. He may be thinking of the futile nature of simply “trying to stand back up” against Jon Fitch. Of the 14 wins Fitch scored in the UFC, 14 opponents were saddled with the project of staying off their backs against Fitch heading in. Fourteen found themselves on their backs come fight night anyway.

Burkman may sense something inevitable.

But Burkman won’t ultimately decide who fights for the inaugural welterweight belt at WSOF. The decision will be up to WSOF president, Ray Sefo. If Sefo says Fitch, then it’s Fitch. If he says it’s Burkman versus Fitch, Burkman should just be happy his name isn’t Abercrombie. Imagine the confusion that those posters would generate?

You know what would be novel, though? Have Burkman against Fitch just for the heck of it. Don’t make it about glorified accessories like the other clubs. Don’t create world titles. Just have the best guys go toe-to-toe. Tear down partitions, and put on “intrigue fights.” Have Burkman and Fitch fight just because it’s logical, at this point in time, to have them fight.

Imagine an MMA utopia that goes about business without the tyranny of gold-played belts. Where guys are free to roam weight classes in pursuit of the best, most ridiculous scenarios. Like former welterweight Anthony Johnson against former UFC champion Andrei Arlovski, perpetuated.

Bizarre = fun.

If Quinton Jackson joins the ranks, or Josh Barnett -- or whoever, as there will be plenty -- the idea should be that they join a pool of possibilities. Rather than former UFC fighters coming over to resurrect themselves as contenders and/or champions in a different setting, they enter the salt mines, baby.

Or something like that.

WSOF has a chance to build itself any way it wants. Why not do fan-friendly fights that are strictly about fan friendliness? Have people fight -- not desperately, but happily -- for simple relevance. The alphas will always stand out anyway. Who knows, it might be a lure, too. Those who hate structure can come to the Wild West, where fantasy matchmaking happens. The WSOF could make it about the best names that couldn’t get at each other in the UFC (or elsewhere) coming together under their own banner. Anthony Johnson wants to fight “Rampage?” All too easily arranged. Marlon Moraes against, say, Bibiano Fernandes? Roll it out. Tyrone Spong against just about anybody from 205 pounds on up?

Here’s a league of pure hospitality.

It’s a thought. And, really, it’s not a very original thought, as I’ve seen MMA Fighting’s Ariel Helwani and others tweet similar ideas about a titleless landscape.

Ultimately there’s nothing that says you have to have belts at the top of every weight class. Belts exist for a reason. They mean money. It’s a game of thrones. We like belts and speculating on the hierarchy of contenders and to have belts hanging over all proceedings like surveillance cameras. But the UFC does that already. So did Strikeforce (mostly) and so does Bellator (periodically). To do that, you have to fill in weight classes and harvest talent. That’s hard to do in the current landscape, not to mention tedious. That line of thinking “competes” with the UFC.

So make it about putting on the best available fights just for the sake of putting on the best available fights. If Josh Burkman doesn’t think Jon Fitch deserve a title shot, fine -- remove the politics from the equation. Get rid of the notion of belts. That’s so un-UFC. Would you have cared more if Arlovski/Johnson was for the heavyweight title? Probably not. They are, very consciously, UFC retreads (Arlovski even wore a UFC glove).

But that an unthinkable pairing should come together at WSOF gave it a fresh coat of intrigue. And you know what? That sort of matchmaking doesn’t need titles.

The UFC wants to pare down its roster, and right now fighters are helping in the quest. Over the past couple of weeks, three more drug tests have come back hot. Alex Caceres for marijuana metabolites. Riki Fukuda for a cocktail of stimulants. Lavar Johnson for elevated testosterone.

It’s always something. Sometimes that something feels like nothing. Sometimes it feels like something.

In these cases, Caceres, a first-time offender, was suspended for six months. Fukuda was cut, not because of the failed drug test, the UFC says, but because he’s on a losing streak. And Johnson was cut due to an unfortunate mixture of both. Before them in recent months were Matt Riddle (marijuana again, cut), Thiago Silva (marijuana, suspended), Stephan Bonnar (steroids again, now retired), Rousimar Palhares (elevated testosterone, suspended), Joey Beltran (steroids, cut), Jake Shields (mystery, suspended) and Thiago Tavares (anabolic steroid, suspended).

Before them were Alistair Overeem, Cristiane Santos, Muhammed Lawal, Rafael Cavalcante and a long ellipses more.

As for Nick Diaz? Let’s just say the colors on the roulette wheel go round and round. He’s a perpetual state of pending.

With all the hype leading up to a fight, drug tests have become the kind of drama that lives on far afterward. And what a word “drugs” has become. If we’re being real, marijuana gets stashed in a fun folder called “recreational,” while steroids and spiked testosterone levels are filed away under “dirty rotten cheats.” One is a form of silly, the other manipulates.

Everybody knows that, right?

Hmm. Problem is that the suspensions (from the commissions) and the general fallout (from the UFC) don’t necessarily discriminate. Illegal is illegal with both parties, though most commissions are consistent (and non-differentiating) with punishment for failed drug tests and the UFC is inconsistent (differentiating but moodily) for them.

The bridge? Maybe UFC vice president of regulatory affairs Marc Ratner, who has begun to point out the folly in sentencing marijuana and PED violators as equals. He spoke up about it at a Nevada State Athletic Commission hearing this week, saying that he “cannot believe a PED and marijuana are treated the same. It does not make sense to the world.”

Ratner is dialed in.

The world has common sense. The world has a loose and general understanding that pot isn’t taken to achieve competitive advantage (and taken seems like such a strange word to use -- who takes pot?), while the other is harmful, dangerous and taken precisely to gain an advantage. Steroid cycles go about outsmarting surveillance systems.

Pot? No way, dude. I’m not a doctor, but pot is an afternoon of video games. It hardly carries the stigma it once did, and it's being legalized in certain states. Not to be facetious, but where testosterone helps 34-year old men perform like 24-year old men, your appetite is the only thing that performs like it’s 19 years old on pot. Is it a painkiller? Maybe. Then again, a six-pack of Molson could be, too. More importantly, is it anything like a painkiller come fight night? Most pot cases are all about those long-lingering metabolites, which have little (or nothing) to do with the event itself.

Should they be treated the same? These things aren’t equal. It’s time that the NSAC and other commissions recognize the difference. Same goes for the UFC, which has recently vowed to crack down on PEDs. Granted, so long as marijuana is tested for, fighters should know better than to jeopardize their careers by smoking it. It’s still a dumb move. Should it even be tested for? That’s a different can of worms, and it’s easy to argue no. Right now, though, it is.

And since it is, it’d be nice if the punishment fit the crime for violators. It’s not hard math. PEDs show up for the express purpose of making an impact on fight night. Pot, on the other hand, is incidental. They share the taboo of being banned, but they have extremely different motives.

Those motives are the heart of the matter.

MONTREAL -- For everything the Georges St-Pierre-Nick Diaz bout wasn’t -- enthralling, competitive, an out-and-out war -- Georges St-Pierre versus Johny Hendricks just might be. And that’s the silver lining after UFC 158, where wolf tickets and dark places finally converged.

Hendricks was victorious over former No. 1 contender Carlos Condit on Saturday in Montreal, and made his case (yet again) for a fight with St-Pierre. Unlike when he defeated Josh Koscheck and Martin Kampmann, this time everybody -- including UFC president Dana White -- seems to be on board with the idea.

“There’s no doubt, as far as the welterweight division is concerned, Johny Hendricks is next in line,” White told ESPN.com moments after UFC 158 wrapped up. “As for a superfight with Anderson Silva, that’s up to Georges St-Pierre. If Georges came out today and said he wanted to fight Anderson Silva, I won’t be upset about it.”

With Silva booked to fight Chris Weidman in July at UFC 161, Hendricks is finally the guy. He and Condit went toe-to-toe for three back and forth rounds, with Hendricks using his All-American wrestling in spots throughout to control the action. Other times he pursued Condit across the cage winging huge left hands, some of which found their mark. Each time Condit truly pressed the action, he was dumped on his back. When they stood, the exchanges were fierce.

It was good enough for "fight of the night" honors. More important, it really pushed Hendricks (15-1) over the edge as a legitimate contender for St-Pierre.

Suddenly, Hendricks’ punching power, combined with his ability to dictate the fight, looks very interesting against the champion. It feels like a battle of strong nullifying wrestlers who can throw hands. Hendricks feels like an actual threat to the throne.

“I think [Hendricks] is fantastic, and he’s a great athlete and he deserves a shot,” said St-Pierre’s coach Firas Zahabi. “I don’t make those decisions, though -- it’s the UFC, it’s the management. I’m pretty confident it’s going to happen. I think it’s going to be a great fight.”

“He’s a great wrestler, good power,” added St-Pierre, who was eating a slice of pizza and feeling good after so many weeks of animosity toward Diaz. “We’ll see what’s going to happen. Obviously I want to fight the best.”

After his eighth title defense (50-45 on all scorecards over Diaz), St-Pierre is finding himself almost too far ahead of the competition. Carlos Condit was hoping for a rematch with St-Pierre, but it never felt like the UFC was behind the idea 100 percent, even if Condit had won. Diaz, who has been the bane of St-Pierre’s existence for the last year-and-a-half, promptly ended his retirement talk by telling MMA Fighting’s Ariel Helwani, “I want a rematch!”

That’s also highly unlikely to happen anytime soon. If ever.

The problem is, St-Pierre has handled everybody he’s faced over the last few years to the point that no rematch is ever truly coveted. Not a rematch with Condit, not with Diaz, not with anybody. St-Pierre wins too convincingly. These days you get one shot, and you had better make the most of it.

“If you look, he’s fighting all the best welterweights in the world, and continues to win,” White said. “I think Georges had a really great game plan. He went in there, and he stood up [with Diaz]. He went to the ground. The fight went everywhere, and he won again. I don’t know what else to say. It was a great fight.”

One might say, too great. So great that it looked lopsided. Did it feel that way to St-Pierre?

“Yeah, but he was dangerous the whole time,” he said. “It was one-sided but he put me in danger sometimes. So I always had to be aware of the danger.”

It didn’t appear that way. It was the same old dominant Georges St-Pierre. It turns out he fights the same when somebody is in his head as he does when they’re not.

“It was huge because it was such an emotional thing,” Zahabi said. “I’ve never seen Georges so emotional. He really wanted this fight. He wanted to fight Diaz before anybody else does, and I think he got his fill tonight. I don’t think he’s going to want to fight Diaz again. It’s over.”

It’s over for Diaz. It’s on for Hendricks.

MONTREAL -- The big news was that Nick Diaz showed up. Believe it or not, this was a concern after the challenger skipped Wednesday’s open workouts in Montreal. And after, you know, his history of sort of not showing up.

“Well it was either I miss that, or I miss this, but I was going to have to catch up on some sleep,” he explained right off the bat at the press conference to promote his title fight against Georges St-Pierre. His flight from Northern California touched down in Quebec at midnight Tuesday evening. Wednesday was no good for him, but by Thursday, he was at last refreshed and ready to talk.

And talk he did. Diaz careened off into subject matter that ranged from sweating out toxic water, to his outdated likeness on the UFC 158 promo posters, to point deductions being handed out for stalling and holding guys down (some psychology aimed at St-Pierre), to the UFC selling wolf tickets (“they’re selling you all wolf tickets and you people are eating them right up”).
Snake oil was never mentioned. But had it have been, it would have fit right in. “Diazisms” were a dime a dozen. St-Pierre, whose own distaste for press conferences and the redundancy of the questions was barely contained, fired back once in a while. But most questions were directed at Diaz and Dana White, who was looking down at him with a red, muted face as if to interject (or destroy him via telepathy).

Meanwhile, Carlos Condit, Jake Ellenberger and Nate Marquardt, all on the card and present, never said a word. Marquardt smiled and chuckled along with the media. Ellenberger might as well have had laryngitis. As for Condit, he did roll his eyes at one point when Diaz went off on yet another tangent.

Actually, hey, let me get out the way and post a couple of those tangential highlights. My thoughts follow in italics.


“I would like to put out the best image I could. To be honest with you I think a lot of times they make me out to be the evil guy. I fit the description of the evil villain. I think Georges fits the description of a good guy. I mean, look at my poster. No offense, but [the UFC] has had plenty of time to switch my poster. That picture of me is from years ago. Can I get one buttered up, photoshop picture on a poster?”

It’s true. The poster features a younger Nick Diaz, who is mean-mugging more than entirely necessary. Come to think of it, he has a legitimate beef here.

–- “Georges likes to say I remind him of the bullies that picked on him growing up. How many times did you have a gun to your head, Georges? How many times has somebody put a gun to your head? How many of your best friends have been shot through the chest with a .45? How many of your friends have been stomped and put to sleep in a coma? How many kids put gum in your hair?”

He reiterated a form of this in an ESPN interview. The guess here is GSP can count on one hand how many times he’s had gum put in his hair.

–- “Georges here is selling wolf tickets. Dana here is selling wolf tickets. The UFC is selling you some wolf tickets. You guys are eating them right up.”

Wolf tickets are now out-hashtagging GSP’s dark place on Twitter.

Meanwhile, White, who curtailed some of the “antagonism” headed Diaz’s way and had a semi-heated moment with MMA Fighting’s Ariel Helwani, did a good job of reminding everyone of why we were here.

“All the stuff that leads up to this thing, all the selling of wolf tickets, all the things that happen leads up to this fight -- there is going to be a fight Saturday night.”

Condit done with being cautious


There was a moment at UFC 154 when it looked like Condit was going to break the heart of Montreal when he rocked St-Pierre. It was only for about 90 seconds or so of a 25-minute fight, but it was enough to bring him to a realization: Should he get that rematch with St-Pierre, he’ll go for broke.

“In [the St-Pierre fight], I think I hesitated,” he told ESPN.com. “Sometimes I was a little bit gun shy. I just need to go back to letting it all hang out, leaving everything in the cage, and really just focusing on what I bring to the table as opposed to training for the other guy’s strengths.”

When asked if he can let it all hang out against a smasher like Johny Hendricks, who has an anvil for a left hand, Condit thought about it for a quick second before answering.

“I can, but I just have to be smart,” he said.

Potluck

ESPN’s Brett Okamoto asked Diaz if he changed anything in his use of medical marijuana after what happened last time (when he tested positive for metabolites in Nevada, and was suspended for a year).

“I think I tested for metabolite, or nanogram, or something,” he said. “I just did a little more than I did last time, so sorry if I don’t pass the test -- but I think it should work out. I’ve passed plenty of them before, unless they just weren’t testing me. I wonder how much they test people around here.”

Then he shot St-Pierre a strong, insinuating glance. What does it all mean? Not even remotely sure. But “it should work out” didn’t exactly come off like reassurance to the boss who was standing right next to him.

(White mentioned later in the media scrum that, should Diaz test positive for marijuana again, he would “probably” be cut).

Brotherly gloves

Diaz’s younger brother Nate, who will be in Nick’s corner on Saturday night, was at the press conference and speaking to media. Somebody brought up the incestuous matchmaking methods of the Canadian promotion MFC, which recently booked a fight between brothers Thomas and Mike Treadwell.

Since we all know Nate Diaz is a “Diaz brother” and not just Nick’s brother, he was asked about his thoughts on that.

“That kind of makes me sick, when you think about it. Guys fighting each other, and they’re brothers? They’re a bunch of idiots as far as I’m concerned. It’s ridiculous. Do they even know each other?”

What exactly is Georges St-Pierre's "dark place"? It has become a hashtag on Twitter for one thing -- an unlit place where St-Pierre himself never goes. Leading up to this weekend's fight with Nick Diaz at UFC 158 in Montreal, the UFC ran a slick promo package with St-Pierre cautioning Diaz about an unfathomable self within. This would have passed off as normal PPV shtick if emotions didn't turn so raw in the media call last week.

Then it became actual theater.

Diaz alternately complimented St-Pierre and spat on him, often in the same breath. St-Pierre, who is usually a picture of intense cool, came unmoored a little bit. He had trouble getting a word in edgewise as Diaz rambled on about being pampered and St-Pierre's tight shorts. By the time St-Pierre called Diaz an "uneducated fool," his dark place seemed like more than "putting American quarters in vending machines," as MMA Junkie's Dann Stupp joked on Twitter. His personal torment bubbled up to the surface for a minute for everyone to glimpse.

All of this begs the question: Is Diaz in St-Pierre's head a little bit? The answer is: of course! He can't not be. But this is all just fun with intangibles. When you think about the fight itself, it's easier to imagine St-Pierre's wrestling nullifying that "Stockton Slap" than vice versa. If Saturday night's main event goes to the ground, and St-Pierre puts the hurt on Diaz (for five rounds, or for one explosive one), the sound you'll hear might be laughter emanating from St-Pierre's dark place.

FIVE THINGS TO KNOW/STORYLINES

Jake Ellenberger as dark horse contender

The third welterweight fight on the card pairs up Jake Ellenberger with Nate Marquardt. No, a win over Marquardt won't be the same as if he had beat his original opponent, Johny Hendricks. But an emphatic victory still might launch Ellenberger into title consideration if (A) Hendricks loses to Carlos Condit, (B) St-Pierre handles Diaz and (C) the UFC thinks it's too soon to roll out Condit-St-Pierre II.

The rise of Darren Elkins

Darren Elkins wasn't a slouch as a lightweight, going 1-1 before dropping down to 145 pounds -- but he has been gangbusters since losing that weight. Elkins is 4-0 as a feather (even if you eye the Michihiro Omigawa decision somewhat suspiciously). If there's a knock, it's that all of his wins have come via decision. An exclamation point finish over Antonio Carvalho would do wonders.

The rise of Chris Camozzi

The middleweight division has gone on a long time without a Chris Camozzi to come along and mess things up. But guess what? If Camozzi gets by Nick Ring on Saturday night, he's suddenly riding a four-fight winning streak and begins to encroach on top-10 radars.

St-Pierre, Diaz as rivals

Rivalries consist of more than heated arguments and rising dander, don't they? The headlining fight between Diaz and St-Pierre is being loosely dubbed a "rivalry," even though this is their first meeting. Yes, they were booked to fight each other in 2011 before Diaz's insubordination became a thing. But a rivalry? If Diaz pulls off the upset Saturday night, then we've got a rivalry. Forget rematch -- that would open the floodgates to a trilogy.

Diaz's long layoff

Diaz will have gone 405 days between fights, which is the longest layoff of his career. Just how this will affect him remains to be seen. The longest he went before that was 314 days between his first pro MMA bout and his second, back in 2001-02. How did he respond to that gulf? By decisioning Chris Lytle. Of course, that was eons ago, when he was barely 18 years old and things like metabolites were still tucked away in their lexicons.

FIVE QUESTIONS

Can Diaz get back up?

We've seen optimism from everybody St-Pierre has faced going back to Jon Fitch. They all talk about staying off their backs, and then end up staring at the Octagon lights for five rounds (except for Josh Koscheck and Jake Shields, who couldn't see anything past the jabs crashing into their sockets). Diaz isn't known for thwarting bull rushes. But he is known to be crafty on the ground and in scrambles. Can he get back up? Aha! That's the question. Crazier, can he reverse St-Pierre and submit him on the ground?

Can St-Pierre get a finish?

It has been four years since St-Pierre finished a fight, and that was at UFC 94 against B.J. Penn. Even in that one, it wasn't overly dramatic -- Penn simply didn't answer the fifth-round bell after a steady mauling. A statistic such as that can lead to "pressure," and St-Pierre can't help but feel it. Chances are, when the fight feels comfortable enough, he'll look for the finish.

Is Hendricks next with a win?

We've been asking this same question since last year when the tulips came up in the spring and Hendricks was fighting Koscheck -- does a win get Hendricks a title shot? The answer is, of course -- maybe. Hendricks not only beat Koscheck, he salted Martin Kampmann next for good measure -- and yet here he is again opening for St-Pierre's big act. Unless the roof falls in on the Bell Centre, a win over Condit should get him that evasive title shot.

Can Diaz win a decision in Montreal?

Diaz doesn't particularly like judges, because he suspects they don't like him (see: UFC 143). But let's make something clear: If his fight with St-Pierre, a native son of Quebec, goes to the gavels, his chances of victory share a percentage with the world's most popular milk (2%). Not necessarily because of hometown favoritism (though there's that), but because can you imagine St-Pierre getting outpointed?

If Marquardt-Ellenberger goes past the first round, then what?

Your guess is good as mine. As Brett Okamoto pointed out, Ellenberger likes to throw punches with such all-or-nothing force early in fights that he's running on fumes toward the end. Then again, Marquardt has had some trouble with determined wrestlers (such as Yushin Okami and Chael Sonnen), and if patient dictation of the will is Ellenberger's tact, this thing becomes a crapshoot.

WHO’S ON THE HOT SEAT

George Roop -- Granted, losing to Hatsu Hioki (narrowly) and Cub Swanson (definitively) isn't all that bad. But a third loss in a row, against Reuben Duran (1-2 in the UFC), just as the UFC is tidying up its roster? Not good.

Reuben Duran -- See above, only reversed.

Rick Story -- Remember when he dominated Thiago Alves and was calling out Fitch and Koscheck? Distant memory. Losing to Strikeforce immigrant Quinn Mulhern would make it four losses in five fights, which is a roundabout way of saying "curtains."

Patrick Cote -- Since coming back to the UFC, he lost very unspectacularly to Cung Le and then was the victim of a series of illegal back-of-the-head blows from Alessio Sakara last time the UFC visited Montreal (remember that inexplicable brainlock?). Play the dramatic doom music: Cote is walking the plank against Bobby Voelker this weekend.

Mike Ricci -- That knockout of Neil Magny during TUF 16 was fun, but if he drops to 0-2 in the UFC by losing to Colin Fletcher, it's hard to justify his roster spot.

Colin Fletcher -- The mask. Won't. Save him.

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE

Because it's a welterweight bonanza that features the best 170-pound fighter ever (St-Pierre) ... because St-Pierre has good reason to abandon "safe" in his attempt to punish Diaz ... because Diaz doesn't do "safe," and fights off his back like a fire hose that got away from its handler ... because with Hendricks, the word "southpaw" barely describes the brute force in that left hand … because Ellenberger leaves behind his aura each time he throws a first-round punch … because that's Marquardt's chin he's aiming at … because Carlos Condit is due for a finish after going 0-for-2 in 2012 in that department … because St-Pierre's dark place becomes, for one night only, a popular destination.

A funny thing happened while Chris Weidman was in Albany, N.Y., lobbying for the legalization of MMA in his home Empire State -- he landed that long-coveted title fight against UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva at UFC 161 on July 6 in Las Vegas.

Now he can exhale. At least for a few minutes.

“Everybody’s excited for me, and I’m getting blown up like crazy,” the Long Island native told ESPN.com. “But it’s time to get organized and time to get working. I didn’t get this title shot just to be happy with that. I got this title shot to win and win in spectacular fashion, and that’s what I’m going to do.”

Good news converged all over Weidman this week. For one, he was told his shoulder, which he’d injured while training in Arizona a few months back in preparation for a fight with Tim Boetsch, was coming along ahead of schedule. Now he’s got the green light to train.

“I just spoke to my doctor on Tuesday, and he just said he was very happy at where my shoulder was at, and that he was surprised at how fast it healed,” he says. “So I’m back into the thick of things, and honestly, my shoulder feels 100 percent right now. It feels great.”

Better yet, Weidman’s path to Silva -- which has had nearly as many obstacles as the UFC’s ongoing efforts to get MMA sanctioned in New York -- finally opened up. And what an ordeal that’s been.

Back in July, after both Silva and Weidman had come off of impressive victories over Chael Sonnen and Mark Munoz, respectively, Silva was reluctant to take the fight at that time. Sensing this, Weidman agreed to fight Boetsch at UFC 155. Silva then took a makeshift fight against Stephan Bonnar to rescue UFC 153, and shortly thereafter Weidman got injured and was scrapped from his card. Meanwhile, as Weidman healed, fresh contenders like Michael Bisping lost.

Which brings everything right back to the undefeated Weidman (9-0, 5-0 in the UFC), who took a scenic detour only to end up essentially back where to he started. The difference is he's coming off a prolonged layoff after surgery to repair a torn labrum and rotator cuff -- not to mention fix a separated AC joint in his right shoulder.

It will be a year between fights, but Weidman is finally in the challenger’s seat.

Now it’s a question of whether the layoff and recovery will leave him that much more susceptible heading into a fight with the greatest mixed martial artist ever. Las Vegas oddsmakers are already lengthening his odds. And given the circumstances, a lot of people in the media and on Twitter think that Silva’s catching Weidman at the exact right time. Weidman has heard it.

“Listen, you come off a layoff people are going to think you’re rusty and all that, but I’ve been in the gym every single day,” he says. “I haven’t taken time off. I’ve had more than a year off before, coming off of hand surgery, and my first fight back I fought Urijah Hall. He’s doing good on ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ show right now, and I ended up getting a first round knockout over him.

“So I’ve had that scenario before, and I won’t let ring rust or coming off an injury like that stop me. I think that’s more of a mental thing, anyway. I’m pretty good mentally. I have a psychology degree, and I think that helps me just keep my mentally strong -- and making sure I don’t beat myself.

"That’s ultimately who you’re really fighting against, is yourself. I feel like if I don’t beat myself, I’m winning the fight.”

It doesn’t hurt that he was an All-American wrestler at Hofstra while earning his psychology degree, or that Silva’s known vulnerability is in the wrestling department. Weidman knows these things, and he’ll undoubtedly use whatever edges he can (psychological and otherwise) leading up to UFC 161.

But right now, Weidman talks like a man who is thrilled with so many happy convergences. He’s healthy, he’s in a title fight, and MMA in his home state of New York is close to becoming a reality. Not a bad week.

“I feel like this is just the beginning of my career, and it’s a great opportunity to fight who I think is the greatest of all time,” he says. “My main goal right now is to be UFC champion -- but my ultimate goal is to be considered one of the greatest of all time.”

The old cliché “to be the best, you must beat the best” only works if you get the chance to beat the best. This July, there's a very happy New Yorker who's getting his chance.

On July 11, 2012, Chris Weidman defeated top middleweight contender Mark Munoz without so much as absorbing a single significant strike in six and a half minutes of fight time. It was a headlining spot, and he made the most of it. The “Strong Island” native slipped a punch and landed a ridiculous elbow in the second round, and won via TKO seconds later.

And that’s how you make a statement.

That same night, with a perfect 5-0 record in the UFC (9-0 overall), he called out the champion, Anderson Silva, who four days earlier defeated Chael Sonnen with a TKO of his own.

“I want Anderson Silva,” Weidman said, in the most polite callout in the history of callouts. “Every time I’ve had a full training camp, I’ve gotten a finish. Give me a full training camp, and I’d love a shot at the man, Anderson Silva. I really think I could do pretty good. So give me a shot, please.”

Just 239 days later, Silva-Weidman has finally been made. Weidman will get a full training camp, and so will Silva. The clash of styles and experience is on. And after all that time, and through all that haze and speculation, the question becomes: What took so long to make this fight?

It’s complicated. Depending on whom you listen to, it was either because Weidman was too green, too threatening, too unknown, too audacious, or too ... eh. It was because of Weidman’s shoulder injury, and that little Stephan Bonnar thing that Silva handled in October. It was Silva’s contract being up. It was because Silva wanted Georges St-Pierre (unrequited), and then wanted Cung Le (fun fantasy), and then wanted Luke Rockhold (posturing?).

Officially, Silva’s camp said Weidman was too low profile. They wanted big fights, with big-name opponents and equal-sized pay-per-view dollars. Unofficially, Weidman’s camp thought that excuse looked like timidity. Weidman, with his All-American wrestling pedigree from his days at Hofstra University, looked like a nightmare matchup for Silva. In seven rounds of Sonnen-Silva, Sonnen won five by wrestling before making critical errors.

Weidman, at 28 years old, is a fluid submission grappler with better stand-up skills than Sonnen. He’s not likely to try a spinning backfist against Silva. There’s been a lot of optimism at the Ray Longo-Matt Serra Fight Team that a title could soon return to Long Island, if the fight would only be made.

Two-thirds of a year later, the UFC made the right call by booking it. In that time, Weidman’s intrigue has become a lot of fans' intrigue. And given his skill set, he does present interesting challenges to Silva. He beat Munoz, who at the time was a top contender. He beat Demian Maia before that, who’d had a title shot in 2010. Those are fine credentials.

But really, it's all about simple deduction -- there’s nobody else at 185 pounds who deserves it more.

Le was a Silva pipe dream. Hector Lombard hasn’t panned out. Tim Boetsch got done in by Costas Philippou (Weidman's teammate who replaced him on the UFC 155 card after a shoulder injury forced Weidman out of the event). It’s too soon for a Silva-Vitor Belfort rematch. Rockhold was willing, but his merit (and star power) didn’t trump Weidman's. Yushin Okami? No way -- not again. Michael Bisping, who was supposed to get the shot, lost in the penultimate spot against Belfort. St-Pierre didn’t want to mess around with his weight, among other concerns. Jon Jones is booked with Sonnen in April, and he has his own contenders at 205 pounds to deal with after that.

That leaves Weidman, who realistically felt like the guy all along. If a superfight wasn’t going to materialize for Silva, the UFC needed to take the next legitimate contender within the weight class. That was, and remains, Chris Weidman.

He’s healthy, and he’s ready. Silva needs an opponent. Boom. The pecking order wins out. Rev up the hype machine.

It might have taken a long time for everyone to get on the same page, but the bottom line is everybody finally did. Come July 6 in Las Vegas, almost a year to the day since Silva’s record 10th title defense at UFC 148, it’s on.

The whole thing feels so old-fashioned. Weidman gets his wish. And it’s for all of us to see what he’s able to do with it.

In 2013, the year of the “superfight” and new-fashioned division jumping in the UFC, anything is possible.

How possible? A simple, timely text can shake up an entire division for the better part of a year. Ask Ricardo Lamas, who should have been the next featherweight for Jose Aldo if Anthony Pettis, ten pounds and 1,000 decibels his superior, wasn’t the quickest Blackberry draw in the Midwest.

When Dana White got the buzz that night, it played out like this: Merit, shmerit. This game deals in duckets.

Imagine that: Diaz-Ellenberger is the potential title fight nobody is talking about.

Now Pettis-Aldo is slated to take place in far-off August. Jon Jones versus Anderson Silva has been speculated about for New York (or Brazil [or Dallas]) in November (or December), even though Silva is fighting Chris Weidman in July, and Jones has a fight with Chael Sonnen in April. Apparently Sonnen can be looked right past to the “superfight” everybody wants. In fact, Jones/Silva is the only true superfight right now that is super enough to make rational people superstitious. Nobody wants to jinx it, except a couple of pesky wrestlers who stand in their way.

Then there’s UFC lightweight champion Benson Henderson, who is talking about bouncing up to welterweight to face Georges St-Pierre, even though he has a fight with reigning Strikeforce champion Gilbert Melendez this spring, and GSP fights Nick Diaz next weekend.

That idea has since been shot down by White but, what, is Melendez a hologram? It used to be that media and fans were always thinking two steps ahead. Now the fighters are, too? This is fantastic. (I have to admit -- it’s fun to align in such foolish behavior!).

At least the scenarios get simpler from here, so let's look ahead. On March 16, at UFC 158, the welterweights will come into focus. It’s really black and white. The three top fights on the card are 170-pounders. St-Pierre, who we are assured has a dark chamber in his psyche that nobody (especially that inconsiderate Nick Diaz!) can possibly fathom, headlines the event.

All revolves around him beating Diaz. If he defeats Diaz he could fight anyone from Johny Hendricks to Carlos Condit to Jake Ellenberger to Silva, this summer, this fall, or this winter. The line snakes around the block. Hendricks more than deserves the shot, particularly if he beats Condit that same night. He has been deserving for what feels like years. If Hendricks and St-Pierre both win, that fight seems obvious.

In 2011, maybe. In 2013, not so fast.

That’s because people like Silva and Henderson happen to exist. Though Silva is now booked to fight Weidman at UFC 162, he can't help but still hover over St-Pierre in 2013. Now with a new contract, it's possible he courts that St-Pierre fight sooner rather than later. St-Pierre would have to be coaxed into agreeing, of course, which is never a given.

In other words, even if all goes to plan and both GSP and Hendricks win, Hendricks could find himself on the outside looking in. Yet again. If that were the case, maybe Hendricks could fight Rory MacDonald next, who was scrapped from the card when he got injured. He was supposed to face Condit.

And speaking of Condit, he could emerge as a dark horse in the St-Pierre sweepstakes. If he takes care of No. 1 contender Hendricks, he has some ammo. After all, the first fight had that fleeting moment when Condit came unnervingly close. And if Diaz pulls the upset over St-Pierre and somehow makes it out of Montreal in one piece, same thing -- Diaz-Condit II is viable (unless the fight results in a scorecard nightmare and St-Pierre/Diaz II has to be played back immediately). If Condit wins and somebody texts Dana White to jump the line to GSP, you’ve still got the Condit-MacDonald vendetta to sort out. No scenario is without a silver lining.

There are other factors. Ellenberger is on the card fighting Nate Marquardt, who two years after trying to debut at 170 pounds in the UFC finally gets his chance. One of them -- namely Ellenberger -- could factor into this title discussion, too. Much like an 8-7 NFL team heading into the final regular season game in a tight Wild Card race -- Ellenberger is mathematically alive, but needs help. He needs an emphatic showing and some smiling fortune, such as Johny Hendricks losing. The UFC might jump him to the top to avoid rolling back Condit-GSP II too soon in that case (even though Ellenberger lost to Condit narrowly in 2009). Unless Diaz wins, that is, and Condit faces a long medical suspension in victory.

Imagine that: Diaz-Ellenberger is the potential title fight nobody is talking about.

What’s at stake come March 16 in this makeshift welterweight grand prix? Feels like plenty. But in 2013, “what’s at stake” has turned into a versatile question. There is no obvious answer. And if you ask White beforehand, you’re likely to get his go-to response for most things yon: We’ll see what happens.

Liz Carmouche is not a can. She is a human being with motivation and drive and a world of dreams that can be realized one weekend late in February. But what happens if she realizes her dreams and beats Ronda Rousey at UFC 157?

What, in this game of four-ounce gloves and four-leaf clovers, happens then?

The vanguards of women's MMA are being stacked up against each other in the old Washington Generals/Harlem Globetrotters dynamic. No, it's not fixed or choreographed, but it's a foregone conclusion that Rousey wins this historical first women's title fight on February 23. Isn't it? It has to be.

There would be no women's MMA in the UFC if Rousey didn't catch Dana White's eye. Her mere arm-barring presence made up for all the red flags that kept it out so long -- namely, the "lack of divisional depth" that White talked about.

Of course, that was all BR (Before Ronda). Now, the depth of one transcendent fighter is enough to fill out a division. It's the wide world of Rousey, and then everybody else. White has made no secret that Rousey is the reason.

That's why it isn't that Carmouche is a can -- it's that they're all aluminum product. Miesha Tate (whom she's already beat), Sara McMann (who is in the on-deck circle) and even Cris "Cyborg" Santos, who is jettisoning herself from the UFC (and can't/won't make 135 pound besides). All of them. This is Rousey's domain. It was her patent. The future of women's MMA is Rousey's burden in the present tense. The pressure is only to win. And preferably to collect a couple more arms along the way, like she's done a million times before (or six, to be exact).

Make no mistake, this is boom or bust.

And if she doesn't win? Well, Seth Petruzelli becomes the second greatest party pooper of all time.

Should Carmouche get her arm raised in Anaheim, this whole thing becomes a Jenga proposition. Rousey, who White admires for being "so nasty, so mean" -- who has broken into larger and more varied media realms than Georges St-Pierre, Anderson Silva and Chuck Liddell combined -- would then slip into more pedestrian ranks. The iconoclast who is potentially inspiring thousands of young girls to give MMA a chance would get hung up in "potentially". I've written in here before that Rousey is the Royce Gracie of WMMA. She's the example of broader possibility.

I still believe that.

But how fast a loss leads the chorus to chants of "you've been exposed", even for those with Olympic medals in judo. How fast those six victories would seem incomplete if upended by a single loss. How shaky the idea of women's MMA in the UFC becomes overnight. How fast the eggs would topple out of that single basket.

And if this is all experimentation, you'd have to wonder how long the experiment goes on -- even with the signings of Tate, Cat Zingano and others to fill in the inaugural bantamweight division.

Carmouche's Marine background is cool. It lends to her no-nonsense pluck. That she's the UFC's first openly gay fighter is admirable and perfect for narrative. She's nice, genuine, sincere -- there's not a bad thing you can say about her. But "Girl-Rilla" Carmouche as champion? What on John Moraga's green earth would the UFC do then? The most marketable fight for Carmouche at that point would be a rerun of Rousey (because surely the first fight would have been an aberration). Beyond that, it's just a bunch of jacks scattered on the linoleum. Or Jills, as it were.

In any case, it's an awful lot riding on a single fight -- this is a crossroads bout right out of the gate.

Yet it's not Carmouche's place to contemplate the aftermath. It's her job to win, even if that means dealing an indirect blow to the thing that she's fighting for. That's a unique mission. It's at least her job to go down swinging, as that's the scenario we've grown most comfortable imagining. Carmouche volunteered herself for this piece of historic martyrdom. We like that. We expect her to go down valiantly.

But man, can you imagine if things don't go to expectation?

Ryan Jimmo does things a little differently. He says on his UFC profile that one of his heroes is Albert Einstein, and that he worked as a “ninja” before fighting. He can quote the philosophies of bodybuilder Dorian Yates as easily as he can mimic Bruce Lee’s moves.

There’s a wide range of things going on with Jimmo; he’s one of the fight game’s interesting characters. And yet, to this point he has made a career to this point on the UFC’s periphery.

Jimmo did have that brief moment on the “Ultimate Fighter 8,” but lost the entryway fight to the house against Antwain Britt. That might have been a blessing in disguise, he says. And while fighting in Canada’s Maximum Fighting Championship, where he was the light heavyweight champion, he feasted on UFC veterans -- Sokoudjou, Marvin Eastman, Jesse Forbes and Wilson Gouveia.

That was 14 rounds of hard toil, but he won them all.

Yet, when the Canadian finally did debut in the Octagon at UFC 149 in Calgary last July, the fight didn’t even last long enough to satisfy the bull riders who’d gathered into the Saddledome. It was over in seven seconds. One big right hand and boom. Down went Anthony Perosh.

Jimmo picked up an extra $50,000 by earning knockout of the night. His $50K per-punch-thrown is the best average in the UFC heading into 2013. It was so fast, that you wonder if it counts as experience.

“

He likes to throw his hands. I think he's been boxing since he was 14. He did some wrestling, so I can see him coming out and wanting to mix it up with some hands and some stand up. If he wants to wrestle that's okay, too, but I see this primarily as a stand-up fight.

” -- Ryan Jimmo, on fighting Anthony Perosh

“You don’t gain a ton of experience being in the ring for seven seconds, but every organization does things differently -- their pageantry is different,” Jimmo told ESPN.com. “And when I say that, I mean all the build up -- the video interviews, getting comfortable with the staff who are going to be handling you and seeing how they do things. So I guess I gained that experience. And afterward all the media attention, I gained some experience there as well.”

Now that he’s dealt with the process and gained a few fans, he can move on to headier things -- like encores. This is where things get tricky. Jimmo faces James Te-Huna on Saturday night in London at UFC on Fuel 7. The New Zealander Te-Huna has quietly (and violently) strung together a three-fight win streak in the 205-pound division, with a couple of first round knockouts. In fact, seven of his last eight victories have come via KO or TKO.

So though a flash knockout isn’t out of the question for a guy like Jimmo who likes to stand and trade, there’s always the chance a flash knockout could work the other way, as well. Jimmo could end up being the one with smelling salts in his nostrils. This is something he’s thought about.

“James Te-Huna is a big strong aggressive guy,” Jimmo says. “He likes to throw his hands. I think he’s been boxing since he was 14. He did some wrestling, so I can see him coming out and wanting to mix it up with some hands and some stand up. If he wants to wrestle that’s okay, too, but I see this primarily as a stand-up fight. If it happens to go to the ground I’m one 100 percent comfortable there. And if it’s stays on the feet? I’m okay with that, too.”

Jimmo originally hails from Saint John, New Brunswick, but spent his training camp with the Blackzilians in Delmar Beach, Florida. He endured a tough weekend watching teammates Rashad Evans and Alistair Overeem lose fights they were favored to win at UFC 156 (“you know, this is the sport it is -- anyone can win, anyone can lose,” he says), but has been so wrapped up in training that holidays have come and went without his notice.

“I’ve been training since October,” he says. “There’s no snow down here, you know, and my mother had to call me and she said, ‘Merry Christmas, Ryan!’ and I said, ‘Is it Christmas, Mom? I need to go back to the gym, I need to take my nap and there’s a chicken breast cooking. Merry Christmas to you, mom. How are things?’”


Though he may have missed out on the holiday cheer in the great White North, Jimmo is finally getting his chance to shine in the UFC riding a 17-fight winning streak. And the Jimmo you see on Saturday night isn’t necessarily the one who fought in the MFC and defended his 205-pound belt twice.

This is a guy who feels he can finally align himself with the stakes.

“I kind of held back and fought a little more conservatively in smaller shows because I didn’t have as much to gain and I had more to lose,” he says. “If I lost in a lower league, well, you know you’re not going to the UFC now.

“Also for me, [UFC 149] was a time to shine and I trained very hard to have that kind of power and aggressiveness in training. So when it came time, it was over and it wasn’t anti-climactic at all. It was the time for me to go in there and really use my skills like I knew I could and not be conservative with it.”

That’s true. It’s near impossible to be conservative on the delivering end of a seven-second knockout.