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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.

There are at least two kinds of greatness in MMA. Greatness that’s current (like Jon Jones), and greatness that’s always been (like Dan Henderson). In a world of immediacy, we warm our hands more quickly to the former.

Henderson now knows the date for his title challenge with Jones, and that’ll be Sept. 1 in Las Vegas. He will celebrate his 42nd birthday just a week prior to the fight. In 1987, Jones was being introduced to onesies while Henderson was reciting lines from “Vision Quest” and winning state wrestling championships at Victor Valley High School in California. The vegetation on his ears is older than Jones.

If nothing else, Hendo definitely has the experience edge over the UFC’s current light heavyweight champion. He’s been at it a long, long time. Yet the books opened in Las Vegas with Jones installed as a 6-to-1 favorite for this UFC 151 clash. The 24-year old Jones would be a huge favorite over anybody in the 205-pound division, so nothing peculiar there. There’s no such thing as even money bet with Jones in 2012, unless he borrowed from Anderson Silva’s flight of fancy and fought his clone. (Ahem).

Yet what is interesting all these months ahead of the fight is that so many people consider it a foregone conclusion that the prodigy will smash the old ax grinder. In fact, the thing is being discussed as inevitable. Forget about odds, Henderson has no shot.

In a game that deals in shaping perception, this becomes the UFC’s task to mend for no other reason than this: it’s hard to generate buzz on a perfunctory matter. Between now and late summer the idea needs to be that Henderson does have a shot. This of course would be best sold as something believable.

And realistically -- why should that be such a tough sell?

Surely over the course of winning simultaneous titles in Pride FC and later taking the 205-pound belt in Strikeforce there should be some love for Henderson here. His list of casualties in the UFC, Pride and Strikeforce -- pan-divisional -- is next to impossible. He was wrecking guys like Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Vitor Belfort and Wanderlei Silva during their heydays.

As for his own prime? It’s apparently a dozen-year venture. Henderson knocked out Michael Bisping with that anvil right at UFC 100. Since then he finished Renato Sobral, Rafael Cavalcante and Fedor Emelianenko, and he decisioned Mauricio Rua at UFC 139. He did these things in his late-30s and early-40s. These are feats that, if lost on the media, aren’t necessarily lost on his peers.

Last week on MMA Live, Jorge Rivera had Henderson in his top five pound-for-pound fighters. Daniel Cormier told MMA:30 that he “should be mentioned as one of the greatest fighters of all-time, if not the greatest fighter of all-time, but he’s missing that UFC title. He has to be a UFC champion. I think if he is, Dan Henderson will universally be considered the best fighter of all-time.”

To be considered anywhere near the greatest of all time you’d have to believe Henderson has more than a puncher’s chance to beat the greatest of right now. Yes, Jones’ landslide run through the division trumps Henderson’s legacy in forecasting how things will play out. If Shogun, Quinton Jackson, Lyoto Machida and Rashad Evans failed to make Jones appear even remotely vincible, what makes Henderson any different? Nothing, it seems.

Jones is not only destroying opponents, but also our sense of imagination.

Yet the other reason that Henderson is unsung goes back to what Cormier was touching on -- he has been decorated as this sort of fugitive champion in other organizations, but not the one that we store greatness by. He hasn’t made it to the top of any weight class in the UFC.

And at 42 years old -- or any age, really -- Jones looks like a pretty imposing hurdle to get there. Imposing, that is, not unclearable. Henderson’s a guy that fights in squalls and yet has remained a lesson in perseverance for more than a decade. He has a chin, and what he gives up size he makes up for it in leverage, a tangible from his Greco-Roman days. And he has that “H-Bomb” right hand. He’s smart on how and when to deploy it.

Does all of that make for a competitive fight with Jones? Not necessarily. It still feels like a reach, as it will continue to feel until Jones is downsized into something human.

Yet given how long Henderson has sustained his own brand of greatness, it doesn’t feel like a given he’ll lose, either.

The one thing that any successful fighter heading into the UFC will hear is this: He’s overrated. He hasn’t faced any real competition. Somebody’s about to come crashing down to earth. Somebody is about to get exposed.

That "somebody" this time happens to be Hector Lombard, the popular Bellator middleweight champion who has rattled off 20 victories in a row, including eight as the company’s flagship. Lombard is a menace at 185 pounds and is sculpted like a Frank Frazetta overlord, but the big gripe against him is he’s beating guys named Falaniko Vitale and Herbert Goodman instead of cats like Mark Munoz and Rousimar Palhares.

All that changes, now that Lombard makes his way to the UFC. Instead of facing UFC castoffs like Jay Silva and Joe Doerksen, the 34-year old American Top Team fighter will face UFC regulars. It’s a completely different vantage point. Lombard’s new assignment is to covert guys into UFC castoffs rather than feast on what’s left of their good names.

Here’s a quick look at five guys who would make for mean welcoming parties for “Shango.”

Brian Stann
Back when Jorge Santiago had built up a new head of stream in Sengoku, he became a popular dark horse pick against Brian Stann at UFC 130. What did Stann do? He punched the daylights out of him. And wouldn’t you know that just as Lombard brings his 25-fight unbeaten streak into the UFC, Stann is coming off a big victory over Alessio Sakara and needs an upgrade in opponent, just as all the bigger names are occupied?

Enter Hector Lombard. The great thing about this fight is both guys like to bang on the feet. Lombard is a precision striker who carries a lot of power. He likes to fight guys that get right up in his wheelhouse and tempt him into uncoiling. That’s Stann, who makes it his duty to oblige brawlers. (And just as often, shut them down).

Jake Shields
Shields has bounced back and forth between 170 and 185 pounds, and after a fairly subpar run in the UFC’s welterweight division, it looks like he’ll bulk back up. Bottom line is, he wasn't losing to slouches, either -- Georges St. Pierre and Jake Ellenberger (under trying circumstances, dealing with the passing of his father) never looked like easy outs.

But the last time we saw Shields as a middleweight he looked ... if not great, then totally resilient. He beat up Jason Miller for five rounds, and then improbably defended the Strikeforce belt against Dan Henderson in a fight he had his wits scrambled in the first round. Not to name drop, but Shields was the last guy to defeat Henderson, who is now set to fight Jon Jones for the 205-pound title. Think he wouldn’t like to punch some holes in Lombard’s lore? And for those desperate for storylines or loose patriotism, it’d be the battle of the Americas -- American Jiu-Jitsu versus American Top Team.

Luke Rockhold
Hey, while we’re restocking the UFC’s middleweight division with valuable intrigues, why not bring Strikeforce middleweight champion Luke Rockhold into the UFC fold to face Lombard? It’s not the likeliest scenario, but Rockhold has just come into his own at a time when Strikeforce has become a weekend skeleton crew. Think he likes the idea of challenges named Keith Jardine or, maybe at some point, Bristol Marunde?

It’s fun to imagine a Rockhold/Lombard scrap. You’ve got two guys who aren’t afraid to fight in the pocket, each with a durable chin and sadistic intentions. It has “back-and-forth war” written all over it, a great UFC debut for both ... but it looks like Rockhold will get that long-awaited battle with Stikeforce contender Tim Kennedy, thus rendering this flight of fancy moot. Truth be told, we’re merely throwing Rockhold’s name out there in the off chance that matchmakers Sean Shelby and Joe Silva are combing the Internet for suggestions.

Ronaldo Souza
Again, we’re dealing in Strikeforce property (read: ultimately Zuffa’s), but Souza hates the pace of fighting once every six to eight months. And if the promotion does make Kennedy versus Rockhold, that means Jacare is going to be fighting some unmentionable. If the UFC brought Souza over to face Lombard, you’ve got the strutting fisticuffs that languished in Bellator for too long against the tall-grass predator with the aggressive, limb snatching jiu-jitsu. What better?

And how would that be for a red carpet rollout for both guys into the Octagon?

Ed Herman
You laugh. I can see you laughing. But let me put Herman’s name into perspective. For one thing, he has been completely rejuvenated since coming back from his knee injury and setbacks, having won three fights in a row. For another, “Short Fuse” is a finisher just like Lombard. In every one of those fights he dusted his hands of the opponent, beginning with Tim Credeur (whom he TKO’d in 48 seconds) and ending with Clifford Starks (second round rear-naked choke).

The guy he beat in-between? Why that was Kyle Noke (via first round heel hook), the same guy who took Lombard to a draw back in 2007. Herman is creeping up on the pack in the middleweight class, and Lombard is a big step up in opposition. Here’s the rub, though: So is Herman a big step up in competition for Lombard. Either Lombard could treat Herman as an appetizer to the main course, or he could, for the first time ever, find himself with a nostril full of smelling salts.

When Jon Jones fought Andre Gusmao at UFC 87, "Bones" was already a practitioner of creative hostility.

At the time, Jones was trying out unusual kicks and punches in a shed in upstate New York, envisioning those spinning elbows and saddle throws that fall under the umbrella of judo. He knew, even then, that he could "dirty box" from three feet out of harm's reach. I remember Tandam McCrory, the lank Barn Cat, preaching Jones’ use of range from back in those days.

The thing is, Jones was never really raw. But, at one point, he was mostly just creative.

Today, Jones is a coachable, maniacal center of poise who institutes and sticks to game plans -- game plans tailored to his overwhelming reach advantage, speed and the eventual surrender of his opponent’s optimism. These days you can visibly see guys lose spirit in a fight with Jones. You see theoretically sound ideas go right out the cage door.

His fight at UFC 145 was no different. Rashad Evans, the former light heavyweight champion, was supposed to close the gap between himself and Jones, and fight on the inside. This was Evans’ criticism of old foe Quinton Jackson, who couldn’t sneak inside Evans' striking range at UFC 135.

Once in, Evans was supposed to dump Jones on to his back like he did Phil Davis -- a lengthy wrestler -- and make it a grueling, grinding affair. Make it boring. It all seemed reasonable enough.

Yet, like Jackson, Evans couldn’t sustain close, and he settled into a stand-up fight with Jones, where he was forced to stay in the champion’s orbit. In other words, the danger belonged to him alone. When Evans did manage to get inside, Jones threw elbows from puncher’s range; when the wrists were locked at his waist, Jones threw shoulders.

As has become the custom, Jones did it his way. The big difference is that he’s traded in the unpredictable for telegraphy and “try and stop me.” Even scarier: The freelance improvisations that we saw against Stephan Bonnar and Jake O’Brien are still in Jones' arsenal, but they’re now situational. His cool dictates the fight.

The Jones of 2012 is a Zen-harnessed version of his already ridiculous self. Before, it was a showcase of a rare and gifted skill set you wondered whether would work on elite competition.

Now Jones is far and away the elite, and everybody else at 205 pounds is left studying the Mona Lisa. He knows it. The guys he fights -- and an increasing number of fans -- know he knows it and want to put a stop to it. They can’t. Even Evans, who had some trade secrets from his days training with Jones at Greg Jackson’s gym couldn’t stop it. Whatever vulnerabilities could be found in sparring sessions have nothing to do with the combined “it” factor that he saw on Saturday night. Jones slows the fight down. He fights without emotional projection, like it’s a casual undertaking to be gotten at with patience and skill and ungodly long limbs. He kills himself in training to make it look easy on fight night. He fights twice as much as Anderson Silva and Georges St. Pierre.

In MMA, it’s Jones' world right now.

And it’s why at this point a lot of people are sold on the fact that he has cleaned out the light heavyweight division. Dan Henderson lingers, but not many are convinced he’ll bring anything to the table that Jones hasn’t seen. Hendo has that right hand. He has the wrestling pedigree. He has willingness. All of it admirable.

But there will be questions, most common of which will be this: How do you defeat Jon Jones? Plenty of fighters have had their theories handed back to them by Jones with a wink and a "nice try."

So, Dan Henderson -- how do you, at 42, beat Jon Jones, the phenom who’s already fighting to his potential at 24 years old?

ATLANTA -- No light heavyweight will defeat Jon Jones. At least not anytime soon.

“Never” is a word seldom used in mixed martial arts -- a sport where truly one moment can change everything. A fighter can be on his last leg, staggering to the fence, and still win a fight with one desperate, groggy swing.

In the case of the 24-year-old Jones (16-1), however, it seems destined not to happen at this weight class. The third defense of his UFC title against Rashad Evans this weekend at Philips Arena was supposed to be his toughest fight yet.

If it was, no one could tell.

Jones failed to finish Evans -- the first time that he hasn't stopped an opponent since January 2009 -- but he dominated every aspect of the fight.

He started to find his range late in the first round and carried that through into a spectacular second frame where he staggered Evans with multiple elbows. The round seemed to have an effect on Evans’ confidence the rest of the fight.

“I thought it was great,” said UFC president Dana White. “I thought [Jones] fought a great fight. He threw elbows like they were hands. I thought he fought a great fight and I thought Rashad did, too.”

Jones, inexplicably, slowed down a bit in the later rounds. Afterward, he attributed his hesitancy to a respect for Evans, a former champion and teammate of his.

“Rashad is an awesome opponent,” Jones said. “He’s definitely game. He’s fast. I think I was a little intimidated at some points to believe in my ability and, as a result, I didn’t fight as clean as I would have liked.”

During the postfight news conference, White stated fans expressed optimism on Twitter for Dan Henderson as the next challenge to Jones’ belt. White agreed, calling Henderson “a big test.”

While Henderson is one of the most successful fighters in the sport’s history, he’ll likely be 42 when he meets Jones. He’ll struggle, as all of Jones’ opponents do, with a significant size disadvantage.

A former Olympic wrestler, Henderson will want the fight on the ground, but he’ll have to become the first fighter to take Jones down to do it. Jones’ takedown defense in the UFC stands at 100 percent. It was difficult to say exactly how many takedowns Evans, a great wrestler himself, attempted -- as Jones thwarted each of them easily.

It’s not time for Jones to move to the heavyweight division yet. He’s still, presumably, years away from his prime and at a time in his career where his body is still changing.

He has nothing but high-profile fights ahead of him, much like Saturday’s. While many fans will no doubt say Sunday morning the contest fell short of expectations, it might just be that expectations need to be changed.

Until he moves on to the challenge of fighting heavyweights -- where he’ll more than likely remain successful -- expecting a test for Jones is downright unrealistic.

Randy Couture is convinced an out-and-out striker will never beat UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones, predicting that the likes of Dan Henderson or Chael Sonnen are the men to dethrone the 205-pound king. More »

Dan Henderson recently made the suggestion to ESPN that Jon Jones will "definitely" be taken down by Rashad Evans at some point in Saturday's UFC 145 title showdown, and at Wednesday's news conference Jones responded to the claim. More »

In the “who’s out there to challenge Jon Jones” discussion, Alexander Gustafsson is the light heavyweight intrigue right now. He is the horizon, the challenge looming at the end of the Mayan calendar for the current champion. Should he lose to Thiago Silva this weekend in his native Sweden in the biggest fight of his young career, intrigue becomes pretty scarce in what has traditionally been the UFC’s glamour division.

So what happened to the well depth at 205 pounds?

Jones happened. Jones happened so fast and Jones pummeled so furious that people are already talking about what he can do to as a heavyweight. Everybody knows that imagination is always first to round the curve, but in this case it feels like meteorological forecasting. Jones is a storm front. In fact, he himself says his days at 205 pounds are numbered, because those skinny legs that earned him the nickname “Bones” will eventually fill in.

And all of this is conversational because Jones has yet to meet his equivalent in a weight class that had for so long been defined by parity. He’s already defended the belt more than anybody since Chuck Liddell’s run from 2005-2007. Since then Quinton Jackson, Forrest Griffin, Rashad Evans, Lyoto Machida -- remember the Machida Era? -- and Mauricio Rua have tried on the belt, couldn’t handle its weight, and ceded it. They’ve all become afterthoughts to Jones’ run -- except for Griffin (who no longer looks like an imposition) and Evans (whom he faces in Atlanta on April 21).

None of the above has made it even so far as the judge’s scorecards.

If Jones defeats Evans at UFC 145, he will still have to get by Dan Henderson, who has been patiently waiting in line since November. After Henderson? As much of a stretch as it seems, it’s Gustafsson. That is, if Gustafsson continues to win. If Silva triumphs in Stockholm over its native son, it could be the heavyweight division sooner rather than later for Jones.

In other words, it’s possible that Jones will have cleaned out the division by summer of 2012. Nobody cleans out divisions nowadays -- nobody. And you know the power of his star is immense when there’s nothing far-fetched in any of this, except for the usual cautions that come with taking anything for granted. For as dominant as Jones is, this sport was not founded on foregone conclusions. If there is a wrench, it looks like this: Jones beats Jones. This is what Greg Jackson and the entire Albuquerque crew are guarding against as much as they are Evans’ takedown ability.

But the next two weeks could clue us in a little bit on Jon Jones’ (extrapolated) future. If Gustafsson holds court, he will have effectively graduated to title talk, which is big in a division of expiring names. Gustafsson might still have to win one more in pursuit of the 205-pound title, but he’d at least appear as viable. In the game of marketable matchmaking, appearances might have to do.

Would Silva look as viable? It’s possible. But right now Silva’s biggest wins are against guys that looked far more imposing before he fought them than after. Guys like Houston Alexander, Keith Jardine and Brandon Vera (which was overturned to a "no contest" due to steroids). Silva is set further back than Gustafsson. Even if he beat the Swede he’d have a harder time convincing the masses that he’s the fork in Jones’ road.

The bottom line is this: If the two favorites in the next two UFC main events win, that means a collision course is setting up. If Jones wins and Gustafsson doesn’t? It’s one last defense with Dan Henderson, and then a lot of talk about how Jones will match up with the likes of Junior dos Santos, Frank Mir and Cain Velasquez.

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.

UFC president Dana White confirmed on Friday that Dan Henderson will fight the winner of Jon Jones v Rashad Evans, and Henderson is warning people not to write off the challenger ahead of UFC 145. More »

Dan Henderson believes Michael Bisping deserves a future shot at the UFC middleweight title, but he warned that the Brit will be in big trouble if he does ever face champion Anderson Silva. More »

Before guys like Joseph Benavidez and Jon Fitch knew limbo, Rich Franklin was the original purgatory in the UFC. He was the middleweight champion for 16 months in the mid-aughts, beginning with a declarative victory over Evan Tanner and ending three fights later where things for all men come to an end ... with Anderson Silva.

Back in the day when immediate rematches were hard to come by, Franklin had to beat Jason MacDonald and Yushin Okami to get a chance at reclaiming his belt. “Ace” finally stepped in with Anderson Silva again at UFC 77, in a conflict that was dubiously dubbed “Hostile Territory.” That is, at least for Silva. Franklin was in the friendly confines of his native Cincinnati, eschewing his trademark Neapolitan trunks for those sporting Bengals colors. It was a homecoming full of furnace warmth.

Until he was being fetched back into consciousness with smelling salts.

For the second time, Silva made quick work of Franklin -- near mirror annihilations, primarily from the clinch -- and the former champion found himself in career limbo. The aftermath was unsettling, just as it has been throughout history with boxing’s newly obsolete. The cold question of “what now?”

Half a century ago, boxing heavyweight champ Floyd Patterson lost his belt and subsequent rematch to Sonny Liston via decisive first-round knockouts. Franklin had to come to a similar realization that Patterson did back in the day, which was this: Nobody wants to see a third match of a one-sided series. That’s a hell of a thing to come to grips with for a one-time champion. In Patterson’s day, you just fought on. In the rapidly changing, modern day UFC, Franklin at least had some options.

That’s why after he beat Travis Lutter in his last 185-pound bout, Franklin decided to move up to light heavyweight and make a run there. It was with reluctance that he did so -- remember how precise he was with weighing out his food? -- but the gatekeeper gig wasn’t for him.

Problem is, he’s been a sort of passing tourist ever since.

Over the past few years, Franklin has gone 3-3 outside the middleweight division (2-2 at 205 pounds, and 1-1 as a 195-pound catchweight). His latest, a loss to Forrest Griffin at UFC 126, left a lot to the imagination. But what was concrete was that Franklin was no longer a threat to anybody’s title. To frustrate matters, he underwent shoulder surgery and has been on the sidelines for more than a year. A lot of thinking goes on when a year passes off the calendar like that.

Now, to the consternation of dudes like Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Franklin is turning back up as a middleweight again at 37 and a half years old. He’ll face a state-of-the-art action kicker in Cung Le, who only fights one way (thrillingly). If you liked Franklin/Wanderlei Silva or Le/Wanderlei Silva, then you’ll love Franklin/Le. Noses will almost certainly be smashed and further reconfigured into sharp right angles that only a math teacher can appreciate.

It’s the kind of fight that is only a fight. No context needed.

And that’s where Franklin should be for his divisional homecoming. Forget a title run at this point, he wants fun (wholesale violent) shows in the twilight of his career. He doesn’t want to be smothered by Forrest Griffin for large segments of an event; he wants to be in fights like his one with Chuck Liddell at UFC 115, where a broken arm means you throw your good one and hope for the best. He wants to stand and bang. He’s old school. In fact, he’s one of the last of the surviving old guard. Stand and trade in each other’s wheelhouse? Now you’re talking. Surely there’s another Nate Quarry out there to add to his highlight reel.

Le provides this chance. And you never know -- Dan Henderson began bouncing around weight classes at 37 after losing to Anderson Silva, too. His emphasis has always been to put on fights that fans want to see and let title shots fall where they may. Now at age 41, Henderson is accomplishing both with no signs of slowing down. Mark Hunt will be 38 next week and yet is looking 25. Randy Couture didn’t get rolling until he was in his late 30s.

Maybe Franklin finds a similar resurgence. And, if not, bring on Le or guys just like him, and that’s good enough.

UFC veteran Dan Henderson insists the middleweight title is not high on his list of priorities, regardless of what president Dana White tells the media. More »

Quinton Jackson and I weren't supposed to share a flight from Los Angeles to Tokyo, but circumstances demanded it.

He was headed to Japan for the first time; this trip was my fourth. Jackson was nothing if not curious, which is among the many things I learned about him during that journey in the summer of 2001. As we flew over the Pacific, Jackson wondered a million different things about Pride FC, Japan, its people and food, and though he couldn’t have imagined it at the time, the country would become his professional home for the next five years.

I saw "Rampage" fight for the first time 13 months earlier at King of the Cage 4. A slugfest against a debuting Marvin Eastman was tucked near the bottom of a lineup that included Duane Ludwig, Falaniko Vitale, Fabiano Iha and Daijiro Matsui. Wearing a heavy chain around his neck and a wrestling singlet on his body, Jackson didn’t appear to know how to do anything but be tough. He certainly didn’t know how to fight, not in a professional sense, and lost on points. Jackson, however, wasn’t easy to forget. Recognizing his potential, promoters Terry Trebilcock and Tedd Williams matched him with eight guys you've never heard of to build up his record.

The 11-month winning streak was convincing enough that Jackson, who by then had earned a reputation on the Southern California fight circuit as an exciting prospect, got a call to fight Japanese superstar Kazushi Sakuraba at Pride 15. He didn’t know what Pride was. Didn’t know who Sakuraba was. But he said "yes", and was booked to fly out on Wednesday of fight week. He didn’t make the flight, of course.

An anonymous tip alleging Jackson was an armed felon attempting to flee the country prompted airport police to arrest him at gunpoint on charges of probation violation. Eight hours in jail, bail having been paid, Jackson hopped on a flight the next day.

He could tell a story, had a good one to share, and an eager listener.

At the time Jackson blamed the arrest on his chief second, Chris Brennan, who wanted to fight Sakuraba himself, “Rampage” claimed. A couple of days later, with Brennan in his corner, Jackson nearly slammed his way to a shocking win.

This sort of melodrama has accompanied Jackson at every stage of his career. Over the last two weeks, for instance, “Rampage,” now a grizzled veteran and former champion, has talked a lot, sparked headlines, and created a story. He was done with the UFC, he said. He wanted out because he felt disrespected and underpaid. He also made waves when he told Fighters Only Magazine he utilized testosterone replacement therapy against Ryan Bader.

All that led to Tuesday’s news that, no, he wasn’t going to get his release from the UFC. Instead, he’d have to make good on the terms of his deal with Zuffa and fight Mauricio Rua again. Jackson frolicked around on Twitter, promising 10 more years of fighting thanks to his TRT prescription.

See, whether it’s played-up nonsense Pride tried to pitch Japanese media about Jackson being homeless and living in a bus, or true-to-life realities that make him among mixed martial arts' most unique and reported upon figures, Jackson is always happy to sell.

Acting as a second job came later in life, but it’s fair to say Jackson has long been a performer. Even when he’s at his most serious, there’s plenty of showmanship to be found when he fights. All he ever wanted to do is entertain. That’s how he passed time growing up in a rough patch of Memphis. And at the age of 33, that’s basically what he’s doing now, only with a bonus of large checks attached to his performances.

For certain periods, “Rampage” became one of the few mixed martial artists to hit it big. His famous knockout of Chuck Liddell in 2007 capped ESPN’s first real venture into covering the UFC and mixed martial arts. Liddell was the man everyone knew coming in. Jackson was the man everyone knew coming out. One fight later “Rampage” tussled with Dan Henderson for the right to unify the light heavyweight division, and claimed the No. 1 ranking.

This period was Jackson’s brightest moment as a professional. He enjoyed great wins in Japan, including picture-perfect efforts like the night he dismantled Kevin Randleman, yet Jackson’s 2007 represented the culmination of what so many people felt he was capable of.

“It” realized.

The issue with his flavor of entertainment: sports is a results-based business unfolding in a finite window. Selling, promoting and entertaining are extremely useful when they fall in line with winning. But “Rampage” hasn’t done so consistently since UFC gold adorned his waist. For Jackson to have a chance at spinning his greatest yarn, that must change starting with his attempt at retribution against Rua later this year.

According to UFC president Dana White, Dan Henderson would fight any man in the world -- including Chael Sonnen -- as long as a UFC title was on the line. More »