SCRAPP! FIGHT MAGAZINE
July - 2015
25
tity and look good doing it, but
even with Werdum defeating
Velasquez, the division appears
no different now from what it
was when Cain held the title
because a competitive gap ex-
ists between the heavyweights
vying for the crown and the
man on whose head it lies.
In other words, a lot of solid
heavyweights like Roy Nelson,
Stipe Miocic, Frank Mir, Alistair
Overeem, Antonio Silva, and
Mark Hunt, among others,
exist in the division, but their
best hope at this point might
be to impress enough to get a
fight with former UFC heavy-
weight champion Junior dos
Santos, who owns wins over
every single one of the afore-
mentioned names except Silva
and Overeem. Still, dos San-
tos needs at least one more
fight to keep his name alive in
the heavyweight title sweep-
stakes after extremely difficult
contests with Velasquez and
Miocic, and Velasquez could
stand to look towards a bout
with someone along the lines
of a Travis Browne to get him-
self back in contention as well.
Meanwhile, Miocic comes off
a win over Hunt, “Bigfoot”
awaits Soa Palalei in Brazil at
UFC 190, Mir is set for a bout
with Todd Duffee in almost
two weeks, and Nelson, fresh
off of a UFC 185 loss to “The
Reem”, counts down to his
battle with former UFC heavy-
weight champion Josh Barnett
this September in Saitama.
This scenario leaves out a gen-
tleman by the name of Andrei
Arlovski, whose career turn-
around mirrors Werdum’s, save
for the title win against the top
dog of the division, but why
not consider making a bout
between Arlovski and Werdum
happen? After all, a number of
factors play into how the bout
would make a great amount of
sense.
First off, Werdum would need
a contender for the title as
immediately as possible, pro-
vided we don’t see the UFC
play the “immediate rematch”
card with Velasquez, and as
we have mentioned already,
any other potential option for
Werdum or Arlovski is either
booked, or in need of more
wins to prove their own case.
Arlovski has never been shy
about taking a bout, as long as
he knows where and when it
will go down.
Also, competition can cre-
ate intrigue when two parties
share history with each other.
Lest we forget, Arlovski defeat-
ed Werdum during Werdum’s
first UFC run, albeit in a some-
what forgettable bout. Even
with that in mind, history does
not always repeat itself, since
Werdum has demonstrated
clear improvements in every as-
pect of his game while keeping
his ground game exceptional,
and that can create an alluring
conundrum for Arlovski, even
with how much different Ar-
lovski has looked now, in com-
parison to when he looked like
he was at the tail end of his
career.
The stars can align for this bout
to go down, and perhaps the
result will be a far better fight
than their first meeting, but
more than that, there is the
question of if Werdum is for
real as the champion, since Ar-
lovski’s win over Browne came
at UFC 187, while UFC 188
was Velasquez’s first bout since
2013, but as far as anyone else
is concerned, nobody will know
until someone tests Werdum.
As many champions will attest
to, claiming a title is difficult,
and defending it is ever more
arduous a task, but when it
comes to the UFC heavyweight
title, any old adages about be-
ing the champion take on new
meanings, and for Werdum,
that means that anyone that
stands between him and his
newly acquired belt can take
the belt from him in as quick a
fashion as he won the belt to
begin with.
