Ideal UFC Fight Card

With UFC 220 set to take over the TD Garden on the twentieth everybody knows what the main event is going to be, the heavyweight title fight between Stipe Miocic vs  the number one contender Francis Ngannou.  The second fight will likely be a second title defense with Daniel Cormier defending his Light Heavyweight title against the number two contender Volkan Oezdemir.  That is about the perfect top of the card a double title defense with one of the best fighters on the planet in Stipe Miocic, a legend in DC, and two legit dangerous contenders.

The rest of the card is still up in the air with the UFC currently having eleven fights.  Which made me think what does the perfect UFC fight card look like.  Obviously right off the bat you’d say five fights all champions but since that isn’t very realistic I decided to take a more reasonable look.

As an opening fight the ideal situation is to have a veteran someone a casual fan would know maybe not a necessarily a former champ but preferably has fought for the title in his division against somebody who has a real future, maybe an ultimate fighter winner, but someone who is two big wins away from the title.  Think of Eddie Alvarez vs Justin Gaethje, this draws interest both in as a test to see if the new kid is for real and brings in the veteran fighter’s fans.

The next two fight are more interchangeable, at least one should be a fight that is a bit more technically minded, something for the MMA nerds who actually enjoy watching good ground and clinch fighting, guys with wrestling and BJJ backgrounds because it’s always fun to watch a guy force another guy to quit by threatening to break his arm.  Next you want a fight where the winner is definitely going to fight a champion next, an old school number one contender bout, preferably against a champ with some name power like Mighty Mouse or Miocic.  Khabib vs Barboza was a goods example of this.

For the last two fight I like for titles to be on the line.  UFC 220 is delivering big in that regard and most big UFC cards do have a double main event.

Depending on how things shake out UFC 220 will likely tick a lot of boxes and a full breakdown on that will be coming out next week.

Written By: Jason MacKinnon