ht: Fightlinker
After sandwiching one pretty impressive round in between two excruciating frames against Houston Alexander, Kimbo Slice came out of the affair looking better than most observers expected him to, and he certainly looked good enough that we’ll be seeing him back in the UFC again in the near future.
Was it ever in doubt that we’d be seeing Kimbo again? Probably not. Even if he’d suffered an embarrassing loss he probably would have gotten one more bite at the UFC apple, but he won the fight and showed flashes of pretty-good-ness, and there’s no reason why that shouldn’t get him a bare minimum of two more UFC fights, more if he continues to win. People are interested in watching Kimbo fight, and that goes a long way towards keeping him employed.
So what’s next for Kimbo? Let’s examine the options:
The Roy Nelson rematch option: This has been talked about around the internets, but I don’t really see it making a lot of sense. For one, I think fans would be more interested in seeing Kimbo matched up against someone we haven’t seen him fight yet. Also, I don’t think there’s any reason to think that a second match against Nelson would be markedly different from their first fight. I don’t see this as a match that the UFC would want to make for either of these guys right now.
The Antoni Hardonk option: This could really be named for any of the lower level heavyweights (or light heavyweights) that the UFC has on its roster. This option basically takes the logic that created the Houston Alexander fight (match Kimbo against a guy who isn’t known for big time wrestling or submissions and let them bang it out) and repeats it. The major flaw in this plan is there’s not a huge upside in it. If Kimbo wins, he beat Antoni Hardonk, a fighter who has next to no name value. And there’s a good chance that Hardonk (whose striking is good enough to have taken him to K-1 in the past) would handle Slice easily. Houston Alexander was a great first matchup because he combined name value with a lack of elite skills. If it weren’t for the incredible impression Alexander’s first two UFC bouts created on fans’ minds, he wouldn’t still be around the company. But the problem is that’s a pretty unique situation for a UFC fighter. Almost any UFC fighter who doesn’t have the wrestling or jiu-jitsu to blow through Kimbo is going to have incredibly high level striking.
The Stephan Bonnar option: Stephan Bonnar may be the rare exception to the rule above, as he’s gone 2-3 with a steroid suspension over his past 5 fights. Dana White has gone on record saying that Bonnar will always have a place in the UFC thanks to the key role his fight with Forrest Griffin played in the rise of the company (and very fairly so). Kimbo Slice vs. Stephan Bonnar would actually be a pretty intriguing matchup at this point in their career. Bonnar is currently pencilled in to face Krzysztof Soszynski at UFC 110, but that sort of thing can be worked around. The biggest problem with this option is that ideally you want whoever matches up against Kimbo to be able to turn a victory into some sort of solid momentum, and I don’t know if Bonnar could do that. I don’t want to come off as overly harsh on Bonnar (whose losses, especially the one to Jon Jones are looking like instances of simply being outmatched), but I don’t know where a victory over Slice would take him. However, if Slice won this match it would provide an excuse to credibly match him up with a big name fighter and make lots and lots of money. So there’s that.
Which way will the UFC go? Joe Silva is a very smart man, so he’ll probably have some very excellent ideas about what to do with Kimbo. But what about you, gentle reader? What matchup would you like to see for Kimbo Slice now that he’s a resident of the UFC?
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