LEAVE aside the hullabaloo surrounding interim titles and injury withdrawals and what we have at UFC 206 is a card packed with exciting matches, featuring some of the UFC‘s best finishers.
Here are five things to be keeping an eye on when you tune in to watch the action live from Toronto on Saturday night:
Can Max Holloway capture interim UFC gold?
The main event bout between featherweight contenders Max ‘Blessed’ Holloway and Anthony ‘Showtime’ Pettis may have an interim title attached to it, but it’s no longer a straightforward title fight.
Pettis missed the 145lb featherweight limit by three pounds during Friday’s official weigh-ins, disqualifying him from the chance to become UFC interim featherweight champion.
The bout will proceed but now only one man, Holloway, can walk away with the belt.
If he defeats Pettis, the interim title will be his. If Pettis wins, who knows? The interim belt may be decommissioned, while UFC bosses will have to decide who gets to face undisputed champ Jose Aldo for the full title in 2017.
The addition of an interim title for this bout came about as part of a bizarre chain of events that started with light-heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier’s injury withdrawal from his originally scheduled main event with Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson.
The UFC then stripped Conor McGregor of his featherweight belt, awarded it to Aldo, freeing up the interim belt for Saturday night’s main event bout.
But interim belt or no interim belt, this fight promises to deliver fireworks aplenty, with two of the most exciting 145ers on the planet set to go head to head.
Most pundits are picking Holloway to win the bout in Toronto this weekend. The super-tough Hawaiian’s game has improved immeasurably since he was beaten by decision by McGregor back in August 2013.
He’s won every fight since, racking up an impressive nine-fight win streak in the process. And if he can take his remarkable run into double figures on Saturday night, he’ll book himself an appointment with Aldo for the undisputed title in 2017.
Even though the title will now only be on the line for one of them, the fight will pit the spectacular striking and dangerous submission game of Pettis against the all-action pressure fighting of Holloway, and the result could be one of the fights of 2016. Do not miss it.
Will ‘Cowboy’ continue his streak?
Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone will take on anyone, anywhere, any time. It’s an attitude that has seen him become one of the most popular fighters in the sport.
And the former lightweight title challenger will continue his new-found career as a welterweight when he makes his third appearance as a 170-pounder against teak-tough contender Matt ‘The Immortal’ Brown.
A glance at Cerrone’s record makes for astonishing reading. He’s fought 12 times in the last three years, losing just once – against Rafael dos Anjos in a lightweight title fight.
After that defeat Cerrone decided to move up from 155lbs to 170lbs and has looked as good as we’ve ever seen him as he’s picked up wins over Alex Oliveira (by submission), Patrick Cote (by TKO) and Rick Story (also by TKO), picking up $50,000 performance of the night bonuses for each fight.
On Saturday he faces a highly-motivated Brown, whose back is against the wall after dropping back-to-back losses to Demian Maia and Jake Ellenberger in his last two outings.
Brown is famed for his in-your-face, aggressive fighting style, while Cerrone loves nothing better than to stand and trade with his opponents, which suggests a potential fight of the night could ensue when their co-main event bout gets underway in Toronto on Saturday night.
Can ‘The Korean Superboy’ propel himself into contention?
He looks like a middle school kid but hits like a middleweight boxer. South Korean sensation Doo Ho Choi is undoubtedly one of the most exciting prospects to emerge in a talent-stacked featherweight division.
Don’t let Choi’s looks deceive you, though. He may look harmless enough as he grins his way to the Octagon to the theme from Superman.
But once he steps through the cage door he turns into one of the most devastating finishers in the UFC.
Choi is riding an incredible 13-fight win streak, with 11 of those coming by KO or TKO. And since landing in the UFC, Choi has had three fights, finishing each one by KO/TKO in the very first round.
In fact, he’s polished off his opposition in the UFC so quickly you could fit all of his Octagon victories in a single round, with the three wins totalling just four minutes 33 seconds.
With stats like that it’s no surprise he’s known to the MMA world as ‘The Korean Superboy’.
He takes on perennial contender Cub Swanson on Saturday night in one of the most eagerly-anticipated bouts of the night.
Swanson is an excellent technician and will undoubtedly pose the toughest test of Choi’s career to date.
But if ‘The Korean Superboy’ can polish off ‘Killer Cub’, the UFC will have an exciting young contender on their hands.
Why should we keep a close eye on Tim Kennedy?
If there’s one fighter you should pay close attention to on Saturday night, it’s Tim Kennedy, who faces Kelvin Gastelum on the main card.
The US Army sniper and UFC middleweight contender hasn’t fought in the Octagon for more than two years, when he was controversially defeated by Yoel Romero, who has since gone on to book himself into a title fight with Brit Michael Bisping.
But Saturday night isn’t just an opportunity to check out Kennedy’s form after 27 months away from the cage, it’s also a chance to see if he makes any kind of statement relating to the newly-announced Mixed Martial Arts Athletes Association.
Kennedy is one of the five UFC stars on the board of the MMAAA, and the group’s advisor Bjorn Rebney hinted during a recent media conference call that things will soon happen that are “very, very public in nature,” and alluded to plans involving Kennedy and UFC 206.
Whether it’s refusing to wear his mandated Reebok fight kit, making a statement of defiance during a post-fight interview or something else altogether, there’s a fair chance we’ll be talking about Kennedy after the fight – and it might not be all about his performance during the bout itself.
Keep ‘em peeled.
It’s also keeping an eye on Gastelum during the weigh-ins. He failed to make the 171lb welterweight limit for his scheduled bout with Cerrone at UFC 205, causing the fight to be scrapped and the UFC to force the former TUF winner to move up a weight class.
If he fails to make 186lbs on Friday, there’ll be hell to pay.
Who’ll win the battle of the light-heavyweight prospects?
They say the UFC’s light-heavyweight division isn’t as blessed with up-and-coming contenders as some of the other weight classes, but on Saturday night we’ll see two of the best prospects at 205lbs collide in the night’s featured preliminary bout.
Ukrainian Nikita ‘The Miner’ Krylov’s loose, languid fighting style has seen him embark on an impressive five-fight win streak in the UFC.
All five fights were finished in side the distance, two by knockout and three by submission, with all five coming before the end of the second round and three ending in Round 1.
He takes on Latvian-born Canadian powerhouse Misha Cirkunov, who’ll be fighting in his home town of Toronto looking to extend his own stellar run of form.
The 29-year-old hasn’t lost a bout in four years, and is riding a seven-fight win streak with all seven coming by stoppage, and five of them coming in the very first round.
With both men possessing the tools to finish the fight in the blink of an eye, this one could provide the perfect appetiser ahead of the main card in Toronto.
How to watch
Please note this weekend’s event is NOT being shown on BT Sport 2 as usual.
This time around the live action will be aired on BT Sport 3, so if you’re planning to record the event make sure you check your series links on your Sky+ or Virgin TiVo boxes to make sure your box picks up the recording.
The early prelims, as always, are exclusively live on the UFC’s live streaming service UFC Fight Pass, and will get underway from around 11:30pm on Saturday night.
The televised prelims will get underway on BT Sport 3 (and UFC Fight Pass) from 1am, with the main card being screened exclusively live to UK viewers on BT Sport 3 from 3am.
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