THE WINNERS part 1 of 2

Alesso Sakara : He blazed through a slow and just bad looking James Irvin. With this win he is now 3-1 in the UFC. This isn’t a bad record to have and if he wins another fight should get a good step up in competition.  Three names have come to mind in who he could face next. C.B. Dollaway, Goran Reljic, and Tom Lawlor.

C.B. is currently 3-1 in his last 4 fights and is on a 2 fight win streak. Goran is coming off his first loss ever to C.B. and Lawlor most recently lost a very close Split Decision to Aaron Simpson. Dollaway and Reljic are both availible as of this writing. Lawlor is not, as he is scheduled to face Tim Credeur at UFC 113, so scratch his name off the list.

C.B.’s wrestling would be a interesting change of style for Sakara. C.B.’s wrestling should be a step up in comparison to the most recent wrestler Alessio faced, which was Joe Vepedo back at UFC FIGHT NIGHT 15.

Goran could prove a interesting fight with his Kick Boxing and BJJ backgrounds.

Kongo: Well he is back in the win column so that’s good. He looked like someone going for the kill so that’s also a plus. Only downside is that it was against Paul Buentello where the strategy for beating Buentello doesn’t consist of much. His wrestling appeared to have improved but its nothing compared to the upper tier guys in the division. Kongo is still a gatekeeper in the Heavyweight Division who can test prospects and other lower tier fighters but not really go beyond that.  Two match ups come to mind for his next opponent.  He could face the winner of Cro Cop Barry at UFC 115 if he can stand to wait that long, or he could face Gabriel Gonzaga, another gatekeeper in the Heavyweight division but nothing more than that.

Junior Dos Santos : Cain Velasquez is the only next step up in competition for Dos Santos.  This match up though could have some bad effects on the Heavyweight division as a whole down the road. Both of them are young, they will be around for quite sometime, so having them fight now may not be the worst of things.

Bones Jones: This guy is good no doubt about it. The calls for him to go and start facing top 5 guys are a bit insane as he is still a prospect. This was his 11h professional fight let the guy grow and mature a bit before we feed him to the Lil Nogs or Shoguns or Machida’s and other monsters in the Light Heavyweight division.  I have two match ups in mind for him, Thiago Silva or Vladimir Matyushenko.

Thiago would be a step up in the striking department and is a relatively well known fighter. This fight could easily main event a Fight Night card. Vladimir is also coming off of a win at the UFC on Versus card so they should be ready to step back in the Octagon at a relatively close date to each other. Vladimir, a long time MMA veteran, would be a good test for Jones.  A win for Vladimir would also help propel him deeper in to the rankings, at least into the top 10. I just want to see Jones fight more and get more ring time.  He is only 22 he has plenty of time to grow into the apparent Fedor killer we all want him to be.

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*Credit to MMAjunkie.com for the Picture of Alessio Sakara and Chris Leben