Contributor: Benjamin Kohn
The main event of this event is one I have personally been looking forward to for a very long time. Ignoring the issue of TRT, Belfort has been on an absolute tear since his infamous front-kick knockout loss to champion Anderson Silva (at Middleweight at least). He has run through Anthony Johnson and Yoshihiro Akiyama, lost to Jon Jones, and most recently fought Michael Bisping and defeated him by a beautifully set up head kick KO in the second round. Belfort could very well get a rematch against Silva (should he get past Weidman of course) with a big win over Rockhold. Luke Rockhold was the last Strikeforce Middleweight champion capturing the title by beating Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza. Since then, he has defended his title twice beating Keith Jardine by first round TKO and Tim Kennedy unanimous decision. Rockhold is being touted as the other major young prospect alongside Chris Weidman. He is a very big middleweight with very good grappling and a long, rangy, kick-centric striking game.
Vitor Belfort is 36 years old but has not slowed down in the slightest. Starting his career, Belfort would blitz immediately either overwhelming his opponents or gassing and being beaten. In Pride, he used his Carlson Gracie blackbelt to ground most of his opponents winning 3 of his 5 Pride fights by decision, 1 by submission, and one by KO. He was very tentative in most of his Pride fights and it bit him in the butt a few times. Now in Vitor’s current UFC run, he seems to have welded his early blitzing style together with his more patient style to create the calculating, yet always ready to pounce Vitor we have seen in his recent fights. Vitor has managed to not only stay relevant, but stick around the top 3 of a division after so many years of fighting. His last chance at a title shot has him in a must win situation and an impressive win may get him the title shot he desperately wants.
Luke Rockhold is a very bright prospect who still has youth on his side, a rarity for the heavier weight classes. At 28 years old, the dapper Rockhold seems to fit the mold of jack-of-all-trades but master of none mold. He has very solid wrestling skills and is a BJJ brown belt with good top control, ground and pound, sweeps and submission. His striking is long and rangy with good kicks and solid punching power to go along with it. However, none of his skills seem to really stick out. He is however an extremely large Middleweight at 6’3 with a 77-inch reach. Rockhold has looked really good as of late and matchup between him and Anderson Silva (again I am presuming he beats Weidman) would be a very good fight between the UFC champion, and the last Strikeforce champion. However, getting passed Belfort will be no easy task and Rockhold will have to live up to his hype in this match if he wants to win. Now how about we look at how this fight will play out.
Striking: This is a very interesting matchup on the feet. Both men are Southpaws although Rockhold has shown he is willing to switch stances. Rockhold has a tendency to get a little wild and reckless with his hands, even though he usually has the reach advantage. Against Tim Kennedy, he would constantly charge him with winging hooks and his chin straight up in the air. Now 
Kennedy couldn’t really take advantage of this since Rockhold had such a huge size advantage over him but against a fighter like Vitor, who loves to brawl with the hands, this is basically suicide. Now Rockholds kicks are really nice and lengthy and he flicks them from various positions. Vitor has historically had issues with guys who can kick him effectively so this will be a major key to Rockhold beating him. Now the issue is, when Rockhold brawls it plays right into Vitors technical brawling style (especially against the cage where much of Rockholds fight with Kennedy took place). Vitor has always been extremely ferocious when he attempts one of his infamous flurries (when he has you hurt….fuck its ugly). But he has added some new tools to close the distance a bit better. One of them is a kick to the calf to sweep his opponents leg or at least stop him long enough to fire a quick flurry at them and this technique worked beautifully in his fight with Akiyama. Now Vitor showed that he has the patience to set up his strikes now as is evidenced in his fight with Bisping. He continually threw straight lefts in order to elicit the reaction of Bisping ducking off to his right to avoid it. This in turn allowed him to set up both, the head kick at the end of round one that hurt Bisping, and the fight ending head kick. It was a simple strategy that Cro Cop based his whole Pride career off of too great effect. Vitor however showed some shoddy footwork as he allowed Bisping to constantly get his foot outside of his. In a southpaw vs. orthodox fight, that is a big no-no. However this is a southpaw vs. southpaw fight (unless Rockhold switches stances again) so hopefully he won’t make those same mistakes. When he is not flurrying, Belfort will throw single shots, usually kicks to the head or body which he can be countered off of with proper timing.
All in all this is an absolutely awesome fight on the feet which can really go either way. Rockhold’s tendency to brawl with his 
hands plays right into Vitors hands yet his kicking ability is the perfect skillset to wear down Belfort and keep him at range. Vitor’s flurries can overwhelm almost anyone at middleweight and with his new ways of closing the distance and added patience; I think he gets the edge on the feet.
Clinch: This is where Vitor’s flurries are most effective, on the cage just inside striking distance but outside grappling distance. He creates enough space to land brutal lefts and rights at a distance where his opponent, if he doesn’t drop, hesitates while deciding whether to fire back or grab a hold of him. Watch his fight with Tito for a perfect example of this. Rockhold on the other hand is very strong in the clinch due to his size and length. Against Kennedy, he showed great control against the cage as he landed lots of punches and knees to the midsection which wore Kennedy down. Against a guy like Vitor, surviving the first few rounds is imperative (unless you finish him really fast obviously). Should clinching range happen, Rockhold has to grab a hold and turn Vitor into the fence. If he trades with him, he will probably be put out. I will give this to Vitor with a very slight edge only because he can finish the fight more easily here.
Grappling: This will be interesting to see how it plays out during the fight. My guess is Rockholds plan A is to keep the fight 
standing and only take down Vitor if he is getting outstruck or hurt on the feet. Rockhold definitely has the wrestling advantage over Vitor and while Vitor doesn’t have amazing TDD, it is solid enough that he doesn’t have to be tentative in his striking. Throw in him having been a blackbelt for like a decade and a half and you have a real dangerous situation. Vitor has shown some slick submission skills from his back but also showed weakness in not wanting to hurt Jones when he had the armbar locked in (based on his own words). Rockholds ground game seems to focus more on control and ground and pound while Vitor tends to not really take the fight to the ground. When he does, he is not the most active fighter so pray Vitor doesn’t take down Rockhold. The edge for grappling goes to Rockhold because of his wrestling.
Cardio: Everyone knows that Vitor has a history of fading the longer the fight goes on. Recently he has shown heart that he has historically lacked in his four round fight with Jones. However, one fight does not erase a career and Rockhold would be wise to try and bring Vitor into deep waters. Rockhold on the other hand will not have the same issue as he has excellent cardio and has a clear edge here.
Experience: One of the issues with Rockhold is that we don’t really know how good he is. His best opponent rankings wise was Jacare and many people thought Jacare won that fight. Vitor on the other hand has fought some of the best fighters ever in his long career. While he has fallen short, he has also beaten top guys such as Wanderlei Silva, Rich Franklin, and Randy Couture (yes I know it was by cut). The experience of having fought in the UFC as a main eventer and top flight opponents should give an edge to Vitor in the fight while Rockhold may be nervous about his first UFC fight.
While there are other factors to this fight, none really will play a key role in the fight or enough of one to warrant its own section. This fight will go one of two ways, Rockhold kicking a lot at range and clinching immediately when Vitor gets to close or he exchanges hands with Vitor. I think Rockhold will not want to try and cruise to a mediocre decision and will want to make this an exciting fight. His lack experience will be his downfall and I think he will get into a few brawls with Vitor who can put you down and finish you with ferocity unmatched by anyone. I think Rockhold will play it smart at first but will get reckless towards the end of the first round. My official prediction is Belfort by TKO 4:37 of the first round.
-Ben can be reached at [email protected] or @agentbenten.
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