Must Win For Lesnar At UFC 87

Looks to rebound off loss to Frank Mir at UFC 81

Brock Lesnar has only two professional fights under his belt but his hype in the mixed martial arts world is matched perhaps only by EliteXC’s Kimbo Slice. Like Slice, Lesnar is a newcomer to the industry after making his name in another arena. Lesnar, however, isn’t being dealt mediocre competition like Slice. Instead, the Minnesota native has been thrown to the wolves by Dana White and the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

After handling Min Soo Kim at K-1’s Dynamite!! USA a year ago, Lesnar attracted quite a bit of attention as a legitimate MMA talent. I’m sure many offers came his way. But his physique, credentials and desire landed him in the big house of the UFC. And instantly, he became an MMA superstar and was forced into proving himself as a real heavyweight competitor in the sport.

His first fight came at UFC 81: Breaking Point against former UFC Heavyweight Frank Mir. Lesnar looked impressive against Mir, doing a good job of pounding away in much the same fashion that forced Kim into submission in the K-1 event. Mir, however, is a veteran of the game and caught Lesnar. He locked in a kneebar and Lesnar’s UFC debut came to a close at 1:30 in the first round via submission.

Unfortunately, such a result is possible when an organization chooses to throw top fighters at newcomers ran than soft competition like what EliteXC has mostly done with Kimbo Slice. Such a strategy also opens the possibility that a string of just two or three losses can cost a once heavily-hyped prospect almost all his credibiltiy in the industry.

This is what Lesnar now faces. Tonight, he enters the octagon for just the second time and will stare across the cage at another veteran heavyweight. Heath “The Texas Crazy Horse” Herring has suffered his fair share of losses to big-name fighters. But he also has 42 fights to his name with a 28-13 record and would love nothing more than to piece together two straight wins after defeating Cheick Kongo via split decision at UFC 82.

I don’t think there’s any doubt that Lesnar has the ability to defeat Herring. Lesnar more than has the skills. But if he doesn’t think before he acts like he did against Mir, Lesnar will once again open himself up and Herring will pounce on that. Can Lesnar, then, enter the octagon with both an offensive and defensive strategy?

If he can, then I think Lesnar will be on his way to putting his first UFC loss behind him and get on track to climb the ladder in a very thin heavyweight division. If Lesnar comes into this fight with guns blazing and doesn’t protect himself, then he might be staring at an 0-2 UFC record and the loss of all the momentum and big money opportunities that came his way when he first signed on.

I hope Lesnar does score the win and moves on to be one of the UFC’s top heavyweights. He just needs to stay smart, which is a difficult thing to do when thrown to the wolves at such an early stage in his MMA career.