By Brian Hemminger

The UFC 109 main event features a battle between two hall of fame fighters in Mark Coleman and Randy Couture.  The fact that this is the main event has some fans excited and many others wondering why?  Both fighters are legends of the sport, but one has to wonder, are they capable of putting on an exciting capper on a night full of other potentially more interesting fights?

The biggest criticism of this fight has been that it should have happened 10 years ago.  Hell, it should have happened 13 years ago.  Coleman won the first official heavyweight title in a fight with Dan Severn in 1997 and lost it in his next fight with Maurice Smith.  Couture won the heavyweight tournament that year and went on to take Coleman’s title from Maurice Smith in December of 1997.  A fight between Coleman and Couture never happened due to Coleman losing three fights in a row in the UFC before heading to Japan to fight in Pride.

13 years later, both fighters are well past the age where most men call it quits in mixed martial arts.  Couture is 46 and Coleman is 45, and both fighters are finally beginning to look their age.  Coleman’s return fight to the UFC against Shogun Rua was not pretty, but he hung around until a 3rd round TKO loss, and he went on to win a decision victory over Stephan Bonner at UFC 100.   Couture is two fights removed from being heavyweight champion, and he is on one last run at the light heavyweight title, but if he fights like he did against Brandon Vera at UFC 105, it is very unlikely that he’ll be sniffing a title shot any time soon.  His fight with Vera was the first time I’d ever seen Randy get booed.  The clock is ticking, and unfortunately for both fighters, it is nearing midnight on their Cinderella story careers.

That’s not to say that there is nothing interesting about this fight, there are a couple notable story lines.  Former Xtreme Couture trainer Shawn Tompkins has been preparing Coleman for his fight with Couture, and he should know all of Couture’s tricks.  There has also been talk that this is a number one contender match but I really hope that isn’t true.  If anything, there are two fights that should be ahead of this in terms of light heavyweight contenders.  Forest Griffin vs Antonio Rogerio Nogueira should be slightly ahead and obviously Rashad Evans vs Rampage Jackson is the fight that most fans want to see be the number one contender matchup.

While not everyone has been excited about this fight, another MMA legend Don Frye wanted to make his opinion known about Couture vs Coleman:

… Both of those guys beat the tar out of me on several occasions, so how the hell should I know [laughs].  It’s going to be like sex with a grizzly bear, you know, alot of scratching and growling on both sides.  This might be the first UFC I buy and actually watch in about 10 years, you know?  These two guys, it’s going to be one hell of a barnburner.  They’re going to show these new guys how to fight.

Even Las Vegas is perplexed with this fight, Couture is currently a -380 favorite.  I’m not going anywhere near this fight in terms of gambling and neither should you.  While Couture has adapted to his age well over his MMA career, his chin has started to become suspect.  Coleman has had gassing problems in the past, but who knows what training with Tompkins has done for his tank.  There are too many unanswered questions to be certain about anything.

We’ll just have to wait and see what happens.  The only thing I truly hope for is that the crowd doesn’t send these guys off into the  sunset with a chorus of boos.