Dan Henderson and Daniel Cormier were both in very interesting spots after their last fights. So it’s no surprise that the UFC would want to make this matchup, especially with most of the top tier of the division busy.
Cormier, denied his chance to prove he was in the upper tier of light heavyweights when Rashad Evans injured his knee and withdrew from their fight, molly-whomped a trash talking barista in under two minutes. He made 205 for the first time successfully after a career spent at heavyweight, looking good in the process and avoiding the renal failure that plagued his final cut as an Olympic wrestler (and knocked him out of the Beijing games). He looked every part the elite light heavyweight people thought he would be when he opted to make the cut instead of challenging training partner Cain Velasquez, the current UFC heavyweight title holder.
Henderson, written off in the division after three straight losses, rebounded from a poor opening two rounds to turn the lights off on one of the division’s toughest outs in Mauricio “Shogun” Rua. After two straight split decision losses to Evans and Lyoto Machida he had the lights turned off for the first time in his career, eating a shin from Vitor Belfort in Brazil that led many to wonder if this was the end of the multi-team Olympic team member. Henderson showed that while he may be in the twilight of his career his one most feared trait, his one shot power, hasn’t left him just yet.
Both Cormier and Henderson are in interesting spots as fighters. Cormier needs a win against a name opponent before he’ll get a shot at Jon Jones. Unless the UFC is thinking that Cormier is engaging in a one man war on Starbucks, and that knocking out baristas is good for business, Cormier isn’t going to get a title shot on the win over Patrick Cummins alone. And Henderson, 1-3 in his last four fights, is still a Top 10 fighter but can’t reasonably be pushed against Jon Jones on the strength of one win over a faded Rua that could be interpreted as a fluke.
It’s why a fight between them makes an awful lot of sense. There are actually three potentially huge, money-making reasons why this fight makes sense.
Cormier making 205 again is a good thing – MMA history has a number of points where it could’ve changed in profound ways. One was at UFC 67, where Travis Lutter had the opportunity of a lifetime. He had won the comeback season of “The Ultimate Fighter” and walked into the evening with nothing to lose and everything to gain. And the first round of that fight against Anderson Silva he had the opportunity to pull off a historic upset, getting mount on Silva early. The problem was that he gassed, and gassed hard, pretty quickly from a botched weight cut. Silva would ride out the early wave and wind up finishing Lutter in spectacular fashion, as Matt Serra would be the TUF 4 winner to pull off an upset of a lifetime at UFC 69 against Georges St. Pierre and change history.
Imagine if Lutter had made weight in a much easier fashion than he did at UFC 67? He would still wind up missing but it was a tough, hard cut that left him drained coming into that fight. While he arguably would still have lost to Silva that night it leads to an interesting discussion: what would’ve happened had he not completely blown that weight cut? Lutter came out and looked great against the champion and there was a brief moment where the phrase “upset” wasn’t mentioned … but it was felt.
Cormier made 205 fairly easy the first time and every fighter who’s dropped weight classes permanently has said that the first time is the hardest. Making 205 one more time, knowing how his body feels and reacts, will help him if he can get his shot against Jon Jones. Potentially life-altering level of money is at stake with a Jones fight; potentially losing out on a title fight because of a botched weight cut is much higher for Cormier the fewer times he makes the weight before a Jones fight. The act of making 205 one more time against Henderson will make it easier for a third time.
Henderson can potentially fulfill the narrative Tito Ortiz didn’t in 2012 – The one thing that Tito Ortiz’s submission victory over Ryan Bader two years ago was that it gave us hope one more time. Those of us who were fans for a while, and remembered the days when Tito Ortiz would dig graves after a finish win, got to relive that moment one more time when he dug that grave against Ryan Bader. For a fleeting moment we got to feel that hope, that emotional calling to when our heroes were still at their peak. It would all fall apart when Ortiz stepped in on short notice and was blown out of the water in a rematch against Rashad Evans, of course, and he would finish his career in the UFC on another three fight losing streak.
But that moment in the sun that Ortiz had was the same one that we all felt after Henderson put the lights out on Shogun Rua. Imagine if he does that against Daniel Cormier? The marketing piece writes itself. Henderson, who many thought beat Rashad and Machida, was written off as done and looked the part for 10 minutes. But you can never count out that right hand and he turned Shoguna’s lights off in the third. If he pulled that off against Daniel Cormier then a fight with Jon Jones is an easy sell.
The UFC hype video is easy to see. Henderson, the old war horse who managed to stay relevant and elite since UFC 17, still has enough left to be elite. Can he land that “H-bomb” once and finally hold UFC gold? Henderson has a shot at one final ride into the sunset for a UFC title in the same manner that many thought Tito Ortiz could’ve pulled off two years ago.
Cormier can get a name win to justify a title shot – Unless the casual MMA fan hates coffee shops, and their workers, one imagines that the UFC can’t find another MMA fighter who works as a barista during the day with enough credibility as an athlete to sell against Cormier again. And even then Cormier knocking out coffee making specialists isn’t a good idea as a marketing tool to get him into a world title shot anytime soon.
Beating Dan Henderson, perhaps the greatest American fighter of his era and perhaps of all time, does that for him in spades.
Henderson has the same resume as Rashad Evans as far as Cormier’s concerned: he’s good enough to get him into the title picture by defeating him. Lamping Patrick Cummins is great for a highlight film but not to sell as a way to get into a title fight. Doing the same to Henderson makes him an instant contender with no further fights needed for a title shot. A win over Henderson, which is tough but doable for Cormier, does enough to get him a title shot. He’ll have made the weight twice, as well, which will quell any notion of a repeat of his Beijing Olympics incident.
Cormier has arguably done enough to earn a title shot in his UFC career as a whole so far but he needs a win over someone of note at 205 to make it seem like it’s deserved. A win over Henderson does that. Henderson is enough of a name to make it worth his time and Henderson is still a Top 10 fighter in the division. A win over Henderson coupled with the Cummins win puts him in better standing than a win over Evans would’ve. Two wins, at least one in spectacular fashion, makes him a credible and sellable contender.
