The UFC 98 card next month is once again complete with the official announcement of Brock Larson as a replacement opponent for Chris Wilson.
With Larson as the replacement, Zuffa made the decision to shuffle that fight to the preliminary card and moved James Irvin vs. Drew McFedries to the main card.
This will be a fast turnaround for Larson, as he fought on the Ultimate Fight Night 18 card earlier this month. Larson earned a first-round submission over Jesse Sanders on that night and will be riding a four-fight win streak into his fight against Wilson.
UFC 98 will be the first UFC card in a long time I’ve attended as a fan and not as a journalist, and while the bloom certainly went off the rose last month with the injury to Frank Mir, the card still looks pretty decent. I’m going to enjoy getting to see Lyoto Machida pull the rug out from under Rashad Evans, and the Two Matts fight is going to be really interesting from a crowd heat perspective.
I have no problem with Irvin and McFedries getting a main card spot over Larson and Wilson, as they’re much more well known than either Larson or Wilson at this point, but I think the smarter thing to do would have been to move either the Houston Alexander or Phillipe Nover fight to the main card. Alexander is on a heavy losing streak and Nover lost his only official UFC fight, but both guys are more well known than Irvin and McFedries, and both guys could have a bigger future in the company, so it only makes sense to push them on pay per view.
MAIN CARD
- Rashad Evans vs. Lyoto Machida (Light Heavyweight Championship)
- Matt Serra vs. Matt Hughes
- James Irvin vs. Drew McFedries
- Yushin Okami vs. Dan Miller
- Frank Edgar vs. Sean Sherk
PRELIMINARY CARD
- Brock Larson vs. Chris Wilson
- Pat Barry vs. Tim Hague
- Kyle Bradley vs. Phillipe Nover
- Houston Alexander vs. Andre Gusmao
- Brandon Wolf vs. Yoshiyuki Yoshida
- Dave Kaplan vs. George Roop
