If there has been one advantage to the UFC's current curse of fighter injuries, it is the fact that people are so happy to see a title get defended they won't complain about the awful matchup. As much as I've hated B.J. Penn until now, I can't help but think that this is his fight to lose. Penn has only one real weakness, and that is strong wrestling. We all saw this get exposed in the GSP fight. Assuming that Penn hadn't been working on this, Diego still doesn't have the same level of wrestling as GSP, and nowhere near the level of ground control. This is a guy who got controlled on the ground by Clay Guida for a significant portion of their fight.
Don't get me wrong, Diego is a well-rounded fighter, but he isn't better than B.J. in any one area. Diego has good stand-up, but B.J. has the better boxing. Diego has a good ground game, but we've seen B.J.'s dominance in that realm. If you still think that Diego has a shot, let's look at Kenny Florian. Going into UFC 101, most people agreed that Florian would beat Diego, and had the better skills on both the feet and the ground. Florian even tried to implement a similar gameplan to GSP, and still lost. B.J. has his cardio and strength issues fixed, and has beefed up his wrestling. There is no place that Diego can take this fight where he will have the advantage and can win. His only hope would be to try and create scrambles and hope to land do more damage that way. If he stays at range, Penn will tear him up with his jab.
Prediction: Penn via Sub in Round 4
Keywords: UFC 107
