On August 28th at UFC 118 in Boston, Randy “The Natural” Couture faces the current IBA and NABO Heavyweight boxing champion James “Lights Out” Toney. Couture was a 3-time NCAA All-American wrestler at Oklahoma State, a UFC Hall of Famer, 5-time UFC champion and generally considered one of the grandfathers of modern MMA. Despite his vast experience and accolades, Couture will not win.
Before you flood my email with complaints, let me clarify my position. This fight is a lose-lose situation, which will do nothing for his career or his desire to compete for another UFC championship. If Randy wins, his victory will be dismissed as an easy fight against an over-the-hill boxer. Should Lights Out win the match, the Natural will have lost an MMA match to an over-the-hill boxer. Neither is much of a resume builder for a man who once left the UFC because, as he claimed, the promotion failed in its attempt to sign the number 1 fighter in the world, Fedor Emelianenko.
Rumors are that Toney lobbied UFC president Dana White for a chance to compete in MMA. White apparently was intrigued at Toney’s request, but when the boxer requested to fight Brock Lesnar, White scoffed and countered with internet sensation Kimbo Slice. The two sides agreed on Couture, who is forced to step up and defend his comrades in arms in the debate of which sport is better, boxing or MMA?
Toney is a 40 year old boxer, not a wrestler, kick-boxer or Brazilian jiu-jitsu world champion. If he were a master of one of these other fight disciplines, opinions might differ, even though many world champions of these other fight disciplines have tried their hand at MMA, only to have their dreams crushed in a matter of seconds. Toney is not Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson. In fact, boxing experts would tell you that his championship belts are somewhat insignificant and that the real titles (WBC, IBF & WBO) are held by the Klitschko brothers.
Truthfully, even though Toney has 72 career wins; his record is not that impressive. He beat a 40 year old Evander Holyfield, lost to Roy Jones Jr. and twice was forced to vacate victories because he tested positive for steroids after the fights. Aside from Holyfield, who was well beyond his prime at the time of their fight, Toney hasn’t beaten anyone with name value at Heavyweight.
Couture isn’t getting any younger either and At 47, he is already the oldest person ever to win a fight in the UFC. Of his 28 career fights (18-10), 15 of them were UFC championship fights against a laundry list of elite fighters like Chuck Liddell, Vitor Belfort, Pedro Rizzo, Tito Ortiz and Minotauro Nogueira. But he hasn’t fought for a title in nearly 2 years since losing the heavyweight title to Lesnar. Its ridiculous to believe that a win over Toney would put him back in line for a title shot in either the heavyweight or light-heavyweight divisions. So if the referee raises Randy Couture’s hand in triumph at UFC 118, realize that it doesn’t make a bit of difference in either of their careers.
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