Brian Bowles vs. Will Ribeiro is almost definitely a #1 contender match. Expect to see the winner of this fight take on the winner of the main event early next year.

Wagnney Fabiano vs. Akitoshi Tamura – For those of you that do not know if Wagnney is, its time to learn about him!!! This kid is for real, and you’ll hear me say that a few times throughout this post, but I’m being for real when I say that they are for real. Really! Wagnney is known for his brilliant BJJ but his last win came by a brutal KO. I would expect the winner of this fight to fight Urijah Faber in a #1 contender fight asuming that Garcia gets first crack at Brown and not an instant rematch for Faber.

Joseph Benavidez vs. Danny Martinez – I don’t know much about Martinez, but Joseph Benavidez is for real!!! He trains with Urijah Faber and he is his protege, his TOP student. I expect BIG things for Benavidez in 2009. I would think that being good buds with Urijah sure can’t hurt when it comes to pulling strings in the WEC.

Johnny Hendricks is a Team TakeDown fighter (Jake Rosholt, Shane Rollins). He has quite a personality as shown in the TapOut show. Being from Team TakeDown, you KNOW he can take the fight to the ground with his solid wrestling base. BUT, Johnny has REALLY been working his hands and wants nothing more than a KO, not a TKO, but a KO. Look for him to keep it standing as long as he is getting the better of it. But as soon as he catches a big punch/kick, he’ll put his opponent on his back.

Mark Munoz – Look for him to be welcomed into the UFC with open arms with a win over this nobody.
Blas Avena vs. Kevin Knabjian – Blas, the casino employee that always makes it onto the card. He is a good mid-tier WEC fighter that will never get a title shot. Knabjian, don’t know of…

Bart Palaszewski vs. Alex Karalexis – THIS is actually a fight that is worhty of being on a UFC Fight Night preliminary card. Both of these fighters made a name for themselves. Through IFL and TUF 1 respectively. As long as this fight stays standing, which it should, it potentially has Fight of the Night written all over it. SlugFest! I HOPE this one gets televised!
Hiroyuki Takaya vs. Cub Swanson – Is this REALLY a Cub Swanson sighting??? He fell off the face of the earth after getting choked out by Jens Pulver. A lot of talent, but possibly a bit too cocky for his own good. They are trying to give him a rebound win here.

Shane Roller vs. Mike Budnik is the prelim fight that I want to see just as badly, if not more so than Bart/Alex. Shane Roller is also from Team TakeDown. Mike Budnik you may not have heard of. BUT, I bet you heard of his cousins. Dan and Jim Miller. Both of these fighters have a lot of power for the 155 division. The winner of this fight will quickly find himself being televised next time.

As for this event…… I SMELL UPSETS! Which would be quite a surprise because outside of Urijah losing last event, there really aren’t too many upsets in the WEC – typically the better fighter on paper wins the fight. However, I have a strange feeling about this event – someone is in for a surprise.

And how about them undercard fights!!!! This card is STACKED and hopefully Tamura doesn’t put the crowd to sleep and we get to see a little bit of up and coming Mark Munoz or Johny Hendricks fight, heck, even Cub Swanson is on the undercard (not a Cub fan). But the two undercard fights that I want to see most would have to be Shane Roller/Mike Budnick and Bart Palaszewski/Alex Karalexis.