Rashad Evans Welcomes Daniel Cormier To Light Heavyweight At UFC 170
Strikeforce World Heavyweight Grand Prix champion Daniel Cormier has made a successful transition into the UFC, notching consecutive victories over heavyweight stalwarts frank Mir and Roy nelson this year. The wins have earned him a lofty number two ranking but he has vowed to never fight his good friend and training partner, UFC heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez.
So Cormier has long been rumored to be making the move down to light heavyweight in order to avoid an otherwise inevitable clash with Velasquez. “DC” already had a long-winded twitter spat with light heavyweight champion Jon jones going, but we found out that he has another opponent altogether at tonight’s UFC Fight Night 33 pre-fight show.
Cormier will square off with former light heavyweight champion Rashad “Suga” Evans at UFC 170 on February 22. The UFC tweeted the reveal this evening:
Just reported on @UFC prefight show: @SugaRashadEvans will fight @dc_mma in a 5 round main event at #UFC170, Feb 22 at @MandalayBay.
— UFCONFOX (@UFCONFOX) December 6, 2013
Evans is on an impressive two-fight winning streak, beating Dan Henderson at UFC 161 in Junes before destroying Chael Sonnen with a first round TKO at UFC 167 in November.
The streak has been in response to UFC President Dana White challenging Evans’ true motivation to keep fighting after losses to Jones and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira. Evans will have his hands quite full with former Olympic wrestler Cormier, who has yet to finish an opponent inside the Octagon.
A lot of this fight is going to come down to Cormier’s weight cut, as he had a well-documented kidney shutdown in preparation for the 2008 Games. Cormier is working diligently on his diet to make the cut. Can he do effectively enough to take out “Suga” in his divisional debut in February?
