I don't think I would have even known that this card was happening had I not opened my website of choice for sports just to check the Olympic hockey results but apparently there is a pretty stacked card that is taking pace tonight.
I can't even be asked to watch it despite the fact that there are some pretty great matchups on the card.
Sean Strickland is more of a guy to watch because of his outspoken and brash nature. I wouldn't really consider him a top talent though. Leading up to this fight he has done his best to stir up controversy saying some really sexist things that don't have anything to do with MMA. I think he really wants some of that Colby Covington sort of press where he is the heel on purpose.
There is also a Dan Ige fight and I haven't seen that guy in ages. I just kind of presumed he was retired. Dude has lost 3 of his last 4 so I would imagine he probably isn't that far away from getting retired whether he wants to or not. This may be a swan song for him.
I believe Dan's best work is in his past and he is just a jobber now that is kept around to push younger talent to the top until his name no longer has any merit associated with it. nobody has ever accused him of being good-looking either. Ok, now I am just being mean.
Looking at the rest of the card it seems like we could actually get some decent fights and since it is a Fight Night and not a major event, normally the fighters are going to really go for it and try to win rather than trying to "not lose."
I think the idea is better than the actual show will be though and this is because of over-exposure for most of us out there in MMA-fandom. When UFC had 1 event per month it was something that I could get excited for but then they started the Fight Nights, the ESPN events, the reality show called "The Ultimate Fighter" and just went too far with it. Also, now that all events stream on Paramount and there is no such thing as a Pay Per View event anymore, the entire fiasco is going to be absolutely inundated with commercials and this was something that didn't happen a few years back when the events were all Pay Per View.
The reason why I tolerate packed schedules in other sports like basketball, football, and baseball is because there are seasons and most importantly, and END to that season. This gives us time to miss it and be excited about upcoming events. With UFC, it never ends and while I was willing to get on board for a once-a-month thing I just can't get excited about something that happens ever single week.
I won't even watch this one and will just catch the highlights on Sunday morning instead.
I don't think the UFC even cares very much about this event. In the many years that I have been following UFC I have never seen them just not put the odds up on their own website. Every single fight is completely devoid of betting odds, which is really strange. You would think that a company as big as UFC would be on top of tech stuff but I have also noticed that there is a rather large delay in the rankings as well. Sometimes they even have the wrong champion on certain pages and while this would be acceptable if say, I made this mistake, it seems really out of sorts for the official UFC page.