WEC 48 Preview: The Main Card

Benson Henderson vs. Donald Cerrone

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The Breakdown: The rematch of 2009’s fight of the year finally comes to fruition with the added stakes of the undisputed lightweight title being on the line when incumbent champion Benson Henderson takes on the favorite fighting son of Colorado, Donald Cerrone. Everyone remembers the contentious unanimous decision that went Henderson’s way in their first encounter. The rematch appears set to head down the same wildly competitive path.

The fight still comes down to the same basic variables, foremost among them being Cerrone’s lacking takedown defense and how it balances out with his spectacular submission skills. In the first go-round Cerrone was able to catch Henderson coming in with all manner of guillotine chokes and transition to every submission in the book off his back. The only thing that kept Henderson in one piece was his seeming immunity to pain and ability to work solid ground-and-pound once he got past the guard.

Gaining positional dominance will be key for Henderson. He can’t bank on surviving another half-dozen fully cinched-in submissions. Just as important will be Henderson’s conditioning, considering he dropped the last two rounds to Cerrone mostly because he no longer had the gas to generate any power on his single leg. That single leg consistently befuddled Cerrone, and it remains Henderson’s best weapon in this fight.

Cerrone’s best weapon is the one he used the least in that first bout: his striking. For all of Henderson’s success, he remains a developing fighter and his striking just doesn’t measure up against Cerrone’s reach and versatility. Attacking the lead leg early and backing off Henderson with the jab and 1-2 could easily save Cerrone the hassles of the first fight, but that would require a level of strategic savvy that can’t be assumed.

This could be the rare example of a rematch that doesn’t boil down to one fighter adapting better to the other, but simply the same scenarios playing out all over again. If that’s the case, it would be hard to imagine Henderson surviving the same gauntlet of submissions again. Of course Cerrone could just as easily lose a lopsided decision if Henderson has the gas tank to go 25 hard minutes.

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The Bottom Line: If nothing else, both fighters can expect to take home “Fight of the Night” bonuses, as this remains an incredibly compelling style clash. Henderson will likely control the early going with his wrestling, but in a five-round fight, the fighter with more ways to win has to be favored. Cerrone will prove that Henderson has a breaking point by choking him out late in the second step of what we can only hope will be a trilogy.