Love him or hate him, Matt Mitrione hits damn hard. This, I think we can all agree on. Coming off two losses back to back with a long layoff in-between didn’t help his status in the public eye though, and many were saying that if he lost to Phil De Fries in Sweden at UFC on Fuel TV 9 that he’d lose his job. And what would a 34-year-old Mitrione do then? Would he even keep fighting? Me personally, I like Meathead, and I like to see him do well, I think he’s a natural and if he’d been fighting for a decade I think he could’ve made a fairly decent dent in the heavyweight division. But the heavyweight division is shallow, damn shallow, and I think Mitrione can go from thin ice to some interesting matchups in a quick turnaround. Mitrione isn’t really specific on who he wants to fight next:
“I was out for 14 months, and I’m coming off of two losses in a row, so it was a really emotional victory. Everything about it was really emotional. I was so elated. It was just a beautiful feeling. Whoever the UFC thinks is a fair and appropriate match-up for me, that’s who I’m looking for.”
We have some suggestions for Meathead’s future though. Here’s some of the guys we wouldn’t mind seeing him bang against. And they’ll even be fair and appropriate matchups:
Todd Duffee: He just beat Phil De Fries himself, so it could be considered some sort of weird Phil De Fries tournament or something. These two are near each other in the rankings and in my opinion, skill level. Fair and appropriate? Yep.
Gabriel Gonzaga: He’s still without a fight after his win over Ben Rothwell at UFC on FX: Belfort vs. Bisping, so why not? He obviously has the ground game edge on Mitrione, but there’s few people below Mitrione, he has to look up somewhere. Or maybe it would be more appropriate for him to fight…
Ben Rothwell: Sure, Rothwell has about 35 more fights more than Mitrione, but this could equate to a pretty slick slugfest. Rothwell attempted to recreate himself, trimming down the fat and bulking up on muscle, but for whatever reason since joining the UFC he doesn’t look like his IFL self. This could catapult Mitrione or send him back down considering his career.
Brendan Schaub: The consistently-hyped medium-sized heavyweight is always hanging around, and these two probably should’ve fought years ago. Why not set up the fight as a TUF 10 reunion with Roy Nelson cageside smiling about how he knocked both of these guys out? OK that last part makes no sense.
