Who’s Next? – Chuck Liddell

With only 2 losses in his last twenty Mixed Martial Arts fights; there is little doubt that Chuck Liddell is the best light heavyweight fighter in the world. Still, fans of the UFC always want to see good battles, so it’s worth looking forward to those fighters, UFC, Pride or elsewhere who might give Chuck Liddell a run for his money.

Chuck Liddell is on a seven fight winning streak, his last defeat coming at the hands of Quinton “Rampage” Jackson in November of 2003. Those seven victories were against some of the top light heavyweights of all time, including two victories over Randy “The Natural” Couture and two victories over Tito Ortiz. Other notables were submission masters Renalto “Babalu” Sobral and Jeremy Horn.

The fight against Quinton Jackson, which was held in Japan under Pride rules was probably the last time that Chuck Liddell looked remotely defenseless. His two victories over Randy Couture and Tito Ortiz were easy and his dismantling of Jeremy Horn shows how far Chuck has come as a fighter since the two first met in 1999. A fight which Horn won by submission in the first round.

So who might be the next fighter to give chuck a real fight. Will it be Quinton “Rampage” Jackson in their long awaited rematch. Now that Jackson is fighting in the UFC, it’s just a matter of time until we see this one. I predict the summer or fall of 2007. I think that Chuck Liddell is a much better fighter now than he was when he faced Rampage the first time.

Also Quinton Jackson is not the same fighter that faced Chuck the first time, unfortunately for Rampage, his skills have not gotten better. Ever since Quinton Jackson’s first knockout loss at the hands of Wanderlei Silva he has not been the same fighter and certainly the second knockout loss to the same opponent did not help matter any.

Let’s hope that Quinton has regained that edge that made him so dangerous in the first fight against Chuck.

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