Dec. 3rd Lineup/Upcoming "Fight Nights" and The Ultimate Fighter Semi-Finals Preview

This week is the first of a number of very busy/awesome weeks for MMA fans we can look forward to in the coming two months or so. Tomorrow (Wed.) is packed full of MMA with WEC 37 @ 8pm on Versus and back to back new episodes of The Ultimate Fighter: Season 8 on Spike at 12am and 1am--six straight hours of MMA...
Schedule

• *12/3: WEC 37 @ 8pm on Versus*
• *12/4: The Ultimate Fighter @ Midnight and 1am on Spike (after WEC 37)*
• *12/10: UFC Fight For the Troops @ 8pm on Spike*
• *12/13: The Ultimate Fighter: Season 8 Final @ 8pm on Spike*
• *12/13: Battle at the Capital I @ DC Armory in SE Washington DC at 5pm (Not on TV)*
• *12/27: UFC 92: The Ultimate 2008 on PPV*

WEC 37 is headlined by a Bantamweight Title fight between current champ Miquel Torres (left) and Manny Tapia and is filled with awesome fights. Needless to say, I'll preview this card later today/tomorrow.


Since the UFC and WEC brands are both under the Zuffa, LLC umbrella, The Ultimate Fighter episodes are being shown late so as not take viewers away from WEC 37. Spike will make up for the lack of a new episode last week by showing two new episodes of the show. A story on Spike.com states that each episode will feature two fights (typically there is one fight) which means that the season finale matchups will be set by the end of the second episode, as the number of fighters drops from 8 to 4 (two 155'ers and two 205'ers).

Wednesday is a great day to start watching the show if you haven't seen it before given the number and quality of fights featured and the fact that it's likely that the winners of these matches (and maybe a couple losers) will end up fighting in the UFC in the future, even if they don't actually win the final match. Along those lines, there is a rumor that Junie Browning (right) gets kicked off the show in the second episode due to another "incident" but even if that is true, I am 100% sure that Junie has or will have a contract with the UFC (see Dana White's video blog from UFC 91).
Look for:

• Light Hvy: Ryan Bader over Eliot Marshall in the first episode
• Lightweight: Phillipe Nover over George Roop by utter obliteration in episode 1
• A battle between 205'ers Vinny Magalhaes and Krzysztof Soszynski--can't say who will win
• Bedlam from Junie Browning that will lead to another visit from UFC President Dana White
• Dana giving Junie yet another chance
• Junie to make quick work of Efrain Escudero--possibly a KO