The UFC kicks their spring schedule into high gear on Wednesday night with the 18th edition of Ultimate Fight Night Live on Spike TV and Rogers Sportsnet.  While the card is headlined by a welterweight bout between Carlos Condit and Martin Kampmann, it’s a light heavyweight battle involving Ryan Bader that has me most intrigued.

The 9-0 Bader will have his second fight inside the UFC on Wednesday night when he hooks up with 10-2-1 Carmelo Marrero.  For Bader, it’s a chance to continue his extremely impressive career that has him poised, in my opinion, to make some real waves at 205 pounds.  The former 2 time All American at Arizona State University won season 8 of The Ultimate Fighter and turned some heads in the process.

I had a chance to interview Bader on Monday afternoon, and was blown away by the poise and humility of the guy.  I had a blast chatting with the guy, but that’s not why I think this guy has very big things ahead of him.  There are a number of things that I think put him ahead of other up and coming light heavyweights at this point in terms of his skill set and ability.

First of all, the pure wrestling skill puts him in fairly good standing right from the get-go.  This guy was a Division I All American and PAC-10 Champion, and knows how to apply those wrestling skills to MMA.  That’s not an easy task, wrestling is one thing, but making the switch to MMA-wrestling is something totally different.  Those who do it have success, and there is a proven success rate with wrestlers who then turn into mixed martial artists.  Ask Tito Ortiz, Josh Koscheck, Brock Lesnar and the most famous example…Randy Couture.  If a wrestler can expand their dimensions inside the MMA game and hone the rest of their game, the inherent wrestling background sets them up success.

Second, Bader has raw power.  Look at the guy.  He’s a freak of nature with one of the best frames in the sport.  The knock on him, at least on the other team, during TUF was that he had no standup game.  Yet, on the finale show in Vegas, it wasn’t a ground and pound victory over Vinicius Magalhaes…it was an early TKO.  When I chatted with him, he told me that was his gameplan for the fight.  He wanted to stand and show that he had more than just wrestling in his repertoire, and that’s exactly what he did.  And when he gets behind a punch, watch out, because he can do some damage.

And finally, he’s got the right attitude, because he’s always learning.  “People haven’t even seen my jiu-jitsu,” was what he told me, because he’s working on this stuff non-stop.  Bader knows he has a great base for a strong UFC career, but he also knows how important it is to keep that wrestling base sharp AND continue working on the other facets of the sport.  You can tell by looking at the dude that he doesn’t shy away from training, which I believe will keep him in good standing in the future.

His fight on Wednesday against Marrero will be a battle of 2 very good wrestlers.  Expect this thing to go to the ground a few times, but I’m sold on the stand up potential of Bader and I think that carries him to a win.  Also on the card on Wednesday is former housemate of Bader Junie Browning.  He’ll fight TUF alumni member Cole Miller while Tyson Griffin fights Rafael Dos Anjos in what should be a really exciting fight.  Not bad for free tv!

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