Buckle up for another great matchup this December, as The Ultimate Fighter 16 Finale has possibly the leading candidate for Fight of the Night on the card with Melvin Guillard taking on Jamie Varner. UFC officials confirmed the booking on their website:
A match between two fighters coming off of Fight of the Night performances has been verbally agreed to as former WEC champion Jamie Varner takes on the “Young Assassin” Melvin Guillard at the Ultimate Fighter Finale on FX.
Guillard (30-11-2, 1 NC MMA; 11-7 UFC) is coming off the first KO loss of his career, a 76 second thriller against Donald Cerrone at UFC 150. He missed weight for that fight and had dropped Cerrone seconds into the opening round before getting caught with a head kick and a punch. It stands as the fastest ever UFC bout to win Fight of the Night. After being on the verge of title contention in 2011, he’s dropped 3 of his last 4, all 1st round stoppage losses.
Former WEC lightweight champion Varner (20-7-1, 2 NC MMA; 2-2 UFC) has revived his career following 0 wins out of 4 fights in 2010. He took a short-notice fight against heavily favored prospect Edson Barboza at UFC 146, and stunned the MMA world with a dominant display culminating in a first round TKO. His fight with Joe Lauzon in August, also on short-notice, proved to be a FOTY candidate, but Varner dramatically lost via triangle-choke in the final round of their back-and-forth war.
Assuming this is on the main card, this is arguably the must-see fight of the evening (on a night of many planned dynamite bookings) from a pure entertainment standpoint.