UFC 152 will down tonight at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. Two title fights and a top contender middleweight bout are featured on the card; also Matt Hamill steps back into the octagon as he comes out of retirement. The main event features Jon “Bones” Jones putting his light heavyweight title on the line against former UFC light heavyweight champion Vitor Belfort. Before that the UFC will crown its first ever flyweight champion as Joseph Benavidez takes on Demterious “Mighty Mouse” Johnson. The road to 152 was an unusual one. This year the UFC has been plagued by injuries that have affected cards for all kinds of events including UFC 151. When Dan Henderson pulled out of his title fight with Jones due to a knee injury, President Dana White tried to replace him with Chael Sonnen but Jones declined forcing White to cancel the event. After Lyoto Machida declined to fight Jones on short notice the UFC put Belfort against Jones and scheduled the fight for UFC 152.
The co-main event for the flyweight championship has had some controversy of its own. Back in December of 2011 the UFC decided to implement the flyweight division, which features fighters at 125 pounds. This allows fighters at bantamweight (135lbs) to drop down and fight against guys that are similar in their natural build. The organization decided that the division would crown its first champion though a quick 4 man tournament. On one side of the bracket Benavidez was able to advance to the final with a quick 2nd TKO, but then on the other side Johnson squared off against world-ranked 125lb fighter Ian McCall. It would be the first of two fights between the two after the first encounter featured a draw that most people believe Johnson won. In June the two went at each other again, Johnson was able to keep the pace of the fight where he wanted it and showed excellent wrestling skills as he won with a unanimous decision.
