By Mark Gessner

Dominant Position

-Last week,it was announced that Frankie Edgar versus Gray Maynard for the UFC Lightweight Championship which was scheduled to headline UFC 130 was postponed due to both being injured. This week, Dana White and Brock Lesnar during a conference call on Thursday announced that Brock is suffering from his second bout with diverticulitis and is unable to main event UFC 131 versus Junior Dos Santos. First and foremost, best wishes go out to Brock Lesnar and here's to hoping for a complete and speedy recovery.

This is however a huge blow to the the probable and potential buy rate of UFC 131. Brock Lesnar has consistently over the past two years to be a million buy pay per view draw. The gap between cards he is on and cards he is not on is significant. For example, UFC 115: Liddell vs. Franklin drew 520,000 buys. UFC 116 which Lesnar was in the main event against Shane Carwin drew 1.16 million views. UFC 117: Silva vs. Sonnen drew 600,000 buys.

Anderson Silva is disputably the top pound-for-pound fighter in the world and he drew nearly half a million less buys. Since Lesnar defeated Randy Couture to become the UFC Heavyweight Champion at UFC 91, the UFC has only hit one million buys twice for PPV's that Lesnar was not on (UFC 92: The Ultimate 2008 and UFC 114: Rampage vs. Evans). UFC 91, 100, 116, and 121 all hit seven figure buys. Lesnar is a box office draw and hopefully for the UFC's sake, UFC 131 will still draw a solid buy rate.

- With Lesnar out for UFC 131, Shane Carwin who Lesnar defeated at UFC 116, has been promoted from a lower fight on the main card against Jon Olav Einemo to the main event against Dos Santos for a shot at the UFC Heavyweight Championship. Prior to his loss against Lesnar, Carwin was 12-0, winning all of his fights via first round stoppages due to knockout, TKO, or submission. Prior to UFC 116, the longest fight he had was against Frank Mir who survived for 3:48 before being knocked out, earning Carwin the chance to fight Lesnar for the title. Carwin dominated Lesnar in the first round of their fight, Lesnar narrowly escaping, but Carwin gassed himself out with the amount of and power behind his punches and was submitted in the second round with an arm triangle choke. Carwin has heavy hands that could be extremely dangerous for Dos Santos.

- Following Lesnar withdrawing from the fight with Dos Santos, UFC still had the author of Brock Lesnar's book, Death Clutch: My Story of Determination, Domination, and Survival, Paul Heyman was kept on to produce Shane Carwin for his UFC 131 Countdown show which will air on Spike prior to the show. In his blog, Shane Carwin put over how helpful Heyman was in producing him and that Heyman helped to shake the "boring" persona that some had labeled Carwin with when it came to him talking about and hyping his fights.

Hopefully this could lead to a full-time gig with the UFC for Paul Heyman. Heyman is the creative genius behind the ECW uprising in the 90s and was famous for producing promos for the wrestlers with the company that would "accentuate the positive and hide the negative." If Heyman could do this for other fighters in the company, it could be a big upgrade for the UFC and increase buy rates because fans want to see people fight based on how they sell the fights in interviews and previews.

- If you want to hear an interview with someone who has worked with Paul Heyman on promos, listen to Jim Mitchell's interview with Jason around the 48:00 mark to hear how Heyman produces promos.

- UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon "Bones" Jones after seeking a second opinion has opted out have having the hand surgery to repair ligaments that caused him to pull out of his fight with Rashad Evans at UFC 133 in Philadelphia. Jones said that the issue with his hand has been a recurring injury since his collegiate wrestling days but has not had an effect on his punching or grappling. Despite not having the surgery that was originally planned, he is currently in a cast for the next month in hopes of healing the injury. He is on medical suspension until June 11 and will not be fighting Evans in the beginning of August.

- Due to the injury and medical suspension for Jones, Rashad Evan versus Phil Davis has officially been announced as the main event for UFC 133 in Philadelphia. After rumors circulating about José Aldo versus Chad Mendes for the UFC Featherweight Championship or Frankie Edgar versus Gray Maynard for the UFC Lightweight Championship being potential main events, I personally as a Philly native are disappointed by this news. While Evans and Davis should be a good main event, it does not pack the main event punch that a title match would for someone who would potentially purchase a ticket to the show. However, like a said last week, the choice to have Phil Davis headline his first card in the state where he was a NCAA Champion wrestler at Penn State is a good call.

- Strikeforce matchmaker Rich Chou has been let go from his position with the company. Former WEC matchmaker Sean Shelby will be replacing him. One of the biggest complaints amongst MMA fans and executives about Strikeforce has been that the majority of their fights seem to be mismatches with most of them ending in first round stoppages. Since covering Strikeforce for DotNet at the beginning of the year, of the four shows that average five fights a main card, only seven have gone past the first round. WEC has produced numerous Fight of the Year contenders so this is a great move by Zuffa.

Striking Flurry

- UFC has confirmed that UFC 134: Rio will in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil will include Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira versus Brendan Schaub. This will be "Big Nog's" first fight since losing to the current UFC Heavyweight Champion Cain Velasquez at UFC 110. The only loss of Schaub's career was against Roy Nelson at The Ultimate Fighter Season 10 Finale. Schaub has won his last four fights since that loss and is looking to to knock off a UFC legend in Big Nog.

- Coming of the the UFC Summit last week, one feud may have come to the forefront. Tito Ortiz vs. Matt Mitrione. Mitrione has been ripping into Ortiz for a while on twitter and also on "The Mitrione Minute" on MMAFighting.com and this was his first opportunity to see Ortiz face-to-face. If Ortiz wants to fight Mitrione due to his comments, not only will it require him to move up a weight class from light heavyweight to heavyweight, it will also require him to beat Ryan Bader at UFC 132. I do not foresee the latter happening so the former is really irrelevant.

- Former NHL enforcer and Philadelphia Flyer, Donald Brasher will be making his mixed martial arts debut on June 4 on Ringside 11 from Montreal. His original opponent Martin Trempe has been forced to pull out of the fight leaving Brasher unaware as to he is going to fight at this time. Brasher was one of the elite enforcers in the NHL during his hockey career and was awarded "The Enforcer of the Decade" by The Hockey News. While football players, such as Matt Mitrione have made successful career changes moving to MMA, it will be interesting to see how the former hockey brawler does inside the cage.

Knockout Blow

MMA Tweet of the Week: He better get excited or Matt will put a foot in his ass- @DanaWhite in reference to Rampage Jackson saying he is "not excited" to fight Matt Hamill at UFC 130.

Thank you very much for checking out "Gessner's Ground and Pound" this week. I'll be back every Wednesday with my opinions and news in the world of MMA over the past week. If you have any thoughts, feel free to email at Kliq4Life28@gmail.com or shoot me a tweet @MarkGessner.

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