The big one is nearly upon us. UFC 87: Seek and Destroy is coming up on Aug. 9, and the main event is going to be a barnburner: Georges St. Pierre vs. Jon Fitch for St. Pierre’s Welterweight title.

At press time, St. Pierre was the solid favorite to defend his championship at –295. Fitch was pegged at +235, even though the two fighters have only two MMA losses apiece. The difference is in the quality of those losses. St. Pierre fell to Matt Hughes and Matt Serra, but got his revenge by beating both men for the title. Fitch dropped a pair of matches back in 2002 at the start of his MMA career.

There’s also a difference in the quality of their victories. Fitch is 8-0 in UFC action, tying Royce Gracie’s record for most consecutive UFC wins, but his top opponents were Thiago Alves and Diego Sanchez. St. Pierre has beaten pretty much every welterweight of note.

Chuck “The Iceman” Liddell planned on exacting revenge on the last man to defeat him at UFC 71 on Saturday night. But Quinton “Rampage” Jackson had other ideas.

Rampage ended The Iceman’s reign as UFC Light Heavyweight champion with a surprising first-round knockout. The fight everyone had been waiting for started slowly before Liddell caught Jackson with a mean left hook. Rampage took the shot in stride and came back at Liddell with a powerful right hand that sent The Iceman to the canvas. Jackson quickly pounced on the defenseless Liddell and after numerous blows the ref stepped in and stopped the fight at the 1:53 mark of the first round. Jackson is the new UFC Light Heavyweight champ and he may occupy that spot for awhile considering how easily he took apart Liddell.

In the event’s earlier action, welterweight contender Karo Parisyan defeated Josh Burkman in a unanimous decision after their brawl went the distance. Parisyan came out on top with scores of 30-27, 30-27 and 29-28 after his speed and quick anticipation allowed him to get in a number of good shots on Burkman, while also holding the advantage when the fight ended up on the ground.

UFC fans looking for more knockouts got their wish from two other fights on the UFC 71 card. Terry Martin and Ivan Salaverry faced off in a middleweight bout, which Martin won after delivering a quick first-round TKO. Martin landed the first big shot of the fight after catching Salaverry with a big right to the jaw early on. The fight was ended shortly afterward when Martin pulled off a huge slam that left Salaverry reeling. A subsequent flurry of punches after the slam brought on the ref, who stopped the fight at 2:04 in the first round.

Another TKO was doled out by Houston Alexander, who took on Keith Jardine in his UFC debut. Jardine started the fight with the upper hand after dropping Alexander to the canvas with a well-timed left hook. Alexander rebounded quickly and sent Jardine to the ground with a right hand uppercut. Another huge right-hand uppercut sent Jardine into the canvas face first, and the fight was over at 48 seconds of the first round.

To be the man, you’ve got to beat the man. So why isn’t Quinton “Rampage” Jackson the man?

Jackson (26-6 lifetime in mixed martial arts) was a +140 underdog at press time for his main event bout with Chuck “The Iceman” Liddell at this Saturday’s UFC 71 pay-per-view. But the last and only time these two men fought in MMA action, Jackson pummeled Liddell in front of over 67,000 people at the Egg Dome in Tokyo.

Things have gone a little differently since that matchup four years ago. Liddell has gone undefeated and is the most recognizable figure in the sport, at least on these shores. Jackson, now 28 years of age and nine years younger than Liddell, stayed in Japan with PRIDE and went 7-3 heading into this weekend’s big show, including a pair of losses to the great Wanderlei Silva.

The Japanese fans know that losing to Silva is no disgrace. Neither was Jackson’s first match in PRIDE, which was also a loss. The Memphis native, who was an All-State wrestler in high school, brought a 10-1 record in various minor MMA organizations into the ring against Kazushi Sakuraba, then at the peak of his fame. This remains one of the great fights of all-time; the stronger Jackson fended off his accomplished opponent and dominated before running out of gas and submitting to a choke.

The punishing style “Rampage” displayed in that bout launched his career as one of the most popular fighters in Japan. Jackson’s nickname was given to him at age 8 by his cousin; however, like his opponent this weekend, Jackson does not show a lot of rage outside the octagon. He’s a born-again Christian, he’s the father of four children, and he and Liddell appear to have nothing but respect for one another. We’ll see how long that lasts this Saturday.

UFC 71 Betting Odds

For the full fight card check out the Bodog Beat.

UFC 71: Liddell vs. Jackson expected to set new PPV record (Sat. May 26, 10 PM EST)

He’s dated a Playboy model. He’s been on Late Night with Conan O’Brien. He’s played poker with Bodog Entertainment founder Calvin Ayre. And he can snap your neck like a twig.

If you’re at all familiar with mixed martial arts, you know we’re talking about Chuck Liddell. He is the consensus top fighter in the sport today. Liddell is the current UFC Light Heavyweight champion, and his title defense this Saturday against Quinton “Rampage” Jackson is expected to draw the largest ever pay-per-view audience for an MMA event. It could easily be the watershed moment for both Liddell and the sport itself. (For a review of UFC 71: Liddell vs. Jackson, read “Wombat’s Fight Forecast: UFC 71″ in Bodog Nation.)

“The Iceman” was born Charles David Liddell on Dec. 17, 1969 in Santa Barbara, Calif. His martial arts career began at age 12 when he took up Koei-Kan, a form of karate that includes many of the techniques used in MMA – strikes, joint locks and grappling among them. Liddell became good enough to be captain of the wrestling team (and the football team) at San Marcos High School in Santa Barbara, then spent four years as a starter for Cal Poly SLO’s wrestling squad before earning a degree in accounting in 1995.

Liddell moved from there to kickboxing, racking up a pair of national titles with his striking skills. But he had bigger things on his mind. Inspired by the inaugural UFC event, Liddell made his MMA debut in 1998 at UFC 17, earning a unanimous decision over Noe Hernandez. His interest and proficiency in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu propelled Liddell to the top of the sport; in 2001, he shared Black Belt magazine’s “No Holds Barred Competitor of the Year” honors with Tito Ortiz, whom Liddell went on to beat in 2004 and again in 2006.

The Iceman continues to hone his craft, adding a purple belt in jiu-jitsu to his black belt in karate. But his MMA profile has grown even larger thanks to his personality. Liddell has worked the talk show circuits, appeared as himself in movies like Cradle 2 the Grave, and dated Willa Ford. That’s one heck of a resume. Expect those accolades to keep rolling in with a victory over Jackson this Saturday; Liddell is pegged at –175 to retain his title.

Bet on UFC 71 at the Bodog Sportsbook, where you can get all your UFC betting odds. And check out the Bodog Fight Web site for more mixed martial arts news, features, interviews and exclusive fight videos.

Please – stop throwing things at the computer.

Of course Mixed Martial Arts is not only alive and kicking, but spreading like wildfire as well. And I’m not just saying this because Bodog Fight is part of the MMA landscape. Fact is, in a highly saturated sports world, MMA is one of the few growing sports that has found the critical mass to keep growing.

It seems odd that a sport with thousands of years of tradition is considered “new.” Most casual observers in North America equate MMA with the Ultimate Fighting Championship promotion, and it can’t be denied that UFC’s 1993 debut was shockingly and memorably bloody. But the brand of UFC fighting you see today is much closer to pankration, the ancient Greek hybrid of unarmed combat disciplines that historians trace to the Olympic Games of 648 BCE.

UFC’s ascension from small PPV numbers to a spot on basic cable may never have happened if the United States government (most notably John McCain) hadn’t attempted at every opportunity to marginalize the sport. But it wasn’t just governmental pressure, nor UFC’s own ambition, that brought the promotion to where it is today. Instead of, say, a shootfighter matching up against a sumo wrestler, all fighters have gravitated out of sheer competitive necessity to styles that echo pankration. Elements of that original style can be found in every brand of MMA, in North America, Japan and around the world.

Perhaps most importantly, MMA’s growth as a televised sport has much to do with the shrinking popularity of professional wrestling. That form of “sports entertainment” used to give audiences a controlled dose of violence that was both realistic enough and tame enough for the general public to tolerate, if not enjoy. Not any more. The rise of the Internet made sure that nearly everyone was aware that pro-wrestling was more entertainment than sport – if organizations like WWE hadn’t already made that perfectly clear with their increasingly unrealistic matches. MMA organizations like UFC, Bodog Fight and Japan’s K-1 and PRIDE, on the other hand, are following the golden rule of mass media: Give the people what they want.