Quinton Jackson vs. Keith Jardine To Headline UFC 96
Posted by Kris Karkoski on Jan 17, 2009 at 4:10 pm ET49 Comments
Quinton Jackson
The UFC announced during today’s UFC 93 broadcast that light heavyweight contenders Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Keith Jardine will meet in the main event of UFC 96 on March 7th in Columbus, Ohio.
Earlier reports suggested that Jackson would meet Rashad Evans for the light heavyweight title in the UFC 96 headliner while Jardine, who was originally slated to be in action at UFC 96, was rumored to be meeting Luis Cane at UFC 97 in April.
With fellow 205-pound contender Forrest Griffin sidelined until late-Summer with a broken hand, the winner of the matchup is likely to challenger Rashad Evans for the light heavyweight title, potentially in the main event of UFC 100 in July.
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why even bother matching these two up, jardine is a wicked fighter but rampage hits to hard. bring on rampage vs evans
psh whatever, should have been rampage vs rashad, jardine’s on a downward slope right now, he had a hard time with vera who isnt going to last in the 205 division, the 205 is the most talented division, so now after rampage beats jardine he fights rampage, who else is there to fight? loyoto? he needs more competition, we need someone who can destroy rashad, and think it’ll have to be rampage
rampage is going to kill jardine no doubt.has for rampage and rashad i would love to see rampage kill him also. get that chip off his shoulder.
bye bye jardine… im sry but rampage should be fighting rashad… this is bullsht he deserves a title shot!!!!!
Keith Jardine is NOT a wicked fighter. Jardine has the biggest glass jaw in the 205 division. He is not an elite fighter nor will he ever hold UFC gold. Rampage will knock him out cold, KNOCK HIM OUT COLD by the 2nd round. The fact they are making Rampage fight this clown is just a warm up for Evans, thats all it is cause even by some fluke of a miracle Jardine won there are still more above him in line for a title shot. Stupid fight that has no real meaning except for Jackson. O well, it’s not like he’s gonna look and uglier after his face gets smashed.
he doens’t deserve title shot but jardine seriously! wanderlie koed jardine, then rampage koed wanderlei, now rampage kills jardine.
i fell bad for jardine
I wonder who Cane will be fighting now….maybe Chuck? That would be a great fight.
chuck is going to fight shgoun on ufc 97.
why doesnt he deserve a title shot?… i meen come on he’s lost one fight in the ufc and personaly in my opion he didnt lose the fight won 3 out of 5rds defended his title your out of your mind….. ranked #2 at LHW in the world give the man a title shot not an average jardine….
how could someone say rampage does not deserve a title shot?!?!?
he has defeated 3 top lhw fighters….hendo..chuck…silva..
and he lost one fight that could have went either way…
why the hell doesn’t he deserve evans!?!?!?!
who else in the lhw division has a more impressive win record in the last 2 years…!??!?!?!?!!
he has had the most difficult fights…
jardine…is prolly one of the easiest fights he will have!!
doesn’t that say something about rampage!?!?
after he wins jardine he will be fighting evans @ ufc 100!!!!
Not sure why they’re putting this on. Jardine did win against Chuck & Forest, but looked terrible against Wandy. Of course he did help train Rashad for Forest, so maybe this is his reward.
Franklin/Rashad would be interesting.
who the hell did jardine beat to deserve an opportunity at a potential title shot? jackson loses a close decision to forrest then comes back and knocks out silva and now has to face jardine? this makes no sense.
I’d like to see Rashad and Jardine fight, but not for a belt. Rashad vs Rampage will be an awesome fight, and if for some reason Rashad loses i’d like to see him fight Jardine. Partner vs Parter.
Dude no one is giving Jardine A chance, just like no one gave Rashad a chance against Chuck. Jardine was a top contender when he was fighting The Axe Murderer. Jardine Comes from one of the best Camps if not the best Camp Here in Albq., NM. I Think Jardine Has a great chance to pull out a victory over rampage. I know Rampage looked better than ever against Wandy so this hard for me to say but I think we will see this fight go the distance with the possibillity of a decision going to Jardine.
Rampage does deserve a title shot, but if he wasn’t getting a title shot at least should of been a fight which makes sense like the winner of Thiago Silva Vs Lyoto Machida.
What a waste of a main event. Give Rampage his title shot!
cant believe that,rampage deserves a title shot.why fight jardine,even an early KO wont mean much to his record after he beat wandi.he should be fightin rashad and he’d take him for sure
I dont like this Jardine fights chuck then helps rashad beat him. He fought forrest and helped rashad beat him. It sucks rashad gets this kind of advantage but i think rampage will still beat him
Thats bull if jardine wins miraculously he doesnt deserve a shot at shad rampage deserves it now and forrest versus machida winner should be next after rampagew
rashad needs to pull a bj and go back to heavyweight and fight brock for title, then once brock knocks him off his win streak then he can fight at 205s
Rampage will lose. Nobody believes in Jardine. He is no push over.
well if u believe in Jardine then you probally think Chris Leben can win a re-match against Anderson Silva. Hopefully nobody throughs debris at him while on the way to the octagon. God forbid a peanut shell hit him in the jaw. He’d be ko’d b4 he gets into the octagon.
I think it’s funny that a lot of people on here were whining about Rampage v Rashad and now you’re complaining about Rampage v Jardine. Plus everyone was complaining about 96 not have a good main event, they put Rampage on there and that’s not good enough. Come on guys, not every card can be as good as 92. You people friggin complain for the sake of complaining sometimes.
All that being said, fighting Jardine does not make sense for Rampage. If he wins he was supposed to, if he loses it’s an a huge upset. Rampage gains a W by winning, and a paycheck. Jardine gets a lot more out of it if he wins.
This is just like when Chuck fough Babalu. There’s really nothing to gain from this fight. Don’t get me wrong, I am 99% confident Rampage will DESTROY Jardin, but Keith’s still got knockout potential. Let’s just have a 20 man, over-the-top battle royal for the number one contender.
On the other note though, the UFC 96 card is looking pointless. Will Jardin really get a title shot if he wins? I hope not. Maybe the GG/Carwin fight will give us a contender, but Cain and Kongo and Verdum are still frontrunners imo. I think we’re getting to a point in UFC where there are just too many ppvs. The fight-makers seem to be having a hard time filling cards with good matches. One ppv a month is good. Call me old fashioned, but at least one fight on a given pay per view needs to be of consequence (title or number one contender fight). Tell us “winner of Rampage/Silva gets title shot”. Not, “winner of Rampage/Silva might get a title shot, or they might just fight some journeyman, just for fun.”
Werdum does not work for the UFC anymore, Dos Santos knocked him out of the UFC, literally.
The UFC has a lot of fighters, and its not fair to have them on an exclusive contract and just stick them on the shelf and not use them, so they have to have guys fight, and to have guys fight, you’ve got to put on events. I don’t know what the numbers are, but I would venture to say that the UFC makes more money on PPVs than it does on UFNs. So… they gotta have the guys fight, and they gotta pay the guys to fight, and they gotta make money to, and people will buy the PPVs regardless, because its still the UFC, so they put on PPVs that might not be “up to par” with some of the better events they’ve put on, but I honestly don’t blame them. My thing for you is, if you’re not happy with it, don’t buy it, vote with your money. If enough people are unhappy with the card and don’t buy it, the UFC will do better next time. I suspect that during this time they may be trying to shelf some guys to protect the potential card for UFC 100 so they can do a huge blowout deal. I would also like to point out that there are a lot of non PPV events as well, UFN 17 and UFC 95 “Ultimate Fight Night – London” in february, then UFN 18 in April. And there will probably be a UFN 19 before UFC 100.
I had this thought after writing the last comment. You say that they are having “too many PPVs”. I ask you, would you rather see a UFC event 1-3 times a month, or have them scale back and do an event 1-3 times a year like Affliction so they can always have “big names” on the cards? My answer is, the more MMA the better, though it would be nice if there were more UFNs and less PPVs, a little easier on the bank account.
Forgot about that Werdum thing. And I agree and disagree with you.
We all know the bottom line for UFC is Dana and company getting paid. It’s only ever been about that, but so is every other company that exists. But overbooking can be just as bad as underbooking. Sometimes a steady income stream is better than spurts of income here and there. UFC is a money making machine, for now.
It’s true that pay per views are the bread and butter of the UFC. But they’re making money with everything they do. Keep the Fight Nights, they’re awesome. But have them focus exclusively on up and commers (which they do).
I do vote with my wallet. Back in high school we would get WWF and WCW pay per views every month. Then WCW started to suck, so we stopped buying and then they eventually went bankrupt. I don’t want to bring this down to the level of pro wrestling, but WCW’s fault was overbooking and stories that didn’t make sense. I don’t want to see that happen to UFC. I enjoy the UFC. I went to Vegas to see UFC 91, and I’m going to Columbus to see UFC 96. I don’t go because they owe me anything, I go because I want to and enjoy the product. But I want them to continue to have a good product, and one that is sport, not speculation. Lytle and Davis should never have made a stand up agreement. Someone else pointed out it’s mma, not K1. Bottom line for me is for the UFC to put on pay per views, not house shows and I’m seeing frightening similarities between UFC and WCW of the late 90s/early 2000s.
There are 10 fights on a card, 5 getting guaranteed tv time. Make the big fights matter. I agree with you 100% that it’s not fair to have exclusive contracts and have them sitting around. Maybe the fighters need a union, or at least compensative salary for when they don’t fight; the UFC can afford it.
I was excited for UFC 93. But it left me feeling dirty and unsatisfied. And it’s kind of hard to unorder a pay per view you’re unsatisfied with.
I made the K1 comment.
I really don’t like the comparison between the UFC and WWE/WCW/ECW/other predetermined crap. Those events are written and have a lot of control over the final product. The only control the UFC has is to book fights they think will be good match-ups. Granted, this particular fight (Jardine v. Jackson) doesn’t look like much of a good match-up, but UFC 93, before hand, looked like it would be a great event. Some of the upcoming events look like they have a lot of great match-ups, even though they don’t have some of the “stars” booked. I personally would rather watch a great fight between two middle tier UFC fighters, than a snooze fest from two big names, like Arlovski v. Werdum.
no i think he has a good point, 1 ppv a month, dont get all the huge named on everyone but this last fight card was a joke, got a handful of the more boring of fighters, ones that are old out of shape or not really known and put them on one, should have been free, now this next fight card has like 4 good fights, why not split them up, i dont mind paying for 2 ppvs a month but make it worth my money
I’ll admnit that I stated that 96 was lacking a good main event, and I honestly think this match-up takes my words back. I also do believe that this match-up was put together last minute to try and validate the card. Not bad for last minute work there Joe Silva.
Winner of Machida vs. Silva will be the top contender for the shot against Evans. There can be only ONE undefeated LHW in the division…
ur effen crazy…u really think the winner is the #1 contender?!?!!???! lmao
Boo, not the fight I wanted to pay 300 dollars to see. Over 500 if you count hotel and booze and food. Can i get a refund.
I hear ya brother. I’m paying $150 for the ticket, $100 for the room, and god knows how much more on beers. Not to mention 4 of us are making the trip from Toronto. It’s going to be an 8 hour drive of “man, I wish Rashad was on this card”. How dare they tease us with that huge fight and then leave us with this tripe.
I’m with you in wanting a better main event but that’s a risk we face buying tickets without any fights announced. At least I’ll get to meet a bunch of Frenzy readers, which is well worth the trip.
It’s still going to be a great time, no matter the main event. Honestly I’m more excited to see Carwin/Gonzaga and Hazelett/Saunders. Rampage/Rashad would have been nice, but I’d pay $150 for 4th row off the floor for any main event.
MCLOVIN!!!
HAHA sorry dude you might think your at 87′ Tyson fight win Rampage knocks off Jardine’s head in 15sec and you pay $300
YEA THIS IS AWSOME, I HATE BOTH WIENERS, LET THEM KNOCK EACH OTHER OUT
YEA CANT WAIT FOR THIS ONE LMAO,,,,,,,,,,,,,
weird, but guess it gives rampage a bit of cage time even tho i think it will be over in the 1st 2min, i give jardine no chance!
Bullshi* Rampage is going to Wandi him. Give him [Sugar}
that is all wrong…rampage doesnt deserve to fight for the title just yet…i’d say let rampage face the winner of machida vs silva. the winner of that should go for the title.
let’s just say that Jardine wins (which is possible – he did beat Chuck!)…does he deserve a title shot? i don’t think so.
who hasnt beat chuck lately
Wanderlei Silva
i think the reasoning behind it is that Jardine was the last one to beat the man that won the title from Rampage! So it makes sense to me! to me it is kind of dumb to give a fighter another title shot 0, 1, or 2 fights after they lost it? “the 205 is the deapest division” so why does someone get a title shot after one win?
I would like to see this fight , I cant wait
This fight makes no sense either. Jardine should be fighting luiz cane, and rampage should be the number 1 contender for evans’s title. Jardine, isn’t top five and rampage is. This all a set up to try and get lidell “back on track” and possibly challenge for the title(yeah right). Dana white knows rampage owns lidell and if he were to become champ again, lidell wouldn’t.
Im 100% sure the winner of silva/machida will fight rashad at ufc 100 now ! i cant wait!
yea this is crap. lidell gets knocked out in ufc 71 and 88; badly and looks like crap in ufc 76 yet he is mentioned for title fights no less than three times in that span!!!!!brock lesnar fights twice in the ufc losing quickly the first time but gets atitle shot because it will ‘make money’. based on that logic- what the hell is rampage fighting jardine for then?!!!!!!!! double standard- i think so!!!!!!!!