The UFC will be running Ultimate Fighter finales two days in a row in December. First up on the 14th (15th in Australia) will be UFC on FX which also doubles as TUF: The Smashes finale. Next day, on the 15th, will be the US TUF finale which takes place in Las Vegas at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino. It was announced that the TUF 16 finale in Vegas will have welterweights Mike Pyle and James Head battling it out in the octagon. The news were later confirmed by Pyle on Twitter.
Pyle, whose record is 23-8-1 in MMA and 6-3 in UFC, has been in the mixed martial arts game for 13 years and he is on a roll having won his last two fights. He surprised the MMA audience in June when he knocked out Josh Neer at UFC FX 3. Back in January he easily finished off Ricardo Funch in a bout held in Brazil. Pyle has won 5 of his last 6 fights with the single loss occurring against the sharpshooter Rory MacDonald.
The stats of James Head are 9-2 in MMA and 2-1 in UFC. After 9 fights as a middleweight he is now fighting as a welterweight. Head got into UFC after defeating former UFC fighter Gerald Harris. After losing his UFC debut fight to Nick Ring via a submission he dropped some weight and turned his loss into a 2-0 run in 2012. In April he put the choke on Papy Abedi at FUEL 2, and at UFC 149 he really surprised everyone by defeating Brian Ebersole.
It’s bound to be an interesting clash between two fighters who remain undefeated in 2012.
Other important fights will include TUF coaches Roy Nelson and Shane Carwin going to battle, and of course the finalists of TUF will fight for the TUF title and a 6 figure UFC contract.