Remember those rumors that were circulating a couple months ago about Affliction possibly staging its third MMA event on July 11, so it could go head-to-head with UFC 100? Obviously, that was a ridiculous idea that was rightly scrapped. But Affliction is doing a little bit of counter-programming this week, releasing the above video to hype its August 1 Trilogy card, featuring Fedor Emelianenko vs. Josh Barnett in the main event.
And the clear message Affliction wants you to get is that Fedor vs. Barnett is the single best fight of the summer, better than anything the UFC, WEC, Dream or anyone else is offering.
I think there's a compelling case to be made that that's true: Fedor is the best fighter in the world, and Barnett is one of the best challengers he's ever faced. Most knowledgeable MMA observers will consider the winner of Fedor vs. Barnett -- and not the winner of Brock Lesnar vs. Frank Mir -- to be the true heavyweight champion of MMA.
Affliction won't draw anywhere near the kind of attention or pay-per-view revenue that UFC events get, and I don't think Affliction Trilogy card is as good a show top to bottom as UFC 100, UFC 101 or UFC 102. But you can make a very good case that the single best fight in MMA this summer is taking place August 1 in Anaheim.
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