An Early Guess at the CBS Strikeforce Card in Spring 2010

Guessing about what a card that hasn't even been announced yet will look like is risky business, but in the last 24 hours I've heard from a lot of readers who want to know who's fighting for Strikeforce on CBS in 2010, so I'm going to give it my best shot.

With all the usual caveats that nothing is finalized and CBS hasn't even committed to putting MMA back on the air yet, I do expect a Strikeforce show to appear on CBS in April, and to look something like this:

Fedor Emelianenko vs. Fabricio Werdum
Dan Henderson vs. Gegard Mousasi
Frank Shamrock vs. Scott Smith
Jake Shields vs. Matt Lindland

I think it's pretty much a certainty that any CBS MMA card in the spring will include both Henderson and Fedor. Because of the contract that Mousasi has with M-1 Global, he's highly likely to fight on whatever card Fedor fights on, so having him fight Henderson makes a lot of sense. I think Werdum is probably a little more likely than Alistair Overeem to be Fedor's next opponent, although that's pretty much a toss-up.

And I think CBS and Strikeforce would like to fill the rest of the card with guys who give good interviews and will help promote the show. Shamrock, Smith, Shields and Lindland all qualify.

So there you have it. I'm about as likely to win the lottery as I am to go 8-for-8 on that prediction, but everyone seems to want to know what this card will look like, and that's the direction CBS, M-1 Global and Strikeforce seem to be going in at the moment.