So, what have we learned in this shameless attempt at a clever intro into the typical fight-by-fight breakdown of the PPV line-up? It's that the two money-matches don't have a lot of built-in suspense as the clock ticks and the event gets closer. Does it matter? No. A definitive "no" at that. This will still be one of the biggest money-events in the history of the company. It doesn't matter that in both fights there isn't a whole lot at stake in terms of unpredictability. Ortiz is going to blast Shamrock out of the water, and Arlovski or Sylvia will be able to call themselves "the" champion while everyone else questions who really is the superior Heavyweight. If anything unexpected happens, shit - we can do it again in 2007 and make some more money! Alright, now that we've got that out of the way. Let's roll our sleeves up and get into this thing here.

Drew Fickett vs. Kurt Pellegrino

Our first preliminary bout of the evening features some hot up-and-coming Welterweights mixing it up. Drew Fickett is on the radar at 170 lbs. due to some unexpected wins over Josh Neer and Josh Koscheck after losing his debut efforts in the octagon against Nick Diaz. Fun fact, Fickett has a win over Kenny Florian, a fight that catapulted Florian into the original Ultimate Fighter season one reality show. Fickett's last outing was a quick submission loss to the impressive Josh Burkman. So this fight is important for Fickett. Pellegrino is the real deal, but an unknown name so Fickett is expected to win here to get another semi-big fight. I've never watched a Pellegrino fight, so I'm talking based strictly on statistics here. Basically, jump to the next fight breakdown, as I'm just filling space to avoid skipping fights on my little column here. Pellegrino is apparently a good submission fighter, as he's already guaranteed a spot in the 2007 Abu Dhabi world submission grappling tournament. Yeah, you have to know a thing or two about submissions to accomplish something like that. Knowing what little I know here, and taking the odds into account (they do the research and they've got this fight pretty close, Fickett a slight favorite) I'll go ahead and pick Fickett by ground and pound stoppage, or decision. Don't expect much from me on specific predictions. I'll pick a winner, but choosing how (especially in MMA) is no easy task. I always love when I see all the "experts" out there doing predictions and listing "split decision" for a bunch of fights. Come on.