Strikeforce set for 'Night of Champions' in 2013

After injuries plagued the final two STRIKEFORCE events of 2012, the ZUFFA owned promotion will begin the new year with three title fights and one farewell fight for one dominating heavyweight.

Several injuries to top fighters forced SHOWTIME and STRIKEFORCE to cancel events on September 29 in Sacramento, Calif. and November 3 in Oklahoma City, Okla. The title fights on those cards have been rescheduled for Saturday, January 12, 2013 and will take place at the Chesapeake Energy Arena in OKC. The event will include title defenses by Gilbert Melendez, Nate Marquadt and Luke Rockhold.

STRIKEFORCE Heavyweight Grand Prix winner Daniel Cormier will also be on the card, in what will likely be his final appearance in the promotion.

As the company has been fledgling as of late, the roster has thinned out. Meaning, title contenders have stayed the same and opponents have been hard to come across. That has worked well for Pat Healy, Lorenz  Larkin and Tarec Saffiedine, who are all fighting for titles on Jan. 12. Healy will face off against Melendez for El Nino's lightweight title. Rockhold will defend his middleweight title against Larkin and Marquadt will defend the welterweight title against Saffiedine.

The only one not defending his title is Cormier, who will be making a return to his roots. Cormier was a NCAA wrestling champion at Oklahoma State. He will take on Dion Staring who will be making his STRIKEFORCE debut. It will not be a title defense, but will likely be Cormier's final bout with the promotion. This past May after defeating Josh Barnett, Cormier let it be known that he had one fight left on his contract and would welcome a move to the UFC afterwards.

With so many title fights and big names on the first card of the year, reportss have began swirling that the January event will be the final one for STRIKEFORCE. Nothing has been reported by STRIKEFORCE, SHOWTIME or ZUFFA, but with there being 4-5 events left on the promotion's contract with SHOWTIME it will be interesting to see what the new year holds.

Until then, STRIKEFORCE and SHOWTIME have put together a card that die-hard and casual mixed martial arts fans will truly enjoy.

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