Here we are only going to look at Joe âStitch Em Upâ Schilling vs Mike Lemaire. They headline the SUPERFIGHT SERIES card which is airing live on UFC FIGHT PASS.
Lemaire (17-2, 8 KO's) fights out of San Diego and Schilling (20-6, 12 KO's) is in Los Angeles so we have a California derby match, so that's interesting. Who will be the 'Middleweight King of California' after this one?
If Schilling wins against Lemaire then he remains #1 in the rankings so the title shot is there. But it depends if he is available and how negotiations go. It it all worked out then we would like to have him fight Artem Levin or Simon Marcus for the world title in Los Angeles in May.
We have one more fight on his contract so theoretically we could give him the title shot but we would need to work out what would happen with fights after that, obviously if he won the title we would need to have a deal for further fights in place.
Lemaire trained in the Netherlands for a while and he has a power punch, so even though they are apart in experience and the level of opponents they have fought, by no means is the result a given.
If you have watched Schilling a long time then you will know that he gets knocked down sometimes in his fights, it is not unusual. But what I like about him is when he gets knocked down he gets right back up and turns the aggression up. He has a real fighter's heart and like that.
But the fact he has been knocked down in the past shows he is open to take punches and that means Lemaire can land.
I expect Schilling to come out like he did against Wilnis, real aggression and delivering a lot of attacks with a machine work-rate. If Lemaire is overwhelmed by that, it can be the end of the fight, but if he handles it well, then everything is possible.
