UFC on Fuel 9

Main card
Gegard Mousasi vs. Ilir Latifi
Ross Pearson vs. Ryan Couture
Matt Mitrione vs. Phil De Fries
Brad Pickett vs. Mike Easton
Diego Brandao vs. Pablo Garza
Akira Corassani vs. Robbie Peralta

Undercard
Reza Madadi vs. Michael Johnson
Tor Troeng vs. Adam Cella
Chris Spang vs. Adlan Amagov
Marcus Brimage vs. Conor McGregor
Ben Alloway vs. Ryan LaFlare
Michael Kuiper vs. Tom Lawlor
Papy Abedi vs. Besam Yousef

With the subtraction of Alexander Gustafsson the main event of the UFC of Fuel 9 now features two fighters that UFC fans may or may not be familiar with in Gegard Mousasi (33-3-2) and Ilir Latifi (7-2). Now if you follow any MMA outside of the UFC you've likely heard of Mousasi who, despite being only 26, already has a storied career.

In 2006 Mousasi emerged from the Europe scene to take part in the Pride Welterweight Grand Prix, where he was eliminated in the Quarterfinals, but he beat Hector Lombard in the Alternate bout. In 2008 he won the Dream Middleweight Grand Prix to become the 185 lb Champion, Mousasi then won the Strikeforce Light Heavyweight title, which he lost to Muhammed Lawal in 2010. Since then Mousai is 5-0-1 fighting in both Strikeforce and Dream. Mousasi has had a good deal of hype around him for his well rounded skill set, relative youth, and spending much of his career training alongside Fedor Emelianenko.

While Latifi might seem like a complete unknown, he is actually a fairly well regarded fighter locally. MMA Viking, a website devoted to all things Scandinavian MMA, rankings Latfif as the #2 Nordic Light Heavyweight. Born in Sweden, Latifi has been involved Greco-Roman since the age of six. He has been fighting professionally since 2008 and is riding a three fight win streak coming into his short notice match with Mousasi.