I can't tell you how thrilled I am to be revealing the report of an official opponent for "The Fireball Kid" in the Ultimate Fighting Championship.  Contrary to his previous comments, Kenny Florian will indeed serve as Takanori Gomi's first fight in the UFC at the UFN 21 show on March 31st in North Carolina.

Elation, anticipation, and slight arousal only begin to describe some of the overpowering emotions I'm feeling. 

Let's get down to it--Gomi is a straight-up killer who dominated the global lightweight class when the UFC scrapped their 155 division and B.J. Penn journeyed to Japan to screw around in higher weight classes;  Florian has come up short in two UFC lightweight title fights, but he's still one of the best and most dynamic machines on the roster, and the match-up makes perfect sense to determine where and how Gomi will fit into his new American playground.

Gomi brings iron-laden southpaw boxing that can invoke unconsciousness at any time, complimented by strong takedown defense and a wrestling-oriented ground base.  KenFlo has developed a technical Muay Thai repertoire that features sharp kicks, precise punches from a distance, and a swarm of serrated elbows from close range.  What Florian lacks in physical strength and rugged wrestling are fully compensated for with an exemplary Brazilian Jiu Jitsu background at the black belt level (and beautifully adapted to the dynamics of MMA).

At 31-5, Gomi has lost serious momentum after Pride closed it's doors, losing a weird decision to Sergey Golyaev and falling to a Satoru Kitaoka submission in Sengoku.  Although not what I would call impressively, Gomi did get back on track with a wins over Nakakura and Hervey since his rare back-to-back losses.

12-4 KenFlo maintained his elite status by choking out Clay Guida after the Boston native was finished by lightweight-Jesus, B.J. "The Prodigy" Penn.