Old Soldiers: Couture/Coleman Tapped for Feb. 6 UFC

In relation to other sports, frequency of competition is MMA’s biggest deficit. If you’re a Yankees fan, you can see them play over a hundred times in a year. If you happen to enjoy the WWE, you’ll typically see major stars wrestle at least a couple times a month. But in prizefighting, unless you’re working the ladder as a near-amateur, you’re going to be trotted out for only two or three fights a year.

It’s not necessarily any healthier: Athletes spend vacation months gorging, partying, and then trying to snap their bodies back into shape, an up-down cycle of bad and worse abuse that can invite problems. And it’s not necessarily the athlete’s preference: Josh Koscheck recently requested to fight 12 times in 2010.

He won’t get that wish, but there’s something to be said for Randy Couture sewing up his remaining time in the sport by accepting a pile of fights after a layoff. He fought Antonio Nogueira in August and Brandon Vera in November: a little under three months later, he’ll be facing Mark Coleman at UFC 109 on Feb. 6 in Las Vegas.

Couture prefers Greco-Roman tie-ups in the clinch, set up by his boxing; Coleman dives for legs. Both have been among the most successful modified wrestlers in the sport. It’s a match that doesn’t need to make any allowances for age, size or ring wear. Whether it has title implications probably depends on how good the winner looks, but that’s beside the point. Not every fight needs to be about a trophy. Watching two hall of fame competitors test themselves on equal footing is a celebration of two impressive careers. That’s enough.