UFC 90 predictions

Patrick Cote is in Rosemont, Illinois, cutting the last bit of weight needed to make 185 pounds. Tomorrow will be the biggest fight of his career so far, and in all likelihood will be the biggest fight he will ever be in. He is facing Anderson Silva, who many people consider to be the best fighter in the world. Cote feels confident and relaxed, and claims to have a sound gameplan to defeat Silva.

But who fucking cares about Patrick Cote?

Ricardo Almeida sure does. Almeida was expected to walk through Cote when they fought in July, with his excellent ground skills leading to an easy submission. Instead Cote took him to a pretty uninteresting split decision. For winning this fight, Patrick Cote gets his chance to become a superstar (although the more likely outcome is that he becomes a tragic part of a highlight reel).

Ricardo Almeida is sitting on his couch, drunk as fuck and sobbing into a bucket of KFC. There's an outdated treadmill sitting in a corner of his living room, covered in old, greasy foil from disgusting hamburgers from the local Wendy's. He hates it. He feels it staring at him, mocking him, laughing at him in an awkward, stunted manner. Tomorrow Almeida will wake up at noon, borrow his friend's truck and take the treadmill into the New Jersey wilderness. He will drink himself into a stupor while he takes out his anger on the treadmill. He will swear at it, curse it, kick it and throw it. He will throw rocks at it, and try to push it down a hill (it is a small hill, and he's really drunk so it won't be as dramatic as he'd hoped). When the bottle of raspberry schnapps is finally finished he will return to the truck to grab a rifle and an opened envelope, which he will place in his pocket. He will take surprisingly steady aim, pull the trigger and put a solitary bullet into the control console. Almeida will drop the rifle, pull the envelope out of his pocket, open it and produce a card. As soon as his eyes touch the card he will drop it and begin sobbing uncontrollably.

The card lies face up in the autumn leaves, open for the world to see. Inside is blank save for the handwritten words:
"I think you need
this more than me

--Pat"