Two former WEC champions will appear on Saturday's UFC 144 card. Benson Henderson, the man who held the lightweight for more than a year, will fight Frankie Edgar for the UFC lightweight strap. Anthony Pettis, the man who took Henderson's title with the jaw-dropping "Showtime Kick," will take on Joe Lauzon.

Those MMA fans who have been living under a rock since December 16, 2010, when Pettis beat Henderson, might wonder how it's Henderson, not Pettis challenging Edgar.

[ Watch UFC 144 right here on Yahoo! Sports ]

After winning the WEC belt in their final event before being absorbed by the UFC, Pettis was supposed to get the next UFC lightweight title shot. He was supposed to fight the winner of Edgar and Gray Maynard's New Years Day 2011 bout.

But Pettis was put on the backburner when Edgar and Maynard's bout ended in a draw. Their rematch was more important than unifying the WEC and UFC belts. Pettis opted not to wait for a title shot, and lost a decision to Clay Guida in June.

For Henderson, it was a win over Guida -- plus beatdowns of Jim Miller and Mark Bocek -- that earned him the title shot at Saitama Super Arena this weekend. No fighter wants to lose, particularly when his belt is on the line, but the loss to Pettis still bothers Henderson. His laid back strategy late in the bout still makes him angry. Was it the best thing to happen to him?

"It was heart-wrenching," he said to MMA Fighting's Ben Fowlkes. "I was sad, and I'm still sad. It was heart-breaking. ...Every time I'm out there, I give you guys everything. I open up my heart and soul. I hold nothing back. To come up short, and to come up short in that manner, that hurt. But I'll never let that happen again."

Even Pettis has noticed the difference in his former opponent.

"Ben was on a tear. He was killing guys in the WEC. Then I come in there, we go five rounds and I win the decision, and he was back to square one. I think a loss makes everyone a little hungrier, and that's what it did for him."

Pettis beat Jeremy Stephens in October. He will fight Lauzon early enough on Saturday's card that, if healthy, he can sit in the crowd and watch Henderson take on Edgar. At just 25, Pettis has plenty of time to get back to a title fight, and what could serve as better fuel than watching the man he beat take the title shot Pettis was supposed to get.

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Amanda Lucas, the daughter of "Star Wars" creator George Lucas, won again in Japan this weekend. She beat up on Yumiko Hotta for two and a half rounds before submitting her with a keylock. With that win, she claimed the DEEP open-weight women's championship and improved her record to 4-1.

A record like that proves the force is strong with her. Darth Vader approved, and even showed up to celebrate. Skip to the 15-minute mark to see Lucas finish Hotta, and like he did in Cloud City, Vader just appears. At the 20-minute mark, he gives his clenched fist of approval, and then poses like a proud papa with Lucas in the final minute of the video.

Lucas had three straight submission wins in DEEP. She trains at Cesar Gracie Academy, the home of Nick and Nate Diaz and Jake Shields, as well as with Gilbert Melendez's Skrap Pack. Perhaps Vader can stop by at Cesar Gracie's and teach the no-hands, force-choke that served him so well as he ruled the galaxy.

It's goofy, but this has to be one of most unique promos we've ever seen for a UFC event. Between the South Park singers and the bulging eyeballs, it's pure dynamite.

UFC 144 card:
Frankie Edgar vs. Ben Henderson
Quinton Jackson vs. Ryan Bader
Yoshihiro Akiyama vs. Jake Shields
Mark Hunt vs. Cheick Kongo
Tim Boetsch vs. Yushin Okami
Hatsu Hioki vs. Bart Palaszewski
Joe Lauzon vs. Anthony Pettis

The irony at UFC 144 is rich, and it’s clearly not lost on Anthony Pettis. Pettis beat Benson Henderson in 2010 to earn a shot at the UFC lightweight title, but it’s Henderson who gets first shot.

A little more than a year ago, Pettis was not only the World Extreme Cagefighting lightweight champion, but one of the most celebrated fighters in mixed martial arts after pulling off what came to be known as “The Showtime Kick.”

Anthony Pettis won four straight fights before a loss to Clay Guida at The Ultimate Fighter 13 Finale.
(Getty Images)

In the waning moments of a taut Dec. 16, 2010, title match with Henderson, the reigning champion, Pettis leaped up, propelled himself off the cage, and proceeded to kick Henderson in the head in one of the greatest moves in MMA history.

It was the clinching move in a title-winning effort that not only gave him the WEC belt, but which earned him a shot at the UFC lightweight championship.

But before Pettis got that opportunity, he was done in by the vagaries of professional fighting. Pettis was to face the winner of the Jan. 1, 2011, title match between UFC champion Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard at UFC 125.

Edgar and Maynard drew, and a rematch was set for May 28. But then both men were injured and the bout was pushed back to UFC 136 in October. Pettis chose not to wait for the winner and took a June bout against Clay Guida, which he lost.

But Pettis, who rebounded after the Guida loss to defeat Jeremy Stephens at UFC 136 on Oct. 8 in Houston, has accepted the crazy turn of events as a part of the business. He and insists he’s not bothered by it.

He’ll fight Joe Lauzon in the pay-per-view opener Saturday at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, while Henderson meets Edgar for the coveted UFC crown.

“That’s the way this sport works out,” Pettis said. “If I had waited, look how long I would have been sitting out. It would have been ridiculous. I’m a young guy. I need to stay busy and keep fighting. I’d rather be fighting [for the UFC title], but it is what it is. I’m still relatively young, and so I know I’ll get a shot sooner or later. For whatever reason, it wasn’t meant to be at that point in time.”

If he doesn’t win, though, it’s going to be later – much, much later. The lightweight division may be the UFC’s best and there are a number of excellent fighters near the top of the division with an argument that they should get a title shot.

A loss to Lauzon, who is coming off an impressive win over Melvin Guillard, would put Pettis well back in the pack. Don’t expect that to make Pettis fret, however. He’s the epitome of cool.

“I don’t get into thinking about all of that stuff,” Pettis said. “If I do my job and take care of what I got to take care of, everything will come together. All I’m focusing on is doing my job [on Saturday] and winning that fight. I’ll worry about what comes next after the fight.”

MMA Musings

• Greg Jackson, widely regarded as one of MMA’s elite coaches, has opted to work champion Jon Jones’ corner when he defends his light heavyweight title at UFC 145 on April 21 against Rashad Evans. Jackson used to coach Evans, as well, before Evans left Jackson’s MMA last year. It’s a significant win for Jones, because Jackson knows Evans’ game as well as anybody and how to game plan against him.

• Give the UFC credit for making the right move after its screwupscrew-up at UFC on Fuel 1 last week. The main event between Jake Ellenberger and Diego Sanchez was a fantastic scrap, but it was only three rounds. In 2011, the UFC had said all main events on pay-per-view and Fox cards would be five-rounders instead of three, but for some reason it didn’t make it on all cards in the first place. Ellenberger and Sanchez fought a spectacular battle on Feb. 15, but the fight went just three rounds instead of five, sparking an plenty of outcry from fans. After the bout, UFC president Dana White admitted he blew it and announced that all main events would be five rounds going forward.

• Eradicating performance-enhancing drugs from MMA is critical, more so than it is in established sports such as the NFL and or Major League Baseball. And while the UFC took a good first step in requiring all fighters to sign new contracts with it to pass a drug test, it’s only a first step. The UFC needs to implement random, unannounced out-of-contest testing for PEDs. If it conducted five random tests a month, the UFC would go a long way toward eliminating steroid use usage in the sport. It wouldn’t eliminate it entirely, but it would make a dent and that’s important.

• On paper, UFC 144 is one of the best cards the company has offered in a while. While many are predicting the Fight of the Night will be Anthony Pettis against Joe Lauzon, a dark horse to win that honor is Hatsu Hioki against Bart Palaszewski.

Readers Always Write

No love for Sonnen in rankings

Why doesn’t Chael Sonnen get any love in the Yahoo! Sports’ pound-for-pound rankings? He beat up UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva, the No. 1 guy, for four-and-a-half rounds and then lost, but he doesn’t even get a single vote? He didn’t even make the “others receiving votes” list. Shouldn’t he be rolling onto this list around No. 8?

Tom
Columbus, Ohio

Chael has been on a roll since the Silva fight, but the problem in putting him in the Top 10, Tom, is choosing who to pull out. I assume if you put him in at No. 8, you’d have to remove either Gilbert Melendez, Rashad Evans or Dan Henderson. Melendez is 22-2 and has won six in a row. Evans is 17-1-1 and has won four in a row and seven of his last eight. And Henderson is 29-8, with four wins in a row and wins in seven of his last eight. Which of those would you pull out of the Top 10 to insert Sonnen? That’s the problem.

Speak up on Diaz suspension

Why the silence on the Nick Diaz suspension? Let’s get it out there.

Patrick Johnson

I’m not sure what you’re expecting, Patrick. I don’t think state athletic commissions should treat marijuana should be treated the same way by state athletic commission as performance-enhancing drugs are. I’d propose a $2,500 fine for the first offense. For a second offense, double it to $5,000 and add a three-month suspension. Diaz will have a hearing and will then be punished. A boxer, Matt Vanda, who was a second-time marijuana offender, was suspended for a year and fined 40 percent of his purse on Jan. 31 by the Nevada Athletic Commission, so I think that’s what Diaz can expect. That said, while I don’t agree with a suspension that long, Diaz knew the rules when he chose to use pot. smoke.

Jones shouldn’t be ranked so highly

What I don’t understand is how anyone can rank UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones so highly on a pound-for-pound list when he’s fighting not even remotely close to his natural weight. You can’t include him on a list with people like Frankie Edgar and Rashad Evans, who can easily fight a class below their current one. If the pound-for-pound best fighter is supposed to be able to beat anybody if they were all in the same weight class, then I don’t think Jon would be very high. His size advantage over the people he’s fought up to date has played a key role in his victories. He has beat some very formidable foes at a young age, but to ignore the fact that his size has aided him is ridiculous. I realize that many fighters cut weight to fight at a lower weight class, but does anybody tower over their opponents the way Jon does? I don’t think so.

Fernando Gutierrez

I couldn’t disagree with you more vehemently, Fernando. Jones’ height and reach are, undoubtedly, advantages for him, but each person is different. Would you say that if one fighter was way faster than all the rest that he wouldn’t deserved to be ranked highly because his natural speed and quickness gave him an unfair advantage? Of course not. There are a lot of big guys – Hhow about 6-11 heavyweight Stefan Struve – who are nowhere near as good as Jones. Jones’ achievements are the result of exceptional talent and hard work. He’s taken advantage of the tools he’s been given and he deserves to be recognized for that.

Palhares deserves better match-ups

I don’t understand why UFC middleweight Rousimar Palhares doesn’t get better fights. He’s one of the UFC’s best fighters at middleweight and he has a great submission percentage. What is holding him back?

Carlos Cuervo
New York

This is going to be the year he gets some big fights, Carlos. He lost on Sept. 15, 2010, to Nate Marquardt, and his heel hook submission win over Mike Massenzio at UFC 142 last month was just his third in a row. He’s going to fight Alan Belcher in May, which is the kind of bout that can move him into the ranks of the contenders and get him the kind of fight you’re talking about.

Quoteworthy

“The best part about doing it was making [boxing promoter] Bob Arum say, ‘I love the UFC.’ ” – UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta, after bidding $1.1 million in a charity auction Saturday at the MGM Grand to win a pair of signed gloves Muhammad Ali wore in his first bout against Floyd Patterson.

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In the United States, we're used to seeing UFC pay-per-view ads that heavily feature the fighters on the card. Even when they break from the fight-highlight-norm-with-voiceover-and-music, like with the UFC 129 commercial featuring Georges St. Pierre and Jake Shields, the advertising still revolves around the fighters.

With the ad airing in Japan before this weekend's UFC 144 bout, the ad features the shadow of an octagon and the voice of cage announcer Bruce Buffer.

No Frankie Edgar or Benson Henderson to represent the main event, not even the more familiar Quinton "Rampage" Jackson. Would that be enough to get you to tune in? Tell us in the comments, on Facebook or on Twitter.

Thanks, Bloody Elbow.