Things I didn’t expect to see Saturday at UFC 93 in Dublin:

1. Denis Kang not only losing to Belcher, but being submitted.

2. Twenty-seven-year-old Mauricio (Shogun) Rua looking almost as old as 44-year-old Mark Coleman.

3. Dan Henderson winning a split decision over Franklin in which one judge gave all three rounds to Franklin.

Allow me to elaborate:

1. This is Kang’s third loss in his past five fights and fourth in seven, so it can’t be super surprising that he was upset again on Friday. It’s just the way it happened. If anyone was going to get a submission in this bout, you’d figure it would have been him, not the striker Alan Belcher, who himself said he was coming into the bout with the plan to knock Kang out.

Anything can happen in a fight, and clearly Kang got caught. But remember when Georges St. Pierre lost to Matt Serra and many people started wondering if there was a problem with GSP’s mental game? Well, perhaps that’s the case for Kang.

2. All I have to say about this fight was “Wow” -- and not in a good way. While I thought this fight would end in Shogun’s favour, I thought that would come early. I certainly didn’t think it would almost go the distance and be pretty much up in the air until the end. Watching the two guys pace around, arms low and completely gassed felt like watching one of those marathon Kimbo Slice bouts.

Rua may have won, but he didn’t look that impressive and now that’s two fights in the UFC without looking great. What’s the deal here? It seems to be another case of the Pride curse. There have been many former stars from Pride who have struggled for the most part since joining the UFC – Mirko Cro Cop, Wanderlei Silva, Rameau Sokodjou, even Dan Henderson lost both his Pride belts right off the bat. I don’t know why this is, but we can add both Rua and Kang to this list.

3. I have to agree with what Henderson said after his win -- the 30-27 one judge gave to Franklin seemed a little off. Actually, I thought it was way off. If anyone were to get a 30-27 in that bout, it would have been Henderson. That’s not to say he completely dominated the bout. But there’s no way Franklin won the second round.

But I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that before, where one judge was in COMPLETE disagreement with the other two. It’s no wonder Franklin raised his arm just before the announcement that he actually lost. When you hear a 30-27 in your favour, you usually assume you're going to get the nod. Still, it was surprising to see Franklin do that, considering the former champ is normally very sportsmanlike. That’s another thing I didn’t expect to see.

Who were biggest winners Saturday?

1. Belcher -- I didn’t consider him a top-calibre middleweight before Saturday night and I still don’t. But he’s knocking on that door now. His performance, if not impressive, at least showed he has some versatility and the ability to hold his own against someone who is a top-calibre middleweight in Kang -- even if he didn’t really show it Saturday.

2. Henderson -- With the win, Hendo also gets to be the coach on The Ultimate Fighter for the first time followed by a matchup with Michael Bisping, which could determine who will next get a title shot. Can’t complain about that.

3. Franklin -- Believe it or not, I think the loss is good for Rich. For one, it will keep him at 205 pounds, where I think he should stay. And he reportedly said he didn’t really want to coach The Ultimate Fighter -- he has done it once before -- but would if asked. Now, he doesn’t have to deal with that.

4. The UFC -- The organization must be really happy with how Saturday went down, for a number of reasons. First and foremost, the event sold out, the crowd was wild (in a good way) and was really loud -- Dana White compared it to UFC 83 in Montreal. The main card featured five close if not exciting fights -- it was another good showcase card. And finally, it established some new marketable contenders for the UFC -- Belcher, Marcus Davis, Rousimar Palhares and even Eric Schafer, who was a winner on the undercard.

Finally, there are some updates to the MMA rankings. Click here to see them.