The UFC on FOX 8 takes place this Saturday and the buzz isn’t quite there for this card like it has been for previous UFC on FOX cards.

That’s not to say there aren’t great fights – there are.

But, the UFC seems to have an issue in drawing interest in one of their most exciting divisions.

For the second time on FOX, the card will be headline by the flyweight division (125 pounds).

If you simply watch the UFC for fights, then this is no issue for you. The flyweight division provides plenty of excitement, and while the fights usually go the distance, but push a fast pace the entire time.

But, if you are FOX, or even if you are UFC brass concerned about ratings, the flyweights probably aren’t the ideal.

It would be easier for the UFC to market this card on the co-main event of Rory MacDonald vs. Jake Ellenberger than it is to market it on Johnson for John Moraga. I am going to guess many casual UFC fans don’t even know who Moraga is.

There is a reason that the flyweights have yet to main event a UFC PPV card. It is because the UFC can’t sell tickets on a flyweight bout. It’s not even very often that a flyweight bout has been part of a UFC PPV main card at all.

What the UFC really needs is one of two things. They need a legendary fight to come from Johnson vs. Moraga or they need an amazing highlight-reel finish.

If Johnson and Moraga put on a legendary fight, something along the lines of Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar, it allows the UFC to market the two in a similar way and create some buzz for the division. People will want to see both men fight again, either against each other or against new opponents.

If that can’t happen, the UFC needs someone to emerge as the clear start of the division. To do that, the organization needs an incredible knockout or submission finish in the fight.

The reason Anderson Silva and Jon Jones draw like they do is because they can do some amazing things in the cage and people want to see that. If a flyweight can establish himself as a star, it will give the UFC the ability to market them as a PPV main event.

As I mentioned yesterday, I had the chance to do an interview with UFC President Dana White on Tuesday afternoon to discuss this week’s UFC on FOX 7 event.

You can read the entire interview, which was done for Bullz-Eye.com, here.

Below are a few excerpts from the interview:

One of the things I was really excited about with this deal with FOX was being able to bring big fights back to free television. That has always been my goal since we bought this company. Coming off “The Ultimate Fighter” finale last weekend, every fight was sick, it was an amazing finale. We pulled 1.7 million viewers. We were the highest-rated thing on network and cable television with males 18-34. This fight on FOX is going to be a big one. Ben Henderson is defending his lightweight title again, this time against Gilbert Melendez, who is probably the toughest guy at 155 pounds that has never had a shot in the UFC. Everybody thinks this guy might be the best in the world, so we are going to find out on Saturday.

I have been thrilled with the Strikeforce fighters. A lot of bad stuff happened at Strikeforce. A lot of guys didn’t get paid for a while and these guys are hungry. First of all, they are happy to be back fighting and getting paid to do it. These guys want to prove to the world that they can fight and become the best in the world. The UFC is the place to do that. These guys have been fighting like maniacs, and I love it.

UFC President Dana White is a busy man, but he is passionate about the things he cares about.

With the UFC set to hold its seventh event on FOX this Saturday (its third of four events in April alone), I had the chance to speak with him for an interview for Bullz-Eye.com.

The interview will come out later this week, but I wanted to post White’s thoughts on what happened on Monday at the Boston Marathon. White previously lived in Boston and is a known supporter of the Boston pro-sports teams.

“It really bummed me out because when the city that you lived in gets attacked like that….you know, you think about when I lived there, we used to watch the race all the time, we would walk up and down Newbury Street. It was just a disgustingly, cowardly act. It makes me sick. To attack a race like that, where people have trained to run this thing from all over the world and their friends and family are waiting at the finish line for them, it’s just so (expletive) cowardly that it makes me sick. The one thing about the city of Boston and the United States as a whole, it’s one of those things where people will all come together, just like 9/11, and the city will bounce back. It’s just unfortunate that….not to mention that it’s the most popular marathon in the world and the oldest marathon in this country, to just do something like that is just….ugh. I can’t even put it into words without going crazy and sounding like an absolute psycho.”

I will post the rest of the interview with White later in the week.

The first UFC fight on Fox was a quick one:

In the UFC’s anticipated debut on FOX, it didn’t take long for the inaugural fight to end.

Junior dos Santos won the UFC Heavyweight Championship in a little over a minute as he knocked out the champion, Cain Velasquez from the Honda Center in Anaheim.

Dos Santos came into the fight as the betting underdog, but a devastating right hand early in the first round caught the champion in the ear and sent him crashing.

It was definitely interesting to see this one end with a big punch.

Lost in the announcement of Lesnar vs. Overeem on Tuesday were some other big news in the world of MMA, mostly concerning the UFC.

– In another big fight announcement, MMAFighting.com is reporting that top lightweight contenders, Ben Henderson and Clay Guida will collide on the UFC on FOX undercard. Henderson is coming off his dominant win over Jim Miller at UFC on Versus 5 while Guida defeated Anthony Pettis at the Ultimate Fighter Finale. The winner of this bout could find themselves in top contender status for the lightweight title. It should be a good grappling match, but I see Henderson favored based on styles.

– MMAFighting.com also reported that Matt Hughes has accepted a fight with Josh Koscheck for UFC 135. Koscheck will replace Hughes’ original opponent, Diego Sanchez. Sanchez had to pull out of the fight with a broken hand.

– You can’t a teach a dog new tricks apparently. Despite Dana White insisting that Nick Diaz would conform to the various media requests that are expected of a top contender for his UFC 137 title bout with Georges St. Pierre, apparently the Strikeforce welterweight champion skipped a press conference on Tuesday in Toronto to promote the event. The UFC had to explination for his absence according to the Winnipeg Free Press, but another scheduled press conference is to take place today in Las Vegas. Will Diaz be there? Will he be punished for his absence?

– Fedor Emelianenko will return to action on Nov. 12 when he takes on Jeff Monson for a M-1 event in Russia according to MMAMania.com. Fedor has lost his last three bouts and will face Monson, who is coming off a loss to Daniel Cormier on the undercard of Strikeforce: Overeem vs. Werdum. Stylistically, this is a good matchup for Fedor, but will do nothing to get him back into the American spotlight.

– Another announcement that took place on Tuesday is that the UFC is heading back to Japan in 2012. Sherdog.com reports that Feb. 26, 2012 is the set date for the organization to make its return to Japan, which is nearly 14 years since the UFC first stepped foot in Japan. Expect to see many of the countries top starts on that card.