Norwegian Hammer Thrower At UFC 92?

Neilk Davidson of The Canadian Press has a quickie profile on Dan Evensen, who will be making his UFC debut this week-end in a showdown with kick boxer Pat Barry on the undercard of The Ultimate 2008 UFC 92 card. These two come off as no namers but Davidson adds a little bit of context to the proceedings in his piece:

Norway's Dan (The Viking) Evensen's career has taken more than a few twists and turns. What's next for the 6-foot-3 250-pounder may depend on what happens Saturday night against Pat Barry on the undercard of UFC 92 (pay-per-view) in Las Vegas.

Mixed martial arts brought Evensen to the U.S. five years ago. A track-and-field enthusiast, he had represented Norway as a hammer thrower and then traveled the world as a marine engineer.

"I've always been a spontaneous guy," the 34-year-old said. "I got a restless when I was done with sport ... I missed sport and got back in. It happened to be fighting."

Losing weight was the original goal. The big man was getting even bigger. He had done kickboxing in the past and figured fighting might be a good fit.

Evensen may have a tall order in Barry. Barry is the smaller guy but is a well versed striker with more than 50 pro and amateur Muay Thai fights under his belt. I'm not liking Evensen's chances of winning this fight, but if he shows even the slight resemblance of having a pulse he could end up as filler on the UFC's Euro Cards for years to come, as actually winning or being any good isn't much of a prerequisite for the European fighters on those cards.