Going by size alone, the coming clash between former UFC heavyweight champ Tim Sylvia and legendary strongman Mariusz Pudzianowski at Moosin: God of Martial Arts should be one of the biggest MMA fights of the year in the United States.

Of course, in MMA, more than size matters. Right?

The match-up, which is going to be held as a super-heavyweight bout, allowed both men to weigh-in over the normal heavyweight maximum of 265-pounds. Pudzianowski, who seems intent on making a serious run as a heavyweight, weighed in at a rather svelte 273, while Sylvia, under no pressure no shed his signature muffin-top, lumbered onto the scales at 305. This is a fight which is likely to see some fighter fatigue if it goes the distance.

One of the UFC's true big men in his heyday, Sylvia (25-6) held the heavyweight title on two occasions, though he was stripped of his first title after testing positive for steroids. Although he never seemed to have the same sort of finishing power once he was off the juice, the "Maine-iac" did manage to reclaim the belt a couple of years later when he defeated Andrei Arlovski at UFC 59. Sylvia defended the title twice before losing to a resurgent Randy Couture, and was finally choked out of the UFC by Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 81 in an interim title fight.

Sylvia has seen some tough times since parting ways with the UFC. With just three fights in the past three years, including his highlight-reel destruction at the hands of Fedor Emelianenko and, more embarrassingly, retired boxer Ray Mercer.

After taking some time away to appear in episodes of the TV shows Blind Date and Bully Beatdown, Sylvia finally manged to score a win last year against Jason Riley at  Adrenaline MMA 4. Jason who?

Exactly. Enter Mariusz Pudzianowski.

Pudzianowski (2-0) has spent most of his adult life performing feats of strength that would rarely be contemplated outside a Hollywood movie set (things like pulling a train locomotive over Victoria Falls in Africa) on his way to amassing a record five titles as World's Strongest Man. Last year, Pudzianowski decided to move on from ruling the strongman circuit to pursue another life-long passion: mixed martial arts.

While there can be little doubt that "Pudzian" is the man you want if you need to budge a recalcitrant semi truck, or flip a giant tractor tire end over end in record time, considerable doubt remains as to how effectively he can translate that success into the MMA world. 

With just two fights under his belt, Pudzianowski has looked at times frightening, and at times vulnerable. He tossed around his first opponent, the much smaller fellow rookie Marcin Najman, like a child's toy en-route to a 43-second submission due to strikes last year at KSW 12. But just two weeks ago Pudzianowski's brute force was stymied by Japan's Yusuke Kawaguchi, and he had to content himself with a majority decision after a sloppy, if powerful, performance at KSW 13. 

Kawaguchi (11-2), a DEEP champion (it sounds like a porn title but it's actually a small Japanese fighting promotion) proved that technique can, in fact, counter strength in MMA, even if he did come up on the losing end. And in doing so he showed what had also been apparent in Pudzianowski's first outing: despite his massive strength, "Pudzian" needs to develop his technique if he wants to compete at a high level in MMA.

The question tonight may well be whether or not Pudzianowski can...