Frank sent this in:

For years Karen Darabedyan has humbly toiled in the shadows of Karo Parisyan and Manny Gamburyan, his fellow Armenians and training partners. That will change on Nov. 18, when the 22-year-old Darabedyan – holder of black belts in Karate, Tae Kwon Do and judo – clashes with former WEC lightweight champion “Razor” Rob McCullough.

“There is so much buzz about this. I think after this fight everyone will know about me,” said Darabedyan, who has trained extensively under Gokor Chivichyan, Gene LeBell and Roman Kalanteryan. “I’ve been in this sport a long time and finally I get a break. People dream of having opportunities like this, being on a big show like this, being on the main card and fighting a big name. With this fight I have everything to lose and everything to gain. I could either make myself or break myself with this fight.”

Darabedyan (8-1) took the fight on less than a month’s notice, but still expects to deliver the finest performance of his career. But he’s not quite sure how he will prevail, especially since he is an instinctive fighter who prefers to adlib inside of the cage rather than follow a strict game plan. It is an unorthodox approach, but it does have a few well-known devotees, most notably UFC lightweight champion BJ Penn.

“I’ve never gone into a fight with a really solid game plan and I don’t have a really solid game plan for this fight,” Darabedyan said. “I’m a pretty smart fighter and I take things as they come. I don’t like to plan ahead and say, ‘I’m going for the takedown’ and then the takedown doesn’t work and I break myself. I just take things as they come. I know how good of a kickboxer he is. He’s very tough and he has twice as many MMA fights as I do. But I feel comfortable striking and I think I’ll feel comfortable standing. I don’t think I’ll shoot for a takedown … I don’t know, I just have to see what happens in the cage. I’m going to do whatever comes.”

There is little doubt that McCullough fancies a slugfest, even though the heavy-handed Californian hasn’t scored a knockout or TKO in over two years. In Darabedyan, McCullough faces an extremely well-rounded foe who also managed a 12-0 amateur boxing record. Darabedyan’s lone loss came two years ago when he dropped a unanimous decision to a stout Japanese fighter named Koji Oishi, who came into the bout with 26 bouts under his belt and UFC experience. By contrast, Darabedyan was just 2-0 at the time of that showdown in Manila.

“I took that fight on a month’s notice and mostly took it for money reasons,” he conceded. “I got paid a good chunk of money to take that fight. I fought in the same stadium that Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali fought in. I went in and there were like 20,000 Filipino fans screaming and yelling. Just the sheer size of the stadium caught me off-guard. I didn’t plan on knocking this guy out or submitting him.”

Yet Darabedyan’s confidence and skills have greatly evolved since then. He has scored first-round TKO’s over his past two opponents, and is dedicating his career to the memory of his father, who perished almost three years ago at the age of 53.

“He passed away from a heart attack. He was at work and they were joking at lunch time and my dad had a severe heart attack and it took him right away,” Darabedyan said. “He was my biggest fan and the one that got me into sports. I had good parents and a really strict dad that was always on top of me, always had me in school and went to all of my training practices, and I think that kept me away from all the crazy stuff like drugs and smoking. For awhile (after his death) I just really wanted to let go but then, I couldn’t throw away all these years of hard work. I just really want to make my mark in the MMA world and I really think I can make a dent in the 155-pound division. Luckily this door has opened up for me. And this is not only my dream, it’s my dad dream.”

Darabedyan, who was raised in Glendale, Calif., and still lives there with his mother, said he will hold nothing back against McCullough and expects a war.

“No one is passing out candies at a fight,” he said. “Everyone is coming out there to break somebody’s head, so… I’m pretty confident and hopefully things go my way in this fight and people will find out who I am. Karo and Manny are my friends and I train with them all of the time. They’ve done so much, and I hope I can come close to what they’ve done. Hopefully big things will come out of this fight.”