Is Roger Huerta vs. Gray Maynard a Huge Risk for the UFC?

Dave Meltzer has an overview of the issues revolving around the Roger Huerta vs. Gray Maynardmain event showdown taking place on September 16th at Ultimate Fight Night 19 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In the article, Meltzer mentions that the UFC is taking a gamble on the Maynard defeating Huerta as Huerta stands to gain some considerable bargaining power if he wins:

For Huerta, a win could also make him valuable to Strikeforce, which needs to add depth with an extensive schedule planned for next year, or Bellator, which marketed its first season around Hispanic fighters, paying well above what would be perceived as market value. Huerta’s first taste of acting came with a small role in the movie "Tekken," which also includes MMA star Cung Le. It comes out later this year.

It's interesting that we haven't heard more about Huerta's acting career taking off. It could be that he's awaiting his contract to end before making any huge deals with movie studios, or he has over-estimated his popularity. In any case, Meltzer suggests that Huerta could gain some huge bargaining power with other promotions with a win. Strikeforce and Bellator are named, but Strikeforce is probably a much more likely suitor who has the money and resources to potentially gain from Huerta's popularity within the UFC. Could Huerta simply be looking for a bigger payday instead of acting?

Meltzer throws in this interesting fact regarding contract negotiations between Roger Huerta and the UFC:

Instead of capitalizing on that momentum, Huerta asked for time off to go back to college. Contract negotiations for a new deal went sour with the sides far apart. Huerta, coming off six straight wins and a classic fight, was asking for a better deal than Penn, the lightweight champion was getting, including pay-per-view points even though he had never appeared in a pay-per-view headline match. His leverage for that kind of a deal fell apart when Kenny Florian beat him by decision on Aug. 9, 2008, in Minneapolis, and shortly after that, made the announcement of leaving the sport for acting.

Asking for a better deal than B.J. Penn including PPV points? That seems like a greedy endeavour by Huerta, but is it justified? After all, he did appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated and managed to be part of one of the best fights of 2007 in an epic war with Clay Guida. Should he command that kind of money? The UFC didn't think so.

All of the information presented makes for some interesting theories, the most prominent being that Huerta is leaving the UFC to try to garner more money from another promotion. He'll definitely burn a significant bridge if he follows through with that possibility, and it seems rather ridiculous to think he would want to burn a relationship with a promotion that built his name up incredibly. I'm more inclined to believe he's taking a serious stab at an acting career, but I wonder why he isn't simply re-signing and acting as a side job such as Gina Carano, Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, or Cung Le.

The other major risk in this match-up is that Gray Maynard is a fighter that the UFC hopes will become a new prospect to eventually battle for the lightweight title. He's already defeated a solid lightweight in Frankie Edgar, and two veteran fighters in Rich Clementi and Jim Miller. This battle is obviously set up as a fight to showcase Maynard as the new challenger to the top of the division, and a solid win will only boost his stock with casual fans. If he's defeated on national television by a fighter leaving the promotion, it certainly puts the UFC on the losing side of their gamble.