UFC 93: Franklin vs. Henderson was a mixed martial arts event held by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) on January 17, 2009 at The O₂, Dublin in Dublin, Ireland.

The main event featured a light-heavyweight bout between former UFC Middleweight Champion Rich "Ace" Franklin and former PRIDE middleweight (205 lbs) and welterweight (183 lbs) Champion Dan Henderson. The winner of the fight would become the coach opposite Michael Bisping for the ninth season of The Ultimate Fighter: United States vs. United Kingdom. The co-main event featured a light-heavyweight rematch between Mauricio "Shogun" Rua, the PRIDE 2005 Middleweight Grand Prix winner, and the PRIDE 2000 Open Weight Grand Prix winner, UFC Hall of Famer, and former UFC Heavyweight Champion Mark "The Hammer" Coleman. The referees assigned for the event were Marc Goddard, Dan Miragliotta, Leon Roberts and Kevin Mulhall.

Fighters were awarded $40,000 bonuses.

Dana White (born July 28, 1969) is the current President of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), a mixed martial arts organization based in the United States.

Born in Manchester, Connecticut on July 28, 1969, White grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada, Ware, Massachusetts and Levant, Maine. White is a passionate Boston Red Sox fan. During his youth, he bounced back and forth between Boston and Maine. He attended the University of Massachusetts Boston but did not finish; however, while there he did launch a boxing program for inner-city youth.

White has a background as an aerobics instructor. In 1992, White established Dana White Enterprises in Las Vegas. He conducted aerobics classes at three gyms in the Las Vegas area and began managing MMA fighters Tito Ortiz and Chuck Liddell.

While working as a manager, White learned that Semaphore Entertainment Group, the parent company of the UFC, was looking for a buyer for the UFC. White contacted childhood friend Lorenzo Fertitta, an executive at Station Casinos, and a former commissioner of the Nevada State Athletic Commission. Within a month, Lorenzo and his older brother Frank bought the UFC, with White installed as its president. White currently owns about 9% of Zuffa, LLC, the entity the Fertitta brothers created to own and manage the UFC.

Daniel Jeffery Henderson, (born August 24, 1970) is an American mixed martial artist and former Olympic wrestler, who competes as a middleweight and light heavyweight in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He is the former Strikeforce Light Heavyweight Champion and was the last Welterweight 183 lb (83 kg; 13.1 st) and Middleweight 205 lb (93 kg; 14.6 st) champion of Pride Fighting Championships. He was the only mixed martial artist to concurrently hold two titles in two different weight classes in a major MMA promotion. Henderson is also the UFC 17 Middleweight Tournament Winner, the 1997 Brazil Open Lightweight Tournament Champion, the RINGS King of Kings 1999 Tournament Winner, and the 2005 PRIDE Welterweight Grand Prix Champion.

Henderson also owns the Clinch Gear MMA apparel brand. As of May 2012, Henderson is ranked the #2 light heavyweight by Sherdog.

Dan Henderson was born in Downey, California and grew up in Apple Valley, California. He attended Victor Valley High School in Victorville, California, and earned medals at the California State Wrestling Championships in 1987 and 1988. He was a member of the 1987 Victor Valley High School wrestling team state champions. Henderson went on to wrestle at both Cal State Fullerton and Arizona State University, participating in the 1993 NCAA championships. He represented the United States in the 1992 and 1996 Summer Olympics in Greco-Roman wrestling.

Marcus Paul Davis (born August 24, 1973), is an Irish-American mixed martial artist. He currently fights as a welterweight. He was a contestant on The Ultimate Fighter 2 on Spike TV.

Davis was born in Houlton, Maine. His family comes from Waterford, Ireland.

Marcus began boxing at 14. At the age of 19 Davis began his career with a second round TKO of Luis Guzman in April 1993. He compiled a professional record of 17–1–2 over the next seven years on the New England circuit, where he fought primarily as a junior-middleweight. In his last fight as a boxer, he suffered a TKO loss to 34 year old Ed Bryant which led him to reconsider his future as a successful boxer. He then became excited with the challenge of mixed martial arts, much to the bemusement of his peers. He retired from boxing after the TKO loss in October 2000.

Prior to boxing, Marcus did martial arts from the age of eight. In 1995, Davis, then based in Massachusetts, started grappling training with Joe Maffei. In 1997, he moved back to Bangor and opened up an MMA school, while running a bar. The doormen took classes at the school, one of whom was Tim Sylvia. After Tim joined Miletich Fighting Systems in 2000, Marcus quickly followed. More recently, he has trained with Mark Dellagrotte and his own team in Bangor, Team Sityodtong. He also frequently visits Jorge Gurgel's main MMA academy in West Chester, Ohio.^{[citation needed]}

Mark Coleman (born December 20, 1964) is an American mixed martial artist, professional wrestler, former NCAA collegiate wrestler and former Olympic amateur wrestler. In MMA, he was the UFC 10 and UFC 11 tournament champion, the first Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight champion, and the Pride Fighting Championships 2000 Open Weight Grand Prix champion. At UFC 82 Coleman was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame. His most notable victories came against Mauricio 'Shogun' Rua, Igor Vovchanchyn, Don Frye (2x) and Dan Severn.

Coleman is credited with proving the ability of wrestlers to dominate in the developing sport of mixed martial arts, and with being one of the first in American MMA to successfully use the strategy that came to be known as ground-and-pound, earning him the distinction as "The Godfather of Ground & Pound".

Coleman was born in Fremont, Ohio, U.S. in 1964. He began freestyle wrestling as a teenager, and wrestled for Miami University, in Ohio, where he was a two time Mid-American Conference wrestling champion. In his senior year, he transferred to Ohio State University and won an NCAA championship. Out of college, he was awarded a spot on the US Wrestling team, placing second (100 kg) at the 1991 FILA Wrestling World Championships in Varna, Bulgaria, and placing seventh overall in the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain.