In case you were still unimpressed with the pending line-up for UFC 121 on Oct. 23, the promotion has assembled yet another fantastic welterweight contest, this time pitting Diego Sanchez against Paulo Thiago for its pay-per-view (PPV) extravaganza in Anaheim, California.
MMAmania.com today confirmed the bomb that "Nightmare" dropped on PennyJoMMA late last night.
Sanchez is coming off back-to-back losses for the second time in his career. After BJ Penn kicked him out of the lightweight division at UFC 107, rising star John Hathaway spoiled his 170-pound return, out-slugging the Albuquerque native en route to a unanimous decision win at UFC 114.
The former TUF champion originally moved down a weight class in early 2009 after he felt he sacrificed too much size as a welterweight. Despite the TKO loss to "The Prodigy," most in the MMA community agreed he was enjoying a successful run as a 155-pounder.
Even UFC President Dana White remarked how "soft" Sanchez looked in his bout against Hathaway.
Soft is not a place you want to be against the dangerous stylings of Paulo Thiago. Despite a unanimous decision loss to Jon Fitch at UFC 100, The Brazilian supercop was in cruise control for the better part of his UFC career.
That's until a pesky Dane named Martin Kampmann refused to lay down for him at UFC 115 back in June. "The Hitman" outclassed his Brazilian foe for the better part of three rounds and cooled off some of the heat surrounding Thiago's place in the division.
Defeating Sanchez would be a surefire way to get some of it back.
Headlined by Brock Lesnar vs. Cain Velasquez, UFC 121 will also feature the Octagon debut of Jake Shields when he takes on Martin Kampmann.
Stay tuned to MMAmania.com for more information on this still-developing fight card.
(MMAmania.com correspondent Eduardo Cruz contributed to this report)
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