Sanchez – Hughes is next up……

The fighter formally known as “The Nightmare”, Diego Sanchez has been matched up with long time UFC veteran, Matt Hughes. Hughes is indeed a “Dream” fight for Sanchez having requested to face the UFC Hall of Famer previously. UFC President Dana White confirmed the matchup but told there is no set date or venue for the fight as of yet.

“A matchup between two welterweight fan favorites has been verbally agreed to as Diego “The Dream” Sanchez will face former UFC welterweight champion and Hall of Famer Matt Hughes,” said UFC President Dana White.

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UFC 123 Weigh Ins Video

Video highlights of the UFC 123 weigh ins. The main card sees a top lightheavyweight bout between Lyoto Machida & Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson and the Rubber Match between BJ Penn & Matt Hughes.

BJ Penn Ready for UFC 123 bout versus Hughes

BJ Penn speaks to Ariel Helwani before his upcoming UFC 123 bout versus Matt Hughes. BJ’s Lookin good….

BJ Penn talks Matt Hughes ahead of UFC 123

The Prodigy, BJ Penn speaks ahead of his upcoming welterweight bout against UFC veteran Matt Hughes. Penn comes into the fight on the back of a 2 fight losing streak and says he has a score to settle with Hughes in what will be the 3rd bout between the pair at UFC 123.

Matt Hughes critical of Joe Rogan

UFC Hall of Famer Matt Hughes had a few opinions about Joe Rogan’s broadcasting performance at UFC 121 in the co-main event bout between Shields and Kampmann.

“From a technical view, Kampmann had a terrible fight, in my opinion, he gave the fight to Shields,” Hughes writes on his website. “One thing I will say is Joe Rogan’s commentary was a little off during the fight. The ground game was pretty even in my book with Shields doing a little more controlling. Kampmann escaped to his feet several times and Kampmann had more submission attempts than Shields had, but listening to Rogan, you would have thought Shields had submitted him the first ten seconds of being on the ground. I really think the UFC could use a third man doing the broadcast, that has some experience inside the Octagon. I don’t disagree with everything Rogan says, but there are a lot of things he says that I just laugh at.”

I can understand where Matt Hughes is coming from, but Joe was also giving credit to Martin Kampmann in the stand-up of the fight. Kampmann ultimately lost the bout on the ground when he should have kept the fight standing, but chose to test his submissions on the much more experienced grappling skills of Shields. Kampmann’s submission attempts were in favour of Shields who fights out of Cesar Gracie camp. Shields never looked close to submitting and used the submission attempts as an opportunity to end up on top of Kampmann. Having a guest fighter as a commentator would also be welcomed but Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg do a great job getting fans watching excited.

BJ Penn talks Edgar, Hughes & the Future

Fighters only interview: Former UFC lightweight champion BJ Penn reflects on his brace of losses to Frankie Edgar, looks forward to fight with Matt Hughes and the future.

UFC 123: Hughes vs Penn Trilogy

Hughes vs Penn

As suggested by MMAFriedRice on Twitter on September 10 2010, the fight between Matt Hughes and BJ Penn looks to go ahead at UFC 123 headlined by UFC Light Heavyweight standouts Lyoto Machida and Rampage Jackson. This will be their third meeting and with score currently 1 victory each with the most recent going to Matt Hughes via tko at UFC 63.

With Penn looking two rebound from back to back losses to current UFC Lightweight Champion Frankie Edgar, this will be Penn’s first return to the Welterweight Division since his failed attempt at re capturing the Welterweight Belt at UFC 94 against GSP. A victory for either fighter could propel them into the Welterweight Title mix. A loss for BJ could drastically affect Penn’s chance of going down as a future Hall of Famer and cause him to rethink his career. Hughes on the other hand is riding a 3 fight win streak with wins coming over Serra, Renzo Grazie and Ricardo Almeida.

Other notable fighters scheduled for the card include Joe Lauzon vs George Sotiropoulos, Nik Lentz vs Tyson Griffin and the return of Kario Parisyan vs Dennis Hallman who holds two submission victories over Matt Hughes.

UFC 117 Pre Fight Press Conference Video

The UFC 117 pre-fight press conference was possibly one of the best yet. Yet more trash talk from Chael Sonnen before his bout with Anderson Silva and a mad staredown between the two fighters at its conclusion. The presser featured 8 of the fighters going at it on the main card including Thiago Alves & Jon Fitch, Matt Hughes & Ricardo Almeida, Junior Dos Santos & Roy Nelson and UFC middleweight champ Anderson Silva & #1 contender Chael Sonnen.

UFC 117: Silva vs Sonnen – Fight Card

Featured Fights:

Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen – For UFC MW Championship

Matt Hughes vs. Ricardo Almeida

Clay Guida vs. Rafael Dos Anjos

Jon Fitch vs. Thiago Alves

Roy Nelson vs. Junior Dos Santos

Thiago Silva vs. Tim Boetsch

Dustin Hazelett vs. Rick Story

Ben Saunders vs. Dennis Hallman

Johny Hendricks vs. Charlie Brenneman

Rodney Wallace vs. Stanislav Nedkov

Stefan Struve vs. Christian Morecraft

UFC 117: Ricardo Almeida signs to fight ex-champ Matt Hughes

As expected former middleweight Ricardo Almeida (12-3 MMA, 5-3 UFC) looks to build off a welterweight-debut win over Matt Brown when he fights former champ Matt Hughes (44-7 MMA, 17-5 UFC) at UFC 117.

Although not officially announced by the organization, UFC 117 takes place Aug. 7 at Oracle Arena in Oakland, Calif. The night’s main card, including Almeida vs. Hughes, airs on pay-per-view.

Almeida said he asked for the fight immediately after Hughes defeated Renzo Gracie (who awarded Almeida his Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt) at UFC 112 in April.

Almeida, who looks to avenge his mentor’s loss, goes for his fourth consecutive win in the UFC. After a four-year break from the sport, the former PRIDE and Pancarase fighter went 1-1 with a submission win over Rob Yundt and a close split-decision defeat to Patrick Cote in 2008. Then, after another yearlong layoff, he returned to post decision wins over Matt Horwich and Kendall Grove and the submission victory over Brown in March.

Hughes, meanwhile, quietly has moved back into title contention. After losing his long-held welterweight title during a tough 1-3 stretch, he’s since rebounded for a close decision win over Matt Serra and the TKO victory over Gracie.

The Almeida-Hughes fight is actually a rematch of sorts. Hughes defeated Almeida in 2000 during an ADCC grappling match.

Source: MMAJunkie