Luke Rockhold hasn’t fought since losing his middleweight belt to Michael Bisping by shocking knockout in the main event of UFC 199 a little over a year ago.
Since then, the oft-criticized Bisping has defended his belt once against retiring legend and rival Dan Henderson before having knee surgery and signing on for a now up-in-the-air title bout with former welterweight champ Georges St-Pierre, and the middleweight division has been in limbo ever since.
Top-ranked Yoel Romero will take on a surging Robert Whittaker in the co-main event of next week’s (Sat., July 8 ,2017) UFC 213 from Las Vegas in a bout many feel is for the true middleweight championship, but it’s anyone’s guess when Bisping will return and if he’ll take on the interim champ when he does.
Rockhold is none to pleased about the matter he essentially created by losing, but still feels he’s owed a big fight when he does return:
“I’m not coming back after all this time and fighting some chump on a worthless card,” Rockhold told MMAFighting.com. “I’m coming back in style and making some noise.”
“The division is fucked,” Rockhold said. “No interesting fights.”
Rockhold was temporarily attached to a fight with Gegard Mousasi; however that never came to be with Mousasi apparently not liking the UFC’s recent contract offer as he fields other opportunities, perhaps in Bellator.
In the meantime, the former champ appears content to wait it out for a big-money fight, but most of those names are tied up at the moment. Obviously Romero will meet Whittaker and his former foe Chris Weidman will meet Kelvin Gastelum at UFC on FOX 25, and his former Strikeforce opponent Ronaldo Souza is in need of a fight in order to rebound from his knockout loss to Whittaker.
Overall, Rockhold is correct in his assessment that the middleweight division is in a chaotic state, but it’s one he created by clearly getting cocky against an opponent he dominated in their prior meeting, so it’s difficult to have a leg to stand on in criticizing something while on the sidelines dealing with injury.
He’s discussed bouts with the aging Anderson Silva and a Jurassic Era Vitor Belfort, and even with former heavyweight champ Fabricio Werdum, but the only one of those names that seems even close to possible is against ‘The Spider,’ who was supposed to meet Gastelum at June 3’s UFC 212 from Rio de Janeiro.
Who should Rockhold face in his return?
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