A welterweight matchup between two high profile fighters was made today by UFC officials, between former lightweight contender Diego Sanchez (23-4) versus, former champion and UFC Hall of Famer, Matt Hughes (45-8).
“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. “Sanchez is coming off of a Fight of Night winning performance against Martin Kampmann and Hughes is looking to add another great victory to his incredible UFC career.”
No date was provided except to say that both would meet on an unnamed date and at an unknown venue this fall.
Sanchez is coming off one of the biggest “Fight of the Night” bonus payouts in the history of the promotion, after earning $160,000 in his UFC on Versus 3 bout with Martin Kampmann last month. Sanchez would earn a unanimous decision, as well as a second straight “Fight of the Night” bonus, and win his second fight in a row. He earned a unanimous decision over Paulo Thiago at UFC 121, and lost by the same result to John Hathaway at UFC 114 in his return to the welterweight division.
Hughes had a three fight win streak stopped by B.J. Penn in their third meeting of their careers. The former champ was knocked out by the Hawaiian at 0:21 seconds of the first round of UFC 123. Previous to that he choked out Ricardo Almeida at UFC 117, stopped Renzo Gracie by TKO at UFC 112, and earned a unanimous decision over Matt Serra at UFC 98.