An interesting light heavyweight matchup will pit fan favorites, and former UFC champions, Tito ‘The Huntington Beach Bad’ Ortiz (16-9-1) against Rich ‘Ace’ Franklin (28-6, 1NC) on the upcoming UFC on FOX event in November.
News that the fight was in the works was broke by Tatame.com on Thursday night, who was told by one of Ortiz training partners, Ricardo “Demente” Abreu.
“Ortiz’s next fight will be against Rich Franklin, at UFC on FOX 1. He’s out of town travelling and I haven’t spoke with him for a couple days. As far as I know that’s the fight, but it’s not signed yet”.
UFC Live on Fox: Velasquez vs. Dos Santos (aka UFC on FOX 1) is scheduled to take place on November 12 at the Honda Center in Anaheim, California. The main event,a heavyweight title bout between champ Cain Velasquez and top contender Junior dos Santos, will air live on FOX television in a one-hour special.
Ortiz is coming off a second round TKO loss to Rashad Evans last month at UFC 133. ‘The Huntington Beach Bad Boy’ took the fight at the last minute, and despite losing in the rematch versus Evans, both fighters earned the “Fight of the Night” bonus. Ortiz ended a five year winless drought in July by submitting Ryan Bader at UFC 132.
Franklin hasn’t seen action since February where he lost a unanimous decision to Forrest Griffin at UFC 126. ‘Ace’ has traded wins for losses in his last six fights, which includes a win over Chuck Liddell at UFC 115, a lost to Vitor Belfort at UFC 103, a victory against Wanderlei Silva at UFC 99, and a split decision loss to Dan Henderson at UFC 93.
Update (9:50PM EST): MMAjunkie.com says Franklin suffered a shoulder injury ten-days ago and will undergo surgery this coming Tuesday (13 Sept. 2011). This certainly puts an end to any thoughts of an Ortiz vs. Franklin matchup. It doesn’t mean though, that the UFC isn’t looking to book Ortiz onto the FOX card.