A series of fights have been added to the upcoming UFC on FX debut event on January 20 in Nashville, Tennessee, providing depth to the previously announced Melvin Guillard vs. Jim Miller headliner.
Among the fight agreements released by the UFC on Tuesday include a middleweight fight between Jorge Rivera and Eric Schafer, as well as featherweight and light-heavyweight bouts.
Rivera will be looking to snap a two-fight losing streak after dropping back-to-back bouts against Michael Bisping and Constantinos Philippou. Prior to that, Rivera (18-9) had won three straight.
Schafer (12-6-2) is coming off a three-round unanimous decision loss to Aaron Simpson at UFC 136.
Meanwhile, former WEC featherweight champion Mike Brown will attempt to forge his first multi-fight win streak since mid-2009, and will need a win over Vagner Rocha to do it. After a two-fight losing streak, Brown (25-8) found the win column at UFC 133 with a unanimous decision victory over Nam Phan.
Rocha (7-2) recently captured his first octagon win when he forced Cody McKenzie to tap out to a rear naked choke at September’s UFC Fight Night event in New Orleans.
The third announced fight features the UFC debut of Ryan Jimmo, a Canadian light-heavyweight who hasn’t lost since his career debut in 2007, winning 16 in a row. Jimmo had been the current reigning champion in Canada’s Maximum Fighting Championships before vacating that belt to sign with the UFC. In his last fight, he earned the judges’ nod in a win over former UFC fighter Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou.
Jimmo will face Czech fighter Karlos Vemola (8-2), who dropped his last fight in an August decision at the hands of Ronny Markes.
UFC on FX will be hosted by Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena.