Diego Sanchez is booked for a return to the UFC cage in August.
The veteran lightweight told MMAjunkie.com Radio that he will compete at UFC 164 at the Bradley Center in Milwaukee on Aug. 31 against an opponent yet to be determined.
“I talked to (UFC matchmaker) Joe Silva yesterday, and he penciled me in for Aug. 31,” Sanchez said. “We’re looking at opponents. I did like I always do and said, ‘Look, you’re the man, Joe. You’re the one who makes all these big matchups. And I’m, in my opinion, in the most stacked division in the UFC, and there are plenty of great fights out there, and you’ll hook me up with a good scrap.'”
While it’s debatable that the UFC’s 155-pound class is the most stacked, there are a number of big names, some of whom he mentions, including Josh Thomson, Gilbert Melendez and Nate Diaz, who all recently competed on UFC on FOX 7 on April 20 in San Jose. He also mentioned Pat Healy, who is coming off a huge upset win of Jim Miller at Saturday’s UFC 159 in Newark, N.J., and veteran Jamie Varner, who recently called him out, as possible opponents.
Sanchez, 31, is coming off a split-decision win over Takanori Gomi in Japan in March in a somewhat controversial nod after he missed weight by a couple pounds and was fined 20 per cent of purse. That fight was his return to lightweight for the first time since losing a championship bout to B.J. Penn in December 2009. He went 2-2 at welterweight in the interim.
He now hopes to make a new run at the 155-pound title, which is currently held by Benson Henderson. The UFC recently announced that the champ’s next challenger will be the winner of the UFC 160 bout on May 25 between Gray Maynard and T.J. Grant of Cole Harbour, N.S.
No other fighters have been announced or rumoured for the UFC 164 event. Sanchez said he’s been told he will be featured on the pay-per-view portion of the card.
NOTES: All drug tests following UFC on FOX 7 came back negative, according to the California State Athletic Commission. Six fighters were tested for performance-enhancing or recreational drugs, including the four main and co-main event competitors and two other randomly chosen fighters, and all passed … The Nevada State Athletic Commission has denied Gabriel Gonzaga’s appeal of his loss to Travis Browne at The Ultimate Fighter 17 finale on April 13 in Las Vegas. Gonzaga’s camp contended that the elbows that he sustained that led to the first-round stoppage included “one or more” illegal ones to the back of his head. While video replay showed that at least one elbow could be deemed to have hit the part of the head that would make it a foul, the NSAC ruled that “Nevada law does not provide a procedure to challenge or overturn a decision based on the allegations in your letter.” Thus, it will remain as a TKO victory for Browne.
