Forrest Griffin vs. Tito Ortiz Set For UFC 106

October 08, 2009 | Tim | Comments 0

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After an injury foced Mark Coleman out of his UFC 106 fight with Tito Ortiz, the UFC searched for a suitable replacement. They finally found one in Forrest Griffin.

According to Yahoo Sports’ Kevin Iole, UFC president Dana White confirmed that Griffin agreed to the contest. Tito Ortiz wasted no time in posting the news to his Twitter page:

So the match has been set!!!! Forrest vs Ortiz 2 live Nov 21st Las Vegas PPV. Let the Punishment begin!!!!

The two fought previously back at UFC 59 in Anaheim, California. In that contest, Ortiz won a very close and somewhat controversial split decision. The win was Ortiz’s last non-Ken Shamrock victory. Since that fight he went on to defeat Shamrock twice, lost for the second time to Chuck Liddell, had a draw against Rashad Evans, and lost to the current light heavyweight champion, Lyoto Machida. He underwent spinal fusion surgery in 2008. Ortiz and Dana White patched up their relationship prior to Ortiz signing a new UFC contract earlier this year. The Griffin fight will be Ortiz’s first fight in 18 months, and the belief was that with Coleman injured, the UFC would try to find an “easy” victory to get Ortiz back on track. That will not be the case.

Griffin has been out of action since being dominated by middleweight champion Anderson Silva in a light heavyweight matchup at UFC 101 for his second consecutive loss inside the Octagon. The loss saw Griffin run out of the cage prior to the official announcement and prior to any post-fight interviews. He hasn’t done many interviews since the fight, but he has said that he got married in the last month and went on a honeymoon. He joked about being out of shape, but apparently believes he can get back into fighting shape for the November 21st bout.

There had been speculation that the UFC was trying to set up a Griffin/Rich Franklin fight for January. Franklin told me last week that he was offered a fight in January against an unnamed opponent, but he turned it down because he wanted some time off to heal up. He told me that he later heard rumblings that it was Griffin that they wanted him to fight, and believed that the UFC would probably come back to him one more time to try to get him to agree to the fight. Now that Griffin has agreed to the November date with Ortiz, Franklin can take his time to heal with an eye towards possibly fighting the winner.

UFC 106 takes place on November 26th in Las Vegas and features a main event of Brock Lesnar vs. Shane Carwin for the UFC heavyweight title.

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