Jay Hieron back in the UFC, steps in to fight Ellenberger

http://mmajunkie.com/news/30092/jay-hieron-rejoins-the-ufc-meets-jake-ellenberger-at-ufc-151.mma
Seven years after his most recent trip to the octagon, Jay Hieron (23-5 MMA, 0-2 UFC) is returning to the UFC.

Multiples sources close to the event today told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) that Hieron has agreed to replace injured Josh Koscheck (17-6 MMA, 15-6 UFC) and now will meet fellow welterweight Jake Ellenberger (27-6 MMA, 6-2 UFC) at UFC 151.

Signed bout agreements and a formal announcement are expected shortly.

UFC 151 takes place Sept. 1 at Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas. The event's main card airs live on pay-per-view while FX and Facebook host preliminary-card fights.

On Tuesday, UFC officials announced Koscheck's withdrawal from the co-main-event fight due to injury.

The fight actually marks a rematch between the two fighters. Hieron earned a unanimous-decision victory over Ellenberger at a 2006 IFL event. It spoiled Ellenberger's perfect 12-0 record at the time.

Hieron currently is on an 11-1 run, and the lone defeat came via split decision to Bellator champion Ben Askren in an October title fight. Due to differences with company officials, Hieron then parted ways with Bellator and signed with the Texas-based Legacy Fighting Championship. This past month, he earned a second-round submission win over Romario da Silva in his promotional debut. A source told MMAjunkie.com that Legacy officials, who recently have sent many of their fighters to the UFC, let Hieron out of his contract to follow suit.

Hieron, a former NCAA Division I wrestler and IFL champion, fought twice in the UFC; he suffered a TKO loss to now-champ Georges St-Pierre in 2004 at UFC 46, and a cut prompted a defeat to Jonathan Goulet at UFC Fight Night 2 a year later.

Meanwhile, Ellenberger most recently suffered his first loss since a split-decision defeat to Carlos Condit in his UFC debut in September 2009. After that setback, Ellenberger went on a six-fight win streak with four knockout victories. The highlights of the two-year-plus run included a 53-second knockout of Jake Shields this past September and a "Fight of the Night" unanimous-decision win over Diego Sanchez in February.

I didn't see that coming. He is still a tough fight for just about anyone.

I had no idea they already fought in the IFL.

not a bad pick up, he is 11-1 and the loss to Askren , he had a better showing than the average askren opponent.

Awesome move by the UFC.

i didnt know his contract with Bellator was over.

Good pickup. Ellenberger is a rough matchup but Hieron is a quality WW.

KingsOwn19 wrote:

i didnt know his contract with Bellator was over.

Good pickup. Ellenberger is a rough matchup but Hieron is a quality WW.

He fought on AXS(HDNet) for Legacy a couple months ago. Fight had a weird BS ending.
https://ninjasplace.forumotion.net/t17091p15-legacy-fc?highlight=legacy

Noice.